orders to prevent employees of usaid from entering the building today and i just find that to be absolutely ridiculous. this is no way to govern. no way to treat public servants. this is no way for us to conduct our foreign policy as a country. i had to show up today to see with my own eyes, the chaos of this administration -- >> back to u.s. city where lawmakers may consider more president trump's cabinet nominees. live coverage here on c-span2. o senate will come to order. the senator from virginia. mr. kaine: madam president, i rise to talk a little bit about what i'm hearing from constituents in the commonwealth in the last week and then in particular to direct a message to federal employees.

there's about 1340,000 -- 140,000 people who work for the federal government in virginia. i was attending a fairly standard annual celebration by the fredricksburg chamber of commerce to open up the tax year. organizations around the world train volunteers to help low and moderate income people to do taxes. it was the kickoff of this 21st annual event to help folks in the fredricksburg area. it was a chance to thank volunteers. someone came up to me and told me that they were a veteran and that they had tried to log on to the v.a. portal and were shut out of the portal. someone else heard someone telling me that story, the

fredricksburg area is very heavily populated with veterans and others started to share their experience. it just so happens that we have just constructed at the cost of $370 million a new veterans clinic in fredricksburg that is scheduled to open on february 28. someone heard this discussion and said, we hear the grand opening is going to be delayed because of a federal hiring freeze imposed by this administration. that conversation amount this otherwise good-news event started what has become a cascade of keshs that i've heard -- concerns that i've heard from virginians. head start programs not getting their funding, universities being told that a funding freeze would prohibit them from getting the money they need for research. numerous employees have been

reclassified from civil service to political employee. i was at church on sunday. i go to a church that is a high percentage of congelese refugees, many are worried about the possibility of deportations because they happen to live in families where there might be mixed status. some citizens, some green card holders, others refugees, some who are not documented. a sunday school teacher at my church told me that the saturday religious instruction program that he had holds at a nearby catholic school because there's a mum of latino families, the attendance is down because they are worried about ice raids and deportations. yesterday i had two enter actions with virginians.

one with local government officials and ngo, ceo's, people who run homeless programs and free clinics in the richmond area where i live and the second meeting with a school board association that was taking place in alexandria, virginia, and again i heard the story, fear, confusion, are our funds being cut off? can we say anything about it? we are set up in such a way that with we have served underserved populations, are we allowed to do that now? and finally, madam president, this morning i came into work and i had an e-mail from one of the largest federally qualified research centers, 1.6 million people, hampton, portsmouth, chess speak, they say we are the health care safety net for low and moderate income people and

we have received federal funding, federal funding for most of these organizations is 20% to 25% of their budget. they tend to get paid the last day of the month many yesterday was the -- was february 3. they indicated they had not received their january payment and when they reached out to determine if they would receive the january paiment or february paiment -- payment, they wouldn't be given the courtesy of an answer. there is grave concern about the numerous efforts this administration has taken with respect to federal employees and the funding freeze. the funding freeze announced last week was partially retracted by the administration. it has been partially and temporarily enjoined and now multiple court cases, but as the e-mail from this morning indicated, organizations who should receive funds, if the

funding freezes are enjoined, are not receiving.they. we have a lot of work to do. the administration has not shared with any of us what their plans are. the analogy i used is like somebody took a jig saw puzzle and dumped it in front of me, all i see is the cardboard back side. every time i talk to a federal employee or someone who works at a domestic violence shelter, a mayor, i turn over a piece of the puzzle. we need to do more to assemble it and i want to pledge to virginians to make sure you are protected. what i want to do now is read a letter i have written and i am posting on my website and what i am disseminating to federal

workers. it is to honor them and give them a pep talk and resources that they can access. 140,000 of these workers live in my wealth. dear federal workers, as you're all too aware, we're in a dark time. the trump administration has made plain they want to kick you around by blocking your ability to administer federal resources, censoring your free speech, locking you out of your workplaces, demonizing you to the press and sending ominous messages. this is shameful not only to you but to the americans across the country that you serve. but especially in the darkest of times, we must stay focused on finding our guiding lights. i hope you will let the call of service that you answered when you first swore your oaths as federal employees to serve as that light.

my advice to you today is simple even if it's not easy, don't give up. don't give up. keep serving everyday folks. you are here because of your expertise, you are here because of your patriotism. you are here because you know the value in dedicating your life to serving your fellow americans. america needs you and that has never been clearer than in the wake of the administration's federal funding freeze last week. i heard from folks in every corner of virginia about the invaluable support they received from federal workers just like you. across the country americans are counting on you to deliver crucial services. from inspecting our food to make sure it's safe to protecting our national security, from administering social security benefits to staffing air traffic control towers to supporting our allies around the world and

keeping the influence of china, iran, and russia at bay. i know it has been and will continue to be tough. donald trump and cronies are determined to do anything they can to knock you off course many they've even dangled a phony buyout in your face. but make no mistake, that buyout is a trap. donald trump has no authority to offer you a resignation buyout. don't trust a guy with a long history of stiffing contractors by taking him up on a sham deal that he won't follow through on. you aren't alone. i'm going to be here with you every day working alongside you in service. i want to share but some specific ways in which i want to be a resource to you. on my website, kaine.senate.gov, i am collecting stories from federal workers about what you are experiencing. under no circumstances will i

publicly share any information you send me without your consent. you can also choose to submit your information anonymously if you prefer. i will be updating my webpage with information that may be helpful to you, including summaries of your rights, recourse you can seek if you believe you are being illegally terminated and answers to other frequently asked questions my office is receiving. please know that i am doing everything i can to stand up for you just like you're standing up for and serving american people. thanks for all that you do. and with that, madam president, i yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

i think he the assurances to the american people that only does he mean business but he means results at the same time. agenda to stop the weaponization of government. tomorrow in the banking you will have a hearing on de-banking and have the biden administration weaponized regulatory environment to stop banking industries and individuals and will have a serious conversation about that tomorrow. >> you make ginger almost double the pace where republican senate was racking 2017 during trump's first term in terms of confirming nominees. what's the difference between now and then?

>> we have conversations with the president on a regular basis but part of it is just the understanding we are going to cranking through these. the democrats have tried as you know to delay the process but i think it requires determination and persistent and a willingness to be here to do is necessary. we're going to continue that approach and hopefully the democrats work with us. i don't anticipate that's going to be the case but as you know that's way we've been required to file cloture on the number of the nominees for my guess is that will continue to be the case. they should understand this is what we're going to do that were going to get these people in place and do it as quickly and as efficient as possible. >> the congressional review act -- by the previous administration. when are you going to start using --

[inaudible] >> ten or 15 official seal raise that were looking at them which ones get to the first that will be a function frankly many ways this is what with the white house to dream what their priorities are and with the house of representatives. a lot of times the cra starvation in houston come over here but we will see. there's a lot of consideration being given now to which candidates are eligible for cra and how to prioritize them. but be assured we will use our time. to do everything we can to repeal a lot of the heavy-handed onerous burdensome regulations of the biden administration which rethink our strengthening our economy making it harder for businesses in this country to grow and create jobs. >> do think the white house has the authority to unilaterally

close a federal agency such as usaid without congressional approval? >> i don't think minus any as i don't think they're closing an agency but i do think they have the right to review funding and how the decisions are made and what priorities are being funded. that's probably true of any administration when they come in. there are lots of programs authorizing and funded through that agency some of which are operating the way which you intend come some which are not and that's the determination the administration is in the process of making. he's trying to determine again how the various programs are authorized to fund under usaid how those dollars are being spent and whether they're being spent wisely and well inconsistent with the purpose for which they are intended. as you saw yesterday with secretary rubio responded to some questions about the subject indicated that for very long time congress have been trying to get answers about usaid, those programs have found why defended what they're being used

for, and if that be able information. it in need of reform, in need of transparency and greater accountability and that's what the administration is trying to achieve. one more. >> some house republicans pushing for deeper spending cuts -- [inaudible] >> it's a combination doge and congress. there are things administration can do as you have seen through executive order but there will be time in which obviously congress is going to have to go to work and work with the administration to find ways to spend less, spend more effectively more efficiently and to ensure the american peoples tax dollars are being used wisely and well. i think yes, we want to be part of that process. we will through budget reconciliation looking for ways that we can scrub federal programs and find ways to spend money more efficiently and get us on a more sustainable fiscal

track which right now is as you look at the deficits and debt in the foreseeable future that picture is not a good one. it's high time we had this conversation. doge is a part of that and i think congress particularly to the budget reconciliation process will be a part of thas well. thanks.

>> so mr. president yesterday elon musk to issues to my warning that doge is operating in many ways like a shadow government. here's what i said. i said quote, doge is not a real

government agency. quote, doge has no authority to make spending decisions. quote, doge is no authority to shut programs down. or ignore federal law. doge contact i said cannot be allowed to stand. congress must take action to restore the rule of law. his response, here's what elon musk said. quote, hysterical reactions like this is how you know that doge is doing work that really matters. at that goal, this is the one shot american people have to be bureaucracy and restore democracy. give me a break. nothing screams democracy like having a secret squad of company men pull off a hospital take over america social security and tax information in the dead of night? that's democracy? no openness, no hearings, no

discussion? no hearing the other side? from a small group of limited people with limited backgrounds who probably don't even know about the program they're cutting and how they actually work. whatever doge is doing it is certainly not not what democracy looks like or has ever looked like in the history of this country. because democracy does not work in the shadows. democracy does not start the rule of law. democracy does not shun accountability and restraint. those that run away from transparency but welcomes it. and does that give privilege to the needs and even the ideas of a small group of ultra-wealthy people at the expense of working people. they are the only people seem to be in the room to make the decisions. working-class americans are excluded, are excluded.

now reform is a worthy cause to seek, no question about it. everyone agrees and everyone should agree that we should find ways to improve the effectiveness, ways to find come we should find ways to improve the efficiency of government. but do you know what history shows? when it's done in the dark of night by a very limited group of people of limited experience, it never works. when ideas are not brought into conflict when people have different views, when it is not debate, when there's that opens, when there's not transparency, things always get messed up. it leads to very bad results and yet that's just what doge is doing. they they know better than everybody else. certainly they're entitled to have their viewpoint. certainly but to just do things in the dark of night, to just

fire people without even talking to them, what they do, what their needs are, makes no sense. and again it's going to lead to bad results. we should talk about reform but we should talk about it the way it's always been done in america, in the halls of congress, in the public forms of the people, peoples government. that's what the founding fathers wanted. if the founding fathers were to be like doge a small group of them would get together and dictate what should've been done in america. they didn't. they set up a congress. they set up debate. and the american people, mark my words, the american people will not stand for an unelected secret group to run rampant through the executive branch. being innovative is good, but mr. mosk, this is in a tech

startup these are public institutions that deal with things like social security and medicare national defense and provide for the well-being of the american people. and the american people have a right to be part of that debate, part of that debate. the elections occurred and one viewpoint got a few more votes than the other but that doesn't mean we throughout democracy. that doesn't mean what's been done for centuries in this country should just go out the window and the substituted by a small group of people who think they know a lot more than the wisdom of the american people. so that is why this week leader jeffries and i will join together to push legislation to prevent unlawful meddling in the treasury department payment system, to prevent everyone's

records from being made available to a small group of people who can look at them at will when this has always been kept secret and always been protected, your tax returns and your payment systems and things like that. and it affects average americans. and who knows, maybe next day will say let's slash all that stuff. that seems what they want to do in their $2.5 trillion desire to cut government. we must protect peoples social security payments, the medicare payments, their tax refunds from any possible tampering by doge or any other unauthorized entity and that's why leader jeffries and i will join together to push this legislation. i yield the floor. >> madam president i rise to talk a little bit about what i'm hearing from constituents in the commonwealth in the last week. and then in particular to direct a message to federal employees.

there's about 140,000 people who live in virginia to work for the federal government. it was week ago yesterday monday morning when i was attending a fairly standard annual celebration by the fredericksburg chamber of commerce and the local united way to open up seasonal tax preparations, called the society program, volunteers and tax assistance peer organizations all around the country trained volunteers who help low and moderate income people do their taxes. just to kick off his annual 21st annual event in the fredericksburg area to help folks and it was an opportunity to thank volunteers and to see those earlybird tax filers who were trying to get the taxes done. someone came up to me told me they were a veteran and they had tried to log on to the v.a. portal that day to get a medical appointment and were shutout of the portal. someone else or the person telling me that story fredericksburg area about

50 miles outside of d.c. is very partly with battery. other studies should experience. it just so happens we just constructed at the cost of $370 million a new dollars a new veterans clinic in fredericksburg that schedule russell vought is laser focus on undermining our government. he's proven it. senate democrats will unanimously oppose him and everything we can to prevent him

from leaving omb. and should republicans not see the light and show their shrug, this dangerous person into the seat, they'll have to have to answer to the american people. russell vought wants to cast chaos across america. he's been sold on republicans to do and i just say he's a danger to the budget, a danger to what people in america need. now, on the reason we are here. so over the past few days, and hakeem and i work together with closely and well and i welcome it to the sentence he welcomes me to the house. yeah, okay. over the past few days democrats have warned the american people that doge is operating like a shadow government. yesterday i said that doge is not the real government agency. it has no authority to make

spending decisions to shut down programs or a door federal law. this is not debatable. this is an indisputable fact. no authority for spending decision to shut down programs for a north federal law. yet elon musk took issue with that warning. he said in answer to a tweet that i said that did this, he said doge quote, is the one shot the american people have to defeat bureaucracy and restore democracy. now give me a break. nothing screams democracy like having a secret squad of company men pull off a hostile takeover of america's social security and tax information in the dead of night. that is not democracy, mr. musk. that's, and yet it is precisely what doge is doing. it's laying a small group of

unelected people, , secret, run rampant through the executive branch accessing the private data aliens of americans need, and god knows what they're going to do with it. god knows. so there are too dangerous. one, peoples privacy is at stake. second, that there's a risk that this small group could cut program after program using one excuse or another. so today leader jeffries and i are joining together to push legislation to prevent unlawful meddling in the treasury departments payment systems and protect americans across the country. our bill aims to do a few simple things. one, to deny access to special government employees, employees that don't have to disclose

their conflict of interest or any other ethnic agreements. two, to deny access to anyone with conflict of interest or lack of appropriate clearance. and three, include personal tax information into existing privacy protection. we call our legislation stop the steal. whatever doge is doing it's not democracy. we know what democracy is like. it out in the open. it's not secret. the two sides debate and then the elected officials make decisions. democracy doesn't work in the shadows. democracy doesn't skirt the rule of law. and it doesn't give special privilege to the ideas and needs of a group of ultra-wealthy people at the expense of american families. of course we should talk about reform.

reform is a worthy cause. i view it agrees we should find ways to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of government. but you know what history shows when it's done in the dark of night, it always leads to bad results. when these doge people decide to cut a program have even talked to the people who run the program? have even done a little research? have they heard the other side or are they just in such a rush to cut anything they can so that they can keep tax breaks and give deeper tax breaks to the wealthiest of americans, undoubtedly not. they are not checking. they are not debating. they are not doing things in sunlight. so we want reform. but do it in front of the american people come to the arguments. have the back and forth that is been a hallmark of this republic for over 200 years. you don't have a small group of

select people who have little experience across the rest of government have access to these records and ability to cut funding. the american people have a right to be part of the debate as to what programs should be cut. and just because a small group of people think they know better than the american people doesn't make it true. so we are going to everything we can to sound the alarm and fight with everything we've got to stop this horrible, horrible act by this doge group with of course the permission, acquiescence, encouragement of donald trump. leader jeffries. >> thank you leader schumer. before leader schumer was a man of the senate he was a man of the house and so we always welcome you back over to the people's chamber here democrats

-- >> you sound like nancy. [laughing] >> democrats are always, always ready, willing and able to work with anyone to find the common ground necessary to solve problems on behalf of hard-working american taxpayers, particularly as it relates to driving down the high cost of living. we understand that america is too expensive. there are far too many hard-working american taxpayerso paycheck. housing costs are too high. grocery costs are too high. childcare costs are too high. insurance costs are too high. utility costs are too high. america is too expensive. democrats are committed to driving down the high cost of living. the working class americans, americans in everyday americans all across the land.

our republican colleagues are not serious about lowering the high cost of living. they have done nothing, introduced not a single bill, not put forth a single policy proposal. they have done nothing as it relates to lowering the high cost of living. at the same time they are rating the government, attempting to steal taxpayer money. that's what the situation at the treasury department is all about. we will introduce the stop the steal act in short order to prevent unlawful access with respect to the department of treasuries payment system, connected to people who are

trying to steal personal sensitive and confidential information related to social security recipient, medicare recipients, taxpayers, businesses, non-for profit, veterans and everyday americans. it's unacceptable, unconscionable and un-american. the stop the steal act will prevent this unlawful access from taking place. it's unfortunate that many of our republican colleagues are determined to stand up a shadow government of the billionaires, by the billionaires, and for the billionaires that will stick it to the american people here that's what's driving much of the behavior on the other side of the aisle. at the end of the day my house

republican colleagues are are. ms. cantwell: i ask that it be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. cantwell: i come to the floor to talk about export strategies, collaboration and american principles. madam president, no one likes to be left behind. i know somewhere people think there is this i win, you lose ment mentality, but what happened to let's grow the pie instead of just hoarding a few pieces that are left? growth, not contraction, is the right solution. the world is more connected, not necessarily because of -- just because of globalization. we are now more connected because of technology, and nothing we are doing is going to stop that. the speed of information is

empowering anyone with an internet connection, aided by the brain of an a.i. app to give answers and ideas hundreds of times faster than ever before. do we need new principles for the information age, rules the world and we should strive to adhere to? i definitely agree. madam president, i thought we were for capitalism. yes, capitalism in the information age needs better rules, so markets ability distorted -- aren't distorted, because markets need to be properly policed and they aren't right now. and i believe the u.s. should aggressively define the rules in the information age. i believe in a technology nato, a model of key democracies and key sophisticated technology countries defining the rules of the information age and telling anybody who wants to follow that, we'll give you a discount on our technology.

instead of those who are advocating to buy from people who have a government backdoor or even, in today's analogy, where you allow somebody to have a government backdoor to your technology. madam president, capitalism is still the largest, smartest export america wants to export. we want open markets, and we want more people to sell to. 95% of consumers live outside the united states. now, it's clear not all the world community is down with cap capitalism, especially places like china or north korea, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't continue to advocate for it. what has u.s. advocacy for

capitalism done to grow and stabilize the world? i would say immeasurable, immeasurable, immeasurable, immeasurable. in fact, the period from the end of world war ii to the early 1970's is considered one of the greatest eras of economic expansion in world history. in the u.s., gross domestic product increased from 228 billion to just under 1.7 trillion in 1975. so whether it was germany, japan, south korea, we have brought about a world economy because the shiny american dream was worth chasing. so, whether it was setting market rules, growing exports, investing in innovation, this is the poster child of what the

united states of america has been about. it has not been a story about contraction. it has been a story about growth. the impacts of the u.s. economy can't be ignored, but to outcompete our adversaries we need coalitions, not go-it-alone strategies. why do we fear this if we think our principles are correct, but somehow the current administration thinks that we've been hurt more than we've been helped in this global equation, and they want us to believe that somehow there is a win-win situation on tariffs that they can deliver on. the american people are demanding leadership here in washington. they want us to work together. they want us to have the best interests of the country at hand. my guess is they think that on a global basis too. i know my farmers do.

farmer always the big potential loser in a trade war want us to work out better economic opportunities for their future. but there are those in this administration who think we can close our borders, chill trade with tariffs, and somehow make time stand still. well, i got news for people, the information age has blown a hole in that theory, even if there was justification for the time stand still theory before the information age. you just cannot drop anchor in the middle of the storm. you need to get to a stable harbor and create an opportunity for the future, and trade, madam president, not only grows economic opportunity, it helps change culture. there are some cultures that are worth affecting. it's better to have a job than be attracted to join a terrorist organization. it's better to create economic

stability than fueling poverty and migration. and tariffs are a distortion of markets. tariffs mean we disagree. it very rarely means the disagreement will be resolved quickly. it usually means people will retaliate, and the escalation of that retaliation will hurt cons consumers, so much so that eventually someone will blink. the payers in this dispute, though, are never the government leaders. no, it's the workers who lose their job, it's the family that pay higher costs, it's the community that lose their economic activity and tax revenue, and that is why it is so important in this day and age that we talk more about the three c's -- collaboration, capacity building, and coalitions.

capacity building gives us the ability to accelerate inn innovation. trust me, one thing i know about traveling in my state, i'm sure it's true in other places too, innovation is not only in the dna of americans, it is the history of our country, whether elect electricity, aviation, or the internet, credit goes to the united states of america for innovation and inventing future economic opportunities, not just for us but for the entire world. but me we're in an innovation race defined by quantum, it may increase gross domestic product between $2 trillion and $4 trillion per decade. boston consulting estimates that quantum computing can generate

$850 billion in annual revenue by 2040. so are we going to focus on those things? winning the races? are we going to allow contraction that hurts everyone? obviously negotiation all in on a.s i. and quantum can help ensure our country maintains both economic and military advantages but we definitely have to collaborate with like-minded nations who also want to grow a.i. and set the rules if you want to be china's ultimate belt and road initiative deepseek. so what do we do about the domestic impacts of trade? well, i can tell you some sure don'ts right away. you don't abolish the trade

adjustment system program designed to protect impacted workers from trade which is what has happened with the other side of the aisle. we need to be intentionally upscaling workers to help them in impacted sectors. i have met and talked to so many americans. they are smart, talented, hardworking, striving, and they only ask for one thing, opportunity. if you bet on them, they will do the rest. i often think, mr. president, of two major shifts in workforce policy in the united states. world war ii where we didn't have a workforce and the women showed up in the factories and delivered production. and when the men returned from world war ii and everybody wondered what the economy of the future would be, and we gave them the g.i. bill and they created it.

