why youhe hearing conversation about some of these unusual unconventional unviable third options things like the 14th amendment. >> host: osgood asked you. i was late last week the president floated that treasury secretary yellen was asked about on sunday. what's the white house position currently on the side of using the amendment? you may want to explained thr our audience. >> guest: these are questions if they get to the point where they set okay where going to default tomorrow, there is no deal, even if we want to make what you wouldn't get through in time, what do we do? these are in case of emergency break last options and all of them are pretty much guaranteed to end up in court. one is a 14th amendment which essentially a theory is the president, it's unconstitutional, ignored, start going around it. that would be mitigated. minting the coin is sort of a trendier more recent thing. that would basically beth the treasury department printing $1a

trillion dollar coin, depositing it t and buying some runway. there are other options republicans to do with 12 years ago when we were in similar situation such ason privatizatin which is treasury picking andpr choosing what he can pay and what it won't pay to try to buy more time. that one is pretty difficult.wi people like -- >> we will leave this year to keep her over for your commitment to live gavel to gavel coverage of the u.s. senate. today on capitol hill senate lawmakers continue work on the president executive nominees. at 5:30 p.m. eastern lawmakers are expected to vote to advance the nomination of a u.s. alternate executive director of the international bank for reconstruction and development. off the floor at 4 p.m. eastern congressional leaders plan to meet with president biden at the white house to discuss the federal debt limit. and nowbl live to the floor of e u.s. senate here on c-span2.

the chaplain: let us pray. o holy god, who has taught us to place our confidence in you, give the members of this body the power of your wisdom. in all their duties, empower them to be loyal to you and obedient to your precepts. although violence, chaos, and turbulence seem to prevail in our land, give lead them into the paths of

loving service, as they strive to hondor you. open their eyes to the many things they can do to accomplish your will. we pray in your great name. amen. the presiding officer: lead them i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the presiding officer: the clerk will read a communication to the senate.

the clerk: washington, d.c, may 9, 2023. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable peter welch, a senator from the state of vermont, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: patty murray, president pro tempore. pliew under the previous order, the leadership time is -- the presiding officer: under the previous order, the previous order, leadership time is closed, under the previous order, the senate will resume consideration of the following nomination, which the clerk will report. the clerk: nomination, international bank for the reconstruction and development, l. felice gorordo, of florida, to be united states alternate executive director of the international bank.

mr. mcconnell: mr. president. the presiding officer: the republican leader. mr. mcconnell: seven of the last ten debt limit increases were attached to bipartisan government spending deals.

all three of the debt limit increases from 2017 through 2020 were attached to bipartisan government spending deals. so there's no reason why our country should be drifting toward crisis. the solution is clear. it's been clear for months. president biden needs to negotiate on spending with speaker mccarthy. the speaker's been at the table since february. house republicans are the only people in town who have passed any bill that prevents default. president biden has been m.i.a.

house and senate democrats have no plan, no proposal, they have no bill to raise the debt ceiling that could pass either the house or the senate, let alone both. so the choice is president biden's. either he drives the country into default or he comes to the table. four years ago in 2019, the roles were reversed. republicans held the white house. democrats held the house. i was the majority leader. my advice to the president then was the same as my advice to the president now. raise the debt limit by negotiating spending levels with the speaker.

that administration listened. they sent secretary mnuchin to hammer out a deal with speaker pelosi. they struck a compromise. spending levels were set and the debt limit was raised. that's what a responsible senate majority leader would be telling the biden white house today. sit down with the speaker, strike a deal. any compromise flushed out by the republican house and the democratic white house will pass the senate easily. so president biden's actions will either prevent default or guarantee default. it's just that simple. it's up to the president. either president biden causes an economic disaster of his own creation or he picks up the 2019

playbook and negotiates with speaker mccarthy. everybody knows this is on president biden. rank and file house and senate democrats have publicly called on the white house to negotiate. "the washington post" -- "the washington post" ran an entire editorial entitled, it's time for biden to call mccarthy. last week an entire news story detailed how the white house is garnering no support from nonpartisan leaders or experts for their bizarre strategy of sleepwalking into disaster. the people around president biden, including the senate democratic leader, seem to think they can wish away the results of the midterm election. they want to pretend the american people didn't flip the house.

that's not how it works. in divided government, you negotiate. the president and the speaker need to talk just like in 2019. we need a bipartisan spending agreement just like seven the -- seven of the previous den debt limit deals. i'll be -- debt limit deals. i'll be at the white house today and will continue to support the speaker. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

>> the u.s. capitol is caitlin emmett, budget and appropriation matters for politico, here to the talk about the congress' perspective on today's meeting. good morning. >> guest: good morning. >> host: what's the mood on congress as far as today? >> guest: i think everybody is waiting to just see if any movement comes out of this meeting at all with the white house this afternoon president joe biden is expected to meet with the top four congressional leaders at 4 p.m. up until now, the white house has flat out refused to negotiate over the debt ceiling, insisting on a so-called clean debt ceiling hike while republicans have been demanding a number of different spending concessions, and both sides have been if in a total deadlock.

everybody's just sort of waiting to see if the stalemate can break, if there's any kind of movement at all, just basically waiting to see what the next step forward is because these folks, the president hasn't met with mccarthy since february. so this is the first time in a long time that we've seen any action on this front, and everybody's just kind of waiting to see if anything comes of it at all. >> host: if something does come forward, the leaders have to convince their majority to go along. talk about the house in that regard. if anything came forward, where is the house as far as supporting speaker mccarthy on some path forward? >> guest: right. speaker mccarthy has a very difficult path forward when it comes to appeasing his conference with some kind of deal. essentially, he has maybe about 4 votes to the lose if everybody is present. so he managedded to pass a debt ceiling package the other week narrowly. it squeaked through the house.

that package would have raised the debt ceiling by $1.5 trillion through march 2024. it -- whichever comes first. it also would have cut $130 billion in discretionary spending next fiscal year which is a tremendous amount of money. it would have tightened work requirements for federal programs. this package barely got through the house. there was a lot of last minute haggling, negotiating, there were some last minute changes. you have freedom caucus members who want to go even farther, who say that this bill should just be a floor. so he's got a really difficult job on his hands when it comes to appeasing every single republican, moderates, you know, hard-line conservatives, a number of different factions there. ..

quietly calling for negotiations of the white house. senator manchin for statement saying president needs to negotiate, speaker mccarthy and democrats have been in lockstep with the white house saying that and they are not part not going to negotiate, it's something that should be waived, he should not be be holding issue hostage so we seen senator manchin say they are negotiating and sinema

has been quietly having dinner with speaker mccarthy expressing support for a deal so democrats are largely in lockstep and departure from the left party and a number of issues have shown issues from the. >> senator lee from utah, as far as supporting the house. >> we sell this of the weekend with 43 republicans said that they are going to support a clean debt ceiling increase so this included gop leader mitch mcconnell which is notable because senator mcconnell to be involved in these negotiations over and over again any deal has to come speaker mccarthy and president biden and notable to have that united had speaker

mccarthy like this because they haven't seen this on a number of issues but when it comes to the debt limit, there's only a few more weeks to negotiate some kind of deal. right now we are seeing no willingness from for publicans to step in they are reporting clean debt limit increase. >> you have a story supporting another group to look at that. tell people what was discovered. >> a think tank that specializes in the treasury department pay the bills anymore expects between early june and early august. this is in line with what we are seeing other independent forecasters and we have this problem of not knowing whether treasury department can make it past june 15. there depending on federal cash flow and subject to a lot of change so the treasury

department can make it to june 15, then they come in through the end of june about $145 billion these measures help treasury department keep borrowing for a few more weeks and we push the crisis july or august of the latest but know it is sure treasury can make to be in june so as the uncertain factor here and whether or not congress is a genuine debt ceiling crisis on the hand. in just a few weeks or if you have several weeks to figure it out. >> it's interesting about their being presented to members of congress. i want to say -- but maybe not in the way you think they would. can you explain that? >> there are a number of factors

at play. congress can move extremely quickly and want to so often things like this happen very last minute. if it happened previously your prior, something comes together last minute and we are looking at a couple days out so i would expect any agreement to come together last minute so it doesn't benefit either side panicking or expand short-term expansion or anything like that. i expect that to continue until there's some sort of panic or financial markets forgetful or something. >> how many working days of congress have resulted in this? >> very few. house and senate different recesses scheduled for next week. the president traveled to their

only a handful of days for both in session to figure this out. there are always options on the table canceling travelers or something like that and congress could move quickly when it wants to and i expect that as well but time is running out and it's unclear whether or not we have a crisis on our hands june 1 door the rest of the summer to think about it. >> one of those judges writing about a discharge position from the house democrat, can you explain how that works and how it would factor into this session? >> minority leader jeffries a few weeks ago said a letter to his colleagues say he was preparing a petition, essentially an interesting procedural maneuver, the debt ceiling increase but at the same

time it will require support for house republicans. they will need to be 218 votes for that. i would expect democrats to not have that. senator schumer and they are preparing these plans at the moment but both sides are very duncan. now missing moderate republicans saying there's something we need to start considering. does benefit others had but the petition is one option on a clean debt ceiling in the house and would require republicans support and could take a long time, it's not an option considered easy but it is an option. >> to me what you're watching out for an who's watching.

