really acting against that. one of the reports interesting is a lot t of this was supposed beheaded by medical boards which have real uncertain place on the internet where that care can be sought anywhere. covid broke down those barriers. typically need to be seen by doctor in your state. covid because the relaxed some of these rules about where you can be in the docs you can see and desert had this change affect a lot a of telehealth and medicine became online and there was a lot of hospitals and health centers embrace of that. and for a lot of good things. this is one thing they said may have been an opportunity for people to sort of take advantage and they kind of came up and went down. it's an interesting for an interesting look at where things kind of rose and fell. there's a broader question the report reads and about where online not unlike -- >> we are going to leave this program to keep our more than 40 year commitment to live coverage of congress. the senate is returning

following weekly caucus meetings. you are watching live coverage here on c-span2. is there a is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the clerk will call the roll. vote:

vote:

vote:

the presiding officer: on this vote the yeas are 70. the nays are 27. on this vote the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid upon the table and the president will be immediately notified of the senate's action. we should finish that this

week and with regard to funding the government, i think we are very close. getting omnibus appropriations bill that would be i think broadly appealing and meet the defense number of the nda a without having to pay a bonus of what president biden asked for for domestic priorities ofthe democrats . whether they accept that, well according to our relations they spend about $700 billion of the two reconciliation bills this congress on their domestic priorities. so the priority now is to get that adequately funded. also we need to stick with our friends in ukraine and add supplemental that i assume would ride along with it. this needs to be finished no later than late evening onthe

22nd . we intend to be on the road going home on the 23rd. we intend not to be back here between christmas and new year's if we can't meet that deadline we be happy to pass a short-term cr into early next year. >> last week the presidents chief of staff said these words. this goal responsibility is very important to us in the biden administration and i think the american people know that nothing could be further from thetruth . we've seen record inflation born again today by the latest cpi numbers but if you look at the increase in the cost of everything this administration has taken office it's gone up 13.8 percent overall. if you look at groceries 12

percent increase, electricity 11.3 percent increase and this is year-over-year increase and fuel oil 55.7 percent increase year-over-year and this is a result of the massive amount of spending that this administration and on a partyline vote democrats in congress have approved in the last couple of years. simple as that. what happens now is the fed meets tomorrow looking at other increased interest rate which for the american people who are putting more and more on credit cards, looking at prices for automobiles, prices for homes, of the things they buy on credit interest rates continue to go up . this administration currently has no plans for how to deal with that. there are a few things i think we could do if we're serious about getting inflation under control and they have to do with expiring

tax policies to the jobs act. one of which is a brief depreciation. the tax foundation suggests extending bonus depreciation would create tens of thousands of jobs, and positively to the gdp . the research and development tax credit allowing the companies to take the full deduction for that also would be something that would create jobs, create growth in the economy and these are progrowth tax policies that would help keep the economy expanding and growing, incentivize businesses and make sure that the american people have a better paying job. so unhelpful that those are a few things we could get done here in the weeks before the end of this congress but clearly this administration has been asleep at the switch when it comes to addressing the issue of inflation and the enormous adverse economic impact on the american people . >> it's 12 days until

christmas and joe biden is the grinchwho stole christmas. new inflation numbers came out today and today in america we are still at a 40 year high .joe biden was asked aboutthat . the prices are up13.9 percent since the day he took office . we said when our prices going to return to normal and his answer was hopefully at the end of next year there's no end in sight to this. people, families have been suffering through biden's inflation the last 20 months and this christmas will be the most expensive ever. and not just for christmas packages and presidents presence and for christmas meals but also for decorations. we have decoration inflation. christmas trees, wreaths, poinsettia plants and the lights to cover them. those are all up 15 percent each one of those and the electricity 15 percent as well. people in national polls say

they're going to because of inflation be able to afford fewer presence or no presence at all. for people living paycheck to paycheck their having to dig into their savings accounts whatever is left of that. people are having to make tough choices.and the reckless tax and spending bill by the democrats has made it worse and the democrats willingness to hire 87,000 new irs agents is a real strain on the american people. this year for christmas families this year are spending 5000 more just to stay even then they were right before joe biden became president. the solution: cut ball washingtonwasteful spending and unleash american energy . >> in terms of savings, american families had more in savings at the end of 2020 than they've ever had before. other accommodation of the

various kinds of assistance that went out under covid-19 and the lack of ability to spend money, there was money there but that money is going quickly for lower income americans their savings have all been spent. medical middle income americans about 50 percent of the savings they had 20 months ago is gone. and everything that they want to buy costs on average 13.8 percent more than it did 20 months ago. the inflation was down 7 and a half percent, people say last yearwas eight, 7 and a half this year it must be going down . you have those numbers virtually together . 13.8 and the 20 months since resident biden started with these bad energy policies and policies that drive inflation and hurt families, it needs

to stop now. unlikely that most of that $.14 everybody's lost out of every dollar they have or will have will go back to anywhere near where it was before. that money is gone. we had savings, that savings is worth about 14 percent less than it was 2 years ago. if you have a 401(k), it's probably worth about 14 percent less and it was 2 years ago. some of that for some people might come back but a lot of it will never come back to the buying power we had just 20 months ago but stop spending, it doesn't make sense and focus on thethings that make sense . to have energy policies that work, that needs to be a commitment everybody makes at the end of this year to change the trajectory of our economy and trajectory of families both what they have and whatthey'd like to have

as we start next year . >> 3000 illegal entries in our 24 hour period in el paso texas. 3000 and 24 hour period. in just one sector of our southern border. 73 thousand got a ways. in the month of november. illegal entrants into the united states. just a few months back i went to the southern border with our colleague editor crews and senator cornyn and we went to the border. folks people were turning themselves in. they were turning themselves in. so you know what those god always are? bad people that know that they will be detained by cdp

and turned back. that's why they run away. the 3000 bad people coming into the united states in one month. we know that title 42 is set to expire in mere days. but what is the biden administration doing? president biden says he has more important things to do then address our southern border. secretary of department of homeland security mayorkas says the border is secure, don't buy it and iknow none of you do . folks we have a crisis on the southern border. they can't deny it, it's all smoke and mirrors. don't look at it and will pretend it doesn't exist. people are starting to worry and hear democrats starting

to speak up about it now. why west and mark as they know our country is going to be overrun with illegal entry . the first step folks, hereis a simple solution . take care on the border. >> what do you say to republicans who say this is the type of operation at this time of year, you had scott perry in the caucus and with the big spending bill here. they're suggesting there might be not be enough time and now you're saying there is enough time. what do you say? >> what i would say is i've beenmajority leader and i've been minority leader . editor schumer is in charge of the floor. he determines whether or not we pass individual appropriation hills and he decides how to process. so we're on defense.

we plead with the card that we were dealt and what i would say is given the fact that democrats have residency of the house and senate, repeat our defense number and not pay any bonus to the democrats on the domestic side. to achieve the defense number is far and away the best we can do given the fact that we don't control the floor or the government. >> did you reach out to her? >> she and i all the time she has a lot of friends on our side of the aisle including me . and i think she's decided she's genuinely an independent and is charting her own course which i wish her well and we particularly admire her fears defense of the institution itself.

we were on the verge of having the institution broken by these people last year and she stood up on the environment. [inaudible] i talked to her all the time.[inaudible] i'm not going to get into the conversations we had, we talk all the time. [inaudible] >> looking back at 22, some of you may recall i never said there was a redwave . we had a bunch of close races and looking at each race separately, i wasn't making that up. there were a bunch of close races. we ended up having

encountered quality time, remember we mentioned that in august? look at arizona. and the challenging situation in georgia as well . we did and by we the senate leadership fund did intervene into primaries in missouri . and i do think we had an opportunity to really learn one more time we have to have quality candidates to win. we went through this in 2010, 2012. claude aiken, richard murdoch but unfortunately revisiting that situation in 2022. our ability to control the primary outcome was quite limited in 22 because of the support of the former president drew proved to be very decisive in these primaries.

my view was do the best you can with the cards you're dealt. hopefully in the next cycle, we will have a better outcome. >> sorry we're a little late. and let's get right to it. i'm with senators and avenue, center senator murray was supposed to be with us but had to go somewhere else. we just had a very productive lunch as we lay out the next few weeks. negotiations for the year-long omnibus continue forward. so we're working tirelessly and we need a bit more time beyond this week. to get an omnibus done and

avoid any lists shut down. that said the senate should be prepared to pass a one-week cr this week and give negotiators more time to finish up before the holidays . an omnibus remains the best and most responsible option to ensure we have all the resources we need to serve the american people at full capacity by like they deserve and i expect an omnibus will contain priorities that both sides want. including more funding for ukraine at the electoral count act which my colleagues in the rules committee have done a very good job on. and after all the work we've done this year to pass important new bills a long-term cr could prevent investments say for instance on the pack. the great thing with 80 some odd quotes i think, we need to fund it. we have to cr it will be funded and those veteranswill be left out . so the vast majority of us don't want to see a cr and there's absolutely no reason

for it to happen. that's why the best option for american people is to proceed to an omnibus. on it judges today we hope to confirm dana douglas a distinguished public servant. he will serve on the circuit. that's covering texas, louisiana, mississippi. if confirmed judge douglas will be the 11th black woman to serve as the circuit court judge. that's a record far and away for any single session of congress. and finally i'd be remiss if i didn't bring up the history our country will mark today. this afternoon i will be proudly, happily my heart full joiningpresident biden as he signs the respect for marriage act into law . for many americans

>> the right to marry the person you love is enshrined in law of the land. to president biden we commend you for your leadership. making justice for the lgbtq

community a top priority of this administration and thank you mister president for your courageous leadership in the protection of marriage early to do so. thank you mister president. let us also salute my colleagues in the house of representatives senator gary not where , so many others who were so much a part of this legislation in the house and of course i joined leader schumer in commending his senate colleagues as well. with courage today and unbreakable unity we have achieved the landmark victory in the fight for full equality. when we pass the defense of marriage act in the house last week which was a follow-up to original passing , i was overwhelmed with ownership when bringing down the gavel on this legislation and for many of us have long thought for the lgbtq rights

were jumping for joy. because for millions of americans the impact of this law are necessary and absolutely fundamental. it enshrines the quality, injuring same-sex interracial couples can access all legal protections that and national benefits marriage is for. it's fortifying families from being abandoned, for the peace of mind that their marriage is contested and it's defends dignity because everyone deserves to bask in blessed of serves to bask in building a union. >> the senate is in sprogram call .

parents, over kids, and over plain old common sense. now we see the tragic consequences. the 2022 naep score card shows the largest drop in reading scores for nine-year olds in more than 30 years. and the first ever, the first ever drop in math scores, a 7% decrease. we warned them that this would happen. we said stop. stop letting labor bosses make

decisions. parents -- parents -- are the ones who know what's best for their kids. they need flexibility. they deserve choice. one of those options should always be high-quality public charter schools. these charter schools continue to outkick their coverage. this year charter schools only represent 12%, 12% of all public high schools. but they make up 22% of the top 100 public high schools in our amazing country. that's nearly one out of four amazing public schools are charter school, even though only 12% of all schools, all

high schools are charter schools. think about this -- in colorado, 85% of charter school students met performance standards compared to only 66% of students in district managed schools. despite their proven track record of success for students, for parents, and of course for common sense, the biden administration continues to attack charter schools. he campaigned against them. and then as soon as he got in office, he directed the bureaucrats at the doe, the department of education to put new restrictions on charter schools desperately, desperately looking for funding. these restrictions are a slap in

the face to parents who are turning to charter schools as a better alternative for their children. since the pandemic, charter schools have gained 7%, 7%. that's 240,000 more students have chosen charter schools because their parents are able to access common sense for their kids' education path. that means hundreds of thousands of students are better off today than they were before they had this option. these are kids growing up in some of america's most devastated communities, some of america's poorest communities, some of america's most disadvantaged communities. and this is a game changer not just for the students while they're enrolled in these schools but this is a game

changer for the rest of their lives. this is a game changer for them economically. this is the fastest path to the american dream. what we all hope to achieve one day. this is the game changer that we so often talk about. we've seen the success of providing parents with more options. right here in washington, d.c., since the creation of the bipartisan -- let me say that word one more time because sometimes here in washington, we don't think anything happens in a bipartisan fashion. but the d.c. opportunity scholarship is a bipartisan, bipartisan coalition of senators, congress members who came together to make sure that d.c. kids since 2004 have had opportunity for quality education through charter schools. yes, 11,000 students, by the

way. not 500, not 2,000. 11,000 students from low-income families here in d.c. were able to receive scholarships to attend the school of their choice, scholarships that were provided by republicans and democrats in the congresses since 2004. good news, by the way. good news is that these students attending these remarkable public charter schools graduate 91% of the time. 91% of the time. compare that to students in the d.c. area that do not attend a public charter school, who are in the public school system.

