states and the democrats just want to stop pick the american people want the kind of action and urgency we're seeing right now out of president trump. jeff merkley center from oregon he's open to shutting dunnigan he said no more business as usual, shut it down for trump is doing exactly what america voted for. but here the headlights come the pictures of those of the democrats in the united states senate saying w we don't care wt the american people say. we're going to shut down thet government. president trump a shrinking the size of government we know that government is too big. we know it spends too much. president trump is accounting for every single penny. and we're not going to make pennies anymore as a result of the fact that the costs three sense to make a penny. that's why democrats wantt to shut down the government. they don't like the success that

america is having today. they don't like the optimism that is pervasive throughout our country. so once again if there's going to be a shutdown, we are talking about a schumer shutdown of our country because they lost the election. additionally, -- >> the senate is coming in for more work on president trump's cabinet nominations. the next vote will be on confirming tulsi gabbard as director of national intelligence. and on whether to advance rfk jr. to be hhs secretary geurts those oats happening overnight at 12:30 a.m. eastern unless there's a time agreement to hold them earlier. live coverage of the senate here on c-span2.

the presiding officer: the senate will come to order.

mr. wyden: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from oregon. mr. wyden: madam president, today i'll be speak being about the nomination of tulsi gabbard to be director of national intelligence, and my reasons for opposing her confirmation. first, i believe the senate must consider with this nomination the examples of blatant lawlessness of the administration. at every turn, donald trump is attacking the rule of law, disregarding the constitutional role of the congress, and trying to purge the civil servants who defend our country every day. meanwhile, elon musk's minions

are gaining access to some of the government's most sensitive systems and records. american democracy and national security are at stake. if the senate is going to confirm nominees, we need to know whether they will stand up for democratic principles, no matter what. so at our hearing i asked ms. gabbard what she would do if donald trump tried to illegally withhold funds from the intelligence community inspector general. this was hardly a hypothetical question. donald trump has in fact sought to unilaterally cut off funding for a broad range of organizations despite the money having been appropriated by congress o by congress. and it's not just me saying this is illegal. the courts have ordered the administration to cut out and resume the funding. ms. gabbard said, i don't believe for a second president

trump would ask me to do something that would break the law. well, he is breaking the law, and the country needs leaders who acknowledge that fact and stand up to him. my concerns about ms. gabbard are also based on her recent turn towards extreme partisanship. now, other partisans have been confirmed to leadership positions in intelligence agencies. george herbert walker bush was successful enough as director of central intelligence that they literally named the headquarters after him. party affiliation is not the issue. the problem is when partisanship distorts one's views of intelligence matters. ms. gabbard has written about a coup being perpetrated by the so-called deep state that includes, among others, the dnc and also the fbi, the cia, and, i quote, a whole network of rogue intelligence and law enforcement agencies. madam president, i've spent

almost a quarter century as a member of the intelligence committee seeking to bring to light and stop government abuses across a range of programs and activities. these conspiracy theories do not help the partisan reform movement. they only serve to encourage a president who wants to tear down the entire intelligence community and replace it with lawlessness -- loyalists. so what happens next, madam president, if ms. gabbard is confirmed, my first order of business will be to hold her to the commitments she made during her confirmation process. with regard to surveillance policy, she expressed her support for -- section 702 reauthorization up next year, the dni support reforms like these will be critical to protecting the

privacy rights of americans. ms. gabbard also confirmed that she has significant concerns about the constitutionality of several provisions of the patriot act. importantly, she opposed mandated back doors and doing crypted communications would threaten both americans' privacy and national security. as she stated during her hearing, these back doors lead down a dangerous path that can undermine americans' fourth american rights and civil liberties. we are living in a time of increasingly devastating cyber breaches, including the salt typhoon compromise. the lesson from that hack was that surveillance capabilities designed for law enforcement will be targeted by foreign intelligence surveillance -- services. in other words, there's simply no way for the government to mandate access to americans' encrypted communications and not

also expose those communications to the government of china or other adversaries. and met me mention something -- and let me mention something particularly alarming last week. the press reported that u.k. officials insisted that apple provide them a back door into files backed up to apple's icloud service. this is a development, madam president, that threatens americans' national security and americans' privacy. and that's even before u.s. government officials come around, once again, asking for the very same dangerous and irresponsible accesses. that's why ms. gabbard's statement was so important and why if she is confirmed the congress needs to hold her and the rest of america's intelligence agencies to it. now, during her confirmation process, ms. gabbard supported restrictions on the collection of communications records of america's journalists.