>> i think we have to watch the white house for one to see if they're willing to engageable on spending negotiations. up until now biden administration said they hope to talk about government funding separately on negotiations. the want any kind of spending cut or spending cap to the debt ceiling. it's worth noting the changes. the white house is in a position -- uorum be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to legislative session. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all in favor say aye. all opposed no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar number 4. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion.

all in favor say aye. all opposed no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary, bradley n. garcia of maryland to be united states circuit judge for the district of columbia circuit. mr. schumer: i send a cloture motion to the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: cloture motion. we, the undersigned senators in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the nomination of executive calendar number 4, bradley n. garcia of maryland to be united states circuit judge for the district of columbia circuit signed by 18 senators as follows. mr. schumer: i ask consent the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent that the mandatory quorum call for the cloture motion filed today, may 9, be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call: a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. mrs. blackburn: thank you, mr. president. are we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: yes. mrs. blackburn: i ask that we dispense with the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mrs. blackburn: thank you, mr. president. on may 4, 2019, 15-year-old mason beauregard died after

trying to mimic a choking challenge he saw on social media. three days earlier, his parents had found him unconscious in his room with a belt around his neck. there was nothing his doctors could do over that three-day period to save his life. i'm telling mason's story today with the permission of his mother because it's so different from other stories. i've shared a lot of these stories about the dangerous influence that online platforms have on our nation's children. there's no evidence to suggest mason was trying to hurt himself. this death was an accident. we know this because after mason died, his parents found a self-recorded video on his phone that had happened days prior to the accident. it shows him attempting the same viral challenge that killed him.

earlier this year i had the opportunity to speak with mason's mom joanne. we spoke about what she is doing to warn other patients and other parents about what's happening with these plas forms. -- platforms. even before she lost her son, joanne knew about the dangers social media could bring into her home and she did everything in her power to protect her children from it. she used watchdog's apps, physically checked their devices and had candid conversations with the whole family about how dangerous content can be when it is popping up in your news feed. at this point i want to share what joanne told me about her efforts to make online platforms keep their promises about moderating and removing dangerous content like choking challenges. and i'm quoting joanne.

shortly after mason's death, i began searching for choking challenge videos on all the platforms. i searched for them weekly and i've reported hundreds, but the typical reply that i've -- that i receive if i receive a reply at all is, and she quotes the social media platforms. we found that the reported content doesn't violate our community guidelines. we understand that you may not want to see this type content and you have the option to block the content that's posted. end quote. she went on to tell me that there was no process for an appeal, no way to push for answers from these so-called moderators. the videos state online. i would remind my colleagues that the response she is describing was generated after she reported videos of children

strangling themselves in order to get clicks. this is one woman's story about one precious child, her child, who died because an online platform, a social media platform, failed him. but thousands of parents could tell you similar stories about how their children got caught up in viral trends or emotionally spiraled after encountering content that preyed upon their insecurities. and while we know that social media isn't the only cause of this decline in mental health, we do know that things have gotten much worse since kids started spending so much time online. according to the pew institute, close to 60% of our nation's youth have experienced some form of abuse online.

it's safe to assume that many have been exposed to content. between 2010 and 2019, teen depression rates doubled with the largest increase among girls. the cdc recently produced data showing that adolescents are now the most likely age group to visit the emergency room for suicidal thoughts with nearly one in three teen girls seriously considering attempting suicide. before the rise of social suicide by young people had stabilized and declined for decades. now it's the third leading cause of death for americans between the ages of 15 and 24. the consumer protection subcommittee where i serve has produced five hearings worth of evidence showing that harmful content is readily available to minors that online platforms are

aware of this and that they have made the conscious decision to ignore it. think about that. they have proven time and again that they will not follow through on their commitment to moderate harmful content unless they are forced to do so. so, mr. president, i think it is time that we force them to take action. it's going to be a long road and i'm going to be blunt when it comes to putting guard rails on the silicon valley, there are a million different ways to get it wrong,jenniferósb-20icap@svc10os learned some valuable lessons. and now we know how to fix the problem instead of just putting about an expensive band-aid on that problem. first, i'm all for encouraging innovacation, but let's be clear. -- innovation, but let's be

clear. the motto, move fast and break things, has a costers and we don't want that cost to be imposed on our children. we know that big tech will never hold themselves accountable to any acceptable safety standard. the creation of safety by design and the resulting accountability should be our goal. second, we want to make sure that the safety standards don't allow these companies to take their hands off the wheel once certain requirements are met. verifying a user's age or obtaining parental consent for minors to use a platform, that's important. but it will not stop children frommest going bombarded -- from getting bombarded with dangerous content once they're online. and finally, legislation should not simply spread the burden of spreading this content onto the parents. this is precisely what big tech companies have been doing for years, and it is not working.

parents want to be involved, but they cannot protect their children if the platforms keep moving the goalpost to protect their business models. unfortunately, when our children are on these platforms, our children are the product. these platforms data mine our children, then they market that data. we've seen proposal after proposal fail, but after years of talking to parents and tech companies and policy experts, we finally have the opportunity to support a bill that does get it right. last week senator blumenthal and i reintroduced the kids online safety act. as of today, this bill has 33 bipartisan cosponsors, and the endorsement of hundreds of bipartisan organizations because it does exactly what moms like

joann beauregard and other advocates have been asking congress to do. first, it would force platforms to give families the ability to protect minors' information, disable addictive product features, and opt out of algorithmic recommendation. it would give parents the safeguards to protect their kids online as well as a dedicated portal to report harmful behavior, predatory content, and content that promotes self-harm, suicide, eating disorders, all of this that causes problems for our kids would become a problem that the platforms have to deal with. no march denial, no more deflection. we also included requirements for annual risk assessments and access to data sets we can use to assess safety threats to underage users. this is a very straightforward bill, mr. president.

it won't hinder innovation. it won't allow platforms to take their hands off the wheel, and it won't put the burden on parents to try to figure out how in the world to control the access their children have to this harmful content. our children are exposed to things in the virtual space that we would never allow them to be exposed to in the physical space. over the past few years, we've heard pundit after armchair pundit insist that it's time to treat our kids like grown-ups, but our children are a dults. and it is our responsibility to protect them so that one day they'll have the opportunity to be grown-ups. our children are being exposed to things that no reasonable parent would ever allow their child to know about these things.

and if there's one thing we've learned during our hearings with the consumer protection subcommittee, it's that simply encouraging more supervision is not enough. a high-tech permission slip just isn't going to cut it. if we want to keep kids safe online, we have to demand real accountability from these big-tech social media platforms. last congress the kids online safety act passed out of the commerce committee 28-0. that's right, unanimous support. i would ask my colleagues on each side of the aisle to join me and senator blumenthal in calling for a vote so that we can finally push this bill across the finish line and provide parents the toolbox they need to protect their children from the harms in the virtual media. i yield the floor.

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

quorum call:

quorum call:

>> seven of the last ten debt limit increases were attached to bipartisan government spending deals. all three debt limit increases from 2017 through 2020 were attached to bipartisan government spending deals so there's no reason why our

country should work crisis. the solution is clear and it's been there for months. president biden needs to negotiate spending to speaker mccarthy. the speaker has been at the table since february. house republicans all the only people in town who past any bill that prevents default. president biden has been mia. there's no plan, no proposal and no deal to raise the debt ceiling to pass the house or the senate let alone both. so the choice is president biden's.

either drives the country into default or he comes to the table. four years ago in 2019, the roles were reversed. republicans of the white house and democrats held the house. i was the majority leader. i asked the president then to the president now, raise the debt limit by negotiating spending limits. the administration listened, they sent secretary mnuchin to hammer out the deal, speaker pelosi and struck compromise, spending levels were set and the debt limit was raised. that's what a responsible senate

majority leader would be telling about my house today. told the speaker to strike a deal. any compromise pushed out by the war republican house and democratic white house will pass the senate easily so president biden's actions will either prevent default or guarantee default. it's that simple. it's up to the president. either president biden causes economic disaster or picks up the 2019 book and negotiate with speaker mccarthy. everybody knows this is on president biden. rank-and-file house and senate democrats to the white house to negotiate. the washington post kevin

mccarthy. last week an entire retailing no support, nonpartisan leaders with their bizarre strategy of sleepwalking into disaster. the senate democrat leader and taking way the results of the midterm election. want to pretend the american people didn't take the house, that's not how it works. a divided government needs to negotiate. president and the speaker need to talk just like 2019 we needed bipartisan spending agreement, just like the previous debt

limit deal. support the speaker.

quorum call. quorum call:

mr. cornyn: mr. president. the presiding officer: the republican whip. mr. cornyn: i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. cornyn: mr. president, it's been a rough weekend in texas. last weekend, we -- tragedy struck the city of allen, texas, and a driver in brownsville, drove into a group of migrants, killing a number of he'll them and injuring others. in both cases, the dints are

still being investigated. but on a beautiful afternoon, people of all ages visited a mall in dallas. shoppers filtered in and out of stores with their children and enjoying what appeared to be a normal weekend. but as we know now the day took a tragic turn when a man drove up to a crowded shopping mall and got out of his car with a gun and began firing. shoppers ducked behind cars, ran into stores, customers crowded into tiny storage rooms, parents used their own bodies to protect their children. the shooter murdered eight innocent people and wounded seven others before being killed himself by police. the victims were between the ages of 3 and 37. a patch on the shooter's

clothing and social media posts suggest he may have espoused white supremacist and other extremist views. as i said, law enforcement is still gathering information about him and his motives. but what we know so far is that he was discharged from the army prematurely do to mental health reasons but it's unclear if that discharge or any other factors would have legally disqualified him from purchasing a firearm. obviously a dishonorable discharge, a felony conviction, those sorts of things would result in your being prohibited under existing law from purchasing a firearm. but we don't know whether there are other circumstances beyond his premature discharge from the army after only three months due to mental health reasons rises to the level necessary to invoke

one of those disqualifying actions. so at this moment there's still a lot we don't know. and of course at times like this, we are all trying to make sense of this unspeakable tragedy. obviously i'm eager to learn more about the circumstances that led to this attack. but one thing is for sure and that is local law enforcement officials leading this investigation and searching for answers have already done heroic work thanks to a allen police department officer who was at the mall who was able for other reasons was able to respond quickly and neutralize the shooter. but for that police officer, many others would have been injured and die. so i am grateful to the police officers, the emergency medical technicians and health care workers who responded to this