they graduate only two out of three times, 66%. i can't imagine a world where my friends across the aisle who stood with me to protect d.c. opportunity scholarships would not stand with us today to protect more education options for kids all across america. by voting for the administration's restrictions, my friends across the aisle are telling these hardworking parents that labor union bosses and bureaucrats know what's best

for their kids better than the parents themselves. that's plain wrong. here is what i know. the greatest difference between the haves and the have-nots is not the color of your skin, it's not the neighborhood you live in, it's not the income of your parents. the biggest difference between the haves and the have-nots in our country will not be solved by playing politics and putting labor unions funding their kids. the way we close that gap, the biggest difference between the two sides the haves and the

have-nots, my friend from ip ips education, quality education. it changes lives. it sets poor kids on the right path. i want to do for the kids today what was done for me when i was a kid. i want to make sure that everybody understands that education is the closest thing to magic in america, and i do mean a good education. i yield back, mr. president. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from indiana. mr. young: i come to the floor here -- mr. braun: i come to the floor to give a simpler argument as it applies to different areas as it applies to education. senator scott coming to the floor to ask for choice,

opportunity, and competition all mixed in together. when you've got that, you've got the description of a perfect marketplace, whether it's for health care, whether it's for education. and ironically, the two places in our country where expenses keep going up and up would be in health care. most families would put that up there right along with education k-12, having that ability to choose where you'd want your own kids to go to school is something that you should never be afraid of. if you're not interested in it, you're probably trying to hide something. and that would be in many cases where you're not mustering what it takes to minimally educate your own child properly. i was on a school board ten

years, 2004 to 2014 in indiana. the public school system in one of the most catholic places in the state of indiana. i'll never forget a high school tried to start that was catholic. our public school system was so good, it couldn't gept -- it couldn't get to first base, but at least the attempt was made. not all areas are blessed with a public school system as we traditionally know it offering that top-notch education. and whenever you do fear competition, transparency -- which doesn't necessarily apply here -- but choice, it does, you're probably trying to cover up something that's not performing. and sadly here, it's where you need the choice more than any other place, where folks can't

afford to have the choice. and if you're trapped in one system, what does that say for your kids' future? i ran a business for 37 years. so many businesses try to do the same thing -- get involved in markets. it gets concentrated. that's what happened in our health care industry. it's like an unregulated utility, and it disguises itself as free enterprise. that's restricting competition. restricting transparency. restricting choice. costs have been going up for decades, no end in sight. postsecondary education very similar. here all we need to do is take a system that's still got a pretty good value to it. it's just not producing the results. indiana has been one of the leaders in charter schools and choice.

have over 100 charter schools. i reflect back, i think it was when i was a state legislator, neighboring county, three grade schools. the smallest of the three had to be shut down because of cost cuts. well, best performing of the three, those kids would have had to travel 10, 15 miles to get to one of the other two public schools, elementary. this place worked as hard as you could over two years, scraped together the resources, and kept their otwell miller academy open. and it was the choice of the parents, and they were part of a system that wasn't working, and they were able to do it. had it not been for the charter school policy in our state, that community would have been out of luck. we have some of the best

charters in the country in indiana. it's a place that generally embraces competition, transparency, choice, no barriers to entry. whenever the health care industry is trying to lobby for not having more competition, for instance, through physician-owned hospitals, when public school systems want themselves to be the only option, sometimes you get lucky like i did and went to a great public school system. many times you don't, and you're trapped in a bad system. our schools too that are charter, sometimes they're a little more experimental. they focus on things like stem, cte, particular education that that community might need. or if you're bought into the same old curriculum, the same old process, the same thing that's not generating even the

basic results, you're trapped in something that should never be the case. be for choice, be for competition, be for a successful education. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from utah. mr. lee: charter schools have seen explosive growth since they first came on to the scene in 1992. it was a model for education. in 1993 there were just 23 charter schools in the u.s. serving a little over 6,000 students. today there are over 7,000 charter schools and counting serving more than three million american students. it's not difficult to understand their increase in popularity.

they offer an affordable alternative to parents and students who want more options. more options increase competition. and more options improve equality -- the quality of the traditional public education. unfortunately the bide:administration's new rule threatens to stifle their progress by imposing stringent, onerous, burden some new requirements on charter schools, specifically those that receive grants under the federal charter school program or csp. mr. lee: this is a terrible idea. the csp was established to provide grants to eligible charter schools to help ensure that all children have access to quality education regardless of their zip code. the administration's new rules would stifle this proven emerging and burgeoning model, one that serves millions of the most vulnerable students in our traditional public school

system. it would require csp grantees to hold hearings, to hold hearings specifically to prove that the presence of the school in question does not or would not contribute to increased racial segregation. this would impose a deliberately costly and inherently unfairly accusatory burden on charter schools and would disincentivize new schools from opening. this i fear is precisely the point. that is a feature, not a bug in this program. look, everyone can agree that we want our children to have access to quality education. the president's rule is antithetical to that very mission. the rule treats charter schools as if they've done something wrong, as if they're guilty somehow of racial segregation until they prove themselves innocent. the accusation of racial segregation is particularly egregious here because csp

schools are required to admit students through a lottery system if there are more interested students than there are available slots at the school. clearly this isn't an observation of reality but an injection of woke politics into an issue as fundamental as the education of america's schoolchildren. most charter schools are doing their best to provide quality education to all students regardless of race or ethnicity. punishing them for behavior that they don't engage in simply isn't fair. it's not right. these regulations would also require the secretary to examine whether a charter school is, quote, unquote, needed. maybe i'm old fashion but i tend to think parents and certainly not the u.s. secretary of education should be the ones

deciding the necessity of such schools. we have seen this in other areas, other sectors of our economy. there are special interests that tend to stifle competition by pushing for regulations requiring new market entrants to demonstrate that they meet a need, that demonstrate that they're a facility of one sort or another, a hospital or otherwise. it is quote-unquote, needed. i fear this requirement would do the same. this requirement has as its object the same thing as other requirements in other industries. stifling competition, erecting barriers to entry, squelching competition. this is not okay. i don't think it's okay in any industry. it's certainly not okay where the victims are innocent schoolchildren who just need to learn, who need to be taught,

need to go to school somewhere and not to be able to go to school with some options that their parents can have a role in choosing. proponents of these rules argue that the regulations are necessary because charter schools are more likely to close than traditional public schools. they rightly argue that such closures can be disruptive to students' education. in reply i first note that csp schools are less likely to experience closure than other charter schools. but i'd also note here that school closures also show why charter schools are so valuable. unlike traditional public schools where students in failing schools can go for 13 consecutive years without any other option, charter schools are subject to greater accountability. that's the power of choice. mr. president, we shouldn't subject new charter schools to

onerous requirements. we should not set up rules purely to protect the interests of teachers unions. the very same teachers unions who also pushed to close schools, who resisted reopening those schools and repeatedly placed their interests above those of parents and students. the president's rule would only lead to fewer educational opportunities for america's schoolchildren. while accountability for any government-funded enterprise is undoubtedly important, these rules go far beyond mere accountability. in fact, they're not about accountability. they're about something else. something far less credible, far less defensible than accountability. this is about swell. ing competition -- swell. ing and competition and protecting teachers unions. i urge my colleagues to oppose this misguided rule, this

misguided effort and to protect parent choice, ensuring that all children have access to quality education regardless of their zip code. thank you, mr. president. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. lankford: mr. president, i want to tell a little bit of a story. there's some great schools and great teachers in oklahoma. pardon me. they do an incredible job and they serve our families every day, doing remarkable work

walking alongside so many kids that struggle in their educational environment, that struggle to be able to learn, but that excel. and i'm grateful to these teachers across our state. those teachers that are in our public schools, both our public traditional schools and our public charter schools, deserve to be applauded and encouraged for the work they do every day and i'm proud to know many of them as friends and as neighbors. but what's interesting to me right now is there's a push that's happening from the biden administration to divide teachers. teachers that are in public school education, that there are some that are like the good public school teachers and there are apparently -- some that you're the bad teachers. it's not on the ratings for their students or the quality, it's about which public school they choose to serve in. the biden administration has put out a new policy to try to crush public charter schools.

how are they doing it? they're saying if there are open desks in other public schools, then the public charter school can't prove a need for them to exist at all and they want to just be able to wipe them out. let me just set this in context for you. in oklahoma there's a school called harding preparatory school. harding charter preparatory high school. make you wouldn't know it but "u.s. news & world report," they know it. u."u.s. news & world report," ty actually rank -- we have 18,000 schools in america. they rank the 18,000 schools in america and "u.s. news & world report" ranked harding charter preparatory school in oklahoma city 115th out of 18,000

schools. in fact, in oklahoma harding charter preparatory high school was ranked number one. number one school in the state is this public charter school. now, it happens to be in an area where there are open desks in other schools around it. so it won't meet the need requirement that the biden administration is putting out to say you can't prove a need for your existence. so the number one school in our state could be wiped out because those public school teachers are teaching at the wrong public school. what else can i tell you about harding? harding 100% of the students at harding school go to a.p. classes, 100% of them. what else can i tell you about harding? 72% of the students at harding preparatory school are minorities.

72%. and it's the number one school in our state. what's different about a chart -- public charter school and a traditional -- i'm sorry. what's different about a public charter school and a traditional public school? well, the rules for the kids are exactly the same. same testing requirements, same state requirements, same federal requirements for the kids. the rules are exactly the same for the kids. but they are different for the grownups. the grownups have a different set of rules. they have a different set of accountability in the charter schools. what's the result that they're getting? the number one school in our state is a charter school. the 115th school in the country is this charter school. yet now the biden administration is saying you're going to have to prove a need for it. can i tell you the parents and families in oklahoma have

already proven a need for it. i got an e-mail in from one of those students who said i was not getting access to these a.p. classes in the public school they were in before. they had no shot of really getting into the college they wanted to be able to get into until they got into harding charter preparatory school, a public charter school. and now they've got a shot. i have to tell you i don't understand the battle with choice that's happening with parents in the country. i don't understand. why suddenly so many government officials want to be able to say to parents you ge to that school -- go to that school, the school we choose. you can't move. you've got to stay right there, why that is suddenly the trend in america. this growing push across our country for public charter schools, for parents to be more involved in their child's education, for parents to have

new options in education, for parents to be able to have a choice and some freedom, why is that so bad? that so many kids get a shot? can i tell you, i have two daughters. they're not the same. they have different preferences. they have different ideas. they're both beautiful and amazing girls. but for some reason the folks in the biden administration and the education department are saying all kids are the same. and we're going to require them to do it the way we want all kids to do it rather than allowing parents like me and parents like others to be able to say this child's best education environment is in that location in that public school or another child has a better educational environment in a different charter public school. and don't lose track of this. they're both public schools. they both have requirements for

the students exactly the same. but the rules for the grownups are different. and some of the teachers union -- some in the teachers union do not like that. so this plan is to shut down this type of school like harding. i say let's stand with those parents and with those students. with that charter school and a multitude of others across my state where parents are engaged in their child's education and administrators in those schools have to work twice as hard because they don't get the same level of funding as other public schools. let's support them, not try to diminish them. with that i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. scott: mr. president, i would like to thank my colleague from south carolina for his work to promote school choice. i've been proud to partner with him to cosponsor the school choice resolution and promote

the maximum amount of choice for parents. since i've been in washington, i've noticed how many options for families in the area. public schools, charter schools, private schools, religious schools, home schools, co-ops. there are all kinds of options for parents and their children. d.c. is a place where school choice has helped everyone as government-funded schools have failed. of course, washington, d.c. is where our nation's political elite and children reside. where diplomats from around the world come and send kids to school of their choice. wealthy parents have all the choice in the world to send their kids to get a great education. why should that choice only be available to the elite political class. why is that teachers unions and democrat politicians -- politicians want to fight school choice to keep students in middle and low-income families in failing schools. it's typical of how the swamp works. they give advantage to their own

kids and pushing the works class down. the elites had school choice and i want to simply extend that choice to every family. i was as proud champion of school choice and charter schools. i have long believed that parents know what is best for their children. florida had 653 charter schools operating across our great state. more than one in four k-12 public school children chose a school other than the one they were assigned to. they're rankinged third in in the for the calendar number of students enrolled in the charter schools. when i was leading, we rankinged fourth in the nation for k-12 student achievement. it helped our students in all of our schools get ahead. that didn't happen overnight but we had to work at it. for example, i worked to expand access to florida's tax credit

scholarship program. this tax credit encouraged volunteer contributions from corporate donors to school arship organizations. these organizations then awarded scholarships to low-income students so they could attend our schools. a number of kids benefited from that scholarship program grew from 40,000 to 108,000. 60 thousand more students were able to attend a school that better met their needs because we gave them that choice. i signed legislation that created open enrollment in l ifful. that built out more than 280,000 students to attend any public school regardless of their zip code. i also signed legislation to expand being a seas to scholarship for students with disabilities so they could attend a school of their choice. also signed a bill creating a school for help program. of attending the lower

performing school, we drew on charter networks with a proven track record. because we offered them increased autonomy and flexibility, and gave them access to grants, these chart schools were better able to serve the neediest students. i sent legislation to give every student access to virtual learning with 428,000 students taking advantage of the program in the 2017-20818 school year. that number was up by 312,000 students compared to ten years earlier. parents who use florida virtual school to supplement what was happening in in-person school or do completely online learning. whatever best suited their child's child's needs. in florida, school choice isn't for the elites, it the for everyone because every family serves the chance to send they are child to the school that best meets their needs. it i thought to -- i fought to

give the kids the best opportunity for a quality education. combest part, this kind of choice in competition benefited everyone. it helped all of our schools, including our public schools and neighborhood schools to improve. in october a team of researchers from northwestern university, uc davis and emery studied the outcomes of florida student whose remained in public schools in the 2016-2017 school year. quote, we find broad and growing benefits for students in public schools. in particular, students who attend neighborhood schools with higher levels of market competition have lower rates of suspensions and absences and higher test scores in reading and math. and while this reveals gains for vitter eye all students, we find out this most positively affected were those with the

greatest barriers including those with low family incomes and less educated mothers, unquote. school choice helped students of poor and working-class families like the one i grew up in. i wasburn to a single mom with an 11th grade education and never met my birth mother. my adopted father never had more than a sixth-grade education. we moved around a lot. but my mom pushed me to work hard and get a good education. i was label to live the american dream. that's why i'm here, because school choice shouldn't only be for the elites. it should be for everyone. i yield the floor. mr. cornyn: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, my children are grown now, but every time we moved or considered what neighborhood to

live in, as they were growing up and attending public school, the first question we would ask is, what about the schools? because we, like most parents, wanted to make sure it that our children went to the very best schools possible. and if we had to dig a little deeper and figure out how do we buy a house in a neighborhood where that -- that was in that school district, then we would do it. but the sad fact of life is that many parents of lesser means, of lower income don't have the luxury of buying a house in a neighborhood where a public school is excellent. in fact, many of our children, because they don't have access to charter schools, are literally trapped in failing

schools, which will forever affect their course of life. their development, the jobs they can qualify for, the level of education they can achieve -- all of that will be impacted negatively by the fact that many of many of our young people go to schools that are less than excellent and in many cases failing. 2018 i think -- 2010 i think it was i saw the documentary called "waiting for superman." this was a story that in one way it was exhilarating but in another way it was very depressing because it was all about the lottery system in new york's schools. if you were lucky enough to win the lottery, you knew that your life and your future was going to be forever impacted for the

better. but i still remember looking at the faces and the tears of the children who did not win the lottery, they did not get to go to otobest schools, and they knew that their life, too, would be -- get to go to the best schools, and they knew that they are life, too, would be impacted but in that case for the worse. i'm a firm believer that competition makes us all better, it makes us work harder, strive for greater achievement. but i think the public school system -- in particular the teachers' unions -- they don't want any competition because they don't want anybody to show that our children can be educated better, with better teachers, better training, better facilities, and that's what the charter school movement has provided -- some

competition, some basis for comparison. if everybody is operating at this level with no one operating at this level, then everybody is going to continue to operate in a subpar performance. of course, i'm not painting with a broad brush. but i am saying that a lot of low-income children are condemned to bad schools with no way out. and charter schools offer a way out for those children. now, i think sometimes the term school choice gets confused with chart schools because school choice, as i understand it, is more broadly interpreted to me parochial schools and that sort of thing, private schools. but charter schools are public schools. we're talking about high-quality, tuition-free public schools that are open to all students.