she endorsed the biden administration justice department policy prohibiting its collection except in very narrow circumstances. that was a policy she said, and i quote, that was essential to protecting press freedoms and maintaining the critical balance between national security and upholding the first amendment. she also called for making sure that policy was actually codified. so i asked ms. gabbard about the collections of communications records of congressional members and staff, as was detailed in a department of justice inspector general report released late last year. she argued that the spying on congress was a significant breach of the constitution and separation of powers and, most importantly, she endorsed reforms to keep it from happening again. during this confirmation process, she also confirmed that the government accountability office should audit the intelligence community to ensure that it's not targeting americans outside of the foreign

intelligence surveillance act. she also expressed support for the public interest declassification board, which has the task of promoting transparency. and, finally, i asked ms. gabbard whether intelligence agency whistleblowers must have a clear path to the senate intelligence committee and don't need permission from agencies to talk to the members. she responded that the answer was, quote, clearly yes. gi given donald trump's ongoing attacks against public servants, that protection of whistleblowers that we discussed may be one of the most important principles of all. let me wrap up this way -- madam president, in just three short weeks since his inauguration, here is the checks and balances scoreboard on president biden. he has illegally fired inspectors general. he has purged the three democratic members of the independent privacy and civil liberties board, not only

removing the privacy members but leaving the board without enough members to function. he has appointed or nominated people to carry out political retribution, including a nominee to be fbi director who comes with his own published enemies list. at the same time donald trump has demonstrated thorough contempt for the security of americans' private information by granting elon musk's people unsupervised access to the country's most sensitive security systems and databases. so what will happen when attempts to steamroll oversight and the rule of law and put the privacy and constitutional rights of all americans at risk and on the line? if she is confirmed, it will be up to ms. gabbard to stand up to him and stick to the principles and commitments that she's expressed and answered in response to my questions. it will be our responsibility to assure that she does just that.

i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from mississippi. mr. wicker: madam president, i come to the floor to direct

members' attention to a very important article on the front page of yesterday's "wall street journal," february 10, 2025, by thomas grove. the headline states, quote, be cruel: how russia tortured ukrainians. this is most disturbing -- this is a most disturbing bit of news, and it demonstrates who we're dealing with in hoping somehow that there will be a negotiated settlement of vladimir putin's illegal invasion of a smaller neighbor that he thought was weaker in violation of every international law dealing with this. the article begins by -- and i

ask unanimous consent, madam president, to insert into the "congressional record" at this point every word of this article by mr. grove. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. wicker: thank you, madam president. it starts out by saying that, in the beginning of this war -- which now has-ed almost three years -- word came down from the leadership of vladimir putin's dictatorship in russia to prisoners of war captured by the russian soldiers from major general igor potapenko. be cruel, don't pity the ukrainian prisoners. now, we all know that war is hell. there's no question about it.

and we also are finding out that russia has learned this. they thought it would be a one- or two-day excursion understand that they would be welcomed by -- and that they would be welcomed by pro-russian ukrainians as they rolled they are tanks in. they found out very differently soon many. and three years later we've seen how the ukrainians have fought and died for their own homeland. but also, once a combatant has been captured, there are very important international rules and regulations and a matter of international law, which can be punished by life imprisonment, which can be punished by the death penalty about treatment of prisoners of war. and this is what we were -- are

learning about what major general igor potapenko told the russian prison officials that they could do. there would be no restrictions against violence against these prisoners of war. the body cameras mandatory elsewhere in russia's system would be gone. guards would rotate, serving a month at a time in prisons before other teams took their place, across the country other units received similar instructions. we're not finding this out, by the way, from some international reporter that somehow got into the system and saw this. this is information given by former russian prison guards. -- who were so disturbed by these orders that they defected to the west. three russian prison guards are

telling "the wall street journal" and americans and anyone who would listen about the horror. this resulted in are nearly three years of relentless torture. guards applied electric shocks to prisoners' genitals until the batteries rain out. i'm -- batteries ran out. i'm almost reluctant, madam president, to speak these words in public. they beat prisoners for maximum damage experimenting to see what kind of material would be most painful. then when there were medical problems as there would surely be, medical treatment was withheld to allow gangrene to fester, forcing amputations. three former prison officials told this reporter how russia planned and executed what united

nations investigators have described as a widespread and systematic torture. accounts were supported by official documents, interviews with ukranian prisoners and a person who helped the prison officials defect. and, thank god they were able to defect. this is also borne out, madam president, by a former are prisoner of war, pavel avisov, taken prisoner in mariopol. for p two and a half years this 25-year-old combatant entitled to protections by partisan geneva convention was moved from prison to prison before being released last october. he said beatings were the worst when he was transferred. after arriving at a penitentiary

in russia's terfer region north of moscow, he was led into a medical examination room and ordered to strip. guards shocked him repeatedly with a stun gun while shaving his head and beard. when it was over, he was told to yell glory to russia, glory to the special forces, and then still naked he was ordered to sing the russian and soviet, and soviet national anthems. when he said he didn't know the words, the guards beat him with fists and batons. this is hard to read, but what did the former guard say? russian citizens, who thankfully had been willing to defect and come forward and tell the truth about the vicious, brutal, illegal regime of vladimir

putin? the former guards describe a staggering level of violence directed at ukranian prisoners. electric shockers were used often especially in showers. that officers complained about they're running out of batteries too fast. can't do this any more because the batteries have gone dead. the guards used police batons until they broke. officers tested other materials, including insulated hot water pipes for their ability to cause pain and damage. this is putin's russia. this is the regime that some people are hoping we can somehow negotiate with in good faith and depend on them to keep up that i were end of the bargain -- keep up their end of the bargain. the guards intentionally beat the prisoners on the same spot on their body every day,