tragedy. as i said, especially the heroic officer who responded to the gunfire and immediately ran toward the danger. the shooter was carrying multiple weapons and had five additional guns in his car. if not for the quick action of that police officer, there's no question that even more families would be grieving today. i've spoken to local officials who are responding to this crisis including mayor ken folk and police chief brian harvey. i offered any condolences and whatever help we might be able to provide, whatever assistance we can provide. one of the things chief harvey told me that he particularly appreciated is the fbi had come forward with crime victim services, a number of fbi agents providing those -- that assistance to the victims of this terrible shooting which relieves a lot of the pressure

on this local police department. and of course the fbi is now taking the lead in the investigation supported by texas rangers, the department of public safety, and of course the allen police department. so today i join all texans in grieving for this senseless tragedy. we mourn the eight lives that were stolen and lift up the survivors who will never forget the horror they endured that day. i know, mr. president, because i have been part of negotiations over the last few years involving the so-called fix nix legislation. senator murphy and i took the lead on that bill to try to fix gaps in the background section. the one area between those we ought to ban some types of weapons even for law-abiding

citizens, the one area we can agree on is that people with criminal records and people who are mentally ill should not be able to purchase firearms. and that's simply enforcing current law. so we were able to do something in the fix nix bill a couple of years back. i think it was 2018 now, that i believe met my test for whether we should do legislation like that. and that is, will it save lives and i believe it has. more recently we passed the bipartisan safety communities act. it's so new that it's only now being implemented. this bill did of course a number of things. it provided for an enhanced background check for gun purchasers between the age of 18 and 21. the reason why that age group is so important is because the profile of many of these disaffected young men who were

obviously suffering from severe mental illness who are so tortured that they not only want to commit suicide, they want to take other people with them, that cohort, that group of young purchasers i believe we needed to go back and look at some of the juvenile records for mental health ajudications, for criminal convictions. these are the sorts of things that if you'd been an adult would disqualify you and you would not be able to purchase a firearm under existing law. but in uvalde texas, salvador ramos turned 18 years old and even though everybody in the neighborhood knew he was a ticking time bomb, he tortured animals, posted threats on social media, he shot his own grandmother who insisted he go back to school after a long absence due to covid restrictions.

he was able to purchase firearms without revealing anything about his iewf nil record, without consulting with the local police who knew him well. that's all changed by the bipartisan safer communities act and the most recent tally i saw from the fbi, approximately a hundred different purchases had been intercepted for individuals between the age of 18 and 21 who had disqualifying juvenile records that are now being queried as a result of that bill. but the other parts of it that are so important is we made the single, largest investment in mental and community-based mental health care in american history in that bill. we were able to find an offset so it didn't involve spending new money, but it was literally billions of dollars in investment so more communities can have locally-based community

health services because, frankly, this is -- there's too many people falling through that net. the net doesn't really even exist. and we also made sure that our schools provided more comprehensive services. part of the problem, though, is there's more demand for mental health counseling and treatment is there's not enough people qualified to provide those sorts of services. so this is a huge problem. the bill provided grants and incentives to educational institutions so more people would train in those areas. so there would be more resources available for people suffering from psychological stress or even mental illness so that they can hopefully get better and become productive members of society. i know at times like this people say well, we need to do something. twice in recent history the united states congress has come together on a bipartisan basis

to do something that meets that test i mentioned a moment ago. will it save lives? and i believe in both instances the legislation we passed that was signed by the president will save lives. but of course then we see what happened in allen and we wonder what else is there? i mentioned the fact that these mass shooters not only are they taking the lives of innocent people, they are essentially committing suicide themselves. they know they're not going to make it out of here alive. and there's this phenomenon that i learned from law enforcement called suicide by cop where actually mentally ill individuals who are unwilling to take their own life will encounter the police, a violent encounter which results in their loss of life which sefntionly is their way of committing suicide. i believe these mass shootings -- essentially is their way of committing suicide. i believe these mass shootings

are a form of suicide because the shooters know they're not going to make their way out of it. tragically they not only take their own life, they take the life of innocent others. we grieve with all the families and the entire community in and around allen texas as we do each time one of these incidents occurs. and we'll continue to look for ways we can find solutions to this sort of violence but eventually or ultimately i believe what we're talking about are crimes that while we can investigate crimes, we can prosecute crimes. we can punish crime. we can even deter crime. but we haven't yet figured a way to stop crime but hopefully there's more we can do. mr. president, on another matter, the president of the united states convened his first meeting of the four top congressional leaders to discuss the looming debt crisis.

a potential default has been on the horizon for months now and from the beginning, both sides, republicans and democrats, have said we believe the debt ceiling needs to be adegreed. -- needs to be addressed. republicans for their part have said we need to do what we've done before, and that is to couple a debt ceiling increase with spending reforms because you just can't keep maxing out your credit card and go back and ask that the credit card limits be increased without coming up with some plan to actually pay down the debt you incur. that's happened time and time again. i believe president biden when he was in the senate voted for that sort of coupling of spending reforms and debt ceiling increase. i think it was four times, if my memory serves me correctly. but never before is the national debt been the size it is now. of course, you can point to

covid-19. this was to my mind, sort of equivalent of a domestic world war iii, although it was a health care battle. and we had to do whatever we could to deal with it and we did. but that spending continued when president biden was in office with the democratic house and the senate and without any additional votes from republicans, after we'd done that together as we should do things in a bipartisan way if we can, democrats, including the president, added another $2.7 trillion to the national debt. and now the president takes the incredibly irresponsible position that i'm not going to negotiate. we just want to raise the debt ceiling. we don't want to talk about how we pay down that debt or any spending reforms. now, we all know the fact that

at $31.5 trillion, $31.7 trillion, we're on an unsustainable path. everybody knows that. and the debt ceiling is important because it forces us to do something we should do anyway, and that is have a serious conversation about our nation's spending habits, about congress' spending habits. well, the president biden announced this debt ceiling crisis that was looming and subject only to how much money was coming in the door in terms of tax revenue as to when the x date would hit. now we hear from the secretary of the treasury it's probably sometime in june. but instead of engaging back when the announcement was made, the president stuck his fingers in his ears and refused to even discuss any sort of negotiated

outcome. again, this is the party that spent more than $2.6 trillion by themselves. and now they're refusing to entertain any ideas or any suggestion that, yes, america has a spending problem. but we know it does. we know we do. and we know congress and the president are the only ones who can deal with it. well, to make matters worse, democrats in congress, including the president, have even attacked republicans for trying to act responsibly to deal with this debt ceiling. and to have the temerity to suggest that yes, there are some spending reforms that need to be coupled along with it. earlier this year the senate majority leader criticized house republicans' approach to the debt ceiling is hostage taking.

he described it as dangerous and destabilizing. but he failed to mention this was at the exact same approach he took several years ago. that's one thing i've learned about the senate. if you're around here long enough and if you're not careful, you're liable to find yourself on both sides of an issue. and look a little hypocritical in the process. so back in 2017 our country was in a similar position. united states hit the debt ceiling. the treasury department began using extraordinary measures to continue to pay the bills. and congress was racing the clock to avoid a default. at that point republicans held the majority in the senate and minority leader chuck schumer said the debt ceiling gave democrats leverage and bipartisan -- in bipartisan talks. he and then-speaker nancy pelosi strategically used a potential debt crisis to strengthen their hand in broader negotiations,

which is a pretty sharp contrast with senator schumer's position today. when he was the one trying to negotiate, the debt ceiling was fair game, as lex. but when it is house republicans who are being the responsible ones by initiating a proposal to raise the debt ceiling -- and i say negotiating a negotiation hopefully -- he says it is dangerous, it is destabilizing, it is hostage-taking. the hypocrisy is palpable. the problem with democrats' argument here isn't just rhetorical. it's also impractical. from the get-go, speaker mccarthy has made it absolutely clear that a clean debt increase will not pass the house. the votes are not there. plain and simple. now senate republicans have made it abundantly clear that a clean debt ceiling cannot pass the

senate. those are the facts. it won't pass the house, and it can't pass the senate. last week i joined 42 republican colleagues in affirming our support for the house's proposal to initiate a negotiation to raise the debt ceiling. we signed a letter to senator schumer that was led by my friend, senator lee of utah, saying we will not vote for cloture on any bill that raises the debt ceiling without substantive spending and budget reforms. we all know that in a chamber that requires 60 votes to move legislation, a united block of 43 senators means that it ain't going to happen. if senator schumer puts a clean debt ceiling increase on the floor, it will fail. it won't have the votes. and that's just a fact of life.

so the big question now is where does that leave us? i see two options. option one -- the senate can spend the next few weeks holding show votes on bills that are guaranteed to fail. democrats can waste even more time as our country inches closer and closer to a debt crisis, something both sides have said they want to avoid. or, second option -- the president can get off the sidelines and start negotiating with speaker mccarthy. so we can make progress on a bipartisan bill that will actually pass both chambers of commerce -- congress. i think we know what's going to happen. there has to be a negotiated outcome. the president can say i'm not going to negotiate. he will negotiate, if he wants to avoid economic catastrophe.