in my state, in texas, we have 900 charter schools. they don't serve the elite. they don't serve the wealthy. they don't serve even the majority population. in fact, 62% of texas charter school students are hispanic. we have about a 40% -- 42% hispanic population, so you can say that charter schools disproportionately benefit hispanic students. 27% of the students at chin charter schools have limited proficiency in english. that is, english is not their first language. and the overwhelming majority of students are economically disadvantaged. in other words, their parents can't buy a house in the best school district in town. their parents don't have the money to send them to a private school. and so charter schools represent

the only real option. public, tuition-free schools that are open to all students. i'm concerned that the biden administration is too close to the teachers' unions that were responsible for much of the extended lockdowns we saw during covid-19, and many of their members basically refused to go back to the classroom, even though across the country private schools and many other educational institutions were able to continue, yes, observing, social distancing, masking, all protocols we became very familiar with during the pandemic, but they continued to learn in person in school. my understanding is, for example, virtually all the catholic schools, because they

depend on the tuition dollar from parents and parents weren't going to pay to have their children learn sitting in front of a computer if they were able to learn at all. and we're only today beginning to skim the surface of the kind of damage that occurred to our students, our children as a result of remote learning. you know, i sort of envisioned a single mom with three children who may not have even graduated from high school, much less college, herself, worried about her own job, worried about being able to provide for her family with three school-aged children, all attending different grade levels. i can't imagine being able to adequately supervise and make sure that their children -- your children are able to learn in

those circumstances. maybe you have three kids from three different grades with three separate curricula sitting in front of a computer trying to pick up whatever educational benefit that you can. well, we learned that as a result of the draconian lockdowns supported and encouraged by randi weingarten and the teachers' unions, that many of our children have fallen far behind, and it may take not months, not weeks, but literally years to catch up, if they ever do. so i don't really understand this idea of some of the biden administration and the teachers' unions who don't like and won't tolerate charter schools. is it because they're okay with children being trapped in failing schools? i can't really understand why they would view this as a

threat. public, tuition-free, high-quality charter schools -- these are public schools, these aren't private schools. these aren't for the elite. this isn't for the rich. this is for overwhelmingly disadvantaged, economically disadvantaged students. and so i support senator tim scott. i applaud his leadership in this area in saying that the biden administration should not stand in the way of these charter schools. every child deserves a quality education, and every parent deserves the freedom to choose the school that will serve their child best. i appreciate the fact senator scott has such a tireless effort for charter schools and a

champion of choices and alternatives for parents, many of whom are economically disadvantaged and have no other choice other than to send their child to a failing school. i hope our colleagues will join us to overturn this damaging new rule tomorrow when we vote on it. mr. president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

>> this needs to be finished no later than late evening on the 2 tennessee and we need to get on -- 22nd and get on the road going home on the 23rd and intend not to be back between christmas and new years and if we can't meet that deadline, we'd be happy to pass a short term cr into early next year.

>> last week the president's chief of staff said fiscal responsibility is very important to us and the biden administration. i think the american people know that nothing could be further from the truth. we've seen record inflation born out again today by the latest cpi numbers, but if you look at the increase and the cost of everything since this administration has taken office, it's gone up 13.8%. overall look at groceries, 12% increase, electricity, 13.7% increase and this is year over year numbers and fuel oil 65.7% increase year over year. this is a result of a massive amount of spending that this administration and on a party line vote, the democrats here in the congress have approved in the last couple of years.

as simple as that. what happens now is the fed meets tomorrow and they're looking at another increase in interest rates, which for the american people more and more on the credit cards looking at price for automobiles, price for homes, other things they buy on credit and interest rates continuing to go up. this administration clearly has no plan on how to deal with that and there's things we could do if we were series about getting inflation under control and deals with extension and expiring tax policy with the 2017 tax cuts and jobs act. one is appreciation. tax foundation suggests extending bonus depreciation would'veuate tens of nows of jobs and positively to gdp. the research and development tax credit allowing the companies to take the full deduction for that

also would be something to create jobs and growth in the economy and help keep the economy going and invent vise businesses and make sure the american people have even better paying jobs and i'm hopeful that those are a few things we could get done here in the waning weeks before the end of this congress but clearly and sleep at the switch and comes to the issue of inflation. and 12 days to christmas and joe biden is the grinch who stole christmas. >> new inflation numbers cape out today and today in america we're still at a 40-year high. joe biden was asked about that because prices republican 13.9% since the day he took office.

we said when will prices return to normal and he said hopefully at the end of next year. there's no end in sight to this. people, families have been suffering through biden's inflation through the last 20 months, and this christmas will be the most expensive ever. not just for christmas packages and presents and meals but also for decorations. we have decoration inflation. christmas trees, wreaths, poinsettia plants and lights to cover them. they're all up 15%. each one of those and the electricity is up 15% as well. people in national posts say because of inflation they'll going to be able to afford fewer presents or now presents at all. people living paycheck to paycheck, they're having to dig into their savings accounts, whatever is left of that. people are at a point where they've having to make tough choices. the reckless spending bill by the democrats has made it worse

and democrats will --

gillibrand -- senator gillibrand. i cosponsored resolutions introduced by senator feinstein to raise awareness of sexual assault. these include the ending forced arbitration of sexual assault and sexual harassment act of 2022, the military justice and improvement and increasing prevention act of 2021, the speak out act, the campus accountability and safety act and resolution supporting the goals and ideals of the sexual harassment and awareness month. i also pressed the fbi and

homeland security for more accountability on their handling of sexual misconduct in the workplace. moving into the next congress, senator durbin and i have agreed to jointly pursue these inquiries. with respect to mayor garcetti, several credible whistleblowers approached my office about concerning allegations that he was aware of and enabled his deputy chief of staff rick jacobs to sexually harass several employees within the mayor's office. these men and women allege that rick jacobs engaged in inappropriate physical conduct without their consent. they alleged that rick jacobs made crude sexual remarks and gestures towards staff and others. they allege that he made

blatantly racist remarks towards asians and other minorities. these allegations have also been publicly reported in "the l.a. times". text messages made public by the laos "los angeles times" -- one shows jacob inappropriately touching an individual next to him. in the picture mayor garcetti is standing on the other side of mr. jacobs. for mayor garcetti to claim he didn't know what was going on defies -- defies reason. there's also a pending law enforcement by the los angeles police officer against the city of los angeles as a result of this type of disgraceful

behavior. the kinds of behavior mentioned in the lawsuit includes jacobs subjecting the police officer to unwanted hugs, shoulder massages and crude sexual language. in total, my office identified over 19 individuals who have either witnessed jacobs' behavior or were the victims of it. so who are these brave and courageous individuals who made these allegations? are they republican operatives? no. they're his former communication director, senior staffers, junior staffers, businessmen, civic leaders, and a los angeles police department officer assigned to protect them.

despite attempts by mayor garcetti and the biden administration to frame complaints against him as a political hit job. some of the individuals who have come forward and shed light on misconduct are from mayor garcetti's own staff. how hypocritical is it for this administration to encourage victims of sexual harassment to speak out, yet, when they do so against a powerful ally of joe biden, they're ignored, and they've been ignored in this matter even after providing evidence of harassment, including foat photographs and -- including photographs and text messages. when convenient, democrats have supported claims of harassment with far less.

just last week president biden signed into law a bill sponsored by senators gillibrand that i cosponsored, which enabled survivors to speak out about workplace sexual assault and harassment,. continuing to push this nominee after signing that bill into law is the very definition of of tone deafness. unfortunately, the biden administration is sending a message to victims of sexual harassment. sexual harassment in the workplace that they'll only be believed when politically convenient. as a result, -- as a result, the biden administration and all those who support this nomination have no credibility when it comes to protecting victims of sexual harassment.

i conducted a thorough investigation of the allegations irrespective of partisan politics. that's my reputation. the evidence is clear that jacobs engaged in blatant sexual misconduct and racist behavior and did it for years. the evidence is clear that mayor garcetti either had direct knowledge of it or chose willful ig norns as a -- ignorance as a defense. nobody is that brazen to engage in this type of outrageous behavior against other people unless that they know they have a powerful enabler protecting them. based on the facts and the evidence, the enabler is mayor eric garcetti. to defend himself, mayor garcetti has pointed to a report

which inconceivably purports to clear jacobs of any wrongdoing. the report was conducted by a law firm hired and paid for by the city of los angeles. mayor garcetti would be liable if it were proved true -- apparently in the hope that no one outside the city would ever see it. the report failed to interview multiple firsthand witnesses. the interviews were not taken under penalty of perjury. the report focused exclusively on allegations of sexual harassment made by the los angeles police department, and get this, failed to give due

weight to other witnesses. for example, the report includes an interview with jacobs in which he admits he used racist language, kissing, hugging, and squeezing people's shoulders. the report also identifies the individual in the lewd photo i said earlier. the individual stated that jacobs actions were not funny and embarrassed that person. that makes it clear -- it makes it clear nonconsent consensual -- nonconsensual physical conduct occurred, it is evidence that sexual harassment occurred. oddly the report makes no attempt whatsoever to reconcile how it can conclude there was no sexual harassment after clearly describing sexual harassment

throughout. these aren'ts acts of transparency. these are acts to sweep this whole thing under the rug. although mayor garcetti may be indifferent to the allegations and the actions of his deputy chief of staff, my colleagues and i have a duty to take such concerning allegations and take it very serious. whether here in the united states or abroad, there's no place for sexual misconduct or racism. mayor garcetti had countless opportunities over the years to stand up for victims by removing his chief -- deputy chief of staff, which he failed to do so. these fundamental failures by mayor garcetti are incompatible with the office that he seeks. therefore, i can't in good conscience vote for him.

i strongly encourage my colleagues to review all this evidence found in my investigative report as well as what's reported in the press. the facts and the evidence compel me to vote no, and i hope my colleagues will join me in doing the same. i yield the floor. mr. schatz: i ask unanimous consent to modify the previous order so the senate remain in executive session until 6:15 p.m. with all provisions under the previous order remaining in effect. the presiding officer: without objection.

mr. schatz: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from hawaii. mr. schatz: mr. president, our navy and manner corps are the best -- and marine corps are the best in the world, but we face many challenges across the world. we need to rebuild our fleet, we need to deter conflict, especially in the indo-pacific and we need to help to keep sea lanes open for commerce and build deeper relationships with our allies and our partners, and to make sure that the navy is able to carry out all military and civilian objectives, we allocate a lot of money for its budget. a comptroller is critical to ensure accountability of taxpayer dollars and keep the navy's readiness at the highest level.