so we don't cut workforce training. we invest in two-year skill training programs at our high schools, make sure we turn to apprenticeship, return to the skilling of the jobs that are needed today. you also don't cut export programs like the state trade export program, step, or the export-import bank. but what do you do? well, let's go back to those three c's, collaboration, coalition building, and capacity building. we will bring more high-wage manufacturing jobs back to the united states fostering investment landscape by continuing on the path of the chips and science act and the bipartisan infrastructure bill. those have put real investments in the united states of america and have started us on the path towards growing the middle-class again.

but we need to continue to invest in science. we need a robust r&d tax policy for inventors and manufacturers and we need to help our manufacturers with capital investment, equipment modernizations to help them with their factories. i've seen this in places like madison, maine, or longview, washington, where we helped revitalize long-standing paper industry into new opportunities for the future. so how do we deal with china? well, they aren't playing by the rule. they are manipulating and flooding markets, but i guarantee you that just a fear of china is not the answer. and solutions like collaboration and coalition building are critical, particularly in the information age. china does have the largest

gross domestic product, about 19% of gdp. in the global economy, the u.s. represents about 15%. but if the united states works to create markets with like-minded partners like japan, europe, and the u.k. and build as coalition of like minded democracies grounded in the rule of law, we can flip the script and have a market representing 34% of gdp. and if we take the next step and expand coalitions to include partners like canada, south korea, australia, new sealland -- new zealand and india, then we're looking at a market that instead of china's 1 19%, accounts for almost half. 47% of global gdp. so why aren't we focusing on

that economic opportunity? a lot of people say, well, that's not the america of today. but i'm pretty sure ben franklin about the time he was focusing on electricity also went to france and helped build a coalition essential for the founding and continuation of our country. so don't tell me it's not in our dna to do this. there is so much more we could and should do working with our allies. obviously, i mentioned a few. research and developed and artificial intelligence, commercializing quantum, scaling safe, affordable fusion technology. and there are many members of congress who are working on these bipartisan ideas. but we have to remain competitive and we cannot allow this debate about tariffs take us off our historical course as a nation. as i mentioned, we mapped out

how to get investment in the united states of america, and now we need to follow that with the training and skilling of american workers. if the afl-cio president liz schuller and microsoft president brad smith at a recent meeting in saelts agreed we need to train and skill 500,000 electricians for the united states, why can't we here agree and accelerate that? i'm not even sure we can agree on the acceleration of air traffic controllers, and we have every reason to get that done. last week i spoke about additional investments the united states needs to make in panama, latin america, and others to modernize bilateral agreements that help us counter china. and as i mentioned, i believe in

an aggressive xm bank investment to counter china's belt and road init initiative. free trade agreements are a way for us, not tariffs to gain the leverage we want. south asia could play an important role in this coalition building, particularly in the indo-pacific region, but i want us to go further. i want us to understand that u.s.-led negotiations in the middle east free trade agreement to build on the momentum of a cease-fire in gaza could further stabilize that region, that investments in other programs, and mr. president, it's tragic that the administration fails to understand the important role u usaid plays in capacity building. mr. president, it is not a tariff first approach world.

it is an information age driven by rapid change where your partner, your friend, your supply chains, getting the innovation implemented and moving faster than your adversary is the key. how will we know that strategy works? well, i suggest we will know when we're growing the middle class in the united states of america again. mr. president, the bills we have p passed investing, allowing us to innovate faster are on their way to doing that. let us not have a trade war disrupt that and dismantle what has been history after history lesson of economic success of this nation, fighting for open markets, capital opportunities, and investing in the ingenuity of america. i thank the president and i yield the floor.

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

mr. padilla: mr. president.

the presiding officer: the senator from california. mr. padilla: i suggest we suspend the quorum call. on roll call vote 26, i voted nay. it was my intention to vote aye. i ask unanimous consent that i be permitted to change my vote since it will not affect the outcome. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. padilla: thank you. the presiding officer: the senator from missouri. a senator: thank you, mr. president. mr. schmitt: i stand here to amplify my support that i was able to give in the judiciary

committee of pam bondi who will hopefully in a few short hours here be confirmed as the next attorney general of the united states of america. i want to thanks, before i do that, the leadership and the hard warning of -- work of leader thune and senate majority whip barrasso in this entire confirmation process, working at a clip that i think is responsible and one that honors the mandate that president trump got to shake things up here in washington, d.c. i think what you is a you in november was -- saw in november was a dynamic where people weren't particularly happy with what was going on in this town. and they voted for reform. and president trump is putting together a team of reformers. and look no further than an ideal place for that reform than the department of justice. but before i get there, i do want to point out on a personal

note that when president trump announced that he was supporting pam bondi, i think i had said to somebody this was a home run. and as many of us in this chamber are often outdone by senator graham, he described it as a grand slam, touchdown, hole in one, ace, slam dunk, dunk, olympic gold medal pick. and he was right. i've known pam bondi for years, from nigh ag world. pam was always known as a leader. and somebody that has this really rare combination of a steel backbone and a heart of gold. she is neal it for the right -- she's in it for the right reasons. she cares about the rule of law. she started her career from humble beginnings in a small town in florida, and she wanted to be a prosecutor. we heard in her testimony in the

judiciary committee that that was her -- that was her goal was to be a prosecutor, and she spent hours and years in those courtrooms prosecuting the bad guys. and she later became the attorney general of one of our bigger states. and as i mentioned, she was a leader. she defended the constitution. she took on the opioid epidemic. she was relentless in taking on human trafficking. and somebody i think that everybody can look up to, not just from a personal perspective and her personal story but also the way that she took on her job and had accolades from both sides of the aisle. there was actually somebody in the senate committee who was on the other side of the aisle in florida that ran for attorney general at the same time pam bondi was running for attorney general and testified to her character. there's just no question that she's supremely qualified for this job. and we're really going to need somebody as the attorney general

to lead the department of justice who has that kind of integrity, who believes in the constitution, believes in individual rights, and getting that department back to where it always should have been, which is fighting crime. sadly, over the last four years, we have seen a department of justice gone astray, one that has made headlines, of course, for going after parents who showed up to school board meetings under the auspices of the patriot act, treating moms and dads as terrorists who went to a school board open forum meeting and had concerns about things like critical race theory or forced masking. the full weight of the federal government honed in on parents and catholics who were treated the same way because they were

traditional catholics, literally setting up informant networks in an effort to spy on them because of their religious affiliation. i'm not talking about the soviet union of the 1980's. i'm talking about the united states of america in 2021. what merrick garland did to this agency in the department of justice is a tragedy. kash patel hopefully will move out of the judiciary committee here soon and be the next leader of the fbi and restore integrity to the that agency as well. but of course the department of justice that pam bondi hopefully in a few short hours will be confirmed and sworn in to lead will restore integrity. in addition to going after catholics, and in addition to going after families who showed up to school board meetings, the very coordinated effort of lawfare by the past administration to take out their

chief political rival under the moniker of show me the man and i'll show you the crime. can't be dismissed. they're not going to want to talk about that. but the effort to financially ruin president trump, to literally throw him in jail for the rest of his life deserves the scorn of the history books. joe biden gave a speech in the fall of 2022 calling half of america a threat to democracy, that president trump would never make it back to the oval office, and guess what happened? a series of zombie cases with, at best, novel legal theories, were resurrected. in new york the number-three person at the department of justice left to join the d.a.'s office in new york.

why? guess what? president trump was prosecuted in a manhattan courtroom not long after that. in state cases the number-two person in the d.a.'s office in atlanta was coordinating with the white house counsel's office on the prosecution of president trump in georgia. and then jack smith, jack smith was brought in, who was notorious among earlegal circle for overcharging, was brought in specifically to take out president trump. and it was only the supreme court ultimately that prevented that. but this was all a scheme devised by the biden administration to make sure president trump never got back into office. well, guess what? he stared it all down, and he won. and we have a real opportunity now to have a level-set.

i don't think it's right that we have people pursued because of their politics from a criminal perspective. nothing was out of bounds in the last four years by the biden administration and merrick garland. so pam bondi is just the kind of person to come in to restore integrity, to make sure that our department of justice is fighting on behalf of the american people and not in an attempt ironically to undermine our republic, the accusation, the very accusation that was leveled at joe biden's political opponent. with that, mr. president, i look forward to voting yes on pam bondi and having a real leader, somebody that we can look up to, lead that very important department of justice. department of justice.

and we are going to stop that. empowering anyone aided by an a.i. app to get an answer to ideas ten times faster than ever before. do we need new principles for the information age six i definitely agree. madam president. i thought we were for capitalism yet capitalism in the information age, the markets are distorted because markets probably lisa they aren't right now. the u.s. should aggressively define the rules in the information age. technology nato defining the rules of the information age and

selling anybody who wants to follow the will give you a discount on our technology instead of those advocating to buy from people have a government back door reading today's analogy government that store your technology. capitalism is still the largest smartest export america wants to export we want the markets and want more people to sell to. cer not. mr. durbin: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, last week i came to the floor to talk about the chaos that has been created by the announced proposed freeze on federal funding and loans. i want to share a few stories about what i've seen and heard since i spoke on the floor last week. sharpsburg is near my hometown

of springfield, illinois, and it has a water system in christian county. it's in phase three of construction of a rural water project. 18 miles of pipeline which will provide water -- excuse me. sorry. that may be a first on the senate floor. i apologize. it contains 18 miles of pipeline providing water to 50 new rural customers. the work is under way. the project is nearly complete. it will be in jeopardy if there is a freeze permitted to take effect. what does it mean? it means that these 50 homes and families will be without clean, safe, and affordable water. that is unacceptable. the freeze also means that

scie scientists at universities across the state are worried about their jobs and research. children with disabilities are worried about losing resources for their kids. adults are worried about access to health care and social is thes. since then, not one but two judges have issued temporary restraining orders blocking president trump's measure. as of yesterday evening, that pause has been extended. but let me remind you. this freeze is unconstitutional. the constitution gives the power to congress, not to the president, the power of the purse, and the president has no legal authority to withhold funding that was signed into law for americans on a bipartisan basis. in the 1970's, former president trump nixon tried to impound or withhold funding appropriated by congress and in response congress passed the impoundment control act of 1974. ica. ica is still the law of the land, and it prohibits presidents from withholding

funds unless congress approves of the decision through outlying procedures. but consider this -- the current administration apparently does not care. the president and his people are ignoring the law, creating chaos in hopes that amidst the confusion some part of this power grab will stick. he is testing the limits of how much he can chip away at our system of checks and balances. there are reports that unelected elon musk and his, quote, government efficiency team now have access to the payment systems of the united states treasury, which is essentially the checkbook of the federal government. elon musk said he is planning to cut $4 billion in federal spending every single day from now until september 30. i'm appalled to see so many of my senate democratic colleagues

falling in line as they try to strip -- i'm disappointed to see so many of my republican colleagues to vote to advance the nomination of president trump's pick for the office of management and budget, russell vought. the damage from the freeze extends beyond our shores. bipartisan congressionally appropriated funds to provide lifesaving humanitarian aid in places like venezuela, iran, and north korea have been ground to a halt. for example, programs like pepfar, started by president george w. bush, and i give him credit for that, with the support of the evangelical community and partner global fund have curtailed the aids epidemic. the program has saved more than 25 million lives. it has been so effective some

have forgotten how devastating aids happened to be in that part of the world. killing more than two million a year globally, leaving 14 million orphans in sub is a hair an -- sub-saharan africa. programs that have a 6-1 return in dollars saved in health, economic and occasional terms. low-cost vaccination programs eradicated smallpox and almost eradicated polio from the face of the earth. food grown by farmers helped to save lives. gutting such programs puts people across the globe at risk. it is senseless, counterproductive and ill-informed and increases the

likelihood of interventions that don't cross borders. the u.s. cannot and should not stand alone in the world many we are a global leader and we have an obligation to continue to act like it. over the weekend in what sounded like a dystopian story, trump administration and elon tried to shutter united states agency for international development. try to imagine that scene as the richest -- one of the world's richest men gleefully guts programs for some of the world's poorest people. this is not about uniform and this will not be solved by gutting usaid. the foreign assistance budget is only 1% of our federal spending, a small, powerful investment that is not only the right thing do but the smart thing to do to prevent conflict and famine around the world.

it is a betrayal of american values, nations like china sense a strategic opportunity. under president trump when these programs go away, the chinese will step in. are republicans going to roll over and creed congressional power to -- cede power to these bipartisan programs. i want to give the president a chance to show his values, but so far i have to tell you there's a lot of disappointment. this temporary freeze hurt a lot of innocent people and this notion now of shutting down usaid, i can't imagine elon musk would have on his conscience that so many people would lose the basics of life because of this plan. he wasn't elected to anything and i think we should return to the constitution which still guides us today and should. i yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

what was go back to the three c's. collaboration, coalition building and capacity building. we were bring them back to the united states continuing on the path of the chip sometimes act and bipartisan infrastructure bill. those have put real investments in the united states of america and started on the path toward

growing middle-class again we need robust policy and help with capital investment to help. i've seen where we help revitalize the paper industry and a new opportunity for the future. in review with china and the incident and articulate the information age gross domestic

product and gdp. have a market representing 34% of gdp. we expand coalition to canada, new zealand and india, you're looking at a market and in june of 19%, 47% of gdp.

why are we focusing on the economic opportunity? a lot of people say that's not the america of today but i'm pretty sure ben franklin focusing on electricity and essential for the founding continuation of our country but not in our dna to do this. quantum, scaling, affordable fusion technology and we are working on these bipartisan ideas but we have to remain competitive in, allow this take us off for golf course of the

nation. we mapped out how to get investment in the united states of america and now we need to follow that. microsoft president brad smith in seattle agreed we need to train and scale 500,000 electricians for the united states. why can't we agree and accelerate that? , sure we can agree on air traffic controllers and we have every reason to get up and. latin america and others to modernize the agreement and as i

mentioned, i believe an aggressive investment for the initiative. the trade agreement gain the levers we want. a cease-fire in gaza before they stabilize that region. the investment in other programs and it's tragic the administration fails to understand the important role in capacity building. it is not a tariff first

approached world. the partners and friends supply chain link faster than your adversary keep. how will we know it works? i suggest will know growing middle-class in the united states of america. they dismantled stricter history of economic success of the nation fighting for open markets, cap the opportunity and investing and ingenuity of america.

>> i stand here to amplify my support i was able to give hopefully will be confirmed. i want to thank the leadership of hard work and working at a clip i think is responsible and honors what trump got. what you saw in november was a dynamic people were particularly happy with what was going on. mr. sanders: i ask that the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sanders: mr. president, today we find ourselves in a

pivotal moment in american history and millions of americans by their actions or lack of action will determine of future of our country for decades. in my view, the trump administration is moving this country very aggressively into an oligarchic form of society where extraordinary power rests in the hands of a small number of unelected multibillionaires. the trump administration is moving this country very aggressively into an authoritarian society where the rule of law and our constitution are being ignored and undermined in order to give more power to the white house and the billionaires who now control our government. the trump administration is

moving this country very rapidly toward a kleptocracy where the function of government is not to serve the needs of ordinary people but to enrich those who are in power. mr. president, i think that today is a very good day to recall what one of our great presidents said at gettysburg in november of 1863. looking out at a battlefield where thousands of union soldiers had just sacrificed their lives in the defense of freedom and the ending of slavery, abraham lincoln famously stated, and i quote, the world will no longer remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they

did, the soldiers did here. it is for us the living rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here has thus far so noebly advanced. it is -- noebly advanced. it is for us to be dedicated to the great task remaining before us. the great task remaining before sus. that from these honored dade, we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave a last full measure of devotion, that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain. this is how he concluded -- that this nation, under god, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not parish from the earth.

if government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth. mr. president, i fear very much that under president trump we are not seeing a government of the people, by the people, for the people, but rather a government of the billionaire class, by the billionaire class, and for the billionaire class. and what is really interesting is that none of this is happening behind closed doors. it's not being done in secret. it's right ow there for everybody -- it's right out there for everybody to see. several weeks ago, donald trump was inaugurated for a second term as president. standing right behind him were

the three richest men in america, elon musk, jeff bezos, and mark zuckerberg. combined, these three men are worth $920 billion. these three men own more wealth than the bottom half of american society, 170 million people. three guys, 170 million people. and i should point out, and this should tell you exactly where we are going as a nation, these three men, wealthiest three in america, have become some $232 billion richer since trump was elected a few weeks ago. three guys, $232 billion richer since trump was elected. mr. president, there is how an

oli olig oligarchic system works. elon musk, the wealthiest person in the world and now a key part of the trump administration, spent over 277 million to get trump elected. in other words, within a corrupt campaign financed system, which allows billionaires to spend as much as they want, he helped buy the election for mr. trump. jeff bezos and mark zuckerberg, second and third wealthiest people in our country, both kicked a million dollars each into trump's inauguration fund. and let us remember that mr. bezos, who among other things owns "the washington post," rescinded the endorsement of that paper for kamala harris just before the election.

mr. bezos was showing early on that he was willing to bend the knee for donald trump. mark zuckerberg, founder and ceo of meta, which owns facebook and instagram, agreed to settle a lawsuit with trump for 25 million. these three multibillionaires are working with trump for one very simple reason -- they understand that trump's policies are designed to make the very wealthiest people in this country even richer. since trump's selection mr. musk has become $154 billion richer. not bad in a couple of weeks time. he earned a great investment. he only spent a couple hundred million on the election, and now he's $154 billion richer. mr. bezos has become $35 billion

richer. and mr. zuckerberg has become $43 billion richer. mr. president, i am concerned not only about the growing movement toward oligarchy in this country, but i am deeply worried that under the leadership of president trump we are moving rapidly towards authoritarianism. and all over this country people are alarmed and shocked by what they have seen in the last several weeks. just a few examples, just a few, last week president trump attempted to suspend all federal grants and loans, in direct violation of the u.s. constitution and federal law. as every third grader in america knows, or i hope knows, the power of the purse in the united

states belongs to congress, not the president. yes, the president can recommend legislation to congress, the president can veto legislation that congress has passed, but he does not have the power to unilaterally terminate funding and legislation that has been passed by the u.s. congress. that is a dangerous and blatantly unconstitutional act. and i should add that trump's blocking of federal funding would have had a horrific impact on millions of americans who utilize programs like medicaid, head start, community health centers, meals on wheels, homeless veterans programs, and many, many initiatives. tens of millions of americans, including some of the most vulnerable in our country, were impacted by that decision.

but that's not all. a few days ago, trump fired 17 inspectors general, independent government watchdogs that were created by congress in the wake of the watergate scandal to prevent the abuse of power by the executive branch. last week, president trump fired a member of the national labor relations board, and in so doing effectively neutered the only federal agency in america with the authority to hold corporations accountable for illegal union busting and to protect the constitutional right of millions of workers who want to join unions in order to earn better wages, working conditions, and benefits. not only is that move blatantly illegal, it is exactly what elon musk, the owner of tesla, and

jeff bezos, the owner of amazon, have been fighting for months. they don't like unions, and what mr. trump has given them is the opportunity to make it much, much harder for workers to organize in their companies. president trump also illegally fired members of the equal employment opportunity commission, the only independent commission in our country that protects workers against discrimination in the workforce. further, and what should upset every american no matter whether you're conservative, moderate, progressive, is that in direct violation of the constitution and federal law trump is intimidating the media, with lawsuits against abc, cbs, meta, and the des moines register. his fcc is now threatening to

investigate pbs and npr. what trump is essentially saying to every media outlet in america, if you say or do anything that is critical of me, that displeases me, you may be subject to a lawsuit or a federal investigation. if that is not a direct attack on the first amendment, on the u.s. constitution and free speech in our country, i don't know what is. but that is not all. elon musk and his unelected minions at doge have forced out officials at the treasury department and illegally shut down usaid, a program which, among other things, helps feed or provide medical help to starving and desperate children all over the world.

presidents, much less unelected billionaires, do not have the unilateral right to shut down federal agencies established by congress. and when we talk about the very dangerous movement towards author authoritarianism that we are seeing in this country now, let us not forget trump's pardoning of the january 6 insurrectionists who injured 174 police officers right here, right outside this floor. even worse, not only did he pardon those people, but trump is undermining the fbi by actually investigating the agents there who helped bring these violent criminals to justice. imagine that. pardoning the people who broke

the law and investigating the people who upheld the law. that is not what america is supposed to be about. mr. president, under trump we are rapidly moving toward a kleptocracy as well. just before the president was northed, he -- inaugurated, he and his wife launched their own cryptocurrency coins, giving them the potential to earn many billions of dollars. if wall street ceo's tried to bribe the president with a bag full of money, that would be illegal. that's against the law. now they don't have to do that. today, if a multibillionaire or head of a foreign country wants to curry favor with the president all they have to do is buy his cryptocurrency coins, and when they do that they are directly enriching mr. trump.