already the public is very anxious about the condition of our economy. inflation is at a 40-year high. it's come down a tad, but the federal reserve continues to raise interest rates, making everything more expensive. companies are laying off employees, particularly in the tech sector. people are worried. their cost of living has increased dramatically. i was having lunch with a friend of mine in austin, texas, yesterday who is a homebuilder, and he talked about the dramatic increase in the components of the homes that he builds, everything from lumber to air-conditioning to plumbing, you name it. everything is more expensive. so president biden will, contrary to his current position, he will negotiate. i am confident of that. but it seems like he is

committed to a soap opera in the meantime -- a lot of drama, a lot of wailing and gnashing of teenage, a lot of expectation that's going to -- of teeth, a lot of expectation that's going to rattle what the future may hold. this is really an unforced error by the president. it's time to accept the fact that a clean debt ceiling increase has no chance of becoming law. so the ball is in our democratic colleagues' court. i think president biden didn't think speaker mccarthy would be able to pull together the votes to pass a bill in the house, and he thought that gives me ultimate leverage, because the republicans in the house can't get it together, they're going to have no option but to deal with me on my terms. but speaker mccarthy and house republicans, i'm proud to say, were able to come up with a

reasonable bill that includes raising the debt ceiling. now, i understand president biden may say, well, i don't like that. there's parts of it i simply can't accept. but that's how negotiations get started, but not if the president of the united states, the leader of the free world, is sitting on his couch waiting for the american people to become more and more anxious about their future, including the future of the economy and their jobs. last month the house passed a bill to avert a debt crisis, and it's now the democrats' turn to respond. that's negotiating 101. one side makes an offer and the other side counteroffers. each day our country is moving closer and closer to a debt default. president biden has wasted

months parroting the same ridiculous talking points, and now is not the time to double down on that tired rhetoric. it's time to start talking. and, again, it's not uncommon for debt limit increases to be coupled with broader negotiations. as i pointed out, senator schumer was a proponent that have back in 23017. he said at the time, the debt ceiling gives mother ample opportunity for bipartisan -- gives another ample opportunity for bipartisanship, not for one party jamming its choices down the throats of the other, close quote. i agree with senator schumer in 2017, and i disagree with chuck schumer in 2023 in his current position. so far democrats have blindly adhered to this position of no negotiations, no reforms. let's just keep on spending until we bankrupt this country. it's time to change course and to focus on solutions.

the art of the possible -- that's what we're here to do. we need to focus on solutions that can pass a republican-led house and a democrat-led senate. and that means speaker mccarthy and president biden need to talk, and more than that, they need to reach an agreement and to do so soon. it's time for president biden to respond to the house's offer with a reasonable counteroffer and to negotiate an end to this potential debt ceiling crisis. mr. president, i yield the floor. mr. kennedy: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana. can he can he thank you, mr. president. mr. president, i would ask unanimous consent -- mr. kennedy: thank you, mr. president. i would ask unanimous consent to use a prop or two during my remarks. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kennedy: mr. president, today i would like to talk about

a distasteful subject to me. i get angry whenever i think about it. fentanyl dealers. i hope there's a special place in hell for them. fentanyl dealers. today is national fentanyl awareness day. last year fentanyl -- or, actually, in 2021 fentanyl killed 71,000 americans. if you break down these sterile statistics, you'll see that somebody in our country dies from fentanyl poisoning every seven seconds. there ought to be a special place in hell for fentanyl dealers. and these are -- these aren't

just sterile statistics, mr. president. these are real people. and they have real families whose lives are torn apart. a lot of these deaths occur among young people. fentanyl is now the leading cause of death for americans who are 18 to 49. from 2020 to 2021, fentanyl deaths in our country increased by 24%. it was even more among young people. what you allow is what will continue. and today this body, the united states congress, allows fentanyl

dealers to carry on their person, if they would like to, enough fentanyl to kill 20,000 americans before they face a mandatory five-year minimum sentence, if they're caught. until these fentanyl dealers have to deal themselves with real consequences, i think the carnage is going to continue. i have a bill. it's called the fairness in fentanyl sentencing act of 2023. and it will change what i just talked about drastically. it will reduce the amount of fentanyl that a fentanyl dealer had a to possess -- has to possess before facing the mandatory minimum five years of

prison. now, mr. president, i know you know this, but when you're dealing with fentanyl, the amounts really matter. fentanyl is 50 times more potent than heroin. not five, not 15. 50 times more potent. it takes only two milligrams to kill you. here's a pencil. here's the point of a pencil. the amount of fentanyl you can put on the point of a pencil will kill you. let me say that again. the amount of fentanyl that you can put on the point of a pencil will kill you. today fentanyl dealers can carry up to 40 grams of fentanyl before they face the minimum five-year mandatory -- mandatory

minimum five years of prison. and with me today, mr. president, is my -- one of my colleagues, mr. wesley davis, who's also a good lawyer, i might add. this is 40 grams of fentanyl. it's not actually fentanyl. it's flour. but if the flour were fentanyl, this would be 40 grams. you can have this much -- you have to have this much before you get a minimum five-year sentence. and remember the pencil? enough to go on the head -- that goes on the head of a pencil can kill you. but you got to have this much -- i don't know howl pencil points -- how many pencil points this but it's a lot. you've got to have this much to get a minimum five-year sentence. 40 grams. it would kill 20,000 people.

it will kill -- this amount will kill every member of this body 200 times over. every member of this body, 200 times over. and, thanks to us and the laws that we pass, the fentanyl dealer would just get a minimum five-year sentence. now, this bag has 400 grams in it. it's flour, but fentanyl would represent the same thing. this has 400 grams. you have to have 400 grams, given the laws that we have passed, to face a mandatory ten-year sentence. 400 grams will kill 200,000

people, dead as a doornail. in shreveport, louisiana, in my state -- some of you have been there. if you haven't, you should visit -- is home to 184,000 people. so a dealer could have -- has to have 400 grams, an amount that would kill every man, woman, and child in shreveport -- 400 grams in order to get a mandatory ten-year sentence. these sentencing guidelines do not reflect how much damage can be done with just a little bit of fentanyl. for example, fentanyl dealers face the five-year mandatory sentence if they have five grams of amphetamine. here's my chart here. to get a minimum of five years

in prison, you have to have just five grams of methamphetamine, but you have to have 40 grams of fentanyl, which is 50 times more powerful than heroin. does that make any sense to anyone? meth's a bad drug. i'm not defending meth, but it's not nearly as lethal as fentanyl. this stuff will kill you, and peel deal -- and people deal with it every day in america. they deal it every day and they're not facing consequences. in 2021, in fact meth killed less than half as many people as fentanyl, yet fentanyl traffickers -- fentanyl dealersl

them traffickers because that sounds too vague to me. they're dealers, they're drug dealers, death dealers. fentanyl dealers can possess eight times as much fentanyl before they face the same sentence as somebody who's dealing met we need a sentencing scheme that looks like somebody designed the damned thing on purpose. we need to have a criminal code that reflects fentanyl's lethal force. my bill, the fairness in fentanyl fairness act in 2023, it's pretty simple. it will cut the fentanyl threshold for the five-year mandatory minimum sentence from 40 grams to 2 grams. from 40 grams to 2 grams. you're not going to have two grams of fentanyl on you unless you're dealing.

it would reduce the legal threshold for fentanyl analogues as well. fentanyl analogues, these are synthetic copycats of fentanyl, and actually they can be even more lethal than pure fentanyl themselves, these analogues. today if a dealer can carry up to ten grams of fentanyl analogues, today -- i should say a dealer can carry up to ten grams of fentanyl analogues before facing the five-year mandatory sentence. my bill would drop that threshold down to half a gram. by doing this, mr. president, my bill helps our criminal code reflect the reality that fentanyl is not like other drugs. it's not. i mean it's bad as -- as bad as meth is, as bad as pcp is, as bad as crack cocaine is, as bad

as heroin is, as bad as powder cocaine is, fentanyl is in a class by itself. the drug cartels who operate south of our border have found that fentanyl is a cheap way to cut corners and to make more money. they use fentanyl to make other drugs. they put fentanyl into cocaine. they put it into heroin, which makes the final concoction cheaper and more powerful. today everything from marijuana to add -- add deral can be laced with lethal fentanyl on the market. it gives the concoction more kick, and the drug dealers make

more money, which is all they care about. and if the drug dealers don't measure it right, it will kill you. now look, we all know that young people experiment, and many young people, i dare say most young people are going to try drugs. when my son, who i love more than life itself, was a youngster -- he's no longer young. well, he's young. i consider you and i young, mr. president. but when my son was growing up -- he's now a grown man -- i would lecture him about drugs. and i'd say don't use them. i knew he was going to try them. but i'd say don't use them. he'd say dad, why?

you get addicted. you get addicted. and i was always terrified that my son would get addicted, would fall into the wrong crowd. that conversation today is different for parents with young teenagers. now it's you can't even try it once. not fentanyl. you can't even try lsd or meth or pcp or crack cocaine or heroin or powder cocaine. you knowhy? because it might have fentanyl in it. the drug dealers, the drug dealers cut these products with fentanyl. and if they put too much in it, you get one shot. one shot. forget addiction. the first time a young person experiments might be the last. now my state of louisiana, like

every other state in this country, has seen the carnage of fentanyl. we all have. in 2021, 94% of drug overdose deaths in new orleans were related to what? fentanyl. in louisiana, we call our counties parishes. our coroner's office in east baton rouge investigated 300 overdose deaths. 88% of them last year were linked to fentanyl. in the average month in saint tammany parish or county, where i live, we lose 10 or 11 people just about every month. ten or 11 young people usually to fentanyl overdoses. and why? these weren't people just taking fentanyl. these are people taking other drugs that drug dealers, each of whom should be assigned a

special place in hell, other dealers are cutting with fentanyl to give the concoction more, a higher high, to make more money. and if they measure wrong and put too much fentanyl in it, you get to try their product one time, and then you're dead. these are sons, these are daughters, these are friends, these are coworkers, and every one of them has a family. now while our families and our kids are suffering, the cartels and the drug dealers who help them in america are getting rich. there was a recent report from the department of justice, mr. president. it stated that fentanyl dealing is one of the sonoma cartel's

most lucrative endeavors. that cartel is led by three of el chapo's sons. we're not talking, we're not talking choirboys here. they have made a boatload of money selling poison to our children. but it's not just them. it's dealers in the united states as well. our customs and border protection officers are working as hard as they can to stop drugs from coming in to this country, but their hands are tied by our bad policies. more people have crossed the border in the last year than at any time in the history of ever. that's a fact. more than five million people have entered this country illegally under president biden, during the biden administration. i only have 4.6 million people in louisiana.