russell rumbaugh served as an army infantry officer, he has a unique perspective that will help him to strengthen our navy. but his nomination is stuck because the senator from missouri is blocking in over disagreements not with russell rumbaugh. not even with the department of the navy, but with the biden administration and afghanistan policy. and i know, because we've been here before actually, senator hawley and i -- i think three times; this is the third time. -- what he's going to do today. i'm going to make a unanimous consent request that we get the navy a comptroller, and he's going to say, no, i want a

special committee on the afghanistan withdrawn, which i'm not the armed services chairman. i'm not the majority. i can't authorize that kind of thing. and, in any case, the house armed services committee is absolutely under a presumed speaker mccarthy going to do tons of oversight in this space. but my basic complaint about this tactic is it's not what this power is for. it's not what this power is for. we're all given the ability to block a nominee. it is supposed to be used sparingly and not in the fashion that it's used by the senator from missouri movement the senator from missouri is essentially -- it's not a total blanket hold, because sometimes he allows the body to vote on somebody. but the demand, which he knows will never be accepted, remains. otherwise he will block the logistics guy at the army, he

will block the fiscal guy at the november. he has blocked numerous department of defense nominees not because of their qualifications, not because of any particular dispute regarding the nominee, but because he's mad about the afghanistan withdrawal. lots of people are mad about the afghanistan withdrawal. only senator hawley does this. understand i would just submit that the right way to influence foreign policy is on the floor as an amendment to the defense authorization or the state department authorization or on the senate foreign relations committee or on the senate armed services committee. but just stomping your feet and disabling the department of defense from doing the work that it needs to do -- i just got out of a meet meeting, came right out of this meeting with the chief justice of naval operations. we talked a little bit about this position. he talked to me about how important it was. and so senator hawley and i may have a different view about the

afghanistan withdrawal, but i don't understand what russell rumbaugh has to do with this. he is an eminently qualified person i don't think the senator from missouri is alleging that this person shouldn't do the job. just he's mad about something else. so we've got to break this logjam. the senator from missouri has been doing this for, well, more than a year now, and the department of defense itself is suffering, and so, you know, we've exchanged some pretty tough words, but i just hope that he sees fit to separate his foreign policy objections around joe biden being president and secretary austin and secretary blinken -- fair enough. it is a free country. he is a republican. i am a democrat. these are the kinds of fights we have. but why block the comptroller from the navy? it just makes no sense to me. and so i ask unanimous consent

that the senate consider the following nomination had calendar number 972, r. russell rumbaugh to be an assistant secretary of the navy. that the senate vote on the nomination without intervening action or debate, that if confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, and that at the president be immediately notified of the senate's action. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. hawley: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from missouri. mr. hawley: mr. president, reserving the right to object, i ask for permission to hold up this shirt. shatt-al-arab i object. -- mr. schatz: i object. the presiding officer: objection heard. mr. schatz: no, it's fine. go ahead. mr. hawley: thank you. this is jared schmidt, lance corporal schmidt from the state of missouri. his father made this t-shirt,

gave it to knee a couple of weeks -- gave it to me a couple of weeks ago when i last had the chance to visit with him. lance corporal schmidt was killed in action at abbey gate on august 22 of last year. on the back are the 12 other marines who were lost along with lance corporal schmitz on that day. when i saw his father and he gave me the shirt, he told me all they're doing to honor jared's memory. he asked me to continue to fight, to uphold that memory and to get answers. and i said, that's exactly what i will do. and the truth is, that family and the family of the other lost marines and every american citizen have been waiting too long for answers about what happened at abbey gate over a year ago, as the senator from hawaii rightly notes. we're waiting for answers as to why the commanders on the ground

weren't heeded. we're waiting for answers as to why the white house wasn't ready to do a proper evacuation. we're waiting to hear why the -- why hundreds of american civilians were left behind to terrorists there in afghanistan. we're still waiting for answers, and so, no, i'm not willing to pretend that everything is fine at the pentagon. everything is not fine at the pentagon. i am note willing to say that business as usual should go on. and, no, i am not willing to waive the rules of regular order and expedite nominations without even a vote on the floor of this senate. but i understand my colleague's sense of urgency here. i understand that he wants to move these nominations and so in the spirit of trying to reach a compromise, as he proposes, i would just say this -- why don't we agree to take a

vote, just a vote, on having a select committee to look into what happened at abbey gate and get those answers and make them public. not a commission that will take years and years to report vietnam-new mexico, when everybody who made the decisions are safely out of proud and collecting their pension, but a select committee that will property and make public to the american people an get real accountability. because who's been fired over what happened at abbey gate? nobody. who's been held accountable? nobody. who's given answers? nobody. so, here's what i propose -- i ask that at senator modify his request such that the following confirmation of the -- the following confirmation of the rumbaugh no the senate proceed to legislative session, the committee on rules and administration be discharged from further consideration, the senate now proceed to senate resolution 763, further that the resolution be agreed to, and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: is

there objection? mr. schatz: reserving the right to object, just very quickly -- the presiding officer: the senator from i had. mr. schatz: look, we're at an impasse here. the problem is that the senator from missouri is asking for something that he knows i cannot agree to. and he is blocking the comptroller of the united states navy because he's mad about something else. i mean, it's very clear what he's mad about and he came in with his set piece about what he's mad about. but the fundamental point here is that this is not the way to be a member of the united states senate. i remember -- i guess it was couple of years ago -- he came down and say, i ask unanimous consent that we pass my bill on section 230 of the communications and decency act. and i had said, if you want to get a hearing, go try to get a hearing. introduce a bill, get a democratic cosponsor. make the case. work it through the committee process.

he has failed on that and he has failed on this issue because he doesn't have other people with him and so he's pitching a fit. and the bummer about this is that it's not me that suffers, it's not one party or the other that suffers. it's the taxpayer, and in this instance it's the department of the navy who will lack a comptroller because josh hawley. i object. the presiding officer: is there objection to the original request? mr. hawley: i object. the presiding officer: objection is heard. a senator: mr. president, i rise to discuss the nomination of ms. tia johnson, who is nominated to be a judge on the united states court of appeals for the armed forces. the senior court with exclusive

jurisdiction over the uniform code of military justice. ms. johnson was set to report out of the committee on april 5, 2022, and has been pending on the senate calendar ever since. i'm unaware of any objection to her nomination with respect to her qawlingses to be a judge -- her qualifications to be a judge on this appellate court. when confirmed, ms. johnson will be one of five judges on the court of appeals for the armed forces often referred to as the supreme court of military law. this court, which is composed of civilian appellate judges, has been operating without its full quota of confirmed judges for this entire judicial session, where it considered important jurisdictional and substantive military criminal law issues. importantly, the fy 22 national defense authorization act i am implemented extensive changes including a statute that would criminalize sexual harassment under some circumstances.

ms. johnson will play a critical role on the court of appeals in reviewing challenges and issues with the recent sexual assault and sexual harassment statutes, including defendants' rights under the ucmj. without ms. johnson, the court risks deadlock which will further hamper the military's ability to maintain good order and discipline. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate consider the following nomination -- calendar number 861, musetta tia johnson to be a judge for the united states court of appeals for the armed forces for a term of 15 years, that the senate vote on the nomination without intervening action or debate, that if confirmed the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the president be immediately notified of the senate's action. the presiding officer: is there objection?

mr. hawley: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from indiana. missouri, excuse me. mr. hawley: mr. president, reserving the right to object. it has now been 16 months since president biden's disastrous withdrawal from afghanistan. 16 months until lance corporal, since lance corporal schmitz from missouri and 12 other marines lost their lives at abbey gate. 16 months since hundreds of american civilians were left behind to the enemy. 16 months, no one's been fired, no one's offered answers. there's been zero accountability. and so for approximately the 200th time we are here on the floor as i continue to fulfill my pledge to seek accountability for what happened at abbey gate, for the lives that were lost, including the life from my own state, lance corporal schmitz, and to press for answers. it is not too much to ask that

not just the families of the fallen, but that the people of this country not be lied to about what happened at abbey gate and we be given the answers that the american people deserve. in that time, in those 16 months central command has done an exhaustive investigation and report. here it is right here. it's thousands of pages long. i can't seem to convince my friend from rhode island to hold a hearing on it, so i've been entering it into the "congressional record" page by page. we're about, i don't know, 100 pages in. we have many hundreds more to go. but when we're finished, everyone will be able to read this report in full. there have been other reports since then. the special i.g. for afghanistan recently issued his own report. that office's own report about the collapse of the afghan government. and what these reports have in

common is a consistent theme that commanders on the ground repeatedly warned the administration, repeatedly warned the national security council, repeatedly warned the state department as early as the spring of 2021 that the security situation was deteriorating rapidly, that the taliban was gaining ground rapidly, that there needed to be an evacuation. and yet, what did the white house do? well, according to the findings in this report, nothing. did they plan? no. did they take action necessary? no. and so on august 26, a terrorist explosion at abbey gate, we lose those 13 marines, hundreds of americans, civilians are left behind in the botched evacuation and here we are. and yet we're asked to act as if nothing has happened, as if we should just go on business as usual, keep the conveyor belt of nominees to this pentagon

running with no votes, no votes on this floor, no debate on this floor. just wave them through, waive regular order, move it right along, nothing to see here. well, i'm not willing to do that, mr. president. i haven't been willing to do it for over a year. and i hope my colleagues see now a year on that i was serious in august of 2021 when i said i would not consent to waiving the rules to send more nominees to this pentagon until something is done to get answers. and, frankly, to change the culture. because the truth is we have a cultural problem, and the whole military industrial complex. you know, this is an entity, an organization that has lied to the american people repeatedly over the years. they lied about vietnam for a decade. they lied about iraq. they lied about the true state of the war in afghanistan. and now we're getting the same lies again, to the point that we can't even hold a hearing in public because the white house

won't consent to it. i don't really blame chairman reed. he can't get witnesses to come testify in public because this white house doesn't want to say another word about what happened at abbey gate. we have a word for that. it's called a cover up, and it's time for it to stop. listen, much has been said about me blocking nominees. the truth is i can't block any nominee. all of these nominees can be brought to the floor. they can't even be filibustered. it's just a matter of what the senate majority leader wants to do, and sadly my side is not in the majority and we're not going to be for the next two years. so if the senate majority leader sees fit to vote on these nominees, he can at any time. but as to whether or not i will consent to waiving the rules and allowing these nominees to the pentagon in leadership positions to be confirmed without even a vote, i will not until something changes at the pentagon, until something is done about what happened at abbey gate. and i know that my colleague,

the chairman is acting in good faith. it's a privilege to serve with him on the committee. and i know he's in a tough spot here because he's got a white house that doesn't want to give an inch and doesn't want to say a word. and i would just say that i hope that with real oversight coming soon in the house of representatives that the senate will see fit and see its way to doing its part in holding open hearings on this report, on this tragedy, and making sure it does not happen again. with that, mr. president, i object. mr. reed: retaining my time. mr. president, i disagree obviously with the the senator from from missouri. the senate armed services committee had extensive oversight on afghanistan, seven public and closed hearings regarding the afghan war, lessoned -- lessoned learned. senator hawley had the

opportunity to participate in each of these hearings. the fiscal year 22 national defense authorization act contained a provision that mandated the popular defense deliver quarterly briefings in unclassified and classified form on the security situation in afghanistan and ongoing counterterrorism efforts. the classified briefings have taken place on january 20, april 14, and july 21. the unclassified briefings have taken place on february 14 and april 25. an additional unclassified briefing will be held tomorrow. obviously senator hawley has full access to these briefings. the fiscal year 2022 national defense authorization act also contained a provision, section 1069, which requires a yearly assessment of our over the horizon counterterrorism capabilities in afghanistan. while the first installment has not yet been delivered to the committee this too will be

accessible to all members of the committee. the f.y. 22 national defense authorization act mandated the establishment of the afghanistan war commission which will spend several years examining all aspects of the 20-year war in depth. let me emphasize, the 20-year war in depth. all the commissioners have been appointed. we expect the commission to commence work in the near term. and i note that senator hawley indicated that beginning in 2020 there were reports, according to senator hawley, that military leaders were warning of possible complications. that was during the term of president trump. i think also one of the issues that has to be looked at is the release of 5,000 taliban fighters at the direction of president trump, and over the objections of the afghan government. where were they at abbey gate? were they the leading forces that were moving in and surrounding kabul?

this situation requires a long, detailed study to focus on one event will create headlines but not intermission knowledge that we can bring forward. the factors contributing to abbey gate were long in the making, and unless we look at those factors over time, unless we look at the whole operation, i don't think we're going to get the kind of insights we need. so i respectfully disagree with senator hawley's objection. i hope we can find a way to confirm ms. johnson. and with that, i would yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. murphy: mr. president, if i could briefly go to other remarks of chairman reed. never before has such a small number of senators stood in the way of this large a number of nominees.

the impacts of this constant effort to hold up nominees to the state department, the department of defense is to compromise the national security of this nation. to try to rob from this administration, from this president the ability to govern and to protect this nation. and i will just remind my colleagues that what comes around goes around. i know right now some republicans may delight in the president not having any personnel necessary to run agencies because of this record number of holds that are put on nominees by the republican minority. but there will be a republican president someday. there will be a republican majority someday. and a handful of democratic senators will use the same tactics that are being used today to essentially rob from this administration its right to do the job it was elected to do by the american people, at

great risk to american national security. so, my prerogative on this is that we should just change the rules and make it less easy for one senator to hold up nominees that are supported by 90% to 95% of us. make it easier to proceed to a vote on nominees. the senator from missouri wants to vote no on this nominee or others. that's his right. but we should come up with a process by which the entire administration is not ground to a halt by one or two of 100. we should just decide to do that. because today this is hamstringing a democratic president, but let me guarantee you it will hamstring a republican president someday as well. mr. president, i come to the floor today to provide remarks in support of senator sanders' resolution that we will consider later today. i have come to the floor many times to talk about the war in yemen. i think i first came to the

floor during the obama administration when very few people even knew there was a civil war in yemen that the united states was participating in. but let me just say again what i hope is common knowledge. the war in yemen has been a national security disaster for the united states. it is now been ongoing for eight years, and by no metric has this war accrued to the benefit of u.s. national security. and let me just give you a few windows into why this is true. first and foremost, this is a humanitarian nightmare. the world's worst humanitarian disaster is in yemen today. the u.n. says that 66% of the country's population -- and, by the way, this is not a small country. this is a country of 30 million-plus people. right now survive only because of emergency aid.