so, mr. president, the question that millions of americans are asking is, given the move toward oligarchy, given the move toward author authoritarianism, given the movement toward kleptocracy, where do we go from here? what should we, as americans, be doing? let me tell you what i think and what most americans think, and that is instead of moving toward an economy which is designed to benefit the very richest people in our country, we have got to create an economy and a government that works for all of us, not just for mr. musk or mr. bezos or mr. sgrzuckerberg. mr. president, in a time of massive wealth and income inequality, we have never had

more income and wealth inequality than we have had right now, it is beyond stupidity to provide more tax breaks to the very richest people in our country, and then to pay for those tax breaks by cutting back on medicaid and other programs desperately needed by working families all across this country. that is what we should not be doing. but let me take a moment to tell you what we should be doing. at a time when 85 million americans are uninsured or underinsured in our broken health care system, we have got to do what every other major country on earth does, and that is guarantee health care to all people as a human right, not a privilege. that's what we've got to do. at a time when one out of four

americans cannot afford the outrageously high prices that the pharmaceutical industry charges, we've got to end the absurdity of the american people paying by far the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs, we've got to cut the cost of medicine in this country in half, making it comparable with what the rest of the world is paying. mr. president, the federal minimum wage today is $7.25 an hour. that is a starvation wage. while 60% of our people, 60% of americans live paycheck to paycheck, we must raise that minimum wage to a living wage, at least $17 an hour. if you work 40 hours a week in the richest country on earth, you should not be living in poverty. mr. musk and mr. bezos want to make it harder for workers to

join unions. well, we have got to do exactly the opposite, make it easier for workers to join unions by passing the pro act. at a time when we need the best educated workforce in the world, we need to have the best public schools in the world. and among other things, that means we need to substantially raise teachers' salaries. with we need to attract the best and brightest young people into education, and we do that, among other things, by making sure that no teacher in america earns less than $60,000 a year. we radically change other broken system so little kids in this country get the quality care they need and the workers there are adequately compensated. mr. president, all over this country and for -- from vermont to l.a., we have a major housing crisis. it's not just the 800,000

americans who are homeless. it's millions of working families who are spending 40%, 50% or 60% of their limited incomes on housing. instead of spending almost a trillion dollars a year on a wasteful and bloated pentagon budget, we have got to build millions of units of low-income and affordable housing. and when we do that, we put large numbers of american workers to work at good-paying union jobs. mr. president, i have heardim a supporters that the president won the election and he has been given this huge mandate, just an overwhelming mandate to do whatever he wantses. well -- he wants. well, no president has the right to move us to oligarchy or authoritarianism but more important, let us not forget while trump did win this election, he actually received

four million votes fewer -- fewer votes than biden did in 2020 when biden won the election. so here we are. where do we go? what do we do? i think now is the time for the american people to come together. to not allow those who want to divide us up by the color of our skin, for our sexual orientation, or where we were born, that's what they want to do. they want to divide us up. now is the time for us to come together like never before and make certain we do not move toward oligarch can i, make sure we do not move toward authoritarianism or a kleptocracy, and most importantly, in the richest country in the history of the world, we must understand that we have the capability of providing a decent life for all

of our people. we can do that when we stand together and we don't let folks divide us up. and with that, mr. president, i and with that, mr. president, i

about 140,000 people that live in virginia that work for the federal government.

it was a week ago yesterday monday morning when i was attending a fairly standard annual celebration by the fredericksburg chamber of commerce to open up seasonal tax preparations called the vita program, volunteers and tax assistance. organizations all around the country trained volunteers help low and moderate income people do their taxes. it was just the kick off of this event in the fredericksburg area it was an opportunity to see those earlybird tax filings. the first day to try to get their taxes. someone came up to me and told me that they were veteran. and that they had tried to log on to the va portal that day to get a medical appointment and were shut out of the portal. fredericksburg area very heavily populated vote to confirm pam b as the attorney general of the

united states. before we do, i would like to speak in support of her nomination. and in doing that, urge my colleagues to vote for her. hopefully in a bipartisan way, like we had for garland, under biden administration. ms. bondi has been nominated to one of the most important offices of our country, and she's shown that she's up to that task. her impressive record and presentation at her hearing are proof that she's ready to take the helm of the justice department. ms. bondi made history in 2010 as the first woman elected to be florida's attorney general. she held this role for eight years after she was comfortably

reelected by the people of florida to that second term. eight years of service as attorney general of the third largest state in this union is excellent preparation for the role of attorney general of the united states. as florida's attorney general, ms. bondi was a member of the florida cabinet, its chief legal officer, and led a very large agency. she handled many issues at the state level that she'll be handling at the federal level. and by all accounts, she's handled these jobs expertly. as attorney general, ms. bondi didn't shy away from hard work

or complicated problems. she engaged in an aggressive campaign to eliminate pill mills, take a leading role in securing a $three and a quarter billion settlement following the deep oil spill and eliminated the backlog of rape kits. she also stood for law and order and sought justice for victims of violent criminals. her record shows then that she's highly qualified to be attorney general of the united states. during her confirmation hearing, ms. bondi answered questions for more than five hours. what we learned during her h hearing reinforced what we knew

from her existing record as attorney general of florida. she's a tough, fair, career prosecutor who built her reputation by enforcing the rule of law. pretty simple. we also heard from witnesses who praised ms. bondi's character, fairness, and willingness to work, work with members of both parties to solve the problems in flo florida. we are sure she is going to work the same way as attorney general of the united states. so what did we hear from these witnesses? we heard from an elected democrat who never voted for president trump. he said ms. bondi was fair, tethered to the rule of law, and could work with both democrats and republicans to serve the american people. we heard from florida's

statewide prosecutor who praised her competence running the legal depa department, as i said, of the third largest state in the union. we heard from a florida sheriff who testified about her commitment to law and order and to her partnership with law enforcement to keep floridians safe. these witnesses have worked with ms. bondi for decades, and they all vouch for her capability and character. ms. bondi's nomination has also received a flood of support from all across america. so i have a group of people here that have expressed their view through letter to the committee. law enforcement groups representing more than 650,000

officers wrote to urge us to support ms. bondi's nomination. a few of these groups included the national association of police organizations, the fraternal order of police, the national sheriffs association, major county sheriffs, national narcotic officers association, the international association of chiefs of police, and still some others. this support is a testament to ms. bondi's history of backing the blue. we should all be backing the blue. i just met with some law enforcement people just before coming over here, and i tell every one of them i'm not for defunding the police. and thank you for keeping the peace. we've also received letters of support for more than 100 former

senior department justice officials, scores of former u.s. attorneys, dozens of state attorneys general, women's rights groups, second amendment groups, and of course others. between her record, her presentation in committee, and the support she's received from across the country, i'm convinced that ms. bondi is the right choice. so when confirmed, ms. bondi will take the helm of what we all know is a turbulent time and also a justice department infected with political decision-making and its leaders refusing to acknowledge that reality. in other words, political decision-making, at least on the

seventh floor of the hoover building overtaking the major role of the fbi and the fbi's part of the justice department. they aren't putting first things first. so here are a few examples of political decision-making and infection in the department. crossfire hurricane. secondly, the justice department's targeting my staff -- that's right -- my investigative staff who at the time was investigating at my direction the government's abuse of crossfire hurricane. thirdly, cover-up of the hunter biden laptop story and sweetheart plea deals offered by the department of justice to

hunter biden. fourth, the fbi's inappropriate briefing to me and senator johnson during our biden family investigation that was later l leaked, and nothing is supposed to be leaked from what we call the scif. fifth, special counsel jack lawfair's operation. in other words, trying to put now president trump in jail. sixth, the targeting of traditional catholics, concerned parents, and abortion protesters as security threats. and seventh, the coordination of censorship of political speeches, and i don't have an eighth, ninth, tenth, 11th and 12th, but they exist.

i'm not going to take your time on that. now, all these things that are mentioned plus things i haven't mentioned are very serious breaches of the public trust. and we can't tolerate that sort of breach. i'm confident ms. bondi will not tolerate that breach, and i'm looking forward to working with her to shed sunlight on these abuses. and sunlight, as some supreme court justice said, is the best attack against -- oh, my gosh, i forgot exactly what it was. but sunshine is supposed -- coming in will really solve a lot of problems. this is the way i put it -- i say we need more transparency in government and transparency brings accountability.

now, i've already released new fbi records -- in fact, just last week -- with senator johnson that show even more political violence -- bias within the justice department and the fbi. these records prove that former fbi special agent in charge thibault, a known fbi agent, authored the initial language for what ultimately became jack smith's federal case against trump regarding the 20 presidential election -- 2020 presidential election. that case was conamed arctic frost. now, i don't know where they get the name arctic frost, with you that's what the case was called.

these records that we released last week showed a scheme in place between the justice department and fbi officials to get trump. i had to rely on brave whistleblowers to uncover the truth because i was stonewalled by the justice department and the fbi, and i was stonewalled even after they promised that their own -- at their own confirmation hearing that they would answer the letters that congressmen wrote them. we never got any answers. in fact, there's 58 answers in the last four years i've written to the fbi on my investigations that i have not gotten answers to. so, if you wonder why i'm so compassionate about -- passionate about pam bonn -- i'm confident that she's going to take a different approach. and she says yes for answering our letters, it'll be yes

instead of what the other people should have said, that the answer to that question is maybe. as the recent terrorist attacks in new orleans and around the world have shown, we're faced with very serious threats to our national security. the president needs his team in place to protect our country. and the american people deserve a secure homeland and borders, safe streets, and orderly markets. we need to swiftly confirm a capable and serious attorney general to get to work. now, i'm disappointed that none of my democratic colleagues on the judiciary committee voted for ms. bondi in committee. i hope it'll be different when we get to the full senate. we had a bipartisan vote, as

i've said previously, for attorney general garland. maybe on hindsight, we shouldn't have had, but we did have. there's no doubt that ms. bondi is high lay qualified -- is highly qualified. in committee, several of my democrat colleagues even acknowledged as much. she's qualified for the job. she represents mainstream views shared by at least the 77 million americans who voted for change on november 5. this should earn her the same bipartisan support this body gave to attorney general garland, so that's the third time i've said that. my colleagues will not cogs -- if my colleagues will not cross the aisle to vote for this qualified nominee, they'll show that senate democrats are intent

on opposing president trump's cabinet picks for purely partisan reasons, even at the same time they admit how fully qualified she is to do the job. so, ending now, i say once again, i proudly support ms. bondi. i look forward to confirming her. she's ready and able to serve our country well, and i know she'll work with president trump to restore faith in the justice department. i urge all of my colleagues to join me in confirming ms. bondi. i yield. the presiding officer: the chair now recognizes the senator from new hampshire. mrs. shaheen: mr. president, i'm happy to be on the floor this evening with my colleague from

vermont, senator welch. we are neighboring states that have been spooning for a very long time. but we're here today to talk about a very serious issue, and that is the tariffs that president trump is talking about imposing on canada -- goods from canada and mexico and the impact that will have on americans. on sat did i, president trump announce -- on sat subsidy, president trump -- on saturday, president trump announced a 25% tariff on mexico hand a 10% tax on energy from canada. he's also threatened universal tariffs on all countries. now, thankfully, the tariffs that he announced on canada and mexico appear to have been delayed for a month. but the tariff taxes on china are now in effect. and even though many of these

tariff taxes were delayed, they're still scheduled to go into effect next month, and they've created unnecessary panic and uncertainty among businesses and families across the country and in new hampshire. now, i want to point out in the beginning very clearly that it's not foreign countries who pay these taxes, these tariff taxes. it's americans who pay these tariff taxes. these are tariff taxes on imported goods, meaning that the person or company who's importing the good will be footing the bill. and these costs will be passed on to american consumers and businesses. and you don't have to take my word for it. bestbuy's ceo said, and i quote, the vast majority of that tariff will probably be passed on to the consumer as a price increase. and walmart's cfo said, there

will probably be cases where prices will go up for consumers. columbia sportswear ceo said about tariffs, we're set to raise prices and it's going to be very, very difficult to keep products affordable. now, if we look at the cost of just the tariff taxes that were originally announced on sat -- those were raise costs by more nan 1,200 a year. if we get into a trade war with increasingly high tariffs on both sides -- and that's what it appears could be happening with china -- those costs will go up even more. now, president trump campaigned on a promise to lower prices for everything. the tariffs that he's talking aboutou the exact opposite effect. i'm glad the administration and the president listened to reason. they delayed -- he delayed the

start of these tariffs. but i hope we don't have to be back here in a few weeks making this case again. and i want to make sure that people understand what these tariff taxes would do and highlight some of the areas where americans would be directly affected. first is energy. america imports more oil and gas from canada than from any other -- than any other product. in new hampshire, more than half of the gas in people's cars comes from canada. these tariff taxes would make gas prices go up. and they could even lead to supply shortages because refinery and delivery infrastructure just doesn't turn on a dpiechlt -- a dime. president trump's new 10% tariff tax on energy from canada would also directly raise the cost of keeping warm for granite staters during the coldest months of this year. in new hampshire, our number-one import from canada is heating

oil and nearly a quarter of a million households in new hampshire -- that's about 40% of our households, more than vermont, i think, senator welch -- rely on fuel oil to heat their homes. that's where the second -- we're the second highest state in the nation next to maine who relies on number-two heating oil to heat our homes. about 30,000 homes use wood. those about 60% of new hampshire that relies on delivered fuel to stay warm. much of that is coming from canada. the average nome new hampshire on heating oil uses about 600 gallons in the winter and for older, draftier homes -- and sadly we have a lot of those in new hampshire -- or those who are further up north, families may be using of a,000 gallons a winter. with temperatures dipping as low as 20 below zorro, heating oil

is a real necessity. my constituents are already getting notices. i don't know, senator welch, if the same is true of your constituents, but i bet it. but they're saying that those notices tell them their costs are going to go up if these tariffs go into effect. on sunday i heard from derrick in sandwich, new hampshire, who received a letter from his heating supplier, irving oil, that informed him that his bill for heating oil would be going up. the letter stated, as you may be aware, the u.s. government has announced a new tariff on imports from canada, including the heating oil or propane that irving energy delivers to you o the letter went on to describe that the tariff costs will be added to the price that he pays, even though he already has a contract. as derrick wrote to me, i will now have less to spend locally. my local businesses will suffer through lost business and

increased costs. and then their suppliers and employees will suffer. it's a real hardship. on inauguration day this year, heating oil cost an average of $3.93 a gallon in new hampshire. tacking an ill-advised 10% tariff tax on heating oil from canada could mean about $150 to $250 more for many in new hampshire just to keep warm through the winter. and while for elon musk and his billionaire friends -- and the billionaire friends of the president -- $150 to $250 may not sound like a lot in the winter, but there are a lot of people in new hampshire for whom $150 to $250 is the difference between staying warm and being cold in the winter. so let me also be clear -- we don't use gas and heating oil from canada because we don't produce it here in the united states.

we do it because it makes logistical and economic sense because in new england we are at the end of the pipelines that are coming from texas and the south. now, the united states produces more oil than any other country in the history of the world. that was true during the last three years of the first trump administration. it was true for the last four years of the biden administration. but for new hampshire, the st. john's refinery in canada simple play provides us the closest, lowest-cost supply. by the way, that the refinery sources as much as half of its crude oil from the united states. so it's helping oil producers in the united states send their toil the refinery, and we get it back in new hampshire and new england. president trump campaigned on cutting energy prices in hamilton reckless tariffs on

canada and mexico will make those prices higher, not lower. new hampshire families shouldn't be punished for what "the wall street journal" has just called the dumbest trade war in history. and that's not all. these tariff taxes will affect groceries. because the u.s. imports 38% of our fresh vegetables, 60% of our fresh fruit, and more than 99% of the coffee that we drink. if we take all these together, americans could be seeing an extra $200 a year on theirjourn grocery bills because of the trump tariff taxes and that does not include farm equipment and fertilizer. america -- much of that comes from canada. we already have record-high nd eggs, if

you can find eggs, some grocery stores are sold out. and one of the things that just happened in the last week is that because of the stop work order that president trump put on our services that we provide overseas to track bird flu, we're no longer tracking the bird flu that has helped to drive up the cost of eggs. it could get worse and we're not going to know about it until we see the prices reflected at the grocery store. any new 25% tariff tax on imports would make our groceries more expensive when families are already straining their budgets. tariffs are sometimes used to support manufacturers, that misses the part, it is often raw

materials and that means the parts we make in cars or electronics. all of it would get more expensive for american manufacturers, which is only going to make it harder for them to compete internationally. one of the messages i hear regularly from businesses is that uncertainty is one of the hardest things for them to deal with. one example of this is a call i got two weeks ago from a small business owner in new hampshire who sells specialized agricultural equipment both in the u.s. and overseas. this is a family business with five employees. his father founded it 50 years ago and i reached -- and he reached out specifically because he's worried about what tariffs on the components he buys from canada could do for his business. for the specialized equipment that he needs, there aren't a lot of manufacturers out there. so he reached out to my office asking if he would have to pay $5,000 more in costs for each of the machines he sells.

he took over this business just a couple of years ago and he's been working to invest to modernize it and expand. now he has to worry about whether he can try to grow the business, whether he might face new foreign competition or if he can pay bonuses or give raises to his employees, he can't be certain of the pricing schedule to send out. because his costs could go up $5,000 next week. i heard from another small business, granite state packing, it is a start-up meat-packing company that is only two years ago. they started just two years ago and they already have ten employees. they got $1.6 million in a grant from usda to expand their operations. that will allow them to double their workforce hchl in order to expand, they placed an order for $500,000 in new equipment because the specialized equipment they use isn't made in

the united states. now, depending on how and when these tariffs go into effect, they could be looking at a bill -- an increased bill for $125,000. that's going to affect whether they can follow through on the expansion, whether they can add the staff they want to add and they don't have any way of knowing if they will face an unexpected $125,000 bill because president trump and this administration hasn't made up its mind what it will do with the tariffs. over the weekend, i had another business owner from c and j bus owners, they run a great bus line. the owner told me they ordered seven new buss from quebec, these tariffs would add $150,000 to the cost of each bus. now, between that and the higher fuel costs they would pay, they

could be looking at $1.3 million more in added costs this year because of the trump tariff tax. no small business can easily just be a sush a 25% -- be a sush a 25 -- absorb a 25% price chief nor can they have good-paying jobs with this kind of uncertainty. make no mistake, i'm glad the administration delayed these tariffs. i'm glad they understand how this could affect america's small businesses and the impact it could have on the economy. and let me finally just talk about housing impacts. because new hampshire has an affordable housing crisis many these tariffs would -- crisis. these tariffs would make it worse. lumber makes up about 50% of building a house, a lot of building materials, in addition to lumber is imporltd. the national association of

homebuilders wrote in part, quote, imposing additional tariffs on these imports will ultimately be passed on to home buyers in the form of increased housing prices. that means this 25% tariff tax would directly add to the cost of building a home at a time when too many granite staters and too many americans across the country already can't afford housing. and we shouldn't pretend that american tariffs aren't going to go unanswered. other countries are going to retaliate and getting into a tit for at it trade war is not going to help working americans pay their bills. families across new hampshire and america are worried about the high cost of housing, about the cost of groceries, about what it costs to heat their homes. business owners are similarly worried about costs or unexpected expenses. i'm hearing regularly from them

about the impact of the uncertainty about the ability to grow their businesses because of these tariffs. president trump promised during his campaign -- i'm quoting here -- to lower the price of everything, but instead of doing something to lower costs, what he's doing now, what his administration is doing is planning to add a 25% tariff tax to countless imports from canada and mexico many and they've -- mexico. and they've added a 10% tariff tax on goods coming in from china. when this was delayed at the last minute, this would raise costs from groceries to housing to energy, it would proportionately hit lower-income families. i'm glad for the delay. i don't want people to misunderstand that. but how is a business or a family supposed to plan when

they don't know if important costs like pass or heating or groceries are going to spike any day? i want to finish by reading a quote here. the quote says, tariffs are inflationary, and would strengthen the dollar, hardly a good starting point for u.s. industrial renaissance. that's a quote from scott bessent, the new treasury secretary who just got confirmed when he wrote to his investors just a year ago. i happen to agree with what he said then, but unfortunately the administration he just joined seems to be willing to risk more inflation. these sweeping tariff tax increases would hurt american families, businesses and workers. i'm glad the taxes on goods from canada and mexico were delayed. i hope this administration can provide everyone with senator

that they won't go into effect next month. thank you, mr. president. i yield to my colleague from vermont. pra i now recognize the senator from vermont. -- the presiding officer: i know recognize the senator from vermont. mr. welch: everything my colleague said about new hampshire and how people are struggling to pay their bills, the cost of rent and housing and home heating bills in the winter has been brutal and groceries, that is totally the same situation for families in vermont, and it is around the country. and i can't add, really, to the r res. /* res. -- this has for

families. it mystifies. people come up to me and they say, peter, seriously, this is going to increase our grocery prices, this is going to mean lumber is going to be more expensive. this is going to mean home heating fuel, and we rely on canadian gas probably more than you do, this is going to raise prices and that $150 to $200 you're talking about, that's real money and they just are mystified that we would, through the president, increase their monthly bills. and for what reason? you know, i want to talk a little bit about that. new hampshire and vermont, we mostly get along, but we're rivals in hockey and other things, but we both have incredibly close relationships with canada. they're our friends. you know, in vermont we have a