imagine us just adding another state the size of louisiana, and the problem is expected to get worse, as we know title 42 expires next week. and more people will be coming in. but it's not just folks who are coming in to our country illegally. let me say i don't hate migrants. i don't hate immigrants. i love immigrants. i mean, we're a nation of immigrants, but we have illegal immigration system, and we ought to follow it. and most americans, they distinguish between legal immigration and illegal immigration. and if you support legal immigration, as i do, and oppose illegal immigration, that doesn't make you a racist,

as some people think. the american people oppose illegal immigration and support legal immigration for the same reason they lock their front doors at night. most americans don't lock their front doors at night because they hate everybody on the outside. they do it because they love people on the inside, and they want to know who's coming in and out. and they're happy to welcome, i'm happy to welcome nigerian doctors and german engineers and whomever to come into our country legally. but vetting people at the border is not racist. it's prudent. but a lot comes across that border, and not just people. a lot of fentanyl does as well. in 2022, the customs and border protection seized 14,000 pounds of fentanyl. 127% increase from the previous year. that's enough fentanyl to kill

every man, every woman, every child in the united states. we've got to show the cartels and the people in america, in our communities who are dealing this stuff that there are consequences for poisoning people, especially young people i've also introduced a bill called the notorious aggressive remorseless criminal organizations and syndicates act of 2023. it's known as the narcos act. it will designate these cargtses as foreign -- these cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. and we need to give our border agents the resources to secure the border and to stop these dealers before they set foot in our country. let me return to the fairness in fentanyl and sentencing act of 2023. it's not going to solve the

problem, mr. president, but it's a start. dealers carrying enough fentanyl to kill a small town deserve to face a minimum mandatory sentence of five years, and they deserve to be punished more severely than someone carrying meth or pcp or crack cocaine, because fentanyl is in a class by itself. and without serious prison sentences for these drug dealers who put money over human life, we're not going to make progress. a five-year prison sentence can close one stream of fentanyl into our communities, and it might deter the neck person who is look -- the next person who is looking to make a quick buck while traffic this poison. i want to be clear -- i'm almost done, mr. president --

my bill is not looking to punish addicts. my bill will not punish addicts. i believe in free will and responsibility, but i also think that there are mitigating circumstances in the nitty-gritty of life, and that's why if you're, if you're an addict and you're convicted of a crime, a serious crime, a judge will consider mitigating circumstances like addiction. i wouldn't wish addiction on my worst enemy. this bill isn't about addiction. a lot of these people don't even take their own product. this is about people, fentanyl dealers who deal death every day to make money. and there ought to be a special place in hell for them.

and this congress, this senate punishes them less than we punish somebody dealing meth. mr. president, as if in legislative session, i ask unanimous consent that the judiciary committee be discharged from further consideration of s. 878 and the senate proceed to its immediate consideration. further, mr. president, i ask that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. booker: reserving the right to object. the presiding officer: the senator from new jersey. mr. booker: mr. president, the

senator from louisiana is a friend and someone who is, as he said, angry about these issues. his passion is real. his anger, his frustration, his determination is something that i share. in fact, i think this is one of the issues that if you polled 100 senators, you would see 100 senators who sincerely and urgently believe we need to do something with this crisis that senator from louisiana has so patently and clearly and candidly put forward. the fentanyl crisis is killing americans at outrageous doing nothing or continuing to do the same thing is absolutely unacceptable. so my colleague, his passion,

louisianans should know that this is one of the best fighters when it comes to protecting people in his the state and his passion fosh r for -- in his state an his passion for protection is for people all over the country. but this is the challenge i have. we have now seen generations of the so-called war on drugs. and the solution we seem to come up with are about more and more and more incarceration. longer and longer and longer sentences. and if that would solve the problem, count me in for continuing to go down that pathway. we now incarcerate more people than any country on the planet earth. one out of every three incarcerated women on the planet earth are here in america, one in every four incarcerated people are here in america. but has that stopped the crisis of drugs in our communities,

kids dying of fentanyl, of opioid epidemics? no. there is no correlation, nothing shows that higher and higher rates and higher and higher sentencing relates to safer communities. i looked for that data. the department of justice itself, the folks who are prosecuting people for drugs, their own report from the national institute of justice says more severe punishment does not chasten individuals of these crimes. it has no correlation at all. and yet as my colleague's pointed out, every seven seconds someone is dying. and so the question is, what will make the difference? my colleague, if you follow the evidence that you so passionately talked about on this day, national fentanyl

awareness day, the things that we know are actually driving down the deaths are treating this issue like a national health crisis. yes weeks need law enforcement, yes, we need to stop this fentanyl coming into our country, yes, the law enforcement needs all the tools. i support .they i will fight for them -- i support them. i will fight for them. i will continue to invest in them. but what is lacking to save lives is the kind of health care access that we need. drug treatment, awareness, public health interventions. we know those work, but yet we don't have the resources in communities to use them. i bru your attention to some of the facts. national institutes of health reports that 85% of our population, the overwhelming population of our prison has an active public use disorder.

people incarcerated involving drug use. that's who we're incarcerating in america right now. folks coming in and out, getting further and further engaged in drug abuse and drug sales, but we're not solving the problem. let me bring attention to the fact that when it comes to sentencing, my colleague was talking about the mandatory minimums, but you know what? you get caught with possession -- i know this. you get tagged with possession with intent to distribute, if you're in a school zone, you get tagged with something else. we have prosecutors that could stack up 20, 40, 50 years, even more so. i don't know if folks know this. but on your first offense possession with intent to distribute, five-year mandatory minimum, but you could be given up to 40 years. the second offense in the united

states of america, you could get a life sentence. the mandatory minimum is ten years to life. is that stopping the crisis in our country? do need to bring in the death penalty? is that going to stop what's happening in every seven seconds? 30 years i lived in newark. 25 years to be exact. i watched the drug war and what it's done. more mandatory minimums, more incarceration, and lives continue to be destroyed by the horrors of drugs. i beg this body to look at the evidence of what actually saves lives. did you know the number one reason why people don't call for help when someone is having a drug overdose is because they're afraid of the consequences when they engage with the police.

people are dying right now because people are afraid of the police because we're treating this -- like just a law enforcement problem and not a public health problem. i will join with any colleague on either side of the aisle to stop the scourge of fentanyl taking too many of our children, but, god, follow the evidence and let's work together of what we see is actually lowering causes, lowering the rates of death. so, yes, i object with a heart that is hurting, with the same anger that my colleague has shown. i will work with him. we've worked together before. let's do something that is a comprehensive approach that follows the data, that follows the report, that follows the patient in institutes of health and the best recommendations. i will join him and bring to the floor a comprehensive bill that does affect fentanyl coming into our country.

overwhelmingly being brought by americans, that does affect law enforcement's capabilities and powers to detect those substances as i found out on the border that does impact the addicts that so he so -- that he so compassionately cares about, not some report, but something that will help the children from dying like in the many seconds i have talked. i object. the presiding officer: objection is heard. the senator from louisiana. mr. kennedy: i listened carefully to my friend's remarks. let me make two or three -- let me start over. i listened very carefully to my friend, senator booker's remarks, and i appreciate them and i thank him for his offer to work together and i do want to work with him.

but i want to make a couple of things clear. my bill doesn't deal with addiction. my bill deals with dealers. a pencil, the point of a pencil, enough heroin to fit on the point of a pencil will kill you dead. you're not walking around with 40 grams of fentanyl for your own personal use. you're going to deal it. you're going to cut other drugs with it. you're going to sell it to young people. probably not even tell them fentanyl's in it. and you're not going to measure the fentanyl very carefully. if you get too much in it, somebody dies.

there are others. because if you can get them to take your -- your meth with fentanyl -- laced with fentanyl, given that fentanyl is 50 times more powerful, more addictive than heroin, you can get them addicted. i'm not talking about addicts. i'm talking about dealers -- dealers and death. dealers that this body punishes less severely than a meth dealer. or a crack cocaine dealer or a pcp dealer or an lsd dealer. what you allow is what will continue. i don't know if my bill will

stop all the fentanyl dealers in america. i can't make you that promise. but it will sure as hell stop the dealer caught dealing and that will save lives. i agree with my good friend senator booker. i believe in justice. the definition of justice for some is complicated. i believe in the definition that was put forth, and i think it was st. awtiontin -- augistine who said justice is what you deserve. and fentanyl dealers deserve, yes, a special place in hell,

but they deserve to be punished more severely than dealers of less dangerous drugs. thank you, mr. president. mr. booker: i ask unanimous consent that i be permitted to speak for 11 minutes, followed by senator grassley for ten minutes and senator menendez for five minutes prior to the scheduled vote. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. the senator from new jersey. mr. booker: thank you very much, mr. president. i was to speak about another public health crisis. i feel a little bit like i'm in this hosk version of ground -- horrific version of groundhog day because i have come to the floor to speak about this crisis time and again. this is a public health crisis that is happening only in america, a public health crisis that's impacting every community

in this country whether it's a rural town called uvalde, a movie theater in aurora, a school in nashville. the uniquely american crisis of gun violence. if you love this country, i will tell you, if america hasn't wroac o'broken -- if america hasn't broken your heart, you don't love her enough. this is heart-wrenching. a specifically, uniquely american epidemic. and so i stand here on the senate floor heart broken like so many americans and share this sense of obligation that we speak as a nation after a mass shooting that we don't treat