23,000 air strikes have been launched just from 2015 to 2021, killing or injuring 18,000 civilians. 18,000 civilians, 10,000 of them children have been hit, killed or maimed by air strikes. there's a humanitarian nightmare inside yemen today. that does not accrued to the benefit of the u.s. security. why? because al qaeda and isis operates there. when there is this type of -- this -- recruitment material for terrorists seeking to recruit those who are looking for answers. al qaeda, isis are growing stronger and the misery in yemen is growing deeper. and at the same time, iran is growing more influential.

this was not at at the outset a proxy -- at the outset not a proxy war. saudi arabia supports the old regime in yemen. and iran who has been partners with the houthis has become more embedded as time goes on with the houthis as the war lingers, iran becomes are more influential and has more power inside yemen. if our interest in the region is to decrease iran's power, every year that we desist, the of iran gets more powerful. if we care about the growth of sunni terrorist groups, if we care about the growing influence of iran, if we care about saving people from misery, destitution and death, then we have to do everything in our power to wind down this war.

what benefit to us, to the yemeni people for this war to persist year after year after year. now in 2019, we considered a similar resolution. it passed both the house and the senate, a resolution to end u.s. participation in the yemen war. it was vetoed by president trump, we didn't have enough votes to override the veto. let's be honest, this is a different moment than 2019. why? because president biden has pursued a very different policy than president trump are. president trump backed the saudis, he, for a long time refueled saudi plans that were -- planes that were dropping bombs in yemen. he sold massive amounts of weapons, he embedded american forces with saudi forces to pick better targets. president biden promised with to end the war in yemen.

the biden administration does not sell saudi arabia weapons to be used in the war, they don't refuel the planes mid-air, they don't help with targeting, they don't help with intelligence. but senator sanders has correctly identified some lingering lines of cooperation between the united states and the saudi-led coalition that continues to let them perpetuate this wore war. -- this war, including the work we do to maintain the saudi air force. this is a different moment than 2019. we should give president biden credit for pursuing a very different policy. the facts on the ground are different as well. there has been for long stretches during the biden administration cease fires in yemen, cease-fires that we did not see during the trump administration. the saudis, to their credit, have been more interest in peace

during the biden administration than they ever were during the trump administration. that is i believe in part because they don't have a blank check from the u.s. regime any longer. in fact, as we stand here today, it is the houthis that are the pry playery impediment -- primary impediment to peace, not the saudis. now, the saudi's interest in peace and de-escalation, it comes and goes, but today as we speak, it is the houthis who make the commitmentment that we need to find a path to er. ly end the fighting in yemen and find a way for everyone in yemen, houthis included, to be able to live in peace, to have a government that everyone can call their own. and so why support this resolution if president biden has pulled most all of our support for the war, if the primary barrier to a peaceful

solution is the houthis? well, i think it's pretty simple. i think we've seen the impact that we have when we withdraw our blank check. and i think so long as there are any lines of effort that the united states is involved in in that continue this war, we are weaker as a nation. practically we are weaker because every day this war persists, iran gets stronger and the potential for sunni extremist organizing becomes stronger. but we are also just morally weaker because for us to be a participant in any way, shape, or form in a war with this kind of misery, it really shapes the way that people think about us in the region and around the

world. and so i'm here to support senator sanders' resolution and urge my colleagues to vote for it, not because i believe that this is the same moment as 2019. it's a different moment, but i think it commands the united states to send a very clear message and our message is this war has to end. the united states should not be involved in this war, not a little, not a lot. this war every day it perrist -- persists makes us less safe and harms our credibility and the senate i would argue should pass this resolution. i yield the floor. mr. murphy: i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator from utah. mr. lee: i ask unanimous consent to suspend the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection, it is so ordered. mr. lee: mr. president, this friday at midnight, the government are run out of funding. that leaves us with just a few options. one, we could pass the massive yet to be drafted pelosi-schumer

omnibus spending package, leaving the outgoing democratic house majority to fund the government for the balance of fiscal year 2023, despite the fact that the voters sent a clear message disapproving of the fiscal direction of our federal government. two, we could getten pass another -- could again pass another fix- stopgap measure c.r. this accomplishes nothing. it is a way to whip up support for another inflated spending package. so when i say it accomplishes nothing, that's not exactly true. it's very effective in doing some things. it marshals very effectively the angst of millions of americans who don't want a government

shutdown. a lot of these people depend on the federal government remaining open to process whether it's the paychecks for our soldiers, sailors, airmen or marines. others have contract with the government or receive payments from the government of one sort or another or otherwise impacted by the federal government's inability to operate during a shutdown. they all have something to worry about. they all have reasons to fear a shutdown. and those anxieties end up being transferred on to their elected representatives in the house of representatives and in the senate who in turn fear a shutdown for the same reasons and feel the collective weight of those concerns bearing down on them. but there's a dual threat that takes place here. you see, those who may be coming to the senate floor in the next day or two to propose exactly this, option two, that is, to just kick the can down the road

for another week for a one-week spending measure. they'll be coming down here predictably, foreseeable in the name of avoiding a shutdown. but make no mistake, mr. president whrks saying they want to delay spending, they want to delay any shutdown by another week, they're not really saying we don't want the threat of a shutdown. they're saying we want to move the threat of a shutdown, the possibility of a shutdown closer to christmas. why christmas? well, that's when the anxieties of the american people and their elected representatives in congress are at their maximum. that's where we all feel it the most. we all feel the pressure to get something done the most. and that's also where members of congress being human understandably want to be able to get home in time for christmas, to spend the christmas holidays with their families. and it's this dual threat that very often year after year is used to persuade members of congress to vote for a spending

bill that spends too much money and that does so through a mechanism that they've had no part in, that they've been excluded from, that they would never vote for in the absence of this dual threat of a shutdown at christmas time. so, no, this isn't right. when we do that to the american people, what you're really doing is cutting them out of the process. when you cut the people's elected representatives in congress who have been elected by the american people to take care of these things for them so that they don't have to worry about it and then you tell them we're not going to give those you elect any opportunity to have meaningful input into a spending bill which we're going to present to them at christmas time in order to force a nonexisting consensus behind something they know they shouldn't vote for, that is wrong. it's gone over and over again and it's got to stop. it must stop now. so that's option two.

suboptimal to say the least. option three. we could do the right thing and we could pass a continuing resolution that keeps the government funded maintaining current spending levels until after we've sworn in the new congress, including the republican house majority early next year. mr. president, it's only this latter option, only the third option that makes any sense at all. and it's only this third option that's fair to voters. you see, mr. president, for the last two years we've seen unprecedented inflation driven by reckless government spending. and we've seen that moving forward in a way that's crushed american families. our national debts that grown during those two years by about $4 trillion reaching an astronomical -- a figure we just reached in the last few days.

in utah inflation costs the average household a thousand dollars a month every single month relative to the day that joe biden took office. these are not for the most part people who have an extra thousand dollars to burn nor is the extra thousand dollars a month going toward luxury items. it's just groceries. housing, gasoline, health care. the basic things that the american people need in order to live. simply put, the american people can't afford the policies of the last few years. they certainly can't afford the kinds of spending bills that get passed when we use this dual threat of the shutdown threatened at christmas time. under an artificially imposed deadline. unsurprisingly american voters cast their votes and in so doing signal that they want the government to go in a new

direction after listening to an exhaustive list of excuses from the biden administration blaming inflation on everything from the pandemic to putin. the american people saw through the smoke and mirrors. they voted for accountability and made it clear that they expect their elected representatives to be responsible stewards of taxpayer dollars. unfortunately, if this body just goes right ahead and passes another omnibus spending bill, a bill that we know is coming, a bill that we know is going to be thousands of pains long, a bill that we know we will receive at the most maybe a day or two before we're expected to vote on it with no intervening committee debate or discussion, opportunity for amendment. this body if it chooses to enact such legislation will be ignoring those legitimate desires on the part of the voters. we're witnessing a conspicuous

recurring trend whereby leaders use the threat of a government shutdown to pressure members into voting for inflated spending provisions without even time to read the bill, much less without giving them any time to consult with those they represent about how they feel about that spending and those policies. so does this tactic remind you of anything? well, it should. how about speaker pelosi's now infamous statement about obamacare when she said we have to pass the bill in order to find out what's in it. we all know how that turned out. not well. like obamacare, the resulting omnibus legislation that results from that kind of attitude, that dismissive approach, dismissive not just of individual members

but those they represent always contains ideologically driven provisions, utterly unrelated to the budget many of which could never pass if they had to withstand the light of day, if they had to be voted on on their own merits. we cannot, we must not, we should never use the threat of a government shutdown to force through policy changes that could never survive a vote on their own merits. i believe we should pass, we must pass a clean continuing resolution, one that will take us into the next congress. failure to do so will lock the remainder of this fiscal year into a pattern in which liberal policies and inflationary spending agenda crammed through by unaccountable members of congress, many of woman have just lost reelection or didn't

seek it, all those things will descend upon the american people in a most unfavorable and unwelcomed way. we can't let that happen. i don't want to be any part of that. i don't think most of our colleagues on either side of the aisle do. not only would it be poor form and unwise and inconsiderate and really unkind for congress to pass a massive spending bill but it would also be without precedent in modern u.s. history. you know, mr. president, since 1954, the party in control of the house of representatives has shifted from one party to another, a total of just five times since 1954. and exactly zero of those instances did congo back after

that election and during a lame-duck session enact sweeping comp men'sive -- comprehensive spending legislation, not one instance since 1954 has that happened. not once has there been an instance where congress did that before a newly elected house majority could be sworn in. we can pass a continuing resolution that doesn't include any of the new partisan agenda items that either side has proposed. it would keep the government running until the new congress can develop a full year discretionary budget, one that's agreeable to both sides, or at least has been adequately vetted on both sides and with our constituents with input from members of both political parties in both chambers of congress. i urge my colleagues to support

the passage of this short-term continuing resolution that maintains current spending levels until the new congress takes office. doing so will ensure that we listen to the people's voices and that the incoming house majority has the opportunity to make the spending decisions that are in the best interests of the american people. we open them nothing less. to that end, mr. president, as if in legislative session, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of s. 5244 which is at the desk. i further ask that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: is there objection? a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. leahy: reserving the right to object. i will but let me explain why. the bill offered by my colleague on the other side of the aisle is shortsighted and premature.

we've been working this omnibus for months. i would have been happy to among the 50 or 60 senators of both parties that sat down with me to talk about what might have been in it, i would have been happy to have heard from him, too. but i know he had other pressing duties and didn't have time to. but i'm afraid it would unnecessarily punt our basic responsibilities even further down the road. vice chairman shelby and i continue to trade offers and negotiate an omnibus spending bill with the democrats and republicans who have worked with us and we believe we're close to a bipartisan, bicameral agreement. in reaching this agreement, now it is important for americans in every state across the country.

i know in my state of vermont in my hometown, my farm house in middlesex, vermont, it was 20 degrees. next week it's going to get cold. with the cost of natural gas, heating oil up more than 25%, families across my state are sitting down at the kitchen tables trying to figure out how they're going to afford to heat their homes and feed their families. they are making these decisions right now. they do not have the luxury of simply kicking the can down the road. they need assistance now, not months from now. they're not the ones who got the benefit from the huge trump tax cut which increased the deficit but gave money to the highest level of income in our state, in

our country. reaching this agreement now is important because my home state opioid deaths are on pace to surpass last year's grim toll. i don't think there's a senator on this floor who hasn't seen opioid deaths go up in their state. we've seen this throughout the country. and i'm mott going to -- i'm not going to stand in the way of blocking money that might help bring those opioid deaths down. because vermont is not alone in this fight against this scourge. you cannot name a state in this country that is not facing this scourge. communities across the country -- people are struggling with addiction and need new resources now, not months from now if at all.

it's republicans, democrats, independent, everybody. these communities are also pleading for resources to support state and local law enforcement. having spent eight years in law enforcement, i know what's needed. in fact, most of my friends on the other side of the aisle claim to support law enfor enforcement. if they really mean it, they should pass an omnibus agreement now which would mean we could get more than 1500 more police officers on the streets and provide law enforcement with new and needed resources now, not months from now if at all. our nation's veterans' committee us to act now. everybody claims they're in support of them, as i am, as our presiding officer is, as most senators are.

if we do not do our jobs, the bipartisan pact act will go underfunded, v.a. medical care will fall at least $7.5 billion short, and our nation's veterans deserve to have the promises we made to them fulfilled now, not months from now, if at all. victims of natural disasters, like hurricanes ian and fiona, need us to act now. the continuing resolution would delay aid to these communities by at least six weeks. now, this week the senate will pass the ndaa. it'll receive bipartisan praise in what it says for our armed services. well, i would remind my colleagues, the ndaa makes many promises, but without an omnibus

appropriations bill, it is a broken promise. $76 billion for national defense will be left on the republican cutting room floor, $76 billion for national defense will be left on the republican cutting room floor. i could take up the entirety talking about why this short-term c.r. is a dereliction of our sworn duty, a failure for the american people. a temporary solution that promises to run headlong into even more difficult promises. but i will end by saying that vice president shelby, chairlady delauro, and i are close to an amendment. the american people sent us here to do our jobs, not kick the can down the road, not make statements on the floor, but to

do our work. so, for these reasons, i object. mr. braun: mr. president. the presiding officer: objection is heard. mr. braun: this is going to be real easy -- the presiding officer: the senator from indiana. mr. braun: this is going to be easy, real short. in november, the house of representatives -- [inaudible] -- it was in a much wider, popular margin when you add up the votes we won across the country in the house of representatives, slimmer in the number of seats we picked up, but we got it back. why would republicans go along with a huge spending bill like this one? it's happened every year since i've been here, no budgeting, no appropriations, and even an appropriator like myself can look at because it's done behind closed doors. all we have to do is get this into the next congress. congress funds the government through c.r.'s all the time for the wrong reason, because they

don't do the homework, they don't do the regular order. kicks the can down the road consistently, standard operating procedure. it is a slap in the face to those voters who let the outgoing house majority set the agenda for the next ten months. we shouldn't fund the government with huge omnibus bills in the first place. and we shouldn't give pelosi, current speaker pelosi, a going-away present when she's been part of the process for all these years. we should actually do a budget like it's supposed to be done and we should not do this as we're heading into a new congress. i yield back to the senator from utah. mr. lee: i yield to the senator from wisconsin. the presiding officer: the senator from wisconsin. mr. johnson: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from wisconsin. mr. johnson: mr. president, you'll notice that the senior senator from vermont didn't talk

about overall spending numbers. i would ask the president -- i would ask anybody listening to these floor speeches today -- do you know how much the federal government spent last year? i've been asking that question of my colleagues, i've been asking that question of journalists here in washington, d.c., people who report on the dealings on the floor, and the vast majority cannot answer that question. so the question you ought to all -- you all ought to be asking yourselves is, why can't you answer that question? it's not your fault. the reason nobody knows how much the federal government spent in total last year, virtually no one knows it, is we never talk about it. we are the largest financial entity in the world, and we

never talk about how much we spend in total. we talk about little bits and pieces. we talk about $billion here -- we talk about $6 billion here, $76 billion there. no doubt, necessary funding for top priorities. but we don't spend the time talking about how we're mortgaging our children's future. i've got a couple charts i'd like to display. this first chart shows over 20 years of spending history, going back to the year 2002 when the federal government spent in total a little more than $2 trillion. if we would have just increased spending from that point by population growth and the rate of inflation, last year we would have spent a little under $3.8 trillion. if you go to the year 2008 when we spent just under $3 trillion

and once again just grew spending by population and inflation, last year we would have spent $4.4 trillion. if you go back to 2016 when we were spending $3.8 trillion, under $4 trillion, and grew that by just the rate of growth of the population, rate of inflation, last year we would have spent about $4.8 trillion. instead last year we spent $6.3 trillion. now, i realize -- and you can see on this chart -- the last three years spending was heavily impacted by covid relief. close to $6 trillion worth. but in 2019 before the covid pandemic, we spent about $4.4 trillion. i have another chart i'd like to put up here to put this all in perspective.