library in derby, vermont, that is half in vermont and half in new hampshire, and our kids are going back and forth playing hockey, that is just on a personal level the affection we have for canada and they have for us. they come down and ski on our mountains, they come down and visit, we go up there. and there's an element of, peter, what's going on? national security is the reason you're doing this? is there a threat from canada to our national security? we know there isn't. so this is an arbitrary decision made by the president, in my view, abusing authority that congress gave him to use tariffs, if there is in fact a national security threat, which all of us in a commonsense way would think it might be

something from a military threat or it might be from the coercive economic policies that we face from china. there'singa legitimate case there for -- there's a legitimate case there for national security. but canada has been in the trenches with us for every war that we've had, they have been by our side. they're our friends. and, you know, that's another thing people ask. people, you don't treat your friends this way. you just don't do that. so i had a concern about what the impact was on vermont. and instead of me speculating about it -- just one minute. instead of me speculating about, mr. president, what we did was invited some vermonters who have some businesses, some vermont families come and tell us what will happen if we have these

tariffs. let me tell you what they said. we met he in st. albans, which is close to the canadian border. i asked them what would happen. first of all, there was nobody in these businesses who said the cost of this tariff would not be passed on to the consumer. all right. common sense. it's like somehow if there's a 25% increase in cost, the business can just eat it when we know, especially our small businesses, they're operating on the margin. they're doing every single thing they can to make their product affordable and competitive. these are really good people totally committed to the communities they're in. every one of them said whatever the cost of the tariff is, that is going to be passed on to the consumer. not that they like to do that, but they have to pay their own bills. it's just reality. the second thing they talked

about was the uncertainty that gets -- that occurs for businesses. one business was talking about how when these tariffs goes in -- by the way we have some history with this in the last trump administration. there was supposedly a tariff, but if you knew the back entrance into the white house, it could make a connection with somebody who had influence, you could get an exemption. so you get this terrible situation, which is not going to be available, by the way, for our vermont fuel dealers or our vermont homebuilders. if you know somebody, you somehow got out of the tariff. and there's no guidance about how these tariffs would have been ruled out. so there was an enormous opportunity for special treatment to be given. but even then the complexity of this. like, for instance, one manufacturer was talking about if you got a certain kind of

aluminum, it was subject to the tariff, if you got a slightly different definition of aluminum, you wouldn't be subject to the tariff. you have a whole production process that is using aluminum a that would be subject to a tariff, but aluminum b wouldn't, if you got a square panel it would be subject to the tariff, but if rectangular, it wouldn't. i keep asking why, why are we doing this, why are we inflicting this complexity on our businesses? why are we inflicting this cost on our consumers and our businesses? there is no justification for it at all. let me go through some of the sto stories, mr. president. garrick at manufacturing solutions, they do precision machining. they're a manufacturer. that's what we want. there's no margins on it. they work with sheet metal and

cardboard. he said these tariffs create a whole burden to determine what is tariff, the type or shape of aluminum. he's bracing to respond to whatever chaos comes next. this company has been in business for 29 years, and it employs 275 people. that is a big deal in our state of vermont, big deal. why mess with him? why? rock garland, atwater innov innovations, they -- we have better maple syrup than new hampshire, sorry to say, and definitely better than canada, they make the equipment that's used in maple syrup production. this is going to increase the costs and threaten jobs, and it really does threaten jobs, okay? then, if you lose a market, by the way, it's hard to get it

back. this company, which might face this huge increase of aluminum to manufacturer its products could lose market share and not be able to claw back. mike tatro from pulin grain, a great frenching lynn county -- a great franklin county family-run, northeast kingdom, too, grain dealer, they've been around generations. they've kept -- paid a huge contribution to keeping our dairy farms going. they import organic grain, huge market in vermont, their products are heavy to transport, think of corn, canola and oats, so they need to buy nearby, and they buy from canada. important, it's 30% to 40% of what they buy, and these tariffs could cost them about $10 million. it's just like the fuel dealers, they've got a contract, but they

honor their customers. they can't eat $10 million. it just can't be done. so the poulin family is really worried about the costs rising for farmers on the thinnest of thin margins. nobody works harder than our dairy farmers. that is hard work, but so important in vermont that we give them every chance to succeed when they're facing tough odds every day. why in the world would an act of the president of the united states add to the burden these dairy farmers already face, when they're trying to hang on? it doesn't make any sense to me. he also said something that -- mike said something really important. you know, the unknown and uncertainty, it's very difficult. there seems to be the point of view in the trump administration, the president, i'll be candid, that he thinks

chaos is a good negotiating tool. i'll leave it to others to decide their view on that, but if the chaos creates this uncertainty for the poulin grain company, for the dairy farmers in franklin county, for a family that is hoping they can build a house and they thought they had a price, for a family struggle to pay their groceries at the end of the month, that uncertainty is really an infliction of distress that's unfair and unreasonable. and to create uncertainty in everyday people, who are trying to live in their community, do a good job for the people that they serve, families trying to do their contribution in the community and keep the well-being of their family together, and they're on a tight margin, it's cruel to inflict unnecessarily uncertainty.

you know, the people from vermont, the people from new hampshire, and i think this is true around the country, they're okay with facing hard and grim circumstances, and they'll grit their way through it, and they'll take care of their kids, and they'll take care of their community, they'll be generous. but you know what -- when the hardship that is something they have to deal with is a hardship that has been arbitrarily inflicted upon them by authorities or powers in washington, in this case the president, and in my view totally improper invocation of so-called national security with our biggest ally, canada, then they start to wonder. that makes the burden even more and more difficult. so, another person that was there, sarah muirhoff was a representative of the general

contractors of vermont, be a they do all the building. they've been incredible with the infrastructure challenges after tropical storm irene. that was a while ago. then the floods we had in july of 2023, then again in july of 2024. the cost of raw materials is already very expensive, and she quoted one of her members, kevin moyer from vermont frame, who said tariffs have always been bad for everyone. as a business owner who buys a lot of timber from canada i'm very worried about the impact of tariffs on my company. i cannot absorb these costs, and we'll have to push them through to my clients in the form of price increases, which will make my company less competitive, versus other construction techniques like conventional framing. so i keep asking myself, why are we doing this to folks so essential to the well-being of the communities we represent?

by the way, you've got two border state senators here. we have a lot in common. but everything we've said applies to similar businesses in every single state in the country. so, this is not a republican-democratic deal. this is -- these tariffs are going to cost our families, our families that you represent, mr. president, that the senior senator from new hampshire represents, that i represent, it's going to cost them more money and for what? what are we getting in return? so, mr. president, i too am very relieved actually, on behalf of the people of vermont and the people of new hampshire and the people of this country, that there's been a temporary pause in these tariffs, but the uncertainty goes on. there will be no more

justification in 30 days from now to impose these tariff taxes on vermonters and on new hampshirites than there is today. and today there's no justification, and in 30 days there'll be no justification. i would call upon the president to get real in accepting the consequences to everyday families, to small businesses. these aren't billionaires. these are really hardworking people in vermont and in new hampshire, and they just rightly don't understand this. so, yes, it's good the tariffs have been suspended, it's really bad that they were ever threatened to be imposed, they will never do any good when there's a bogus reason, so-called national security, and a real abuse of that authority

by the president to invoke that with respect to our closest ally and neighbor, and in the trenches with our soldiers in every war we've been in. so mr. president, i just urge president trump to do the right thing here. he can be tough. he can pursue his policies. but the first principle that every one of us in public office should respect is that we do no harm to the people we represent by the policies we advocate. mr. president, i yield back.

mr. welch: mr. president. the presiding officer: i recognize the senator from vermont. mr. welch: thank you, mr. president. over the past two weeks, political operatives in the administration of president trump and elon musk have shown the american people and the world that they plan to destroy as much of the professional workforce in the executive agencies as they can get away with. whether it's illegal, and it is, it is about 140,000 people who live in virginia that work for the federal government. over the past few weeks, political operatives have shown the american people in the world that they plan to destroy as

much of the present professional workforce and the executive agencies as they can get away with. whether it is illegal, and it is , or, unconstitutional, and it is of no concern. inspector general's and career civil servants who have served the american people for decades. some for their entire professional lives are being summarily removed without any due process at all and due process that they are legally entitled to. they are being replaced with much improved artisans who have little, if any government experience orls little if any substantive knowledge. they do have aio qualification d that is total loyalty to the president. on top of mr. musk list of

agencies to eliminate in the u.s., is the u.s. agency for international development. or usaid, as we know it. that has been the subject of a ferocious attack by mr. musk. that agency is one that not many americans know about but which fulfills a vital mission. it has a relatively small budget lesson 1% of the total federal budget and it has a large responsibility to support humanitarian, economic development and governance programs in more than 100 countries. whatever savings elon musk may obtain from cutting usaid would have no appreciable impact and mr. trump's huge tax office of general counsel, were purged. purged. cuts not happened before in this country. over the weekend, musk called

usaid evil and a viper's nest of radical left marxists who hate america. others in the administration have accused usaid personnel of insubordination in acting against american interests without producing any evidence to back that up. reminiscent of the mccarthy era. make the accusation, destroy the reputation, and move on. that's a serious question, and we should, each of us, be asking the implications of this language. i find mr. musk's accusations appalling. i know they're factually baseless, and fra inkly i -- frankly, i find them despicable. it's also curious, because in 2022, his company, star link, received millions of dollars from usaid for starlink's operation in ukraine, not to mention the incredible amount of taxpayer subsidies that helped tesla become the major company

that it is. and mr. musk, he's a billionaire as we know, he has no reluktance to take tack -- reluctance to take taxpayer funds from usaid, none. he took money from usaid. it was a good organization when the money was coming from it to him to help us in ukraine. but now he's calling it a criminal organization. and i doubt that he knows what 99% of usaid employees do, or the positive impact they have on the lives of people around the world and on u.s. national security, the obligation all of us have as members of the united states senate. i wonder if he's spoken to anyone who works at the over seas missions or seen with his own eyes what usaid does in countries like indonesia, ethiopia, haiti, mozambique, just to name a few where the lives of countless

people really do benefit. from usaid. and being billionaires, president trump and eli musk -- elon musk may not be aware that one billion people in the world live on less than a dollar a day. they may not be aware that the lives of hundreds of millions of people, especially children, are threatened by diseases that can be prevented or cured with drugs that cost only a few pennies. or maybe mr. musk is not aware that the life of every american is threatened by the spread of infectious diseases. we saw that with covid and there's other diseases out there where what we do elsewhere protects the health and safety of people right here at home. maybe mr. musk isn't concerned that the earth's tropical force and endangered species are be decimated by illegal miners, loggers and wildlife traffickers

who are often in collusion with local police and transnational criminal organizations to feed, by the way, china's insatiable demand for minerals, timber and wildlife. consequences to the environment be damned. usaid works with local governments and organizations to protect forests in south and central america, central africa and in indonesia and to train wildlife rangers to combat poaching and trafficking. it may make absolutely no difference to mr. musk as it clearly doesn't to president trump that the rising acidity of the oceans and plastic pollution are destroying what remains of the world's coral reefs and marine species at the bottom of the food chain. due to the burning of fossil fuels and usaid works to protect marine echo systems -- eco systems in support in the

reduction of fossil fuels, carbon emissions and reduced plastic waste. mr. president, government corruption, repression and impunity may not be a priority in other countries for president trump and elon musk to take on. even though they are major causes of the poverty in the word, political instability, and violence and narcotics trafficking and migration in our own helms fear. so what happens in these countries makes a difference in what happens here, especially with respect to immigration. and these are just a few of the many complex global problems that u usaid personnel works to address every single day. partnering with foreign governments and thousands of nongovernmental organizations. those are real people. they're doing real work, even though they aren't ceo's. they're doing their best to address poverty, environmental

degra degradation, corruption and governance. it's affecting nongovernmental organizations, contractors, and institutions of higher education in vermont, this attack on usaid. these are vermont organizations, mr. president, that have a long history of implementing usaid humanitarian and development programs. i'll mention a few. world learning, at the time troe tech -- tetro tech ard, the afghan alliance are examples. they're being decimated as a result of this order. and suddenly, out of the blue, without even an hour's notice, these organizations and others were forced to shut down programs and lay off staff with no idea of what comes next. many of their employees are working overseas where they are stranded without even the ability to have funds to pay for

flights home. that's how sudden it was. and unlike mr. musk, they don't have their own private jets. this not only sends a message to the people of those countries that the united states can't be relied on, it's pretty cruel. to create that uncertainty, that confusion, and then that desperation. the u.s. agency for international development like any federal agency is not perfect. any time there's top of reform coming from your side of the aisle or ours, i'm all ears, because anything we can do to make what we have work better, we all have an obligation to do our part. but usaid was established by an act of congress more than 25 years ago. and constitutionally, no president and unelected billionaire can unlawfully shut a congressionally authorized agency down. there's no authority to do that.

and we shouldn't stand by and essentially abdicate our article 1 authority and creed the capacity -- cede the capacity to a president it pick and choose among agencies legally authorized by the congress as to whether he will destroy it or continue it. you know, some folks have said that shutting down usaid is part of the president's plan to reduce the national debt. it isn't. you know, i think the president cares a lot less about the national debt. it went up by more than $7 trillion to pay for tax cuts and eliminating the usaid would make no dent in that at all. some have said that we need to better align usaid's programs with the policies of the state department. that's something that is worth discussing. i'd have some confidence in secretary rubio taking a serious

look at how that can be done. but that's already being done by and large. diplomacy is the job of the state department. it's not the same as development which is what the usaid does. you don't shut an agency down, freeze billions of dollars in authorized programs, silence or remove entirely the senior staff and lock thousands of employees out of their offices. i mean, this is unbelievable. he locked the door so people show up for work and can't get in. and do you that without any notice before having any discussion. you know, this is the difference between disruption -- that can be good -- and destruction, which is terrible. and i believe, mr. president, that it's our job, it's our job as senators to speak up in defense of the civil service, the foreign service, their families, usaid's autonomy in

the foreign assistance programs, that republicans and democrats have strongly supported for generations. programs that have been the building blocks of u.s. security partnerships and alliances around the world that we depend on to prevent conflict. responding to humanitarian disasters and create -- by the way, create markets for u.s. exports and counter the malign influence of our adversaries. mr. president, it's my college, the senior senator from south carolina has said year after year when speaking about u.s. a aid, quote, soft power is a critical component of defending america and our values, unquote. he's been a consistent defender of usaid's workforce and budget as have many other republican members of congress, leaders of the u.s. business community, and senior military officers who

understand that diplomacy and development are as important to preventing conflict as the threat of military force and a strong military, which we support. it wasn't long ago that secretary rubio, then our colleague, senator rubio, praised usaid's work and global health, in aiding victims of natural disasters and supporting venezuelans who were persecuted by that dreadful maduro. until elon musk decided that it's, quote, time for usaid to die -- he really said that -- time for usaid to die, usaid previously had always received bipartisan support. this is no time for the congress of the united states, the united states senate, to stand by passively while an agency that plays a unique indispensable

role in protecting the interests and the influence, the security and the reputation of the united states around the world is decapitated and dismantled. those responsible for the self-inflicted disaster have no respect for the law, no respect for the will of congress, and no respect for the thousands of truly patriotic public servants who have devoted their lives to defending the interest of the united states and presenting a positive face of america in some of the world's most dangerous places. mr. president, i yield back.

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from nevada rose it's now been more than two weeks since president donald trump took office and there's been virtually no actions, virtually no actions to lower costs at the grocery store. on the campaign trail, donald trump made promises over and over that he would address rising costs. in fact, he said, quote, on day one we'll end inflation and make america affordable again, on day one. and he said, quote, when i win,

i will immediately bring prices down starting on day one. end quote. well, way past day one. it's now day 16 of his presidency and so far the trump administration has failed to meet the president's own goal and promise to hardworking families. just look at what it cost to buy milk, bread, and eggs. when nevadans go to the grocery store, many are seeing empty shelves where the eggs are supposed to be. and the eggs people did find -- well, they cost an arm and a leg. look at this picture here from reno, nevada, a grocery store there. empty shelves. that's where the eggs would be. and meanwhile, the trump administration is doing nothing to help fix this or stop corporations from jacking up the prices. instead, president trump has been cozying up to billionaire ceo's and taking actions that

will hurt families and drive prices up and up. trump's first actions were to push through a whirlwind of executive orders, including to roll back actions to lower prescription drug prices. i want to repeat that. one of president trump's first actions was to stop efforts to lower your prescription drug costs. and just this past weekend, president trump announced reckless tariffs on mexico and canada. this is essentially a new tax on hardworking families for products from these two countries, our biggest trading partners, by the way. while he's promised to delay his tax on canadian-mexican goods for a month, ultimately these tariffs will hurt our economy. canada is nevada's biggest export partner. they provide us with chicken, grain, sugar, and livestock.

and the impact of these tariffs, well, they just don't stop at the grocery store shelves. they'll also increase what you pay at the fuel pump. they'll increase the price of construction materials making housing even more expensive. and so i ask everyone in this chamber, i ask everyone across the nation, how does that help you? how does that help you? how does it help lower costs? how does it help provide financial relief for families? how does it make your paycheck go farther? how does it put more money in your pocket? it doesn't. president trump, he's now even saying that inflation is no longer his number one issue. he has flipped on his promise to you. he has flipped on his promise to you. and the fact is, as americans work hard every day, nevada

families, the finest families in our nation, they work hard every day and many are struggling to get by because prices have skyrocketed over the last few years. it's why i've been taking action to lower costs for families and reduce their financial burden, to give folks some much needed breathing room, to make their paycheck go even farther. i'm working to lower housing costs by investing in our construction workers, to increase our housing supply. help lead the charge last year against a proposed clover albertson's mega mefrnler that would have let grocery prices e they already are. and there are steps we in congress can take and have been taking to tackle inflation. i urge the president to take this issue seriously and tackle it head-on.

and i am willing to work with him and work with anyone else if it means lowering costs for hardworking families. but we need to get going right now. so i urge my colleagues, democrats and republicans, to come together and prioritize solving kitchen-table issues, instead of pushing extreme wedge issues. it's what the american people need to us do for them. that's what the american people are counting on us to do for them. we need to get busy and do that. thank you, mr. president. i notice the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: the clerk: ms. alsobrooks.

puma -- tampa by my supporters able to give the judiciary for pam bondi who will hopefully be confirmed as the next attorney general of the united states of america. i want to think before you do that, the leadership and the hard work of leader thune and senate majority whip barasso and this entire confirmation process working at a clip that i think is responsible and one that honors the mandate of president trump got to shake things up in washington d.c.. i think what you saw in november was a dynamic where people were particularly happy with what was going on in the town. they voted for reform and president trump is putting together a team of reformers. look no further than an ideal place for that reform than the department of justice. before i get there i do want to

point out on a personal note that when president trump announced he was supporting pam bondi i think i said to somebody this was a homerun and as many of us in this chamber are often outdone by senator graham he described it as a grand slam touchdown hole-in-one a's slamdunk olympic gold-medal pick and he is right. i've known pam bondi for years from the a.g. world but that was my job before at this job job. it was attorney general of missouri and pam was always known as a leader and somebody that had this really rare combination of a steel backbone and a heart of gold. she's in it for the right reasons that she cares about the rule of law she started her career from humble beginnings in a small town in florida and she wanted to be a prosecutor. you heard in her testimony in

the judiciary committee that was her goal, to be a prosecutor and she our 10 years in those courtrooms prosecuting the bad guys and she later became the attorney general of one of our bigger states and as i mention she was a leader. she defended the constitution, she took on the opioid epidemic, she was relentlessly taking on human trafficking and somebody to think that everybody can look up to not just on a personal perspective from her personal story but the way she took on her job had had accolades from both sides of the aisle. there was somebody in a senate committee who was on the other side of the aisle who ran for attorney general the same time that pam bondi was running for attorney general and testified to her character. there's just no question that she supremely qualified for this job. we are really going to need

somebody as the attorney general to lead the department of justice who has that kind of integrity, who believes in the constitution, believes in individual rights and getting that department back to where it always should have been which is fighting crime. sadly over the last four years we have seen a department of justice gone astray, one that has made headlines of course for going after parents who showed up to school board meetings under the auspices of the patriot act, trading moms and dads as terrorists who went to a school board open forum meeting and had concerns about things like critical race theory. the full weight of the federal government honed in on parents and catholics who were treated the same way because they were

traditional catholics literally setting up informant networks in an effort to stymie them because of their religious affiliation. i'm not talking about the soviet union of the 1980s, i'm talking about the united states of america in 2021. what merrick garland did to this agency and the department of justice is a tragedy. kash patel hopefully will move out of the judiciary committee hears it may be the next leader of the fbi and restore integrity to that agency as well but of course the department of justice that pam bondi hopefully in a few short hours will be confirmed and sworn in will restore integrity. in addition to going after families who show up to school board meetings, the coordinated

effort by the past administration to take out their chief political rival under the moniker of show me the man and i will show you the crime. he can't be dismissed. they don't want to talk about that. but the effort to financially ruined president trump, to literally throw him in jail for the rest of his life deserves the scorn of the history books. joe biden gave a speech in the fall of 2022 calling half of america threat to democracy and president trump would never make it back to the oval office and guess what happened? a series of zombie cases with the best -- novel leave goal theory were resurrected in new york. the number three person at doj left the department of justice to join the das office in new york. why would that person want to do that? we'll guess what president trump

was prosecuted in a manhattan courtroom not long after that. and stay cases the number two person at the das office in atlanta was coordinating with the white house counsel's office on the prosecution of president trump in georgia. and jack smith, jack smith was brought in who is notorious among legal circles for overzealous and over prosecutions over charging and was brought in specifically to take out president trump. it was only the supreme court and ultimately that prevented that this was all a scheme devised by the biden administration to make sure president trump never got back into office and guess what he stared it all down and he won and we have a real opportunity

now to have a level set. i don't think it's right that he has people pursuit because of their politics from a criminal perspective. nothing was out of bounds in the last four years by the biden administration and merrick garland so pam bondi is just the kind of person to come in to restore integrity and to make sure that our department of justice is fighting on for half of the american people and not an attempt ironically to undermine the republic in the very accusations lobbed at joe biden's political opponent and with that mr. president i look forward to voting yes for pam bondi and having a real leader, somebody that will be able to look up to in that very important department of justice and i yield back.