this like business as usual many decades ago in this body, if eight people were shot and killed, i think we should share a sense of outrage with our heart break, that in the face of almost daily reportings of gun violence victims, many of them innocent children, we have failed to respond to this crisis. instead, we choose the pathway of inaction or choosing a pathway where the action is in no way proportionate to the crisis. we've allowed carnage in our country to persist, and we have chosen to value the power of wealth and special interests to

overcome the majority will of a nation. it seems so common now to turn on the tv and see yet again americans being slaughtered in our nation. this past saturday that place was a shopping mall. it was in the suburbs of dallas where a shooter opened fire on shoppers with an ar-15 style rife. we're still learning more about -- rifle. we're still learning more about this event, but early reports indicate that at least eight lives have been lost, and numerous others wounded, lives shattered, crippled by weapons that belong in a war zone firing bullets that rip through bodies with gruesome reality. victims from their 60's to a child, toe a child that is -- to

a child that is it 5 years old.y in america, only in america, only in this country is something like this routine. eight people killed, and we continue with a growing savage normalcy that just accepts this carnage. eight more souls, eight more. every time one of these shootings happens, we go through the same motions. it's almost beginning to seem like autopilot. i see the same tweets. it see the same moneys -- i see the same moans. i see similar statements. and then we seem to get to a point where it leaves the

headlines just to be replaced by another slaughter, by another shooting, by another mass murder, by another child dying, by another kid without his parents. we seem to have resigned ourself to the cycle of carnage. and the responses? our thoghts -- our thoughts and. as the death toll climbs, thoughts and prayers as more people die. thoughts and prayers as more people are put into the ground. thoughts and prayers as more families and communities and places of worship and places of commerce are forever remembered as the place where family members, friends, and loved ones died. only in america. only in america.

only in america. yesterday, may 8, was the 128th day of the year. in those 128 days, there have been 201, 201 mass shootings. and those 128 days, more than 14,000 americans have been killed by gun violence. in 128 days there have been 12,000 americans who have been injured, many of them crippled, many of them with forever scars on their bodies and trauma to their souls. this staggering toll includes people that weren't shot in mass shootings. we just had a 14-year-old girl shot because she was playing hide-and-seek, shot in the back

of the head because she went on someone he's -- someone else's property. what about the young black boy who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, mistakenly ringing the wrong doorbell only to be shot and traumatized for the rest of his life? what about the toddler, the toddler shot in the head after a gun fell off a shelf? as of -- as of 2018, we have seen an explosion of gun purchases in the united states. we now have 390 million guns in circulation, which means there's more guns in this nation right now than there are people. in my lifetime alone, just the short 50-plus years of my life, more americans have been killed

by gun violence in the united states than all of our wars from the revolutionary war through the world wars, through the vietnam war, through the korean war, through the war on terror, than all of our wars combined there are more people in our country have been killed by gun violence in the last 50 years. and every single day that this body does nothing, another 120 people die. only in america. only in america. we have gun death rates that are eight times higher than our northern neighbor, canada. 22 times higher than the european union. 23 times higher than australia. only in america. only in america. 58% of us now, more than half of

americans now, more than half of american adults have someone they care for that has experienced gun violence. this creeping reality is eating into everyone in america. it's now the leading cause of premature death in the united states and the leading cause of death for our children. the number one killer of american children is gun violence. only in america. only in america. is the number one cause of death for children gun violence. nearly 19% of childhood deaths in 2021 were caused by firearms. only in america. no other comparable country. are fire warms even in the top four causes of mortality amongst children. our kids are being forced to do active shooter drills more so

now than fire drills, being forced to hold hands, to be taught to escape, to be taught to hide, to be implicitly told by adults that we can't protect you from the number one cause of death. what is this doing to a society? more than the deaths even is the trauma that is creeping like a cancer into all parts of our society. what is it doing to our collective hearts? what is it doing to our one nation under god that this cancer of trauma is entering neighborhoods and communities and towns and cities? what does it mean? well, research on trauma shows that the level of collective trauma constitutes a cat take

chris i'm vent that affects not just victims of violence but society as a whole. it is a cancer. it undermines our fundamental sense of security. if you look at other countries that have suffered these same tragedy, that decided to act, that their collective response was to do something. canada took steps to ban military-style assault weapons. new zealand placed restrictions on ar-15's and other semiautomatic weapons. and australia -- in australia, they implemented a gun buyback program and other actions and their gun deaths in country after country that took action, they affirmed their collective agency to protect their nation. they responded to tragedy with action, to trauma with healing. and yet only in america while

other nations make progress, we choose to normalize trauma. and people make comments like more guns. more guns will make us safer. people make comments like oh, well, it's mental health issues like -- when other nations have mental health crises. the presiding officer: the senator's time has expieshed. mr. booker: i ask unanimous consent for three more minutes. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. booker: we cannot profess to be a nation of freedom if we can't free our society from fear, if we can't free our society from violence. we cannot profess to live up to our values if the very nation founded for one of the reasons being common defense, but we

can't defend our children. last week i introduced with senator warren the firearms safety act which would implement federal safety regulations for firearms because right now guns, the most lethal of all consumer products, are the only products that aren't even subject to consumer safety regulations. look, i want to end with the truth. a police officer who arrived at the shooting in allentown recounted discovering a young boy beneath his mother's lifeless body who died protecting this child. he shared with anguish the haunting encounter of finding a young girl also crouched in a prayer-like position as he searched for signs of life. he turned her head to the side only to find the horror of her

face missing. in her final moments on earth, the position of that girl was in prayer, was to pray, and we in this country, only in america, our response is only thoughts and prayers? we need to be the prayer answerers. we need to be the ones that respond when people call out for help. how will we respond to this national nightmare? what will we do to this uniquely american problem? will we show american might? will we show american strength? will we show american healing? will we show american community? will we show american love for our children or will we repeat this national nightmare over and over again? when the shots rang out, people

run, people hide, people pray. it is time that we in america answer those prayers. answer those prayers with action. mr. president, thank you. mr. grassley: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mr. grassley: in 1988 president ronald reagan first recognized may, the month of may as national foster care month. every year since then, the month of may has been recognized as a time to bring awareness to the needs of america's young people who are placed in foster care. it's also important to recognize organizations in iowa and around the country tirelessly serving kids and families in our foster care system. i salute these organizations and individuals for their year round

efforts to support the kids, kids that are most in need. in 2021 there were nearly 400,000 kids in foster care. more than 4,000 of those 400,000 are in my home state of iowa. older youth in foster care and adults who experienced foster care as a child can speak to what worked for them and what didn't work. they should have a seat at the table and a voice in making policy about foster care. when i founded the senate caucus on foster youth in 2009, the very special focus of the caucus was to hear directly from young people in foster care.

we also wanted to hear from those who had been aged out of the system without having a permanent place to call home. over and over again i've heard an urgent point of view from these young people and also the teenagers who were in foster care -- who are in foster care. what i heard was that they would like some permanence. they would say it like they would like to have a mom and dad. they would like to have a family. they would like to have a place to call home instead of being shuffled around, maybe two or three different schools in one year. so it means two or three different foster homes in that year. all children no matter of their

circumstances then deserve a permanent, loving home. they need consistent caring adults in their lives. this year during foster care month, i want to give special recognition to families who answer the call to help vulnerable children and the teens in their communities. my resolution recognizing national foster care month also marks may 31 as a very particular day to celebrate and show appreciation to foster parents. throughout my years in the united states senate, i've worked to keep families together. for example, i've expanded access to prevention services to help parents safely keep custody of their children during substance abuse treatment.

e the family, as we all know, is the bedrock of our society. so we must work to strengthen the family in the hopes of keeping vulnerable children out of foster care in the first place. at the same time, it's important that we support the very people that are taking care of these kids, the ones we call foster parents. they answer the call to take into their home children and teens who have experienced trauma in their very young lives. foster parent, all of them, deserve recognition and support. in iowa, almost every county has a shortage of foster parents who are able to provide temporary home for these young people. without volunteer foster parents, kids who cannot remain

safely at home often end up sleeping in hotels or in offices of social workers. i've introduced a bipartisan bill called the recruiting families using data act. this legislation would improve how states recruit foster parents and help ensure that they're supported and actually heard. it would help states conduct targeted recruitment for specific areas of need and help kids get matched with the best family for their individual circumstances. we know that having at least one loving adult in the lives of these young people can meaningfully improve the academic, the social and environmental well-being of these kids. that positive experience lasts long into adulthood.

when family reunification is not an option, and that ought to be the first option, we know that adoption can provide a permanent loving home for a child in need. recent data shows that adoption from foster care is declining with 12,000 fewer children being aadopted in 2021 than in 2019. currently more than 100,000 young people in foster care are waiting for adoption across our country, including more than 1,000 in my state of iowa. by improving support for foster families, we can help increase adoption for kids who are placed in foster care. moving forward, congress must continue to work -- must continue to work to find more solutions and secure better

outcomes for youth and foster care. whether the best choice is family reunification or adoption or living with their relatives, the goal is always, and must be the same, to protect kids from abuse and to provide them with love and with support. i urge my colleagues to pass my resolution to recognize may as national foster care month. once again, i will continue to lead efforts with members of our bipartisan senate caucus on foster youth to help these young americans achieve their full potential and have a place to call home for the rest of their lives. i yield. mr. menendez: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from new jersey.