this breaks down spending between discretionary and mandatory plus interest, and then you have total outlays. again, you look at 2019, total outlays, $4.4 trillion. so because of covid, the next year we spent an additional $2.1 trillion, $6.5 trillion, $ -- 2021, $6.8 trillion. last year, $6.3 trillion. now, i heard president biden say the pandemic was over. i think most of us have gotten back to our normal lives. that's a good thing. why haven't we gone back to a normal spending level? i don't know exactly what the total spending will be for fiscal year 2023. i do know we're two and a half months into the fiscal year. we have not brought up one

appropriation bill on the floor of the senate for debate, for amounts -- for amendments, not one. we're operating on a continuing resolution. i hear all the time these continuing resolutions, such a terrible way to do business. i agree. it shows the dysfunction, the complete dysfunction which is leading to these out-of-control spending numbers. you would think now that the pandemic is over we would return to a more normal level of spending. had we just grown the 2019 level by, again, the rate of population growth, the rate of inflation, we'd be spending about $4.8 trillion this year. but it appears -- again, we we don't know -- again, we don't

know, but there are a couple of people negotiating this. the rest of us are completely outside of the process. we're going to have some massive omnibus spending bill dropped on our desk and be expected to vote on it in a day or two or maybe just house. it's going to be somewhere around $6 trillion. have we literally just increased the baseline since the beginning of the pandemic by $1.6 trillion? that's a 36% increase. to put this in perspective, again, had we grown this just by inflation and population growth, that would be a reasonable way to put some kind of constraints on what we're spending, that would be $4.8 trillion. last year the federal government raised in revenue t.d. 4.9 -- raised in revenue, $4.9 trillion. again, i can't predict what revenue is is going to be in 2023, but based on 2022 revenue,

if we were only talking about $4.8 trillion, we would actually have a surplus. as opposed to a massive deficit almost guaranteed to be more than $1 trillion. mr. president, my final point is -- and i know senator scott also was in the business world, a number of senators have been -- if we were looking at this as, let's say, a division that had a problem, had to spend a lot more money, a fire -- you know, some kind of real issue with a business where they had to dramatically increase spending over the last three years. but that spending issue had been resolved, and that division came us to having spent $4.4 million in 2019 and now that the problem has been resolved, now they want to spend $6 million, i can guarantee you we'd be looking for a lot more detail.

we'd be spending a lot more time in terms of why in the world would we be increasing our base budget by 36% now that the danger of the problem has passed? so in the business world, in in the private sector where myself and senator scott came from, we would be spending a lot of time analyzing this. but here in washington, d.c., the world's capital of dysfunction -- monetary and budgetary designation if you please, we dis-- monetary and budgetary dysfunction, we don't know what we're spending. because the powers that be with negotiating some massive omnibus spending bill that will jam us up against the christmas holidays and ask us for an up-or-down vote. this process, this horribly

dysfunctional broken process must end. which is why i completely agree with senator lee's amendment. let's pass a continuing resolution, as much as i hate them, as much as that signals dysfunction. it will it will aloss us -- it will allow us to take the time to debate, question why in the world are we talking about $6 trillion of spending when at most looking back to 2019, growing that by inflation and population growth, we ought to be talking somewhere in the neighborhood of $4.8, certainly under $5 trillion, and maybe looking at the prospect for the first time in many, many years of balancing a bucket? that's the attitude we -- of balancing a budget? that's the attitude we ought to be taking. that's why i support senator lee's amendment. mr. president, i yield the floor.

the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. scott: let me begin with a simple question. when are we going to say, enough? the american people are saying this. heck, even traditionally liberal mainstream news outlets are getting there. but here in congress, it's nothing but business as usual. we just keep letting it pile up, month after month, year after year. now, the itch should be obvious. i'm talking about america's massive federal debt. now more than $31 trillion. it's grown by nearly $5 trillion since president biden took office, and it was growing like a weed before that, too. we should all be disgusted with the reckless spending in washington. look what the it's doing to our country. our inflation is rage across america, hurting families and businesses and pushing the american dream out of reach as prices skyrocket and interest

rates follow close behind. reckless spending approved by this chamber and our colleagues in the house has caused this. mr. president, i've been in the senate for almost four years. i've talked a lot about my childhood. many of you heard my story as someone who were born to a single mom, grew up poor and lived in public housing. it is a hard place to live your life. today folks are struggling more an ever to get by and make ends meet as they deal with sky-high inflation. in most places across the world, people who group like me have no hope of being anything but what they were born into that's not true in earthquake in. this is the greatest in addition on earth because a kid that grows up watching their parent struggle and live in public housing can work hard and beat anything. but that promise isn't guaranteed. we have to protect that by being responsible with taxpayer money and not allowing inflation and debt to ruin us.

throughout my life i've run businesses big and small, from a couple hundred employees to hundreds of thousands of employees. here's the one thing that doesn't change no matter how big you get. if you don't live within your means, you fail. the same goes for any family. no family or business in any of our states gets to burn through money with no consequences. mr. president, the only place it's become acceptable is here in washington. why? because congress stopped doing what it got elected to do. as i said i've been in washington for about four years now. one thing i've learned is that in washington, compromise means everyone gets everything so nobody has to make a tough choice. the result is gross fiscal mismanagement and unsustainable debt. instead of standing up to this broken cesspool in congress, something i think most of us ran on, too many people get elected, come to washington and become a rubber stamp for more spending. so here we are again, just days away from a government funding

deadline. some of our colleagues are again pushing a massive omnibus, what we're calling the pelosi-schumer spending bill, which keeps this inflation bomb deficit spending going. i asked earlier when are we going to start saying enough? will it be when the debt hits $35 trillion, $45 trillion, $50 trillion? can you imagine $50 trillion worth of debt? the answer has to be now. we say enough is enough today. and we should by saying no to a massive omnibus spending bill and approve the simple continuing resolution being offered by my good friend, senator lee of utah. this allows a new congress to put together a real budget that's balanced, which is what we should always be doing anyway. i don't like continuing resolutions no more than i think anyone here does. since my first day in the senate i've been vocal about needing to pass a budget, a full budget, that's balanced and gets america's finances in order. but that's not going to happen in the next three days or before

the next congress begins, for that matter. so the thought of passing a pelosi-schumer spending bill weeks before a new republican majority in the house takes power, takes power is insane. it's as bad an idea as i've heard up here. it also goes against decades of precedent. as senator lee said, since 1954 control of the house has changed five times and there's never been an instance of congress passing an omnibus spending bill before a new house majority takes party. given that america is in more debt than ever before, inflation is the highest it's been in 40 years, why should we choose now to break precedent and green light more reckless spending? let's not forget what the democrats wish to do with the hard-earned tax dollars of american families. the last time the democrats passed a spending bill they approved $80 billion so the irs can hire 70,000 new agents. democrats are now forcing every american to report any transaction of $600 or more to the irs, giving the federal

government unprecedented access into the personal assets of american families. we can expect more of the same from them now. maya angelouo was right when she said when someone shoals you who they are -- shows you who they are, believe them the first time. the democrats are saying that -- our proposal will cut services. pass the c.r. into next year will not result in cuts to funding or services. this will continue funding operations just as they are today. here's the deal, for too long the failed and ridiculous hig in washington has been -- thinking in washington has been budgets don't matter and inflation doesn't matter because americans will never tie wasteful spending to inflation. the only way to get things done is to shove them into a giant spending bill, negotiate in secret and pass them before anyone has time to read it. that's wrongened a the american public is disgusted with this.

it's not how any family or business operates. in the real world you make plans, you meet deadlines, you make choices and live within your means because failing to do so means failing to survive and prosper. congress shouldn't be preeted any different -- be treated any differently. congress has been broken and unaccountable for too long. i yield the floor. mr. lee: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from utah. mr. lee: mr. president, in closing this discussion, i want to respond to a couple of points made by my friend and colleague, the distinguished senator from vermont. senator leahy is someone i really enjoyed working with throughout my 12 years in the senate, and i will miss him when he's gone. i respectfully but very strongly disagree with his decision to object to this commonsense approach toward avoiding a government shutdown, and i want to make clear just a few things. number one, this continuing

resolution is not precollusive of anything else -- preclusive of anything else he may want to do. it provides a safety net so that congress doesn't produce a government shutdown. just as importantly, so that members don't feel coerced into this dual threat having to navigate between a shutdown and people having to cancel holiday plans with their families. that's what we're trying to avoid. it's a false choice to say that this doesn't allow for anything else. that's just not true. i disagree with him about his desire to pass an omnibus because that omnibus doesn't yet exist. there still isn't an agreement on it. the bill has yet to exist. it has yet to see the light of day not only to the public, but to all but about four members of the united states congress. that's what i object to.

but make no mistake, what we're proposing today, what we reasonably suggested today would not preclude a subsequent omnibus. it would just take away the shutdown threat, which is exactly my point, which is exactly my concern. when we do this sort of thing, without speaking to anyone's subjective motives -- i can't read other people's minds, but i do know this pattern has been used before. it's a tried and true process by which people convince their colleagues to vote for things they would never otherwise vote for. typically we don't like to vote on things that we haven't seep that spend trillions of dollars. my colleague from vermont also refers to the fact that he had lengthy conversations with a number of colleagues coming to him with their concerns. that's great, i appreciate that. it's a very appropriate thing for any senator to do, particularly the chairman of the appropriations committee. as great as that is, mr. president, that isn't

legislating. that doesn't substitute for actual floor debate, and it sure as heck doesn't substitute for transparency and accountability, allowing the american people to see what they're going to be spending their money on. we're going to get in a matter of days, probably in about a week because usually they don't give us more time than that, a bill and it will be 2,000 or 3,000 paibltion long and will spend probably $1.6 trillion or $1.7 trillion, and, mr. president, i think the american people understand that 2,000 or 3,000 pages of appropriations legislative tax does not read like a fast-paced novel. nobody's going to have a chance to review this, and that is the problem. so the fact that he's meeting with individual members hearing their concerns, talking about possible trade-offs, that's great but that doesn't provide what the american people need. next, he appeals to the sense of the good things that will be in the bill, talking about the

need to fund efforts to combat opioid abuse and a addiction and the need to fund law enforcement. great things, great things, but we haven't seen the legislative text. and the fact that there may be good things in the bill funding good causes that would benefit good, deserving beneficiaries doesn't mean that the bill as a whole makes any sense. he also says that, with some defiance and indignation, he's not going to settle for another short-term c.r. it's a bad way of doing things and he's not okay with a short-term c.r. that's a good point, i don't like them, it's a default. but we've been on a short-term c.r. since september 30. that's two and a half months, mr. president. i don't comprehend exactly where

he would draw the lieb between a short-term -- line between a short-term acceptable and one that isn't. two and a half months is just fine but a few more weeks isn't. i suspect he's going to be just fine when somebody comes to the floor and asks for a one-week short-term c.r., a one-week short-term spending bill. that's wrong. why? well, because it moves the threat of a shutdown that much closer to christmas, when members most want to get out of town and when the american people and those they elect to represent them here are most concerned about a shutdown. that's coercive. that isn't trying to avoid a shutdown, no. that's playing with fire. that's presenting as a feature, not a bug, the risk of a shutdown. it's wrong and it has to stop. he objected today. i hope he'll reconsider. this isn't right. we know it isn't right.

those who elected us, whether we are republicans or democrats, deserve better. they don't deserve this. thank you, mr. president. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from nevada. ms. rosen: i rise to express my strong and continued support for dreamers, tps resip yents and immigrant communities in nevada and across our nation. it has been decades since congress has passed real immigration reform and almost a decade since we have made a real attempt at taking action to provide a permanent solution for those communities and allow families, allow families to stay together. as a result, our broken immigration system has been left

with a patchwork of policies that are outdated and inefficient. this is why congress needs to take action now on comprehensive immigration reform so we can once and for all fix this severely broken system. this shouldn't be a partisan issue. we're talking about families who deserve peace of mind about their future. they shouldn't be subjected to uncertainty they currently face every single day. unfortunately, some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle refuse to come to the table to work with us on comprehensive immigration reform. they would rather leave dreamers in limbo and have this issue for their own political gain than work towards solutions. but a number of reasonable republicans have said in the past that they do support a legislative fix to protect our

dreamers and their futures. so let's start there and work together to provide an immediate permanent legislative solution for daca recipients right now. right now. while at the same time we keep working for more comprehensive immigration reform. in the ten years since the daca program first went into effect, it has protected nearly 600,000 dreamers and allowed them to, well, make a home, build a life and a future here in our country. and in my state of nevada alone, thousands of individuals and families rely on daca to live, work, raise a family free from fear in a country, the only country they've ever known or ever called home. daca has provided vital protections and opportunities for dreamers, ensuring that

they can attend college, fully contribute to our economy, serve in our military, and really make a difference in our communities. because of daca, thousands of people have been given access to the american dream. and yet, years long threats to end this policy have left 600 -- nearly 600,000 daca recipients in limbo, facing uncertainty and awaiting court decision after court decision that could jeopardize their future and threaten the lives that they've built here. so we cannot wait any longer to take action, mr. president. that's why i'm calling on my colleagues to work to pass a permanent legislative solution this year, this year for dreamers. one that gives them permanent protections and a pathway to

citizenship while we continue working on comprehensive immigration reform. so let's put a stand-alone proposal to provide a permanent legislative fix for daca recipients, let's put that proposal right here on the senate floor and take a vote immediately to solve this issue. because we must also continue to keep fighting, we have to keep fighting to ensure we take the comprehensive approach to reforming our immigration system and finally giving these families the peace of mind they so richly deserve. families across our country, they deserve certainty in their futures, and the senate must feel the same sense of urgency that they feel every single day. we can't keep them waiting any longer. thank you. i note the absence of a quorum.