mr. durbin: mr. president. the presiding officer: the democratic whip. mr. durbin: are we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: yes, we are. mr. durbin: i ask that the quorum call be suspended. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. durbin: thank you, mr. president. shortly, senate republicans will confirm the nomination of pam bondi to serve as attorney general and lead the department of justice in the new administration. yesterday i came to the senate floor to discuss the trump administration's decision to purge department of justice officials and warned that ms. bondi's record suggests that she will aid in this effort to pack the department of justice with loyalists seeking

retribution against president trump's rivals. since the watergate era, there has been bipartisan support for the principle that the department of justice investigations and prosecutions must be independent from the white house. over the years, both republicans and democrats have asked many individuals seeking the office of attorney general one basic question -- will you be willing to tell the president no? given that ms. bondi, when speaking about president trump's criminal indictments, threatened to, quote, the prosecutors will be prosecuted and the investigators will be investigated," i have serious doubts about her willingness to really say no this president. this concern is even more pressing because of the last 16 days the prescription drugs has purge -- the trump administration has purged dozens of senior law enforcement -- career law enforcement officials at the department of justice and

at the fbi. this purge has particularly focused on dedicated, nonpartisan prosecutors. on its first day, the trump administration removed or a signed as many as 20 experienced professionals with invaluable national security expertise without any comparable replacements. including the veteran career deputy assistant attorney generals in the national security division. these are the men and women we have entrusted with the responsibility to keep america safe. they were dismissed by this new president just days into his administration. those reassigned have been put into roles concerning immigration enforcement for which they have little expertise. this morning we talked about fentanyl and some 70,000 americans each year losing their

lives to this drug. we were all concerned and expressed it at this hearing, but some of the very people working in drug enforcement will be moved and put into mass deportation of immigrants many we have said over and over again if the -- the president is setting out to do what he plans, he will have to cut back our law enforcement community at the risk of endangering our families and businesses in america. since that warning, dozens more senior officials have been removed. at the fbi at least six fbi executive assistant directors or ead's, including those who oversee the national security branch, intelligence branch and the -- and they special agents in charge of four major field offices and the

assistant director of the washington field office. and the acting attorney general have a memo stating, and i quote, given your significant role in prosecuting the president, i do not believe the leadership of the department can trust you in implementing the president's agenda faithfully. the trump administration asked line attorneys and agents to resign simply for handling tasks linked to president trump or prosecution of his misconduct. the acting fbi director informed the entire fbi workforce that he was reviewing the files of, quote, all current and former fbi personnel assigned at any time to investigations and or prosecutions relating to january 6 and related deny unrelated terrorism cases. mr. president, if you're a

student of history, you know that when the communists took over the soviet union, one of the things that they gloried in doing -- gloried in doing was rewriting history, trying to make the sad chapters different so future generations were not sure what happened. that is what is going on with january 6, 20 it 21 -- 2021. despite the videos of what happened on this day when the insurrections took over, they continued to believe that this is a hoax, that somehow these were just tourists coming by the capitol. those of us who were there, those of -- those of us who remember the danger brought by the mobsters and thugs know this

is a lie. and now they are saying if you know of any of the policemen beat up in this building, tore down the structures, broke into windows, you are not welcome at the department of justice. they want to we are write history, that he want future generations to believe the lie they perpetrated what happened that day. those who were there will never forget. the interim u.s. attorney for d.c. ordered an internal review of staff handling of cases related to january 6, and has fired dozens of prosecutors and investigators who work these cases. the people who were spared by the pardoned of donald trump include individuals who were dangerous, one had a record of 38 convictions for crimes and they're now back out on the streets. over the past weekend, thousands

of fbi personnel across the country were told to complete a questionnaire that asked a series of questions about their involvement in the prosecution or investigation of january 6. this shameless partisan retribution is only the beginning. it has been reported that the future fbi director, carb patel will have a solely partisan political operators, including an associate of elon musk. elon musk, who elected him? by what authority does he have any voice in the administration of our government? why should he or his mignons have -- minute yuns have access to the records of private citizens? it's happening. these actions will cripple field offices and u.s. attorneys offices across the country by increasing the caseload for the remaining agents, dramatically

slowing down critical investigations and prosecutions. and the trump department of justice is taking it beyond the president's personal grievances. they are dropping mullin investigations -- dropping criminal investigations against his allies and have begun to strip the department of justice of vital substantive expertise by reducing personnel from the law and policy sections of certain divisions such as the environment and natural resources divisions. as america faces a heightened threat landscape, the shocking removals of hundreds of employees deprive years of experience fighting crime, espionage, and terrorism. for years my republican colleagues claimed back the blue and declarld democrats are soft on crime. we heard it over and over and

over. but now as president trump is gutting our nation's law enforcement agencies and putting our national security at risk, my republican colleagues do in the complain. they nowhere to be found. instead of condemning these actions they will likely come to the senate floor and confirm an individual who lead the department of justice who is in lockstep of this policy of president trump and chosen for the role specifically because she's loyal. more than anything else, she is loyal. i urge my colleagues to consider what a danger president trump and pam bondi present to this nation. i will oppose her confirmation and hope my colleagues will do the same. i will say, mr. president, letters went out today asking for a fourth hearings on kash patel, and there are more questions than answered. he has an attitude and to think this man will be in charge of

38,000 fbi agents and personnel, 400 field offices across the nation and around the world, is going to have the authority to investigate those whom he chooses is frightening. his message in politics is get even. i've read his book, it's called "government gangsters," and this book in specific detail talks about his view of politics. he has a long list of grievances, political and personal, and he plans to get even. that is not the kind of person we need in charge of the fbi. he has no experience that points to any significance which qualify him for this job. we have had many directors of the fbi chosen for long periods of time because of our change of the law. we now have a ten-year period of service for the director of the fbi and we do our pest to make sure they -- best to make sure they are a political since they

bridge many administrations, not just one or two. that is part of the law and that's the reason we did it. now we're going to put a man in the position who has no experience, no background, and a political chip on his shoulder. i'm afraid that is it a res. pooe for -- recipe for disaster. i urge my colleagues to think twice about kash patel and pam bondi. that is it not what -- that is it not what we want. mr. president, i yield the floor.

the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. welch: thank you, mr. president. i believe that the attorney general is an important position in a president's cabinet. and if it's not the most important, it certainly is the most difficult. whoever is our attorney general, and it is a person that serves all of us, they have two clients. they have the president who appointed her or him and they have the constitution. and let me be clear that i have no objections to any president, including president trump, appointing someone that the president is close to. president kennedy appointed his brother. i do have a problem with any president seeing the job of

attorney general to be the person who runs, quote, my justice department. and that's how president trump has characterized it, my justice department. so we have this dilemma with respect to coming to a conclusion in the use of the responsibility that the senate as an institution has for the advice and consent of a cabinet member. i start from the orientation that a president should be able to pick his team and that we should move on nominees and vote on them expeditiously. my orientation is that the president is entitled to the benefit of the doubt but not to a blank check.

what's also difficult for me with respect to this appointment is that in my view pam bondi is accomplished and qualified. i have great respect for her work as county prosecutor in florida and i have great respect for her work as attorney general in the state of florida. i have great respect for the fact as a woman she made that decision to run for attorney general and had to overcome pretty significant odds in order to win that position. and i also remember mr. ranking member, she had great testimony from people that she worked with and i think both you and i have a great deal of respect for folks who have a leadership position and treat their subordinates with great respect and have the affection and confidence, and that came through in the testimony of

people who had worked with ms. bondi. my grave concern is really about president trump and what he is clearly demanding of the person, whoever it is he has, and now it's ms. bondi, what the president is demanding and that clearly is the loyalty oath to him as opposed to a demand for straightforward candid advice, including if the president is asking something to be done like a prosecution of a political adversary that the answer, mr. president, has to be no. that's what the president is demanding. now, we can argue on both sides about whether that's the case, but the evidence is overwhelming.

the question that i've asked a number of nominees, including mr. patel and including ms. bondi is who won the 2020 election. and it's pretty clear that the president's team, in preparing folks for that inevitable question, came up with an acceptable answer. the acceptable answer is that president biden was the president. president biden was certified. no one can just say the straightforward president biden won. you know, in the closest election in our history, bush v. gore, after the supreme court made its decision, not only did al gore accept the outcome, but

democrats did, americans did. and that was prejanuary 6 when we all relied on the guardrail in the constitution that there would be a commitment to a peaceful transfer of power and that there would be renunciation of violence in the means of persuasion in the outcome of an election. january 6 did change that. there was the attack on the capitol. many of us were here. that was inspired by president trump. he invited people to come -- it will be wild. and it was provoked because the president used the enormous authority he had, the enormous credibility he had with people who supported him, to begin peddling the stop the steal narrative, the election was

stolen. and president trump has never, ever given up on that. as far as he has -- as far as he's concerned, and to every person, every audience, that election was stolen. and people that were going to work in his administration in a vetting process had to answer that question in the way that was acceptable to president -- then newly elected president trump. that's not acceptable to me. it's not acceptable. president biden won. president trump won this last election. i didn't vote for him, but i can say it. i can acknowledge it and do the best i can as a member of the minority party. but we now have a president who is not allowing a person who has to have a dual loyalty to him,

yes, but to the constitution, to make it clear before that person is nominated for a law enforcement position that they accept his narrative of what happened in 2020. it's really dangerous, in my view, for our country. you know, the president has gone on, much to my regret, intensifying that concern that many of us have as to whether there'll be an adherence to the rule of law. in an extraordinary first two we

weeks, the president has gone on, in my opinion but a lot of court support, a rampage of illegality. it's a serious threat to our country. let me start with the impoundment. you know, basic civics, article 1 branch, that's the u.s. senate, u.s. house, has authority over appropriations and spending. the executive can propose and we can consider an appropriation request. the president can reject an appropriations bill that the congress passes with a veto. but what the president can't do is pick and choose where he feels like spending or just disregarding the appropriations passed by the congress of the united states, and he's doing that. the impoundment is patently

illegal, not even close, and what's clear to me is the president doesn't care, because if the impoundment causes enough havoc that affected agencies will either be destroyed or severely damaged. let me give a couple examples. that impoundment notice went out, wells river community health center in vermont, it provides health care to really poor vermonters, and they do an incredible job. they have a cash balance that allows them to stay in business for zero to five days. that's it. the impoundment notice comes in, literally they show up to work, it says you shut down, you can't open up tomorrow. those folks running that organization don't have the money to pay the salaries of anyone, the doctors, the receptionists, the medical

providers. we see what's happening at usaid. we're shutting you down. the doors are locked. people show up for work, they can't get in. that's illegal, unconstitutional. as i see it. and the administration, the president, has made a clear decision that he doesn't care. he's not going to worry about the niceties, things that restrained republican and democratic presidents before, namely adherence to the law and recognition of their responsibility to preserve a tool that has been a safeguard for our democracy, through both republican and democratic administrations, those rules don't apply to him. and then we've seen that he's delegated authority to an unelected billionaire, mr. musk, and told him basically to go wild with the federal government, do what you want, go

where you want. and in one of the most astonishing things, they sent over, musk sent over, five kids, one is 19, he can't drink in vermont, and for early 20-year-old folks -- four early 20-year-old folks, they march into the treasury secretary, basically, in the united states, the successor to alexander hamilton, a man i respect, by the way, mr. bessent, and the person who ran the payment system, and said, we're in charge. that's basically what they did. then they got access to the computers. which means they have your social security and mine, they have information about our taxes, every individual in this country, their privacy has been put in jeopardy. think if this were the private sector. let's say you're jamie dymond and you run jp morgan, and five

kids show up at your bank and they say, hey, mr. musk sent us, give us access to the computers, and they have access to all the individual information, company information, of the folks who work with j.p. morgan. that's what happened. and it's not really apparent to all the american people what is happ happening. it's the folks who are directly impacted by this, the folks at usaid who don't have a job, the folks at wells river clinic who are operating on a marginal -- on the tightest of margins, that have suffered and don't know whether they'll be able to keep the lights on. it's the woman, the mom, who had, finally after months and months of trying, a dental appointment through medicaid, had it canceled arbitrarily and abruptly. so those individuals are feeling it, and this is going to ripple

out to more and more americans seeing what's happening. but we need an attorney general who will share my shock at a president acting in such a lawless way. so, the fact is, frankly, i don't think president trump ever in the world would place a value on having an attorney general who's willing to tell him, mr. president, no, you can't get appointed unless you pass the test, and the test was on full display both with mr. patel and ms. bondy and their -- ms. bondi and their inability to answer the basic question, who won the 2020 election. my concern is not that they, quote, get the answer right.

my concern is they get their profound responsibility is first and foremost to the constitution and the rule of law, and the president is not looking for anyone other than someone who's going to give him the fealty that he demands when these questions arise. and what we're seeing with the president in these first two weeks of his term is that there is no restraint, the rule of law is for suckers, he's going to break things, and whatever damage is done is not his problem. the problem is, it's a lot of really innocent and good americans who are being affected by this -- doctors and nurses, moms whose

children get medicaid help, lawyers who dedicated their career to civil rights or environmental protection. you know, there's a cruelty with the way in which the president has acted. it's almost a casual cruelty. it just doesn't matter. so, i'm looking for some confidence that the checks and balances that are required, that we can build up, and frankly there's a major question that we face as a united states senator and each of us as an individual senator. i believe, at least to exercise our judgment. we won't agree necessarily, and we may come to a different judgment about how best we can do what i think we each of us is

required to do, and that is protect the institutional responsibility of the united states senate to be an independent and separate branch of government, and to adhere to the importance of the separation of powers, and that this institution has a fundamental responsibility to the american people to be a check and balance. and there's a hundred of us here, and we ma i have a hundred -- we may have a hundred different opinions as to when it is we should say know. but my hope is that every single one of us will accept that it is our responsibility to make that judgment and not just passively submit to whatever action the president is sending our way. with that, i yield back.

mr. whitehouse: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: mr. president, i sit on the judiciary committee and was present for the confirmation hearing of pam bondi in her quest to be attorney general of the united states, and i have to say that there is a lot to admire. she had been a competent prosecutor for many years. she was the twice elected attorney general of a major state. and she said a lot of the right things about independence of the department and rule of law. what i couldn't get over was how things changed when she got to a topic that would have been sensitive to donald trump, something that would have gotten donald trump all twitchy. when she hit those topics, it was like watching the plane fly

into the bermuda triangle, and all the navs and comms go crazy. she couldn't say obvious things, things like did president biden win the 2020 election? that's an easy answer. yes, he did, sir, or ma'am. soup simple. when she -- super simple. when she can't say that, that's a sign when she told us that there had been a peaceful transfer of power. a roomful of senators who had had to flee this chamber because of the violence of january 6, and go and shelter in a secret location, and she had to tell us that there had been a peaceful transfer of power. again, haywire. she couldn't say there was no predication do go after liz cheney or jack smith. predication is the key to being

able to open a case like that. the predication is pretty apparent, or its lack is pretty apparent, and she could not agree that there was no predication to answer a case. and last, she pretended that the candidate for fbi did not have an enemies list. he had an enemies list. he published his enemies list. he said that the people on his enmislist were criminals. he said now it's time to go on the manhunt for the enemies that he identified on the enemies list. when she can't state the obvious, it causes real concern, and it causes real concern because of the lawlessness of this administration already demonstrated in the first two we weeks. she got a lot of questions about pardons, would she support violent offenders in the january 6 attack on the capitol being pardoned? and we were chaste iced for

having -- chaste eyed for -- chastised for asking those questions by the republicans, you know, you're asking ridiculous hypotheticals, that will never happen. jim jordan -- oh, that will never happen. the president will never do that. over and over again, the republicans say that will never happen. what happened? he pardoned the violent offenders. in fact, some of them are already up to no good again. we've got some arrested for assaulting police officers. we had some shot in a violent confrontation with police officers. this is in just the t weeks since their pardons. and here, soliciting a minor. that is the quality of people that the president was willing to pardon. so those pardons are another signal about a very strange and dangerous time that president trump is taking us into. as my colleague from vermont

just mentioned, we've got these little charters. i call them the musk rats running around in treasury, running around over at usaid. getting into systems where apparently they're not just able to get into the payment systems for social security and things like that tax refund, whatever, but they can actually manipulate the systems. and they can leave backdoors so elon musk can continue to access that data, even after this raid by his little musk rats is over. we don't know the details of what they've done but there are probably a great number of laws, including privacy laws, that they are violating by running around without proper authorization through these enormous accounting databases. and of course the billionaires that helped bring trump to office live off data.

now they have access to one of the biggest data sets in the world. you think they're going to be responsible about that? i sure don't. right now in rhode island, funds are prosen and people can't get -- frozen and people can't get straight answers how they'll get access to funding that has been authorized and obligated. the freeze of those funds by the president is now in violation of not one but two court orders. so the lawlessness is apparent, whether it's the muskrats running around in treasury looking at everybody's files or whether it's court orders being patently violated or whether it's violent offenders being pardoned so they can go out and solicit minors again. i mean the whole thing really calls for probity and good judgment and adherence to constitutional norms from an attorney generally. and when she can't answer a simple question as did president

biden win the 2020 election, my alarms go off and they particularly go off when we get to her gibb director, kash patel. she subjected she -- suggested she would be able to rein him in. i have my doubts. he made preposterous explanations how his enemies list was not an enemies list even though he called them crimes and there would be a manhunt for them. he denied having a role with the j six choir which was a singing group of violent attackers from january 6. and he had taken credit for producing their recording but pretended he did nts -- he didn't know they were violent january 6 attackers. he said that he would -- he assured us that fbi agents would be protected against political retribution which was beginning as he testified and which is going on at the department right now, massive unprecedented political retribution.

he won't tell us look what he told a grand jury in proceedings in which he pled the fifth amendment. well, if you plead the fifth and then you go into a civil proceeding, you having pled the fifth is something that the civil attorney can use against you. it's called the adverse inference. a jury can draw the conclusion that the testimony that you would have given, had you not asserted your fifth amendment privilege, would be harmful to your case. there are legally available to reach that conclusion. a judge will instruct you that they may reach that conclusion. and here we are in the judiciary committee, and we can't get an answer from this guy about his grand jury testimony. we know he pled the fifth. and we're not supposed to take the adverse inference that a regular jury would take from pleading the fifth? it is a mess. this guy, patel, went into a

court in colorado to testify for trump. how did he do when he went in front of that court and testified? well, the presiding judge said that -- i'm quoting here -- was not a credible witness. his testimony was illogical. and was -- quoting again -- completely devoid of any evidence in the record. okay, so i used to be a united states attorney. and we used to take fbi agents and we would put them into court to make cases. if an fbi agent working for me had gotten that kind of a response from a rhode island district judge that he was incredible, that he was making testimony that was illogical, that he could not be believed, there would be rep kugss -- repercussions. we would need for see if that was a giglio disclosure problem for this person. we would need to understand why this fbi agent couldn't be trusted about i a federal judge. this isn't just an agent. this is the guy who wants to run

the fbi. so to trust pam bondi to rein in a character like this who has virtually no experience that would qualify him to lead the fbi, says former attorney general bill barr, who has ideas that are ludicrous, absolutely unqualified for this job, untrustworthy, an absolute disgrace to even consider him, a guy who ran on to his website kash patel retruthed, imagery of him chainsawing his enemies list. this is actually a video clip. we can't play it here but it's a video clip of him chainsawing through his enemies list. and he thought that was cool to retruth. that's the kind of person we're dealing w. pam bondi is going to be able to restrain him? not if she can't even say that joe biden won the 2020 election.

this was his last comment. he said i misquoted him. to the president, we're going to come after the people in the media who lied about american citizens, who helped joe biden rig presidential elections -- like he didn't win it. we're going to come after you, whether it's criminally or civilly. we'll figure that out, but, yeah, we're putting you all on notice. that is what is coming to the department of justice, the fbi is in danger of being turned into the political enforcement weapon of this president who is already breaking the law over and over again in just the last two weeks. and a woman who cannot say that joe biden won the 2020 election i believe is not going to be able to restrain this kind of misbehavior let alone the kind of misbehavior we are seeing out of the oval office. so regretfully because there was

a lot to like about ms. bondi, rethreatfully -- regretfully i cannot possibly vote to confirm her and i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from hawaii.