mr. menendez: mr. president, i come to support today in support of l. felice gorordo, the nominee to be the alternate executive director of the world bank. at a time when china is increasingly willing to use its economic power to pressure other nations to do its bidding, when latin america is trying to recover from the economic impact of the covid pandemic, when putin's war in ukraine threatens the food supply of developing nations around the world, strong, dependable leadership at the world bank has never been more important. and l. felice gorordo has the experience and vision the united states needs to tackle the challenges the world bank faces today. his journey starts the way mine does. he is -- he is the son of cuban compiles who fled -- exiles who fled dictatorship. his dad was in law enforcement, his mom was a teach, and from them he learned the importance of public service. he will be a tireless advocate

for the democratic values that our nation and both our families hold so dear. and he will succeed because of his commitment to helping others, which he has demonstrated throughout his life and career. he founded the roots of help. his work for both the bush and obama administration, advancing the united states national interest, no matter which party was in the white house. he should be in this post because in the wake of covid, his understanding of finance, economic statecraft and technology will help the united states and its like-minded partners make the concerted push to prevent economic collapse in the developing world. he should be in this post because we need to make sure that china doesn't continue getting away with their maligned influence at the institutions that we, the united states,

created. he will advocate for our values, to stand up for democracy and human rights, and so i urge my colleagues to support the nomination of l. felice gorordo, for the post of u.s. at gnat director for the world -- alternate director of the world bank. with that, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the question comes on the -- so the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby bring to a close debate on the nomination of executive calendar number 71, l. felice gorordo, of florida, to be united states alternate executive director of the international bank rf reconstruction -- of

reconstruction and development. the presiding officer: by unanimous consent the qork, the question is, is it the sense of the senate that l. felice gorordo, of florida, to be united states alternate executive director of the international bank for reconstruction and development for a term of two years shall be brought to a close? the yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. the clerk will call the roll.

vote:

vote:

vote:

vote:

the presiding officer: the yeas

are 53, the nays are 42. the motion is agreed to. mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to legislative session, 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: mr. president, i have one request for a committee to meet today during today's session of the senate. it has the approval of the majority and minority leaders. the presiding officer: duly noted. mr. schumer: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the commerce committee be discharged from further consideration of h.r. 346, the senate proceed to its immediate consideration. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: h.r. 346, an act to

establish a task force on improvements for notices to air missions and for other purposes. the presiding officer: without objection, the committee is discharged. the senate will proceed. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the cantwell substitute amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to, the bill as amended be considered 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: just a word on what we just did, mr. president. a few moments ago the senate unanimously passed the notam improvement act requiring the faa to look into the resiliency in cybersecurity in notice to the system which is critical when pilots are in danger of flying. nobody, nobody wants a repeat of the chaos and delay we saw at airports in january when faa's no tam stamp went down -- system went down.

this will ensure it's as safe, reliable and well protected from cyberattacks and technical glitches as possible. i want 43, s. res. 157. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: calendar 43, s. res. 157 commemorating the 25th anniversary of the signing of the good friday agreement, and for other purposes. the presiding officer: without objection, the senate will proceed to the measure. mr. schumer: i further ask the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to and the motions to reconsider be considered made, laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection.

mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to the consideration of s. res. 204, which is at the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: s. res. 204 congratulating the university of oklahoma women's gymnastics team for winning the 2023 national collegiate athletic association championship, the program's sixth title overall. the presiding officer: without objection, the senate will proceed to the measure. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: and finally, mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that when the senate completes its business today it stand adjourned until 10:00 a.m. on wednesday, may 10, following the prayer and pledge, the journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day and morning business be closed. following the conclusion of morning business, the senate proceed to executive session to

resume consideration of the l. felice gorordo nomination postcloture, that all time be considered expired at 11:30 a.m., that following the cloture vote on the glenna laureen wright-gallo nomination the senate recess until 2:15. that if cloture is invoke cloture at 2:30 p.m. the senate vote on the wright-gallo nomination. upon disposition senate begin consideration of the colleen joy shogan nomination. upon disposition of the colleen joy shogan nomination, the senate begin consideration of the gupta nomination, and vote on the nomination at 5:30 p.m. if any nominations are confirmed, the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the president be immediately notified of the senate's action. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: for the information of the senate there are two roll call votes at 11:30. two at 2:30, one at 5:30 p.m. if there is no further business to come before the senate, i ask that it stand adjourned

under the previous order following the remarks -- i'm sure they will be excellent -- of senator murkowski of alaska. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. murkowski: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from alaska. ms. murkowski: mr. president, i would welcome the majority leader to stay and listen to my comments this evening because i'm speaking about the arctic. and as the senator from new york, he will certainly appreciate the role that the arctic plays. mr. schumer: if the gentlelady will yield, i love the arctic. i've never been there. i'm sure your remarks will be excellent. there is a bipartisan spouse's dinner. ms. murkowski: the majority leader is invited to the arctic at any time of his choosing. january is a fine time.

mr. president, i do share with colleagues -- they hear it from me quite frequently -- that the united states is an arctic nation. hailing from the fine stain of georgia -- fine state of georgia, you might not think or appreciate the role that your state plays in the arctic. but each of our 50 states, each of our 50 states sees benefit, sees opportunity because we are an arctic nation. and we're an arctic nation by virtue of the fact that in my home state of alaska, we sit, parts of it, parts of it sit above the arctic circle. it is our status as a nation. it is our good fortune, i think, as a nation. we have opportunities to come together as arctic nations and

work on the common challenges, shared opportunities, and we had such an opportunity just a couple weeks back when here in washington, d.c. we were able to to be an arctic host nation in welcoming the standing committee of parliamentarians of the arctic region for our conference. we held it here in the capitol. i think many heard of the arctic counseling. it is the primary institution for intergovernmental conversation in the arctic. you may know that as of this moment the arctic council is chaired by russia. obviously very challenging right now at a time when russia is engaged in this horrible war against ukraine.

i'll have an opportunity to speak in just a few moments to that, but as we think about the arctic council, i think it's also important to recognize that the standing committee, the standing committee of parliamentarians of the arctic region is also a body that is quite important. it facilitates a bi biennial gathering of representatives from the various parliaments and legislatures of the eight arctic nations. there's also permanent participants, indigenous groups that are parts of the parliamentarians as well as representatives from the nordic council, other councils. as an entity the standing committee helps to make recommendations to the arctic council itself. but the standing committee is made up of policymakers, again, from these arctic nations coming together, talking about the issues in our respective regions and how

together we can guide the broader arctic towards a more sustainable future. i have been involved as a member of the standing committee for nearly my tenure here in the united states senate. i am the u.s. sole representative on the standing committee and i am now very privileged to serve as its vice chair and have done so for now the past three years. we hold our conferences in obviously other parts of the arctic. we have been to helsinki and finland, we've been in reykjavik, iceland. we've been to norway, sweden several times in alaska itself. one meeting in anchorage and then a ministerial meeting held

in fairbanks. and then, as i mentioned, just a couple of weeks ago now we held our conference for 2023 here in washington, d.c. it's not exactly an arctic capital here, i get that, but it is a place where we could all come together to convene and discuss the challenges and the opportunities that we face in the far north. so we were proud to welcome respects from five arctic nations at the conference. in addition to the united

, ms. murkowski: we take about threats from coastal erosion, increasing wildfires that we're seeing in the tigre areas. the challenges that a warming climate brings with food

security issues and vern i from alaska's perspective, the challenges that we're seeing with our fisheries. a subsistence identity that is key and central to so many of not only our native people around the state but so many who live a subsistence lifestyle. so many of us, as arctic nations, share common challenges like lack of core infrastructure. our need for sustainable economic development, the priorities for our first peoples. we talk about what we see with the rise of shipping and trade as well as new industries such as mary culture. -- as mariculture.

we're also seeing significant shared challenges. so many are facing out-migration of young people. we're certainly seeing that in my state, but in the far north in canada and some of other areas. certainly an issue in greenland. we talked about housing shortages and what that means in arctic environments. we talked a lot about mental health issues and the challenges that so many in the northern regions face, public safety issues. there was so, so much that was on our plate. and, again, talking about challenges but also talking about some of the best practices. and, of course, you have to talk about the geopolitical landscape and how it is impacting these shared challenges and really how

we move forward to address them. and you can't avoid this. you can't avoid these geopolitical discussions because the largest arctic nation -- russia -- typically part of the standing committee. they're one of the eight arctic nations a. but this year they were not present, they were not welcome, they were not represented due to their own doing, due to this catastrophic war in ukraine. mr. president, you and i know that's what happens when you move to declare war against a free and sovereign nation. there are extensive, there are far-reaching consequences. so they are not part of the discussions within the arctic council. they are not part of the discussions within the standing committee on the ash particular parliamentarians -- on the arctic parliamentarians. but i think we know that even

though they are not part of these discussions, they continue -- russia continues to lean in, to exert its influence, its dominance in the arctic. after finland's asession into -- accession into native, we saw russia step up its military drills in had the arctic. we have seen in recent years -- in recent years we've seen increased military buildup; again, even while putin is prosecuting this awful criminal war in ukraine, he is pushing, pushing resources to, again, put his military influence in an area that for a period of years has been relatively, relatively

dormant. he has just a couple weeks ago, russia has signed an agreement to strengthen cooperation with china in the region, signaling very clearly that perhaps the multilateral discussions in the arctic that they have been part of as with the arctic council. now they're seeking to pursue a more bilateral strategy. so russia is absolutely, absolutely not -- not stepping off the gas when it comes to its engagement and interest in the arctic. so, even though russian parliamentarians might not be sitting with us, it is not as if we can ignore the elephant in

the room. i think that the conversations that the parliamentarians had, again, a couple weeks ago, are worth sharing here, worth an entry into the "congressional record," because the future of the arctic is literally being defined as we speak. as we speak, there is more attention that is being paid to the far north, by more people and more nations with more varied interests, than we have ever seen before, and i think that there is a greater need for us, here in the united states, for cooperation and sharing best practices with friends and those with similar interests. just last week i had an opportunity to sit down with a member of the japanese house of representatives, ms. kamikawa. she is the head of the polar caucus, and she shared with me

japan's plans to build an ice breaker, designed for research in the area. they are not an arctic nation. japan does not pretend to be a near-arctic nation, as china has self-labeled themselves. but they do believe that the area, the region is so significant and so important. and so, how can they be a helpful participant? how can they help in that shared research? and so, to be able to cooperate in these ways, i think is key. i think those of us here in the united states, especially those of us who serve as policymakers, need to be aware of those other non-arctic nations that are looking at the arctic with a heightened sense of interest and desire to be either a

participant or how they might take advantage of the arctic. don't get me wrong -- we've got a very strong, i think an abiding commitment from nearly all of our arctic partners, to work together to find solutions to the challenges and the issues that we face. and i believe equally strongly that the ups has got to be a -- that the united states has got to be a leader in advancing those solutions. for a long while the united states was lagging behind. we were -- i had suggested we were not at the table, we were not in the game. but, mr. president, i can assure you we have taken some very important steps. we have made progress. it has been noted by other nations. and it is good to see. we've taken some steps to put people and policies in place

that will guide our actions in this very, very dynamic region. we're investing billions of dollars now in core infrastructure. this is, again, i need to remind colleagues, we're not talking about earmarks or even congressionally directed spending for alaska. we're talking about national security investments, investments in our national arctic strategy. you can't have coverage of the u.s. arctic here if you don't have a deep-water port. right now, our deep-water port is down here, in the in the, dutch harbor. it's 800 to 1,000 miles to get up into the arctic. we've moved ahead the port of nome is coming on. it's going to be significant. it's going to be important.