the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

isn't and -- mr. sanders: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. sanders: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent to dispense with the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sanders: i ask that the previous order with respect to the motion to discharge be

vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sanders: i further ask that i be allowed to speak for up to 30 minutes, senator risch for up to five minutes and senator menendez for up on it ten minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sanders: mr. president, this is an issue that i and a number of us, democrats and republicans, progressives, conservatives, have been working on for a number of years. i was disappointed that the biden administration has announced its opposition to the resolution that i am bringing forth, but we have been in communication with the administration all day and just a few minutes ago, we have received a commitment from them that they will work with us to

end the war in yemen and bring peace to that very troubled region. now, i don't know if the administration and those of us who want to go forward will end up being in agreement. if not, i assure the members that we will be back with a resolution in the very near future, as soon as we can, because this is an issue that i and many others feel passionately enough. for the members, i'm not going to ask for a vote tonight, but i do want to express my concerns, deep concerns about what's going on in that region. mr. president, in 2014, with the active support of the united states military, saudi arabia, the uae, and a coalition of

other countries intervened in the civil war in yemen. the result of that intervention was the creation of the worst humanitarian crisis on the planet, and it really is almost hard to imagine what is going on in that impoverished country. since the war began in 2015, over 377,000 people have been killed, including at least 130,000 people who have died from indirect causes like food insecurity and lack of health care as a direct result of the saudi blockade of yemen and the humanitarian obstruction by warring parties. today nearly 25 million yemenis are in need of humanitarian assistance, five million are at risk of famine, and over a million are affected by cholera. according to unicef, by the end

of this calendar year, nearly 18 million people including over nine million children will lack access to safe water, sanitation, and hygiene services in yemen leading to regular outbreaks of preventable diseases like cholera, measles, and diphtheria. the eight-year war in yemen has internally displaced over four million people making yemen home to one of the largest internal displacement crises in the world. with women and children bearing the brunt of that burden. according to united nations population fund, nearly 77% or three million of those displaced in yemen are women and children. mr. president, every two hours a yemeni woman dies during childbirth and almost entirely,e

crises. more than a million pregnant and breast feeding women are acutely malnourished, a number we may see double with rising food insecurity. according to the international relief organization, oxfam, the he threat of famine is very serious despite ongoing humanitarian assistance, over 17 million people in yemen remain food insecure, a number set to rise to 19 million by the end of this year. in yemen today, over a million pregnant or breast feeding women and over two million children under five require treatment for acute malnutrition, acute malnutrition. and if you think the suffering in that country cannot get any worse, unfortunately you would be dead wrong. the united nations reports that if the conflict doesn't stop, the war in yemen could lead to the deaths of 1.3 million people

by the year 2030. and, mr. president, let us be crystal clear. the initiators of this terrible war in yemen was saudi arabia, one of the very most dangerous countries on the face of this earth. saudi arabia is a dictatorship that is doing everything that it can to crush democracy in its own country. it is a brutal regime that treats women as third-class citizens and tortures civilians. it is one of the worst human rights violators in the world. saudi arabia's crown prince, as i think many of us are familiar with, mo ordered the murder of l khashoggi, a "washington post" columnist and american resident with a bone saw in 2018.

and there is little doubt about that. in a blatant attempt to jack up gas prices in the united states and harm our economy, saudi arabia agreed to partner with vladimir putin in the murderous war against the people of ukraine. at a time when children in yemen are facing mass starvation, when that impoverished country's health care system is collapsing, the saudi crown prince mohammad bin salman bought himself a $500 million yacht, a $300 million french chateaux, and a $450 million leonardo da vinci painting. he can afford to do this because their family is worth some $1.4 trillion. one of the wealthiest if not the

wealthiest family in the entire world. according to freedom house, respected human rights organization, quotes saudi arabia's absolute monarchy restricts almost all political rights and civil liberties. no officials at the national level are elected. the regime relies on pervasive surveillance. criminalization appeals to sectarianism and ethnicity and public spending supported by oil revenues to remain in power. women and religious minorities face extensive discrimination in law and in practice. end quote. according to human rights watch under the government headed by crown prince mohammad bin salman, quote, saudi arabia has experienced the worst period of oppression in its modern history, end of quote. human rights watch has reported that, quote, accounts have emerged of alleged torture of high profile political detainees

and saudi prisoners, end of quote, including saudi women's rights activists and others. the alleged torture included electric shocks, beatings, whippings, and sexual harassment. mr. president, enough is enough. we must fundamentally reassess our relationship with a murderous regime of saudi arabia. we can and we must begin to do that by ending our support for the saudi-led war in yemen. and that is why i have introduced a resolution that requires the united states to withdraw its forces from and involvement in the saudi-led war in yemen which has not been authorized by the united states congress. this obviously is not a radical

idea in 2019. the senate passed a similar resolution by a vote of 54-46. every democrat who was present voted for it along with seven republicans. the house of representatives passed that same resolution by a vote of 247-175. every democrat in the house who was present voted for it along with 16 republicans. sadly then-president trump vetoed it and it did not become law. mr. president, it is long past time that we take a very hard look at our relationship with saudi arabia. our country whose government represents the very opposite of what we profess to believe in. last year president biden and his administration did the right thing when it announced that it would end u.s. support for offensive military operations

led by saudi arabia and yemen and named a special enjoy to help bring this conflict to an end. the good news is that as a result of these efforts, i think as a result of the resolution passed in the house and the senate, the saudis have paused their deadly air strikes in yemen and in april the united nations broke a truce between the warring factions. the bad news is that this truce expired over two months ago, and there is now evidence that violence in yemen is beginning to escalate. now, i understand that the administration is opposed to this resolution and let me briefly respond to some of their concerns. first, the administration claims that this resolution is unnecessary because saudi arabia has paused its bombing campaign in yemen.

well, mr. president, that may be true, but let's be clear. there is no guarantee that saudi arabia will not stop bombing yemen tomorrow relying on u.s. military support and u.s. manufactured weapons to carry out those air strikes which in the past have done incalculable harm to the people of yemen. in fact, a previously announced end to u.s. offensive support did not prevent devastating and indiscriminate saudi air strikes in yemen which occurred as late as march 2022. passing this legislation would allow congress to play a constructive role in the negotiation of an extension of the truth and a long-term and lasting peace. the resolution that we are debating today, we are discussing right now, will help

ensure that saudi air strikes do not resume. further, while it is true that the saudi blockade is not as severe as it has been in the past, vital commodities like fuel and medicine are still in short supply and saudi arabia to this day still has imposed restrictions on nearly all commercial imports into yemen including fuel. saudi arabia still has control over yemeni air space which has prevented thousands of patients with medical emergencies from leaving the capital according to the quincy institute. this legislation that i have brought forward simply codifies what president biden has already pledged to do by ending u.s. military assistance to the saudi-led coalition's war in yemen. specifically this resolution

would achieve three important goals. first, it would end u.s. intelligence sharing for the purpose of enabling offensive saudi-led coalition strikes inside yemen. second, it would end u.s. logistical support for offensive saudi-led coalition strikes, including the provision of maintenance and spare parts to coalition members flying warplanes. finally, it would prohibit u.s. military personnel from being assigned to command, coordinate, participate in the movement of, or accompany saudi-led coalition forces engaged in hostilities without specific statutory authorization from the congress. mr. president, let us be clear. this is a narrowly targeted resolution that only affects saudi arabia's offensive operations in yemen. this resolution would still allow for u.s. military support to be used to protect the

territorial integrity of saudi arabia. in other words, nothing in this legislation prevents the united states from helping saudi arabia defend itself against attacks originating from yemen. further, this resolution would not affect america's support for ukraine's self-defense as some opponents of this legislation have claimed. that is why i am proud to be joined on this resolution by some of the staunchest defenders of ukrainian sovereignty and u.s. national security interests who like me are outraged by saudi arabia's collaboration with russia and open support of illegal wars of aggression. they include senator durbin, senator blumenthal, senator peters, senator warren, senator markey, and a number of others who support this resolution. passing this war powers resolution will send a very

powerful message to saudi arabia that the war in yemen must finally come to an end. there must be a peaceful resolution for this horrific conflict. passing this resolution will also send the message to saudi arabia that its partnership with russia with respect to the war in ukraine is unacceptable. mr. president, in october after saudi arabia agreed to cut oil production, the biden administration recognized the need to work with congress toll re-examine the relationship between saudi arabia and the united states. president biden said he wanted action from congress. this resolution is a narrowly tailored response that will help achieve that objective. in october the chairman of the senate foreign relations committee senator menendez said, and i quote, the united states must immediately freeze all aspects of our cooperation with

saudi arabia, including any arms sales and security cooperation beyond what is absolutely necessary to defend u.s. personnel and interests. and he continued as chairman of the senate foreign relations committee,ly not green light any cooperation until the kingdom reassesses its position with respect to the war in ukraine. enough is enough. end of quote from senator menendez. and i agree with that. and this resolution is our opportunity to send a powerful message to saudi arabia that congress is in fact reexamining our relationship with their country. it is an attempt to defend the constitution of the united states which gives the power of making war to the congress, not to the president. and it is an effort to end our complicity in this horrendously bloody and horrible conflict. congress has a narrow window now

to do something important. enacting the war powers resolution will send a powerful message to the saudis and to the hooties that -- houthis that the united states will not be a party to this war and the warring factions must fine a sustainable peaceful solution. the vote on this resolution is very important. let me repeat. with just a few minutes before i got to the floor received word from the administration that they wanted to work with us in crafting a language that would be mutually acceptable. we're going to give them that opportunity. whether we succeed or not i don't know. let me repeat. if we do not succeed, i will being back with many of my colleagues to bring forth this resolution, or something that is very important. and with this resolution, finally, what it's about, it says that the people of yemen need more humanitarian

assistance, not more bombs. it is a vote that says that the senate believes in the constitution of our country, which makes it clear that the congress, not the president, determines whether and when the united states goes to war. it is a vote that tells saudi arabia that we will not continue to give it a blank check with respect to war and foreign intervention. and it is a vote that says no, we will not stand with saudi arabia while it is actively supporting vladimir putin's horrific war of aggression against the people of ukraine. so, once again, where we are at is i'm not going to ask for a vote tonight. i look forward to working with the administration, who was opposed to this resolution, and see if we can come up with something that is strong, that is effective. and if we do not, i will be back. with that, mr. president, i yield the floor.

mr. sanders: madam president, i ask for a quorum call. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. brown: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. brown: i ask unanimous consent to dispense with the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. brown: thank you, madam president. i wanted to say a few words, not a formal speech about my junior partner, the junior senator from ohio. he's only the junior senator not in intersect or actions, but only -- not in intellect or actions, you in seniority. that's the way it works leer. i know i'm talking when the presiding officer has such a record of bipartisanship and working with others in the senate, the junior senator from new hampshire and the work she's done. i wanted to talk about rob portman. i was at his last speech, his

retirement speech last week. i wanted to say a few words about his work. he and i, on the big issues, no surprise, senator portman from cincinnati, i live in northern ohio, have looked at the world differently on big trade issues, on tax issues. he was for the trump tax cut that gave big tax breaks to corporations. and i think squeezed middle-class and low-income tax pairs. on the big issues, we in a sense canceled each other's votes out. on a lot of ohio-specific things, we worked together on important problem-solving issues. a few come to mind -- level the playing field, first issue, then level the playing field 2.0, which will help the u.s. enforce its trade laws. rob was for nafta, i was against it, or for pntr with china, i was against it. we did come together to help ohio businesses and ohio manufacturing. that's one example.

another example is what we're able to do in the infrastructure bill. he was a leader on writing the infrastructure bill, always thinking about how important it was. the spence bridge in cincinnati, the viaduct on the west side of cincinnati, but what we did on the 71/70 interchange in columbus and were able to do in small township roads around rural ohio, what we did in appalachia, and in major transportation projects. another example, rob portman cared a lot about the environment. we worked, he loves canoeing. we worked on issues that matter on the ohio river, especially on lake erie. one of my favorite statistics is lake erie, the smallest of the great lakes in area, the most shallow, 30 feet deep around toledo, 90 feet deep around my wife's home county. lake erie is 2% of all the water

in the great lakes, but has 50% of the fish. in lake superior, the largest glaik, has 50% of the water and 2% of the fish. we know how important lake erie is to our fishing, water supply, and how important as one of the beautiful parts of the great lakes that matter to all of us. when i think about rob, i regret he's leaving. i look forward to working with senator vance. i'm hopeful we can be as cooperative and effective as rob and i have been on issues that are ohio-specific. we will continue to search out those issues. another was nasa glenn in cleveland. we have one of the ten nasa facilities in the country. nasa glenn is important with the armstrong center in sandusky to the state's economy and our space program. that's in my part of the state. rob's been helpful there. i've been helpful in his part of

the state, with wright patterson air force base, one of the key facilities for our united states air force. issue after issue, many of them rob and i each cosponsored dozens of bills that have become law, some 35, i believe, with each other that have become law, dozens more with other senators in both party, including senator hassan from new hampshire, one of the real leaders on doing bipartisan work. those kinds of issues don't get the media attention. they'd rather, i don't blame them, cover when rob and i disagree than agree. my job, as senator portman's, has always been look for opportunities to do thingsing to. we found does -- to do things together. we found dozens of those opportunities in our 12 years together. i came in 2006, he came in 2010. he's retiring at the end of 2022. we had 12 years together and accomplished a lot for the state. i will miss him and his leadership. i will miss his reasonableness,

and we'll continue, i hope, once he retires, working together on other things that are state-specific for my state. i thank the presiding officer for allowing me to speak for a couple minutes about my friend rob portman, and i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