a senator: mr. president, in examining all of the president's cabinet nominees, i am focused on two things. ms. hirono: their fitness and their qualifications for the positions to which they are nominated. , including their ability and willingness to put loyalty to the constitution above loyalty to the president. this independence is critically important for the attorney general, our nation's highest law enforcement officer. the attorney general oversees thousands of career prosecutors in all 50 states trying cases based not on politics but on facts. however, pam bondi's record, her statements in her confirmation hearing and her responses to questions for the record make clear she does not have the

requisite independence to lead the department of justice. in her confirmation hearing, ms. bondi shows she had trouble differentiating fact from fiction where her loyalty to president trump might come into question. rather than attempting to assuage my concerns, concerns shared by many of my colleagues -- you just heard from one of my colleagues just previous to myself -- ms. bondi failed to provide clear and convincing answers to the following questions. whether president biden won the 2020 election. whether she agreed with the president's characterization of january 6 felons as hostages and patriots. whether she would make good on her promise to prosecute the prosecutors and investigate the

investigators by using the doj to go after the president's perceived political enemies. i also asked her in writing for the record how she would resolve a conflict between a request from president trump and her duty to the constitution. ms. bondi provided no response, and she left the answer blank. this refusal to even try to answer the question told me a lot. we have already seen in the two weeks since president trump took office that he does not believe that the rule of law applies to him. he issued an unconstitutional order on birthright citizenship. he put an illegal hold on all federal funds. he fired or pushed aside scores

of senior career fbi officials and federal prosecutors. most egregiously, he issued a blanket pardon for more than 1500 criminals convicted for their roles in the january 6 insurrection. not content to stop at pardoning those who assaulted police officers, now he's compiling lists of fbi agents and doj prosecutors who did their jobs by working on january 6 cases to which they were assigned. this could be thousands of civil servants who donald trump is apparently planning to punish to exact retribution. make no mistake. by focusing doj and the fbi inward on themselves instead of outward on the many threats

against our country, president trump is making our nation less safe and sowing fear and chaos in the doj. when we suffer an attack, a hack, or a rise in crime, president trump will try to blame everybody else, but he will be responsible. as senator durbin so accurately put it, donald trump sees the doj as his personal law firm. but the doj and the attorney general work for the people, not for the president. any president but especially this president needs an attorney general who will tell him when his actions break the law. what's more, the american public deserves an attorney general who will put the law first and

refuse an illegal order from the president. ms. bondi will not be that person. she will be yet another yes woman doing whatever the president wants her to do. the law, the constitution, and our country will suffer the consequences. for these reasons i urge my colleagues to vote no. i yield back. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from california. mr. padilla: thank you, mr. president. i, too, rise today to oppose

president trump's nomination of pamela bondi to serve as attorney general of the united states. i don't do it lightly. after evaluating her record as well as her testimony before the judiciary committee, it's sadly become clear to me that ms. bondi is either unwilling or unable to put her duty to the constitution of the united states and her duty to the american people above her loyalty to president trump. with the president now in who -- in office who has proven his disregard for the law on numerous occasions, pam bondi is simply unfit to serve as our nation's chief law enforcement officer. time and again we've seen ms. bondi more than willing to go on national television and

push president trump's lies about the results of a free and fair election. despite the facts, despite overwhelming evidence, she's chosen to lie to the american people in defense of donald trump. now, as i shared in committee during the confirmation hearing, this very issue, offered her an opportunity to withdraw those statements that she made back in 2020, reminding my colleagues, anybody watching, that the danger of her refusal isn't just that she is sea sticking to some political -- she's sticking to some political talking points, when it comes to to the integrity of our elections, lies have become threats to our democracy. threats to voters, and threats

to election workers who dedicate themselves to administering our free and fair elections. to this day, she refuses to state the simple truth that donald trump lost in 20. -- in 2020. colleagues, consider the fact that the same lies have led to her associate, rudy giuliani, being disbarred. think about that contrast -- rudy giuliani lied and he's being disbarred for those actions. pam bondi, same lies, refuses to take them back, and now you want her to be the top law enforcement officer for the united states of america? it's this very behavior that actually endears her to

president trump, and the same reason why we cannot trust her to hold him accountable. if confirmed, ms. bondi would no doubt face far mortgage daunting -- far more daunting challenges to shield the department of justice and its prevail civil servants from politics. i mean, just look at president trump's activity in the first couple weeks in office. from his first day on the job -- day one of his second term -- he issued around 1,500 pardons for january 6 insurrectionists and commuted the sentences of 14 of his supporters, including those convicted of violence against police officers. let me say it again. the first day in office, trump

freed convicted violent criminals who pepper sprayed and beat capitol police officers. so much for back the blue. president trump's appointees then proceeded to fire career department of justice lawyers involved in investigating and prosecuting him for his role in the january 6 insurrection and for his improper handling of classified documents. the acting u.s. attorney for the district of columbia has already promised to investigate the prosecutors who helped put violent insurrectionists behind bars. then this comes -- none of this comes as a surprise, though. before she was even selected, before the nomination was official, ms. bondi had already publicly promised to investigate

the investigators, to prosecute the prosecutors, and just this past sunday, president trump's department of justice demanded specific fbi staff fill out a questionnaire sharing what involvement they had in the january 6 cases. this is a tough environment for any attorney general to walk into and to act independently, let alone someone who's already shown blind loyalty to president trump over the rule of law. but these past few weeks i was struck most by the fact that despite her having practiced law for decades, despite the national debting she serve -- despite the fact that she served

once as the attorney general for the state of florida, ms. bondi was somehow unfamiliar with the 14th amendment of the constitution and specifically its citizenship clause. it shouldn't have come as a surprise. we talked about it in nigh office the day before the hearing. i let her know that i was going to be asking her about it during the hearing. and when i gave her an opportunity during the hearing to discuss it, she simply refused to answer my questions. and now we know why. in his very first day back in office, president trump issued a blatantly unconstitutional executive order seeking to strip birthright citizenship from american citizens. citizens born here in the united states. now, one who still needs to

study birthright citizenship surely won't be a champion in defending it. and i point to that because that's what ms. bondi said in response to my question, that she would study it. think about that, colleagues. top law enforcement officer in the united states needing to study the constitution? the american people need and deserve to be able to trust that the department of justice is the enacting the law fairly, neutrally, and free from political interference. we need and deserve an attorney general who will speak truth to power, push back against illegal, immoral, and unethical requests, someone who can be a credible messenger to the american people in a time of crisis and someone who will

defend not only the american people but the proud public servants who work within the department and who are being purged in a -- not a saturday night massacre, a monday massacre, but a january massacre by president trump. to my colleagues today, i ask this -- do you believe ms. bondi will fight against retttribution or enact it? do you believe she's stand up to the administration's chaos or further enable it? colleagues, i don't believe ms. bondi is up to the test. and for that reason, i will oppose her nomination and i urge all of you to join me. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor.

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from california.

mr. schiff: just over eight years ago donald trump assumed the office of the president for the first time. he began that administration with at least a few people of independence and stature, people that had enough of a respect for themselves and the rule of law that when they were asked to do things that violated the larks their oath, or their own sense of decency, they said no. they resigned. people like defense secretary mattis who wrote in his resignation letter, my views on treating allies with respect and also being clear-eyed about both maligned actors and strategic competitors are strongly held and informed by over four decades of immersion in these issues. we must do everything possible to advance an international order that is most conducive to our security, prosperity, and values, and we are strengthened in this effort by the silt daughter of our alliances, because you have the right to have a secretary of defense whose views are better aligned with yours on these and other

subjects, i believe it is right for me to step down from my position. treating allies with respect, being clear-eyed about maligned actors, advancing an international order conducive to our national security, prosperity and values. the solidarity of alliances -- so thats these didn't used to be controversial ideas. what secretary mattis said about an international order that is most conducive to our security and values may also be applied to a domestic order that is respectful of our agencies and institutions, our norms and values. not everyone in trump's first administration was like secretary mattis. some took much longer to realize that the president's demand for loyalty to him be placed above all else was incompatible with their own oath of office. attorney general bill barr once so desperate for a job in thes

trump administration, that he wrote a lengthy job application cat city debating an investigation he knew little about found ultimately that there were lines even he could not corroboration like lying about the election. others still like kash patel seemed never to find demand by the president too taxing of their own motherly code to raise an objection but, rather, viewed any questionable order as a means of advancement. the question we face with the nomination of pam bondi is what will she do when inevitably she is pout the test by a president who feels unbound by law or provide pry. her testimony before the senate judiciary committee tells us that she will not pass the test. when asked about whether the president lost the 20 election, she could not answer. when asked whether she would preserve evidence gathered in the january 6 investigation, she could not agree to do so. when asked about potential pardons of violent criminals who

attacked police on january 6, she indignantly assured us that she would review all pardon cases on a case-by-case basis, a promised breached by the president so soon thereafter that her words seemed still to hang in the air. if she could not assert her independence now before congress, before taking office, what hope can we have that she will do so when put to test -- to the test by the president? when asked about this, too, she demurred. that's a hypothetical. but it wasn't then and it isn't nouchlt the president has already pardoned hundreds of violent criminals. would pam bondi have objected to the firing of inspectors general? do any of us believe that she would? the president has issued an executive order attempting to amend the constitution. a federal judge struck down this horde as presenting perhaps the simplest constitutional question he had ever heard -- could we

have expected pam bondi to defend it? sad did i, yes. -- sadly yes. the president issued an order impounding congressional l. appropriated funds. would she have you shall usher he had a word of protest? certainly not. dozen of top prosecutors have already been fired from the department of justice who did their lawful duty, investigating the rioters who attacked police. would she have resigned in protest? she has witnessed this saturday night massacre and wants the job so plainly, the answer is no. top fbi agents have been fired, questioners have gone out to identify the hundreds, perhaps thousands of the legitimate prosecution of these felons. would she have defended these fbi agents at the risk of her own job as one senior fbi leader has done? of course not.

and let us not pretend otherwise. donald trump only took the oath of office a mere two weeks ago with an oath to protect and defend the constitution of the united states, to faithfully execute the office of the president of the united states, to faithfully execute the laws of this country that congress passed and funded each day, it seems he has found new ways to bend and break those laws. to put in power unelected billionaires and political cronies to dismantle agencies, take control of payment systems and exact political retribution. each of his nominees, whether -- asked whether they would oppose such contact has claimed they will not engage in hypotheticals stated that what the president promised to do during the campaign simply wouldn't happen.

but it is happening. it has happened. his campaign of retribution is happening. his empowering of a shadow president is happening. his dismantling of congressionally approved departments is happening, and we cannot afford an attorney general who believes their role is to defend him rather than the american people and the democracy we have inherited from our founders, this big, bold, brave, and improbable experiment in self-governance. we need an attorney general with a backbone of steel, whose purpose is to enforce the laws against any law breaker, including the president of the united states. that person is not pam bondi. senator rufus who once walked these halls and served in this body recommended us 200 years ago that we have built no temple but the capitol, that we consult

no common oracle but the constitution. and what does that oracle tell us? i think maybe, simply this, we have been given the most brilliant constitution every devised to constrain the worse impulses of human nature, but even that brilliant document will not protect us if we do not inhabit positions of great responsibility with people worthy of them, with people who view our system of checks and balances not as a weakness to overcome or to overrun but as a source of strength, who view the domestic order who -- to take secretary mattis's words, conducive to our prosperity and values, we need an attorney general who will be strong when the president seeks to turn this institution a rubber stamp, when the president seeks to empower

elon musk, when the president ignores our allies and emboldens our enemies, when the president targets those in government who did their job to investigate crimes and malfeasance in order to exact vengeance, vengeance apart from self-enrichment, the president's only motivation, vengeance. donald trump is hoping that in the chaos of his executive orders, of oligarchs mar raweding through the -- marauding through the government agencies that we will get lost and in getting lost be lost, we must not be. his actions will get worse. they will. with the congressal majority that empowers him -- congressional majority that empowers him, with appointees that embolden him, he himself will be more emboldened in return. his unconstitutional actions will multiply, and when that

happens, will pam bondi take up her role, her duty as the people's lawyer or will she serve as the president's lawyer as she has done before? will pam boifrn said -- bondi say no to the president's unlawful actions, no to actions of perceived political enemies, no to investigations of career officials? because if she will not say no, if she cannot say know, it is up to us today to say no. no to this nomination, no to pam bondi. it is up to us. i yield back. the presiding officer: the

senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: as my colleague, senator schiff from california, has just powerfully stated, we are in the midst of a constitutional crisis. a crisis that would have been unimaginable just weeks ago, a crisis that involves a president disobeying the law. now presidents in the past have disobeyed the law, they sought to test the boundaries of their power, and the courts have blocked them, but never has a president violated so many significant laws and the constitution to rapidly, so repeatedly that we are, as senator schiff said, lost in the chaos. and it falls to the arbiors

of -- ashors of law, it is also encouple bent on the enforcers of the law. any of us who have served in the department of justice -- i was the united states attorney for connecticut for four and a half years -- knows that the most important decisions that any prosecutor, any law enforcer makes, is whether to uphold the rule of law and sometimes say no to an fbi agent who is too enthusiastic about a case and wants to indict someone, who could not be convicted, a public official who is close personally

or politically and has overstepped their powers or ethics. to be fair, independent, ob objective, to be completely impartial and to uphold the rule of law is the first duty of anyone in the united states department of justice. and i have more than respect, i have reverence for the department of justice, and that's why i am so deeply disappointed that we are here tonight for the nomination of pam bondi. the attorney general of the united states of america is supposed to be the people's lawyer, not the president's. donald trump has said he wants the attorney general to be his

roy coen, his fixer, his personal attorney. well, ms. bondi said she would be the people's lawyer but that claim is betrayed by almost everything else she said and most important what she would not say. here's what she would not say. she would not say that she would say no to the president when he asked her to do something illegal or immoral. she dodged that question. she would not say that she was wrong for spreading lies about fraud and cheating in pennsylvania during the 2020 election. she dodged that question too. she would not say that president biden won the 2020 election or that president trump lost.

she ducked it. now, the issue of whether president trump asked his attorney general to do -- asks his attorney general to do something illegal or immoral, it is not abstract, it is real. we know it's real because every one of his past attorneys general ran afoul of donald trump because they would not do something illegal or immoral. our colleague jeff sessions, bill barr, no matter how good their intention, nobody can talk donald trump out of what he wants to do and the law is no concern nor is the lawyer. he will get lawyers to do whatever he wants and pam bondi was reassuring, very reassuring

to one person, donald trump, when she dodged those questions because what he wants is a loyalist, a sycophant, and he wants a puppet to do his bidding. the american people need a lawyer at this moment in history at this point of constitutional crisis who will truly speak truth to power. we use that phrase all the time, speak truth to power, but in this instance it is the essence of what an attorney general has to do at this moment in our history. and donald trump doesn't want to hear the truth, as much power as he has, he wants to hear an attorney general tell him, fine to go ahead, you have the green light. if pam bondi thinks that she

won't face that same dilemma, that bill -- dilemma that bill barr and jeff sessions did and every other lawyer that has worked for donald trump has faced, she is either delusional or disingenuous, delusional and disin disingenuous, for me, both are disqualifying for this job. and she can't even pay or pass that low barf saying she could say no -- barf saying -- bar of saying no, she would say, oh, he would never do anything like that. he is my friend. as we are here tonight, the trump justice department is reported to be preparing to purge hundreds of even thousands of fbi agents or other personnel in the department of justice for nothing more than doing their

job. these agents were assigned to crennel cases -- cases -- criminal cases involving donald trump. they didn't volunteer. they were assigned. and like fbi agents do, they took the assignment. and now they will pay a price in their careers, unjustly, unfairly, and unwisely because it will deter other fbi agents from doing their job when it comes to drug cases or terrorism cases. we've heard also that assistant u.s. attorneys are being reassigned from drug cases and terrorism cases so that they can do immigration. we're hearing that career civil servants must be loyal to donald trump in this department of justice. well, to donald trump and to

them we all know something fundamental in this body. we swear an oath, the lowest private in the united states army in the navy, marine corps raise their right hand and takes an oath, anybody in the cabinet takes that oath and they swear alle allegiance, but it isn't to the president and it isn't to the government, it is to the constitution. that's what's at risk here. that's what pam bondi cannot do in god conscience if -- good conscience if she is confirmed because her allegiance will be to donald trump and the purge of agents, the reassignment and retribution of others, not only damages morale, the effectiveness of the department of justice, it undermines the

rule of law. the attorney general, perhaps chief among presidential appointees is responsible for making good on the constitutional promise that no man or no woman is above the law. that we have no king in the united states. we are no longer a monarchy. we can no longer ask a billionaire to rummage through the files of the department of tre treasury, that have information about the presiding officer and every one of us who serves in this body, and almost every american, because we all pay taxes, we all have social security, we get tax refunds, veterans get disability benefits. almost anything the united states government does creates a record in the treasury

department, and all that information is being read and scanned and now collected. that's the news of the day. more bad news about elon musk. who is going to stop elon musk? when he's doing something illegal and immoral. it won't being pam bondi, because she's donald trump's lawyer. that is a real and present d danger for every one of us in this country. after i was united states attorney in connecticut, i was the attorney general of my state for 20 years. in that job also, i took an oath to the constitution of the united states, as a state official, as well as to the constitution of the state of

connecticut. it isn't an abstract notion. it's what we all do. and if she's confirmed, maybe pam bondi will be able to raise her right hand and recite after whoever's administering the oath, but it will not be an oath she is capable of keeping. and so, on this critically important vote for our country, i don't think there is a cabinet officer more important at this moment in our history. i urge my colleagues to say no to this nomination. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor.

the presiding officer: the democratic whip. mr. durbin: i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: the clerk: ms. alsobrooks.

it is not a real government agency. it has no authority to make spending decisions. "doge has no authority to shut programs under ignore federal law. doge conduct, i said cannot be allowed to stand. congress must take action to restore the rule of law.

his response, here's what mosque said quote hysterical reactions like this is how you know that doge is doing work that really matters and that quote this is the one shot american people have to defeat bureaucracy and restore democracy. give me a break. nothing screams democracy like having a secret squad of company men pull off a hostile takeover of america social security and tax information in the dead of night. that is democracy? no openness, no hearings, no discussion. no hearing the other side from a small group of limited people who have limited background don't know about the programs they're cutting and how they actually work. whatever doge is doing, it is certainly not, not what democracy looks like or has ever looked like in the grand history

of this country. because democracy does not work in the shadows. democracy does not skirt the rule of law. does not shun accountability and restraint. does not run away from transparency but welcomes it. that needs and even the ideas of a small group of ultra- wealthy people at the expense of working people. they are the only people who seem to be in the room to make the decisions. working-class americans are excluded. are excluded. it's a worthy cause to seek, and a question about up at everyone agrees everyone should agree that we should find ways to improve the effectiveness. we should find ways to improve the efficiency of government. but you know what history shows?

the dark of night by very limited group of people with limited experience, it never works. when ideas are not brought into conflict. when people have different views. when there is not debate, when the sun openness, when there's not transparency. things always get messed up it leads to very bad result yet that's just what doge is doing. they know better than everyone else. certainly they are entitled to have their viewpoints. certainly. but, to just do things in the dark of night comment to just fire people without even talking to them, what their needs are. again is going to lead from bad result. we should talk about reform. we should talk about it the way it's always been done in america in the halls of congress and the public forms of the peoples of

government. that's what the founding fathers wanted. if the founding fathers were to be like doge a small group of them would get together and dictate what should've been done in america. they didn't, they set up a congress. they set up debate. and the american people, mark my words the american people will not stand for an unelected secret group to run rampant through the executive branch. being innovative is good. but, mr. muscat, this is not a tech startup of these are public institutions that deal with things like social security, medicare, national defense and provide for the well-being of the american people and the american people have a right to be part of that debate. part of that debate.

the election has occurred one viewpoints got a view more votes than the other. that does not mean we throw out democracy. that does not mean what's been done for centuries in this country should just go out the window and should be substituted by a small group of people who think they know a lot more than the wisdom of the american people. so that is why this week leader jeffries and i will join together to push legislation to prevent unlawful meddling in the treasury department payment systems. to prevent everyone's records from being made available to a small group of people who look at them at will. when this has always been kept secret and always has been a protected your tax returns and your payment systems and things like that it affects average

americans. and who knows maybe next they'll say what/all of this stuff in there $2.5 trillion desire to cut government. we must protect people's social security payments, their medicare payments, their tax refunds from any possible tampering by doge at any other unauthorized and that's why leader jeffries and i will join together to push this legislation. i yield.

quorum call:

>> hopefully in a few short hours here, should be concerned of the next attorney general of the united states of america not what i think before i do that, leadership and hard work leader majority brass all, and the entire confirmation process, working at a cliff that i think is responsible, when the donors that mandate the president trump, that she thinks up here in washington dc read ai

think would you saw in november was, dynamic where people were particularly happy with what was going on in this town. in the voted for reforming president trump is putting better engine together a team of reformers. look no further than ideal place for that reform and that department of justice but before i get there, i do want to point out that a personal note, when president trump, announced that he was supporting pam bondi, i said this was a homerun to somebody and as many of us in this chamber often outdone by senator graham come he described as a grand slam touchdown hole-in-one base slamdunk to be gold-medal kick and he was right. and i have known pam bondi for years, from my job before and before had the this job is

attorney general missouri she was always known as a leader. and somebody that had is really rare combination of steel backbone and a part of gold. she's in it for the right reasons she hears about the rule of she started her career from humble beginnings in a small town in florida and she wanted to be a prosecutor and you heard in her testimony coming the judiciary committee that that was her goal to be a prosecutor and she spent hours and years and is courtrooms prosecuting the bad guys. and she later became the attorney general when the bigger states is a mention she was a leader, she defend the constitution, she took on the opioid epidemic it, and she was relentless in taking on human trafficking, and 70 think that everybody can look up two notches from a personal perspective interpersonal story, and also the way that she took

on her job had accolades from both sides of the aisles was actually summing the committee, who was on the other side of the island floor that ran for attorney general at the same time pam bondi testified to her character. it is just no question that she supremely qualified if and for this job. we really going to need somebody as the attorney general to leave the department of justice is a kind of integrity, who believes in the constitution leaves an individual rights. in getting that department back to fighting crime which is what it should've been sadly over the last four years, we have seen a department of justice gone astray. one that has made headlines of course for going after parents, who showed up to school board meetings, and the patriot act.