hopefully it will be just a system of deep-water ports in the arctic. the investment that has been made, in broadband connectivity, you cannot have this extraordinary mass down here and be blanked out when it comes to arctic communications. so everything that we have done to invest, not only in communications for the communities and the north slope, but what it means to be in these waters, to be in these skies. i've had a pretty good day and a half. i just came back this afternoon from alabama and mississippi, where i was able to visit shipyards that are in the process now. alabama shipyard is building out offshore petrol cutters, opc's that are going to be significant to us in the region. but even more exciting -- i've been waiting for this, for, i

swear, 20 years now, but i was able to go to bolinger shipyard down in pascagula and actually see where we're going to be building, hopefully cutting steel, by the end of this year, the first polar security cutter. the first polar security cutter that this country has built since the early 1970's. we are well, well, well overdue. mr. president, we have authorized now six ice breakers. we have fully funded two. we're pushing hard to advance commercially available ice breaker. my hope is that we will get that resolved this year. coast guard is committed to it. administration is committed to it. we're all in. and we need it. we need it, because right now -- and this is no great secret hers

has no ice breaker, no polar-strength ice breaker that is in our waters. we do have an ice breaker that -- a polar-strength ice breaker, but she breaks out antarcticca. that's a requirement. she's been doing it for a long, long time. but that vessel doesn't see these arctic waters. we have a medium-strength vessel, very capable, the healey, but we need to have our polar security cutters. we need them in the water and i was really encouraged to see the forward movement. it's coming. the ships are coming. and it's going to make a difference. they're part of our arctic strategy. we've got an updated national scratgy -- strategy for the arctic region. this came from the white house. we've got a new goals and objectives report from the u.s.

arctic research commission. every branch of the military has now developed its own strategy for the far north. we have reestablished the arctic executive steering committee, featuring the department -- the deputy secretaries or their equivalents from the departments and the key agencies. we've revived the arctic energy office at doe. we've stood up the ted stevens center, located in anchorage, part of the department of defense, but like the other security centers that look out over the pacific or europe or africa, this is specific and unique to the arctic only. brilliant people who are thinking about where we sit in this extraordinary space. we've also convinced state department to establish an ambassador at large for the arctic region. as many, many countries already have done. so the president has nominated a great guy.

he's a fellow alaskan, dr. mike spraga to be the first person to hold this position. i'm really looking forward to the foreign foreign relatio, hopefully to consider his nomination later this month and get him confirmed. i met with the ambassador from norway, and norway is set to ashiewm the -- assume the chairship of the arctic council on may 11, this week. it's going to transfer from russia to norway. i asked the ambassador, what can we do, what can the united states do, to be most hopefully to norway, as you kind of resettle the arctic council? he said confirm your arctic ambassador. so we need to do that, mr. president. we made important progress in recent years, but what has happened so far is really only the beginning of what we need to do in and for the region. because we continue to face major challenges that i think

take all of us to address. the arctic's future must always be it determined by the people of the arctic, but having said that, there's good reason for us here in congress to pay attention and a role for us to play in helping to guide its future. i've got a pretty long list in that regard. i'm dusting off my arctic commitment act. this a comprehensive package focused on security, shipping, research and trade policy improvements. i mentioned the arctic ambassador position. we need to codify the arctic ambassador position into law. we need to grow our diplomatic capacity and our soft power. i feel pretty strongly. we need to ratify the law of the sea treaty. we need to do this. we need to ensure that our rightful claims in these areas aren't snapped up by those who want to control as much territory and resources as

possible. we need to do more to invest in our defense. again, i mentioned our ice breakers, but also our coast guard, a naval presence, in missile defense, and in advanced fighter jets that can respond to all threats, whether it's the russian bear bombers coming over, just from right here, right there or whether it's these unidentified aerial objects that the whole country was tracking as they were coming right up through the bering strait, across alaska, into white horse. wooer in the front lines. we need to -- we're in the front lines. we need to invest mo, in core infrastructure, water, wastewater, broadband. so all those in the u.s. arctic have access to basic necessities and a modern standard of living. we need to tap into some of the new opportunities, including for

food security. i've got a measure that i'm going to be introducing. we call it our arctic ag bill. focusing on not necessarily traditional agriculture, but mericulture to contribute to the growing blue economy. we need to grow the resources we need now and for decades to come. not just the recently approved willow project that was approved within the national petroleum reserve, and we're thankful that the administration saw the benefit of that, but also we need to look to the commercialization of our vast natural gas resources, the build-out of our renewables and clean technologies, like advanced nuclear power, the approval of new mines that produce the minerals we need, that's going to power our future. we need to do all of this while we work to address the issues of climate change by dramatically working to reduce our emissions, but also finding solutions for

adaptation, which is just as critical. and we have to be ready for new threats as they arise. as i mentioned, the enhanced, or growing, relationship between russia and china, strengthening their ties, what we're seeing coming out of russia right now is a move to ship oil to china through the northern sea route. so they'll be moving their oil through the northern sea route, coming right through the bering straits here, to deliver down to china. when you look at choke points, it's 57 miles, but 57 miles between mainland russia and mainland united states right here. not a lot of room. you got two islands right in the middle, one russian, one u.s.,

two miles spreapg the two of -- separating the two of them. i'm worried, mr. president, that what we may see are non-polar code compliant tankers coming through these waters. at a time when russia is looking to do everything they can to evade western sankss, but i am -- western sankss, but i am concerned we may see an accident or spill, and our response capacity is extraordinarily limited, potentially thousands of miles away. there's a lot we're watching. there's a lot we've got to do. i think there is still not enough of us giving the arctic the attention it deserves. it's still harder than it should be to secure critical arctic policies and investments. i know more and more members of congress are visiting the region.

i think maybe i might have gotten a commitment from the majority leader to visit the arctic. maybe not in january. but he says he likes the arctic. people need to see it for themselves to understand really what we're talking about. we welcome all of you. for those of you who aren't able to visit, and frankly don't understand about the significance of the region, i think some still ask the question why bother? it why is the arctic important? why does it matter? the answer, my answer is that the future of the arctic matters more to the future of the nation than most can possibly imagine. as the occupant of the chair probably well recalls, famous general, general billy mitchell, and general mitchell in 1935 said, i believe that in the future, whoever holds alaska will hold the world. i think it is the most important

strategic place in the world. billy mitchell said that in 1935, and i think it's fair to say that the future has arrived, because general mitchell is absolutely right. alaska is the most strategic place because of our location, because we are part of an arctic nation, and because we're sitting right op top of the world. we're in the center of it. we're oftentimes on the front line of our nation's sovereignty and defense. and now new cargo, new shipping, trade routes are creating chal, yes, i've -- challenges, yes, i've mentioned, but economic opportunities to deliver benefits all over the country. the investments in ships, planes, manufacturing facilities and everything else that that involves, the creating of jobs and they're furthering opportunities in every state in the country. when i was at the shipyard this morning, they had a map of the

lower 48 states, with the number of dollars and -- i don't believe it was jobs, but the number of dollars that come to each state because of investments that are made purchasing, whether it's raw materials or built parts. you look around it, 48 states on that map now. it wasn't alaska. we're not building any of that yet, but we're going to be hosting this. so it points to the value that, whether you're from arizona or from georgia, you've go at stake in the arctic.jenniferósb-20icac parliamentarians and coming back to our conference, we say, what happens in the arctic stay in the -- doesn't stay in the arctic. we know that. it isn't frozen in time, in place. it really affects every single

one of us, and i think more by the year. and i think the sooner that folks realize that, the better. and the time is really now. on the heels of our meeting of the standing committee, as i mentioned, later this week we will transition the chairship of the arctic council from russia to norway. we're hoping that that transfer is going to be very quiet, very uneventful, and there is i think a fair amount of anticipation and hopefully relief on the is itth of may -- on the 12th of may that we will begin to really renew our intergovernmental collaboration as arctic nations, with norway at the helm there. but arctic nations working together to work through some common challenges but to do so much more to share best

practices. so i think here in the united states we meet this with determination and commitment, as we work to do our part as an arctic nation. with that, mr. president, i thank you for your attention. i invite you as well to come to the far north and to the arctic. thank you, and i yield the floor. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the senate stands adjourned until stands adjourned until that congressional leaders met with president biden a the white house to talk about the federal debt limit. over the rest of the week members are expected to continue work on more president biden's executive nomination. watch live coverage of the u.s. senate when they return here on