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they are very secretive and are very careful not to give information away before their

opinions are headed down. there's been this entire influence operation some on the religious right had been engaging in to try to cozy up to several of the conservative members of the supreme court's. and really try to shore up their opinions on abortion and a few other issues. cracks on that who's the reverend robert schenk? corks reverend robert shank brought to life these allegations. also the person needing these influence operations as you call them out. he had been the lead antiabortion boys in washington d.c. had an organization that tried to recruit wealthy donors to cozy up to the supreme court justices through donations to the supreme court historical society by praying with some of the injustices in the court. but he at a turnaround if peloquin needed to come forward. and he did did so with a letter to the supreme court justice

sharing that allegation back in july. cracks about a face of the name he testified at house judiciary committee hearing recently about these issues. here's some of what he had to say in his testimony. cracks operation higher court involved recruitment of wealthy donors in a stealthy missionaries who befriended justices that shared our conservative, social, and religious sensibilities. in this way i aim to show these justices that americans supported them and thanked god for their presence on the court and the opinions they rendered. our overarching goals were to gain insights into the conservative justices thinking and to shore up their resolve to render solid unapologetic opinions, particularly against abortion. i call this our ministry of emboldened mints. it was not an attempt to change minds beyond small talk our

missionaries did not engage liberal members of the court. my recruits for operation higher court were older, highly accomplished and independently minded. they did not take kindly being told where to go, what to do or how to do it. successfully deploying them require their autonomy. i didn't suggest tactics to cultivate a fitted tea but otherwise our folks were on their own. most of them limited their support to regular prayers on behalf of the justices family, warm personal greetings assurances of goodwill about social functions and sending greeting cards and special occasions. but they might also host a justices or for restaurants that the private clubs or homes and sometimes the justices reciprocated. a hobby lobby leak resulted from one of these arrangements. next reverend robert last week

about house judiciary committee on the conservative justices on the court of the court in general responded to those allegations? >> yes justice did flatly deny the allegation he leaked the decision back in 2015 from the legal counsel for the court reiterated that refusal. unlike the case of the leak in dobbs, this signature abortion case that came up earlier this year, the chief justice to my knowledge has not responded directly when his these allegations appeared the chief justice's direct and partial of the court to conduct a significant and into the origins of the leak. we have heard almost nothing since then.

cracks coming back to that hearing before the judiciary committee california republican darrell issa defending the integrity of the court amid those allegations that we just heard from the reverend robert shank. here's a little bit more from that hearing. court sitting in this body with all of the rules that we know what to add to the court, some of which i support. but all of those rules do not change the fact that on balance the court has been calm and i suspect will continue to be a group of individuals, nine at the top over six and article three judges and countless more article one judges. for the most part deserve the public confidence of the american people that the vast majority of them all the time and endeavor to do the right and honorable and ethical thing.

it does us no good today to look at legislation by denigrating another body. the facts are there have been mistakes, perhaps even lapses of judgment and this body has on occasion had to remove a federal judge. that does not change the fact that although they are human beings and we should do everything we can to promote greater confidence we gain very little by implying this is a bought and paid for organization or their ethics which were very, very high in everyone's mind on the other side of the aisle when they decided with them on an issue or two is suddenly fraught with unfair influence when they do not like one or two of the last decisions. doctor puck and calvert congressman darrell issa at that

judiciary committee hearing last week. with the center for american progress to talk about supreme court ethics this morning. do you think he use the term bought and paid for organization we should not be saying that is that important in the bought and paid for organization? >> i don't but i certainly see some troubling activity. what i say is the american people have some concerns. we are now sort of at the lowest point on record of the percentage of american adults who have a strongly supported review or a fair amount of support for the court. one other measure showed positive use dropped from 70% in 2020 to about 48% today for that's really troubling. the rule of law is foundational to our democracy in america. central to that is a perception of our judges can be fair and neutral arbiters and impartially

interpret the law. regardless of whether of the leak in the hobby lobby case ever occurred, the mere perception of impropriety really underscores a need to have a binding enforceable code of ethics that americans can rely on snow the justices really are above the fray. >> what would you advocate for, what should be added? click shore, is a great question but there's a code of conduct for all the other judges in united states it does not apply to the supreme court. that would be a first step. i don't have to go a little further there would have to be some way of enforcing such a code in making a binding on justices. that would be a first step. the second would really have a binding recusal requirement such that when there are cases for which there either is some conflict of interest or a significant perception of

conflict of interest to justices would have to recuse. third they be really clear and binding rules around gifts and travel. we know somebody justices on the court to accept outside paid travel. this is both the size of justices appointed by democrats and republicans who know you're going to be at those events and sponsoring some of those events. we just want to make sure there's no perception of impropriety or conflict of interest per. >> with us to the bottom of the hour for this conversation. we invite your should join as well republican (202)748-8001 per democrat (202)748-8000. independence (202)748-8002. when already calls for you, the call isn't stafford shower county england this morning: from over over the pond, paul good morning. >> good morning how are you this morning?

the supreme court before do you think? can it be performed? >> i remain somewhat optimistic. we have seen over the past couple of years and members on both sides of the aisle talk about some kinds of ethics reforms. in looking back in the last couple years seen senator lindsey graham a republican who is been interested in certain kinds of financial disclosure for the justices. senator kennedy from louisiana similarly has an interest. the democrats might also suggest that. ethics reform is always hard to get done. but i think some the allegations that have come out really bring this to a head. and to suggest a time is right for congress to add asked. implies the justices are weaker and the rules apply to congress

for it should be much more comparable. oklahoma city, oklahoma this is mark and independent morning. >> good morning. how are you?

mr. schumer: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the quorum be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without

objection. mr. schumer: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: madam president, i ask that the chair lay before the senate the message to accompany h.r. 7776. the presiding officer: the chair lays before the senate the following message. the clerk: resolved that the house agree to the amendment to senate to the the bill h.r. 7776 to provide improvement to the rivers an harbors of the united states and so forth and for other purposes with an amendment. mr. schumer: i move to concur in the house amendment to the senate amendment, and i ask for the yeas and nays on the motion it to concur. the presiding officer: is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the yeas and nays are ordered. mr. schumer: madam president, i move to concur on the house

amendment with an amendment 6513, which is at the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: senator from new york, mr. schumer, moves to concur in the house amendment to the senate amendment to h.r. 776, with an amendment numbered 6513. mr. schumer: i ask further reading be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i ask for the yeas and nays on the motion to concur with amendment. the presiding officer: is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the yeas and nays are ordered. mr. schumer: i have an amendment to amendment 6513, which is at the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: the senator from new york, mr. schumer, proposes an amendment 6515 to amendment numbered 6513. mr. schumer: i ask that further reading be dins spenced with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i move to the --

with an amendment 6516. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: the senator from new york, mr. schumer, moves to refer the bill to the armed services committee with instructions to report back are forthwith with an amendment numbered 6516. mr. schumer: i ask that further reading be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i ask for the yeas and nays on my motion. the presiding officer: is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the dwrains are order -- the yeas and nays are ordered. mr. schumer: i have an amendment to the instructions which is at the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: the senator from new york, mr. schumer, proposes an amendment numbered 6517 to the instructions of the motion to infer. mr. schumer: i ask for the yeas and nays. the presiding officer: is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the yeas and nays are ordered. mr. schumer: i have an amendment

to 6517 which is at the desk are. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the senator from new york proposes amendment numbered 65188 to 6517. mr. schumer: i ask further reading be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i ask at a time to be determined by the diswroorl in consultation with the republican leader, the senate consider calendar number 1053 so to be -- to the organization of american states, that there be ten minutes of debate equally divided in the usual form, upon the use or yielding back of time the senate vote intervening action or debate on the nomination, that if the nomination is confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, and the president be immediately notified of the senate's actions and the senate then resume legislative session. the presiding officer: without objection. so ordered. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed

to executive session to consider the following nominations en bloc. 977, 1106. 1113, 1119, 1257, 1261, 1262, 1263, 1266, 1267, 1268, 1269, 1270, and 1272, that the senate vote on the nominations en bloc without intervening action or debate, the motions to be considered be considered and made on -- and laid on the table, the:be immediately notified of the senate's action and the senate resume legislative session. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. the question occurs on the nominations en bloc. all in all those in favor say eye. all opposed no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nominations are confirmed en bloc. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to executive session and the senate environment and public

work committee be discharged from further consideration of p.n.2402 and 2249, that the senate proceed to their nomination en bloc, consideration and vote without intervening action or debate, that if confirmed, the motion to be considered be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate, and the president be immediately notified of the senate's action and the senate resume legislative session. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. the question occurs on the nomination en bloc. all in all those in favor say eye. all opposed no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nominations are confirmed en bloc. mr. schumer: madam president, i have nine requests for committees to meet during today's session of the senate. they have the approval of the majority and minority leaders. the presiding officer: duly noted. mr. schumer: madam president, i ask the chair lay before the senate the message to accompany

s. 1698 -- 198. the presiding officer: the chair lays before the senate the following message from the house. the clerk: resolve that the bill from the senate s. 198 entitled an act to require the federal communications commission to incorporate data and so forth do pass with an amendment. mr. schumer: i move to concur on the house amendment and i ask unanimous consent that the motion be agreed to and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that the judiciary committee be discharged from further consideration of s. 4926 and the senate proceed to its immediate consideration. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: s. 4926, a bill to amend chapter 33 of title 28 united states code and so forth. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding to the measure? without objection. the committee is discharged and the senate will proceed. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous

consent that the cornyn substitute amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to, the bill as amended be considered read a third time and passed, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the judiciary committee be discharged from further consideration of s. 5006 and the senate proceed to its immediate consideration. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: s. 5006, a bill to designate the month of september as african heritage month. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding? without objection, the committee is discharged and the senate will proceed. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent that the bill be considered read a third time and passioned, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to the consideration of s. res. 869 submitted earlier

today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: senate resolution 869, commending and congratulating the portland thorns football club on winning the 2022 national women's soccer league championship. mr. schumer: might i add parenthetically, syracuse won the men's championship. and now resume. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding this to measure? without objection, the senate will proceed. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to the consideration of senate res. 870, submitted earlier today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: senate resolution 870, honoring the life and legacy of secretary ash carter.

the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding to the measure? without objection. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: madam president, i understand there's a bill at the desk, and i ask for its first reading. the presiding officer: the clerk will read the title of the bill for the first time. the clerk: s. 5244, a bill making continuing appropriations for fiscal year 2023, extending various health programs, and for other purposes. mr. schumer: i now ask for a second reading, and in order to place the bill on the calendar under the provisions of rule 14, i object to my own request. the presiding officer: objection is heard. the bill will receive its second reading on the next ledges

lative day. mr. schumer: madam president, finally, i ask unanimous consent that when the senate completes its business today it adjourn until 10:00 a.m., wednesday, december 14, and following the prayer and pledge the morning hour be deemed expired, the journal of proceedings approved to date, the time for the two leaders reserved for their use later in the day and morning business be closed. that upon the conclusion of morning business, the senate proceed to consideration of calendars 640, s.j. res. 60. at 12:00 noon the senate vote on passage of the joint resolution. upon disposition of the joint resolution, the senate proceed to executive session to considee consideration of executive calendar number 1053, francisco mora, that the senate vote on confirmation of the mora nomination at 5:00 p.m. if any nominations are confirmed during wednesday's session, the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and and the president will be immediately notified of the senate's actions. the presiding officer: without

objection, so ordered. mr. schumer: if there is no further business to come before the senate, i ask that it stand adjourned under the previous -- under the provisions of s. res. 870. the presiding officer: under the previous order and pursuant to s. res. 870, the senate stands adjourned until wednesday, december 14, and does so as a further mark of respect for the preorder your copy of theor the

congressional director for the 118th congress. it is your access to the federal government with a bio and contact information for every house and senate member important information for congressional committees, federal agencies and state governors. scan the code at the right to order your copy today it is $20.95 plus shipping and handling. every purchase helps support the nonprofit operation cspanshop.org. >> a couple of weeks ago the conservative heritage foundation publishes 2023 index of u.s. military strength for the study concluded the current u.s. military place at significant risk of not being able to meet the demands of a single major retail conflicts. we discussed the index findings with the editor, dakota wood. who wanted another point of view on the military posture. this longtime observer and

critic of the u.s. military procurement process to talk with us. he spent 40 plus years working on national security defense budget and military reform from both political parties, the government accountability office and the center for defense information per. >> winslow wheeler on this episode of book notes ps. book notes a plus is aille on that free mobile app or were ever you get your podcast. c-span now is a free mobile app featuring your unfiltered view of what is happening in washington live in on demand. keep up with today's biggest events with live streams of floor proceedings and hearings term u.s. congress, white house events, the courts, campaigns and more from the world of politics. all at your fingertips but helps to stay current with the latest episodes of "washington journal" and find scheduling information for c-span tv networks and