treating moms and dads as terrorists. we do school board, open for meeting and concerns about things like critical race theory forced masking and the full weight of the federal government, honing in on the peer rents predict and catholics. who were treated the same way because they were traditional catholics and literally, setting up and informative networks, an effort to style them because of the religious affiliations. under talking about the union of the 1980s, i'm talking about the united states of america in 2021. when merrick garland it did to the agency, he was a department of justice, is a tragedy. kash patel hopefully will be

here the committee soon move the fbi and restoring integrity to that agency as well but of course the department of justice pam bondi hopefully a few short hours will be confirmed as more into lead will restore integrity. in addition, the going after catholics, in addition to going after families showed up to school board meetings, the very coordinated effort affair, but that past administration to take out the chief political rival, under the moniker of show me the man and i will show you the crime. cannot be dismissed are not going to want to talk about that. but the effort to financially ruined president trump, to literally throw him in jail, for the rest of his life, deserves that this court of the history books. joe biden give a speech in fall

2022, calling half of america a threat to democracy and president trump in interbank back to the oval office and guess what happen a series of zombie cases with a best novel legal theories and theories were resurrected in new york, number three person at doj left the department of justice to join the das office in new york and why with the person want to do that will guess what, president trump was prosecuted in a manhattan courtroom not long after that. in state cases, number two person in the das office in atlanta, was coordinating with white house counsel's office on the prosecution of president trump in georgia. and then jack smith, was brought in who was notorious among legal circles for overzealous and over

prosecutions. overcharging, was brought and specifically to take out president trump and only the supreme court ultimately that prevented that but this was always scheme devised by the biden administration make sure president trump never got back into office and guess what, he steered it all down. and he one. we have a real opportunity now to have a level set and i don't think that is right to be have people pursued because of their power fix from equivalent perspective braided nothing was out of bounds the last four years by the biden amendment administration dornsife is just the conversion coming in restore integrity, and make sure that our department of justice is fighting on the half of the american people. not attempt ironically, to undermine our republic and of

the very accusations was level that joe biden political pundit and without mr. president i look forward to vote yes on p.m. bondi, and having real leader that we can look to repeat that's very important department of justice.

mr. thune: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. thune: i ask unanimous consent the quorum call be suspended. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: mr. president, i know of no further debate on the bondi nomination. the presiding officer: is there further debate? if not, the question is on the nomination. mr. thune: mr. president, i ask for the yeas and nays. the presiding officer: is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the clerk will call the roll. vote: the clerk: ms. alsobrooks. ms. baldwin. mr. banks. mr. barrasso. mr. bennet. mrs. blackburn. mr. blumenthal. ms. blunt rochester.

mr. booker. mr. boozman. mrs. britt. mr. budd. ms. cantwell. mrs. capito. mr. cassidy. ms. collins. mr. coons. mr. cornyn. ms. cortez masto. mr. cotton. mr. cramer. mr. crapo. mr. cruz. mr. curtis. the clerk: mr. daines.

thank you, i had the opportunity to meet with almost all of you and i greatly appreciate that pretty i'm grateful to president trump when it is committee for your consideration to be the any seventh attorney general of the united states. i would not be here without my family. in big bear with me, for just a moment, a lot of made a very long trip and around the mall down so i don't forget anyone predict my beautiful mother, retired kindergarten teacher would not be here without my month rest of the week ago it was 12 years since we lost my dad to leukemia for like 12 days. my amazing husband john, it is to incredible girls, colin infinitely pretty colin is a senior university of florida next month i think all of you in this committee will be very happy to know the family is in cybersecurity. there's a third who's traveling

abroad and we shouldn't be here in my amazing father-in-law, david and my sister, beth my brother-in-law home with my knees to my nephews and if you just raise your hand, evan j can seem to be niece savannah. my brother brad, a brilliant lawyer my sister-in-law candy and my nephew justin are just that a 4.0 that uva. and rex, great college tennis player, and brad, great tennis player, mnes my beautiful niece maria, the little guy is in school because he is ten years old. my friends is likely kathy dn tiffany and kim and paulette so many my former coworkers, and ranking member you want to get there to meet these women have known me since i was a child.

and seriously, most of them pretty so thank you and for indulging me in the development of very long trip, to be here and thank you for holding my hearing as well and not postponing it and i appreciate that and thank you all. from the moment i interned at the state attorney's office in tampa florida, holland wanted to do was be a prosecutor supreme court certified me and off school and lost most of them, but had to for jury trials did not want to do anything else and i continued my career there trying everything from duis, domestic violence cases, capitol murder cases. the whole gamut. medicament lead trial attorney courtroom in everyday trying career criminals with deputy chief of the division and ultimately with felony bureau chief and eventually best become

florida's 37th attorney general to the state of florida. nothing is impacted my career more than my experience as a state prosecutor. because i know this document is with many victims and families from when i was a prosecutor. and upon becoming attorney general in 2011, probably served for two terms that i was term limited and i was probably still be there right now had he not been kicked out of office by term limits. i love being attorney general. i did my best to keep florida safe to continue to stand up for victims of crime and fip opioid crisis in the drug crisis that was not only facing sort of this entire country. after that top 100 this one of the things i am the most proud of.

oxycodone dispenser in the entire country i believe that it was 98 of them are 90 rate 90 of them lived in florida. we fought for tough legislation kids were dropping dead every day. we fought for tough legislation and after that legislation, none of those opioid dealers practiced in florida as doctors we fought to eliminate human trafficking by raising awareness and prevention and talking the parents and talking to the children and we also provided critical resources including safehouses that my state was lacking in uncivil site come up we were protecting the consumers and we tackle everything including off label prescription marketing which in effect you know, many many people who cannot afford prescriptions as well. we partnered with state attorney

general, from both parties and federal agencies across the administrations and we went after price dodgers during hurricanes. and if confirmed become a as the next attorney general of the united states, my overriding objective will be to return to the department of justice to its core mission of keeping americans safe and vigorously prosecuting criminals and that includes getting back to basics gangs, drugs, terrorist about our kills in a border and our foreign adversaries. yes with the american people expect and that is what they deserve from the department of justice and if confirmed, i will do everything in my power, and will be my great responsibility to make america safe again.

making america safe again also requires reducing recidivism and we have to fix the bureau of prison reading looking both sides of the i/o read bureau suffered years of mismanagement and lack of funding and low morale. and i was proud to support president trump and i think that more can be implemented in more can be done on that front and president trump leadership on criminal justice reform, has demonstrated what is possible when the president is unafraid to do things that have been deemed to be too difficult. we have to reach across the aisle and get solutions for all of these problems. like the president, i believe that we are on the cusp of a new golden age with the department of justice can and will do better in confirmed.

lastly and most importantly, if confirmed about i will fight everyday to restore confidence and integrity to the department of justice and each of the components printed partisanship of the weaponization, will be on that america will have one here justice for all. in all of this work, collaborate closely with this committee, and i will work with all of you as i committed to do when i met with almost all of you. i will partner not only with the federal agencies, but with the state and local officials throughout our great country. i look forward to answering your questions today and working together. for this country and our constitution. thank you sends hers.

senators. >> i bless the first questions and senator durbin and then i will call in the democrat people in ways that the senator would say so on their arrival. by senior dorinda seniority the same way the house side. i will make sure that i don't abuse the seven minutes and i want to have your attention on this binder here and it gets to a factor of each senators role in oversight. and it 144 oversight letters that i sent to the biden harris justice department and it is component agencies with many of those letters and their to the fbi. adding letters to the inspector general, that would be about 165

letters predict so have sent more letters since you been in my office before christmas freighted to do printed could you be confirmed 144 letters will be your response ability and responses i received so far two categories in first not anst all thickly receipt of the response but it did not fully respond and the justice department nearly 70 birds on a piece of paper. so to be confirmed you have an obligation to respond to the minority and consider letter from them even if my signature is not on it. as they when information. we are committed to responding to my oversight request as well as request other members of the committee?

>> chairman, he dry my top staff will personally reveal the letters i do everything we can to respond to you. >> you tenure is florida attorney general was impressive. he fought against pill mills, human trafficking and you eliminated a backlog of rape cases and state labs and reporting its organized retail theft. your known to stand for law and order. with such achievements is easy to see whether people of florida reelected you in 2014. my president-elect trump dominated you deserve as the nation's chief law enforcement officer. so this gives you a chance to tell us in this and the people in this country, when you are proud of his record as attorney general of florida.

>> thank you chairman grassley. i truly honored to serve the people of state of florida for eight years as a team effort and i had great people around me many of them are in this room today. we did a lot, we will lot to fight crime been reminiscing a lot since i was asked to take this nomination opioids that i talked about our top priority when he took office and when i was running off is overthrew the entire state of florida parents were walking up to me handing me pictures of the children who were deceased. from opioid abuse. and after i was elected, i do this pictures and i framed them in my office. as a goal of stopping the fight we just talked about my opening statement. and if u.s. attorney general in

general, bring the pictures back out and they will be there to inspire me on the further drug abuse that we are facing throughout this country. we also learned that something else is happening, pregnant women having babies as a result of being opioid dependent dependent. he fought to educate the mothers and we find that issue as well. physical, with wreaking havoc in our country but was just getting started and i actually saw my own from my own party event to schedule for know because that the time people that it was something he merely got in the hospital on a patch after surgery apples and oranges going to be all know that now the difference. fentanyl is raging throughout the country and i will do everything i can to fight that with agencies that follow under the department of justice human trafficking become a top priority for me as attorney general pretty i had the opportunity to bipartisanship, to go to mexico on the one thing

that i found out there, they were doing better than we were, they had safe houses i saw thini never dreamed that i would seat and all of these things in my past have formed the person i am right now sitting here before you. i came back to florida and we started human trafficking counsel, we partnered with others and we expanded and added safe houses in the state of florida pretty i know how many in this country right now but i would like to partner with both sides if confirmed that to continue those efforts. >> i would like to interrupt you. >> yes. >> go to another question. it will have another round so you can finish that point. i would like to ask you about something the central to fighting government waste dump run the false claims act. i want to want you to know that

attorney general garland calls me once a year and he called me yesterday to tell me the success of the act and since 1986, when i got it past president reagan signed it. in about an $70 billion as of yesterday. and the year 2024 and most of that is because of patriotic snowblowers who found the fraud brought the cases forwarded at thorough risk. the supreme court as long help the law's constitutionality but i want you to know your view is the false claims act constitutional and before you answer that, when time the 1990s, one of the attorney general said that it wasn't constitutional and was not the same person by the name of bar,

was back five years ago to be attorney general and he said that it was constitutional and so if confirmed, will you commit an answer the first question, do you think it's constitutional and we defended punch into into constitutionality a. >> i would defend the constitutionality of the false claims act senator. >> last question if confirmed, would you commit to continuing the doj's defense on the constitutionality and leisure entire staff and funding levels to properly support prosecute all claim cases #. >> it is so important and especially but what you said with the whistleblowers as well the protections in the money and brings back to our country yes. >> think you for your question. ...

the clerk: mr. markey, no. the staff and funding levels to properly support and prosecute cases pickwick center to the false claims act is so important. especially by what you said with whistleblowers as well the protection and the money brings back to our country yes, sir. >> thank you for your answers. senator durbin? thank you. if you are successful in your nomination, this democrat would like to give you three words of advice. answer grassley's letters. [applause] you will never hear the end of

it if you don't. [laughter] an issue i believe this nomination hearing is not your competence or your experience. issue is your ability to say no. there is a peaceful transition of power. president trump was overwhelmingly elected in 2024. >> you have any doubts joe biden had the majority of votes, electoral votes necessary to be elected president 2020? collection of center i can size a prosecutor is from my first-hand experience. i accept the results. i except of course joe biden is president of the united states. but what i can tell you is what i saw firsthand when i went to pennsylvania as an advocate to the campaign. i was an advocate for the campaign i was on the ground in pennsylvania i saw many things

there. i do accept the results? of course i do print driver that happened i saw so much no one from either side of the aisle should went there to be any issues with election integrity in our country. we should all in our elections to be free and fair. and for the rules and the law to be followed. >> think that deserves a yes or no. i think the length of your answer is it indication you were not prepared to say yes. that recording and president trump on generally second, 2020 2020urges secretary state of gea to quote find 11780 votes and declare in the winter that steak? state? snow i've heard about through clips but no, center of not heard it because it was your reaction to president trump making that call? >> i would have to listen to the tapes, senator.

>> the quote i give you is exact. he said the charges secretary of state, find 11780 votes. >> do you have the entire context of that call? i feel like it was much longer than that amount may be taken out of context. >> it is, it's in our law you can certainly listen to and i hope you will. as every american should. as former prosecutor i do not concern the president of the united states call estate election official asked to change the results of the election? >> senator i have not listened to the hour-long conversation. but it is my understanding that is not what he asked them to do. >> you need to listen to it. let me ask the third question. do you believe generate six writers convicted of violent assault on police officers should be pardoned? >> senator, if confirmed as

attorney general of the united states the pardons of course follow to the president. but if asked to look at those cases, i will look at each case and advise on a case-by-case basis. just as i did my entire career as a prosecutor. >> you also advise the president of pardons as part of your responsibility as attorney general. and so i am asking you, do you believe those who would be convicted of the january at six and violent assault on our police officers should be pardoned? that is a simple question. >> center i have not seen any of those files of course but if confirmed and asked to advise the president i will look at each and every file but let me be very clear in speaking to you, i condemn any violence on a law enforcement officer. >> ask about your work as a lobbyist for ballard partners.

you did not list your current position as a partner of the lobbying firm or the work that you have done for ballard partner clients such as a lobbying for that country but one of $15000 corporate giants amazon when asked about conflict of interest. why do you believe your work as a lobbyist is not constitute potential conflict of interest? >> senator, first that's he met my firm received. multiple people represented the country within my firm. my role, i am very proud of the work i did. it was a short time i wish it would have been longer with antihuman trafficking efforts leading into the world cup which is something i like to talk about later to. i was registered along with many members of my firm. that's the sole portion of my representation. now if there are any conflicts with any when i represented in

private practice, i would consult with the career ethics official within the department and make the appropriate decision. i, would also like to point out to you i do not believe i would be the first attorney general he was represented and advocated for businesses in the past. >> of course not for the question is whether you would recuse yourself from any case involving ballard clients? one of those clients was a group. >> gol. >> a private prison company you lobbied for that managers correctional facilities that group has facing criticism for safety violations, and adequate healthcare import management for u.s. integrations custom enforcement largest source of revenue under the trump administration stands hundreds of dollars by detaining immigrants of mass deportation.

the sense any conflict of interest if you are asked to judge the performance of this government contract? >> senator i will consult with the career ethics official within the department of justice and make the appropriate decision. >> think it mr. chairman. >> senator graham question. >> thank you congratulations. i forgot to say jon's a family was south carolina pick. >> >> upstate i'm sorry. >> will give you a pass on that. so, listen president trump asked a bunch of us who would you pick for attorney general? i maybe got asked that on our side. i said pam bondi. it's an easy decision. i cannot think of anyone more qualified that he knew that he trusted. it's okay, you are his lawyer right? >> yes, sir. i represented him when they tried to impeach him the first time as part of white house counsel office of special counsel. >> then trumps lawyers prepares

you for many things. give a long-standing relationship with the president. he trust you. that's a good thing but that's probably why president kennedy picked his brother. [laughter] bobby kennedy. you can say no to her older brother, i'm sure he would. this idea that there something bad is ridiculous but who you pick? you pick the people you know, people you trust people who are qualified. glad he picked who knows you, he trust you are highly qualified. so, the edge of the something wrong with that is absolutely ridiculous. >> lists on what the job you're about too have here do you support making certain drug cartels and federal terrorist organizations? 's. >> senator, i personally went to mexico. i personally dealt with these cartels when i was a state prosecutor. they are a grave in violent threat to our country.

>> you consider advising the president? good. good. when it comes across fire or hurricane are those days over if you are attorney general? >> absolutely pick oxo kate lakin around and are you familiar with that case question. >> at the eye am, centigram. you know why the man who killed her was released from custody? he was paroled to detention capacity at central processing center in el paso, texas. that is not your call, you will be d.o.j. the statute regarding parole does not allow paroled to be based on we don't have detention beds? that's nothing that statute would authorize based on lack of capacity. are you familiar with the statute? >> yes sir and that is frightening. >> it is frightening i going to fix it? lex i'm going to do everything in my power to fix it if

confirmed as attorney general perk are you going to advise president trump we need more beds. tom hellman is the guy who's going to do this but you as attorney general say we need more bed space at lakin riley never happens again because you're quick senator my job if confirmed as attorney general will be to keep america safe. that includes having enough space for violent criminals for people should not be in this country, who have committed violent crimes. lakin riley is one of many perks 41000 beds in this country to detain people as like millions of pr people here relate let this dude go we didn't have any place to put him. i hope those days are over and tom, your listing hope you'll create an app detention space to make sure we do not find this dilemma ever again. do you think we are at war and if so who with? >> o, senator, we are at war on so many fronts. quick so it worth isis kuester.

>> of course we are at war with them. >> they are at war with us to greet that? >> absolutely. >> you think since our withdrawal gone up from isis? >> yes. march 7, 2024 isis kate retains the capability and interest abroad look or no warning that's march of 2024. general mckenzie isis-k has a strong desire to attack the united states after began to grow in afghanistan following u.s. exit in august 2021. he also stated the threat to isis-from isis-k is growing. target number one for isis kate do you agree that? >> on my secure clearance from everything they want to kill us.

i would like to have a strategy to deal with the isis threats does that make sense to you? the state and local officials too. better cooperation throughout our country and through our world. >> i totally agree do you support reauthorizing pfizer in 2025? quick senator, i believe 702 is up in 2026. i believe is 2026 we will closely be looking at that it's very important. books do you agree 702 provides important intel gathering capability to protect our nation? >> extremely important. >> okay. so pam, you are about to step into a job that's one of the

most important jobs in any democracy. let's go back to pardons. if i am a lawyer for somebody in jail would you promise to listen to the application and read it before he made a decision? >> yes bring about who you are? good. that's the way it works people want to bargain with you up at what you did this? we do that? all i ask you to do is call it as you see it higher good competent people give the president the best legal advice you can run the department of justice in a manner other people would want to join it one day. growing up i had a fondness for the fbi watch the show i think it was every sunday wanted to be an fbi agent. right now the fbi needs an image overhaul. so, you have a real task ahead of you in two areas. to restore trust of many americans whose lost trust in the department of justice and to make sure this country is safe from drug cartels that are

killing 3000 americans every two weeks for money. to go after these people and protect our homeland that is under siege. you are the perfect pick out one of the most dangerous times in american history and i look forward to supporting you. >> thank you, senator. >> senator whitehouse. >> thank you chairman. welcome ms. von d. >> think you sent it thank you for meeting with you. it was a pleasure. ms. bondi you were cold room courtroom prosecutor for great many years. did you ever have an enemies list? >> no senator. >> he went on to be florida's attorney general as florida's attorney general's edge of an enemies list? >> no senator. >> is florida's attorney general you're responsible for hiring into the florida department of attorney general, correct? center of the attorneys general office in florida is the third largest in the state approximate 1400 employees and approximately

400 lawyers. only california and texas are bigger offices. you're responsible for hiring into that office while you are attorney general? >> yes to paying what you have hired someone into the florida attorney general's office who you knew had an enemies list? quick senator, to cut to the chase you are clearly talking about cash per child. i do not believe he has an enemies list emit a quote on tv which i have not heard i saw your signer senator durbin's sign about cash. but i know kash patel has said 60 jury trials as a public defender, as a prosecutor. he has great experience in the intel department. the department of defense. i have known cash and i believe that he is the right person at this time for this job you will have the ability to question mr.

>> whether you will enforce an enemies list he announced publicly on television et cetera i'm sorry there will never be an enemies list within the department of justice. >> thank you. >> the fbi, what's the fbi's role in national security and counterterrorism and how is important is that role? >> you know senator i believe now more than ever counterterrorism is so important and vital in our country. we are facing such incredible threats here and abroad i am sure many of you sought fbi saw fbi formerfbi director raisn 60 minutes. he talked about the threats and i don't have my security clearance. threats from china that are so great. there are sleeper cells within our country. >> given that importance, is it

responsible to call for shutting down the fbi counterterrorism and national security work? and will you, as attorney general impede or shut down the fbi counterterrorism and national security work i believe i am so many fronts. on the fbi's played a vital role in counseling you will are not shut down? >> i will look at each agency and have no intention of shedding anything down right now, senator. i am not in that office yet. if confirmed i will look at each individual agency we have said that department of justice and prosecutors will be prosecuted. the will be prosecuted and why?

>> i said that on tv. i said prosecutors will be prosecuted to finish the quote investigators will be investigated. we all take an oath to uphold the law. none of us are above the law let me give you a good example of a bad lawyers in the justice department a guy named klein smith altered a pfizer warrant will everyone be held to an equal and equal fair system of justice to find the next attorney general what circumstances will you prosecute journalists. >> i believe in the freedom of speech. only if anyone commits a crime.

it's pretty basic, senator, with anything paired with any victim. this goes back to my entire career for 18 years as a prosecutor 18 years as florida's attorney general. we find the facts of the case. you apply the law in good faith and you treat everyone fairly. it would not be appropriate for prosecutor to start with the name and look for a crime. it's a prosecutor's job to start the crime and look for name, correct? confirmed. under the previous order, the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid upon the table, and the president will be immediately notified of the senate's action. mr. thune: mr. president. the presiding officer: mr. leader. mr. thune: i ask unanimous consent that the mandatory quorum call with respect to the turner nomination be waived.

the presiding officer: is there an objection? without objection. 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 move to bring to a close debate on the nomination of eric turner, of texas, to be secretary of housing and urban development, signed by 17 senators. the presiding officer: by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. the question is, is it the sense of the senate that debate on the nomination of eric turner, of texas, to be secretary of housing and urban development shall be brought to a close? the yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. the clerk will call the roll. vote: the clerk: ms. alsobrooks. ms. baldwin. mr. banks. mr. barrasso. mr. bennet.

>> thank you, mr. chairman ranking member warren and the committee. i'm so happy and honored to be here with you all today. i think all of the members of the committee. thanks for your thoughtfulness. thank you for your engagement

and fear ideas on rebuilding the american dream of our nation's forgotten communities. it's a pleasure to visit with each and every one of you. and that was just a scheduling conflict. i'm so grateful to that time to meet with you. thank you for making that effort i hope our conversations will not be the end, but only the beginning of a great and true partnership to meet that mission and serve the american people i like to take a moment to thank my wife robin who is here with us for her unwavering support of over nearly three decades of being together at the college at the university of illinois, the nfl, that whitehouse, business, ministry and family foundation. robin has been a true partner and building god's kingdom and doing the work he's called us to do together. so robin, thank you for your support the friends and family

that are here. i want to thank president trump for his confidence in his support and nominated me for such a crucial position and even more so, purpose. i want to thank president-elect trump. i sit before you today as a nominee to lead the department of housing and urban development. deep down committee members this opportunity is personal to me. i grew up as a kid as was mentioned before in richardson, texas. and before that in plano, texas with my parents. i worked as a dishwasher at spring creek barbecue one of my claims to fame. early on in my childhood, my family was broken due to divorce later moved into a blended family for i love my mother, i love my father and all of my brothers and sisters. but when you go through a divorce many say the odds are now stacked against you. i overcame extreme adversity.

going against the status quo and graduating college despite beingll drafted in the seventh round of the nfl which is the last room for those who don't know i was a blast to go on and have a successful career in the national football league. went on to serve in a texas legislator which was a great honor for me and at work in the white house to advance the opportunity initiative. i sit before you today committee members humbled by the call to serve my country as a member of president trump's cabinet. my upbringing and my background is not totally unique to me. there are many in this country even those sitting in this room today who are one point or another have had to overcome adversity in their own lives. we have all been there one time or another. i recognize this and hope we can all work together as you comment ranking member warren, have said work together to better the american tree the american people.

i share my story because i think to know my heart of who i am. and also because of the challenges hud faces are cool vital to our nation as well as personal to me. these are not just things i heard about or read about these are things my family and i have experiencedn. through the yearsi believe that perspective will be verymr beneficial to hud if i become the leader if confirmed by this committee strong and sustainable communities and support quality affordable housing,ja serve the most vulnerable of our nation. yet as we sit here we have a housing crisis in our country. we have the american people and families struggling every day. we have a homelessness crisis in our country. hud is failing at its most basic admission that has to come to an end. the point in time report set out by hud on december the 27th of the seven earned 70000 americans

homeless one night in january 24.770000 plus people many of which families were homeless, this cannot continue. as a country were not building up housing we need millions of homes and all kinds of homes multifamily, single family, duplex, condo, manufacturing housing, you name itth we need housing in our country for individuals and families to have a roof over their head and to call home. the hud workforce the reports of our committee said hud is at the bottom when it comes to employees returning to work a bit on many teams in my career i believe we need to bring hud step back to work, back to the office to do the job and empower them to serve the american people. in this moment we are not just fixing what is broken. but about continuing and expanding the policies from the first trump administration. i'm talking about policies that work for the american people i

was fortunate enough to lead the opportunity zone initiative. i'm so grateful for your leadership on that. i saw firsthand the impact of this initiative has a gave americans living in underserved communities an opportunity, a foundation to start businesses. to live in better homes. to be self-sustaining. to be self-confident and to unleash that promise and potential the lord has given each of us in our country. when i played in the nfl we had film after every game. you could tell your coach one thing on the sidelines but when you turned on the film and told the story. it was not about your chatter, it wasn't about the noise with the film say it showed us our weaknesses. it showed us our mistakes and it thathelped us to get better. this is the same type of leadership if confirmed by the distinguished committee i want to bring as a leader of the hud because every day we have an opportunity to get better. every day we have an opportunity

to take inventory and make hud the best place. mr. chairman, my heart is ready. i am ready i thank god for this opportunity thank you and the committee members for the chance. >> thank you for your testimony. i'll tell our new members are meant those of us have been on this committee for a little while we do have a five minute and a hole is pretty tightly to the five-minute clock including myself. [laughter] so we will get started right now but thank you veryst much. one of the things i hope you realize the bipartisan committee we represent different communities around the country. i think government should never serve the party that is empower. government should serve all americans no matter whether we vote for you or not. your job is to stay out of the political laid and serve the american people. for me, or the most effective ways to serve people is to go

where they are. i asked him to come into the bubble but we have to get out of our offices so to speak and go into the community. one of my questions. frankly my first question will you submit to visiting communities as diverse as north charleston and as different as detroit in your first several months on the job? i think mr. tillis asked lap anyways,. [laughter] i will finish that. [laughter] anyways i hope that you will go to detroit, michigan see the devastation in the sense of hopelessness that can be turned very quickly into hope. come to my home town of north charleston take a tour of some of the impoverished areas. look at mix development and remind people we care about everybody, what you say question

works yes i am in agreement. i remember as i was appointed to the opportunity zone job as executive director after i think the president for the appointments of mr. president i'm not going to be here because i'm going to the streets were the people are i went over 70 cities in our country visited places like pennsylvania, visited places like birmingham, alabama, dallas, texas liberty city, miami and so yes that is a commitment from me too you and this committee i will go to the people of america, visit the neighborhoods, visit the leaders the servant leaders and see what is a problem you're having? how can we work together to come up with sustainable solutions and i think that is very important. >> thank you. one of the challenges we have in the housing needs of our citizens and we both agree is over 7 million needed units. part of my road to housing act

suggests the definition of what we need to use for manufacturing needs to be updated for going to meet the needs of the average person improving the definition of manufactured home in the hud code to remove the permanent chassis requirement is incredibly important. the use of updated the code to change the definition of manufactured homes for. >> think it mr. chairman. i know how important manufactured homes are when it comes to housing availability and housing affordability. such a look at those codes all of the codes and take inventory on how we can reduce the burden. >> the statement the homelessness has increased by 30% since 2020, devastating. do you have specific thoughts than 30 seconds or so on how you would address the homelessness issue?

>> yes, sir. so homelessness, i think we need to engage local communities. local communities and organizations that have real results in combating homelessness. i think the federal government can be a great partner but we do need to engage those on the local level that have great results and pertains to homelessness and work with them. >> i think the 50 laboratories of democracy gives us an opportunity to see was working and what's not working we should direct our attention toward those issues that are working for i had an opportunity to meet with so my democrat mayors in south carolina. one of the things they were celebrating was successful opportunities for the first time bring affordable housing back into their communities. i've seen that in south carolina. we were this across the country were our favorite mayors around the country many of whom are democrats celebrate opportunity

zones. my favorite governors on the country are often times republicans celebrate opportunity jones keating speak to the benefit of opportunity zones and creating opportunity for everyday americans? about 20 seconds. >> i'll do my very best opportunity zones are very impactful. if you look at the reports we did you will see a million people were lifted out of poverty. housing went up for minority families, salaries went up for minority families so to give people the opportunity to invest in places that have not seen investment in many decades is great for our nation as it pertains to housing, affordable housing and operated businesses. >> thank you very much. senator warner question. >> warren? think it mr. chairman. i want to ask you why housing costs are so high. he recently said there is quote an ever-growing need for high quality affordable housing in

our nation. experts have said, as he chairman said we need about 7 million new housing units in america. now, there are a lot of explanations for housing shortage. local zoning and land use restrictions can make harder to use homes the cost of capitol which has been made worse by the fed's decision to make interest rates high. makes it into to build and by housing. there are places where the federal government can help. take the home program. hud gives grants to states and localities to help build and preserve affordable housing. and it works in its history at home has supported the development of more than 1 million affordable units nationwide. including more than 100,000 homes in your home state of texas. mr. turner, in 2023 you said that quote it's more expensive than ever to build and

developers need access to more capitol. do you support additional federal investment so we can lower the cost of building affordable housing? >> thank you, senator warren. i appreciative visit together but thank you for your time in this as you said there are many factors to why housing is so expensive now. i believe first we have to get our fiscal house in order and our country. interest rates are at an all-time high. >> i would just like to focus it is a big problem. i'm sorry to interrupt the chairman's going to be tough on time. i just want to make sure i understand do you support additional federal investment in programs so that we can lower the cost of building affordable housing? >> thank you, senator warren. but i do support is in maximizing the budget that we do have. making sure. >> is that a note to additional

investments? >> it is aes to maximizing the investment that we have in making sure the programs that we do have our meeting the intended need and serving those it's intended to serve. >> i have to say that disney real pause. just established that we have a terrible gap of affordable housing. we have a program here that is help close that gap. state and local governments, i understand they are doing what they can but they do not have enough money to match the scale of the problem nationwide. what i am looking for is a commitment we are at least going to look to get more help to the state and local communities that are trying to build affordable housing. >> yes, ma'am, thank you. i do look forward to look at the home program and other programs. my point is there is record funding from hud it's nearly $7 billion at this point were still not meeting the need were response beneath. >> which might mean we need more

money. >> limit turn to another topic. unfortunately are some people trying to take advantage of the housing shortage instead of trying to fix it. private equity firm's corporate landlords have moved into local housing markets and they have driven up costs even higher for families. in 2011 no single investor anywhere in america own more than 1000 single-family homes. by 2022 justified in vectors investors collectively owned nearly 300,000 homes. in effect, in your home state of texas in 2021 big investors moved in they bought a whopping 28% of all homes that went on the market. so mr. turner the governor of texas, greg abbott recently said quote large-scale filing of residential homes seems to be

distorting the market and making it harder for the average texan to purchase a home. do you agree it's a problem if big corporate investors are beating out families to try to buy homes? >> think you senator. i have not seen that statement from governor abbott but i do look forward to looking at this issue even working with you and your staff on this issue. i believe we have a housing affordability crisis in our country. the more capitol we get into the market, the better and obviously we want the right people, qualified people to invest the steps i saw comment senator said about 2% of institutional investors own the single-family homes. if i am confirmed by this committee and look forward to digging into this more with you so that we can look at this issue together. >> i appreciate that. we have got to be laser focus on lowering the cost of housing for families. >> yes, ma'am thank you. >> thank you, thank you,

senator. >> think it mr. chairman and congratulations to both of you in your new positions. mr. turner, personal thanks for the opportunity to visit with you in my office. i really appreciated that we have the same focus the traditional market is available interest rates are low individuals can afford to literally get a mortgage. when the opportunities are available so the entry way to getting that mortgage rates is simplified and brought down. more people can do the traditional markets have the home ownership. i personally believe equity in that home should beat without home owner and not with the federal government. i really do like the idea of having the individual have that homeownership opportunity. i would just like your thoughts for just a minute. i do not need to push it too far.

isn't that really what this is all about is allowing individuals the ability to gain equity in their home? and for them to have that value rather than to be paying rent through federal program? wouldn't it be much better to have a private sector loaning the money and an individual actually getting equity in their home? >> senator thank you senator round is great to meet and visit with you. for most americans their home is their largest investment that they have and that's how they begin to build generational wealth i know what that was like for me and my family growing up and even now. so yes, i believe having equity in their home should be made available to that homeowner. that is help most families begin to grow wealth and achieve the american dream. quickset is one of the reasons why president trump was elected was to bring down that cost of interest on a home so that more people can get into that.

and i think another important part is once you get the equity in the home, now you have other opportunities. it's a whole lot easier if that individual has the opportunity in the first place. i think it's a step in the right direction. at the same time we have areas like hundred native american reservations in south dakota the tribal trust land. 15% of our population is native american. for them to be able to have a home in a rural area that we have got to have access to people that understand how you put a mortgage on a home that's located on tribal trust i would ask for your commitment to working with us to make that as simple as possible in those rural areas. >> absolutely. i really appreciate your care for your constituents in particular those in tribal lands. i do commit to working with you and also visiting so we can go visit the leaders of the tribal lands and see how we can make it

the most efficient and affordable for them and their families. >> thank you under really appreciate that i'm going to hold you to that. that would be really good. we want to take poverty out and some of the rural areas start with providing opportunity for homeownership on a reservation will make a huge difference. >> yes sir. >> we were comment our office talked about a number of items one of the items we talked about was trying to cut the red tape making federal programs work more effectively and efficiently. as a former state legislator you undoubtably understand the undoubtedly understand the challenges and the costs associated with excessive federal overreach. at a time when there's a growing demand for additional housing units, there's no question about that right federal regulation like davis-bacon environmental review, built america, by america and new energy standards or slowing the construction process and increasing cost nationwide including on tribal lands. breaking down some of the bureaucracy should be part of the discussion as we try to

incentivize housing development. my question for you is under your leadership will the department make it a priority to review and adjust program regulations to match the level of risk based on the type of activity, the location or the amount of federal funds involved? >> yes sir. once the goals confirmed as to look at all of the programs at hud intake and account, take inventory and ask is this helping the mission of hunter is it not? isn't helping to build more affordable housing or is it not? is it combating the homelessness crisis or is it not so yes, sir make that commitment. >> thank you. one last question during our meeting we also discussed the challenges with hud section 202 program in south dakota and i think this will eventually be a problem nationwide. so the need for greater flexibility to adapt to changes in housing markets, service industries in tenant populations particular the enrolled

communities we may have to make the modifications to existing programs. i would ask for your commitment to work with us to be able to resolve some of the issues which are front and center today? >> yes sir. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you. >> think it mr. chairman permits return it's great to see again, thank you for our meeting. i just want to add quickly in a bipartisan way we spent about $5 trillion out under both president trump and biden under covid edward one area we did nothing for it was housing. we'll them all into public/private i do think there needs to be additional resources if we spur this issue appreciate the conversation we had. i want to hit quickly two or three items i hope we can work together on. as members of a committee snow i'm a big advocate for community development financial situation cdfi that serve the underserved community. is actually an area i work for a close of the first trump administration. i work at my friend mike crapo

many on the other side $12 billion for cdf eyes turns a caucus which i'm proud to say bipartisan 24 members, 12d12 ri appreciate that we had to make a talked about cd5 in dallas that helped work to acquire of building working with the church is school building. can you speak for a moment about the value of cdfi how we can further expand the vital role they play? >> thank you senator warren it was great to visit with you and learn more about cdf i, how you are doing and your vision on that we do see the value in that and i will say that i look forward to working with you further in your home state and other areas around the country to see how we can utilize cdfi to help when it comes to housing and investments is our local communities. >> thank you.

when your earlier answers as well we all know homeownership is a pass of wealth creation is going to the reserve 10 -- one racial wealth gap black -- white the fill each of home ownership fairly represented across all communities in the program i have worked on with got interest in both sides of the alcohol that lift a program that would target first-generation, first-time homebuyers which by definition into being what two thirds folks of color is it if you qualify for 30 year mortgage what we would give you make those payments you get a 20 year mortgage you double the amount of equity you obtain in that first 10 years that's the wealth creation notion. again we talked briefly about it but i'd like to get you on the record of how we can increase homeownership for disadvantaged communities using the markets. i would love to get using some nice things about that. >> oh yes and thank you for this

program we talked about briefly in your office i didn't look to further going into that in learning more about it for as you said we do have a housing crisis in our country i heard one leaders say all ideas need to come to the table will pick the best one that impacts the people that we serve. i look forward. >> tomorrow went to get them very quickly. one is again another topic we talked about in my office. it's a challenge for every state in the country virginia it may be little more the cutting edge states look at both the challenges upside and downside of it bringing data centers to the community. they generate a lot of revenue it's also got challenges i talk about waco county outside of richmond 400,000 person community crosses the economic strata. this committee sent something very creative when they take in the tax revenue from the data centers dedicated to housing trust fund. where that housing trust fund helps acquire the land pretty build affordable housing there

you get a lot of regulations pretty do not have to pay your sewer permit fees your regulatory fees. this may be one tool in the toolkit that takes something ths otherwise controversial is still has controversy but might generate towards the public/private initiative. again i invite you to my office and want to invite you to look at this program should you be confirmed. >> i love to forward to coming. >> last one and i'm going to get all my points in. i'm down to 44 seconds.get done in time. that is has a lot of potential is one of his wingmen on this. they still need to be renewed but updated as well. i think opportunity zones particularly in terms of affordable housing ought to be an area we can put more focus as

well as small business development. the last 15 seconds and we talked about opportunity zones but i hope you will work with the chairman and many of us on how we can perform that program and work toward this outing housing shortage. >> absolute look forward to that public thank you sir. >> everyone should follow your lead on that one, senator warren. senator tillis question. >> i have muted my phone. [laughter] >> is good music though >> attacks or my wife by the way. [laughter] thank you for being here. i think probably one of your standout games was december 19 i forgot to interceptions against the arizona cardinals, is that right? >> i think that was a good game. [laughter] >> you better be ready to intercept a lot about ideas. [laughter] one bad idea is throwing money after something without trying to figure out how to fix the plumbing in hud. thank you for the time is spent in the office. going to support your confirmation because in 30 or 40

minutes that we spent in my office, much more than i can do and the remaining four minutes and 20 seconds. i have said this to anyone that's come before this committee and your role. the trailer park i grew up in and nashville still stands. those people are hurting. they do not have affordable housing. one of the reasons they don't is because government keeps on trying to regulate themselves out of any path ownership. we keep on talking about throwing more money at it repeatedly discount. agreed to. the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: department of housing and urban development, eric turner, of texas, to be secretary. mr. thune: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate resume legislative session and be in a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each.

the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: i ask that the senate proceed to s. 55 submitted earlier today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: recognizing january 2025 as national mentoring month. the presiding officer: without objection, the senate will proceed. mr. thune: i ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or mr. thune: ski unanimous consent the senate proceed to s. r.56 submitted today. the clerk: congratulating the university of vermont's men's soccer team on winning the 2024 national collegiate athletic association division i men's soccer national championship. the presiding officer: without objection, the senate will proceed. mr. thune: all right, here's to

vermont. i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: i ask unanimous consent that when the senate completes its business today it stand adjourned until 10:30 a.m. on wednesday, february 5. that following the prayer and pledge, the journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, morning business be closed, and the senate proceed to executive session and resume executive calendar number 11, and that at 11:30 a.m. all time be expired on the turner nomination. finally, that if any nominations are confirmed during wednesday's session 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. thune: if there is no further business to come before the senate, ski that it stand adjourned under the previous order. the presiding officer: the the presiding officer: the

the senate has gaveled out today the chamber confirm former congressman doug collins of veterans affairs secretary by vote of 77 -- 23 lawmakers confirmed pam bondi as attorneyy general and advance the nomination of eric turner to be secretary of housing and urban development. watch live senate coverage here on cspan2. ♪ expands "washington journal" per alive a form involving you to discuss the latest issues of government, politics, and public policy. washington to across the country. coming up wednesday morning north carolina republican congressman pat harrigan afghan war veteran armed services committee member talks about his legislative priorities house republicans agenda. tennessee democrat congressman steve cohen member of the house judiciary committee discusses elon musk doge effort christian

science monitor washington bureau chief on present terms of meeting was really prime minister benjamin netanyahu also political economic correspondent reviews president trump's use of terrorists to achieve policy goals but as he spent "washington journal," join the conversation live at 7:00 a.m. eastern western morning c-span sees by now or in line at c-span.org. ♪ >> come up on cspan2 senate judiciary cmittee hearing testimony on proposal department classied functional as a schedule one drug under the controlled substances act. after that special envoy to the middle east steve witkoff talked about the situation in gaza but later we had to capitol hill f remarks by louisiana republican senator bill cassidy's support for the nomination of robert f kennedy jr. to head the department of health and human services. >> wednesday a look at ways to increase government efficiency

and reduce unnecessary spending with iowa governor kim runnels citizens against government waste president testified before the house oversight and government reform committee watch live 10:00 a.m. eastern to spend three comments he's been mobile app and online at c-span.org. ♪ c-span democracy unfiltered. we are funded by these television companies and more including comcast. >> are you thinking this is just a community center? it is way more than that. comcast is part of 1000 committee centers to create wi-fi enabled so students from low income families can get the tools they need to be ready for anything. comcast support c-span as a public service log these other television providers. if you get a front row seat to democracy. >> the senate judiciary committee considered whether to permit classify fentany