preventing bruises from healing and causing infection. at least one person died of sepsis because of this type of brutality. and the guards enjoyed their brutality. according to these russians, who were guards at the facility and who defected rather than countenance what their government was doing. ukranian former p.o.w. described how prisoners were forced to run through the hallway, holding mattresses on their heads. the guards beat them on their ribs as they run by. when they got to the end of the hall they would be forced to do push-ups and sit-ups and each time they came up the guard would punch them or hit them with a baton. i would say to my colleagues, madam president, this is not a

bunch of prison guards gone rogue. this is a bunch of prison guards in vladimir putin's dictatorship and vladimir putin's illegal regime that were following orders from a high-ranking major general. madam president, there are differences about the united st states' interest in ukraine, but i will tell you that the countries around ukraine in the neighborhood know what they're facing, and they know that if vladimir putin succeeds in his illegal war to take over a neighbor, that will not be the end of it. and one can only listen to what we're hearing out of neighboring countries, out of the republic of georgia, out of neighboring

armenia and azerbaijan, russia intends and the war criminal vladimir putin intends to return to as much of the old soviet union dictatorship as he possibly can. i hope this war ends, and, frankly, i've hoped for three years under the biden administration that that administration would provide the freedom fighters inside their own country to have the necessary equipment, the necessary ammunition, the necessary permission to defeat this illegal invasion. but i simply at this point want to alert anyone who's listening, alert my colleagues, anyone who is listening to the sound of my

voice in any way, to the reality of the utter cruelty, the unspeakable conditions that russia uses in violation of every international law. if vladimir putin comes to the negotiating table and agrees to a cease-fire, we need to bear in mind that he is the gentleman who has countenanced this outrage that i've barely been able to speak about today, and any negotiations we have with the russians and with the current leadership needs to be done in light of the facts as outlined in this independent report. thank you, madam president, and i yield the floor.

a senator: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. reed: thank you, madam president. madam president, i rise to oppose the nomination of tulsi gabbard to be director of national intelligence. in its first few days in office the trump administration has been remarkably cavalier and incompetent in its handling of our national security affairs. shutting off foreign aid, threatening panama, greenland, and canada, calling for the mass deportation of palestinians from gaza, and just last week it was reported that the cia sent an unclassified e-mail listing all employees it had hired over the last two years in order to comply with an executive order from president trump. one former agency called this a counterintelligence disaster. the president's choice to lead

national security agencies have inspired confidence. the director of national intelligence or dni serves a critical role in collecting analysis so that the president, congress and those across the u.s. government have the best and timely information for our national security. indeed the office was created after 9/11 to better coordinate analysis across the intelligence community. the position of dni requires someone of great experience, character, judgment, and the confidence to speak truth to power, especially when the findings of the intelligence community differ from the policy objectives of the administration. while i respect ms. gabbard's military service, including overseas deployments, she dmots have a demonstrated record of experience to qualify her to lead the intelligence community.

as dni, she would oversee 18 different organizations, tens of thousands of military and civilian personnel, annual budget of more than $100 billion. she has in which served in an intelligence role much less led a intelligence enterprise. more concern than ms. gabbard's lack of experience is her era particular statements and actions, many of which have run counter to the interest and findings of the intelligence community. in 2020, ms. gabbard and congressman matt gaetz cosponsored a resolution calling on the federal government to drop all charges against edward snowden. snowden was a contractor who was indicted for espionage and for publicly releasing the details of some of our most sensitive intelligence efforts, including those that were conducted

jointly with foreign allies and partners before snowden it fled to russia. former deputy dni sue gordon responded to ms. gabbard's defense of snowden by saying, quote, it reflects a lack of understanding of who we are, and it reflects a lack of respect for what we do. unauthorized disclosures of intelligence are always bad. don't go with the good or bad. any good outcome or whether he was right or wrong. the not only harmed intelligence, he harmed our allies and partners. and he harmed our businesses by what it allowed china to assume about that. there is nothing justifiable about what he's done. none. let me be clear, edward snowden's betrayal has cost american lives. he is a traitor by every definition of the word. as the chairman of the intelligence committee, senator

cotton, has said in the past, mr. snowden is, quote, an egotistical serial liar and traitor whose unauthorized disclosures of classified information have jeopardized the safety of americans and allies around the world. snowden's close and continual contact with russian intelligence services speak volumes. he deserves to rot in jail for the rest of his life. yet, during her confirmation hearing, ms. gabbard was repeatedly asked whether or not she believed that snowden was a traitor. i think colleagues on both sides of the aisle were stunned that she not only refused to do so, but that she continued to defend him. our national security leaders consistently emphasize that the greatest advantage we have over our adversaries is our network of allies and partners, including those who share intelligence with us. if ms. gabbard is confirmed as

dni, i have serious concerns about whether our allies and partners will trust her with their nation's most sensitive intelligence given her past actions. i'm also concerned about a pattern of statements over the years by ms. gabbard peddling what the intelligence community has found to be russian propaganda. for example, at the outset of russia's illegal invasion of ukraine, as eloquently described by the chairman of the armed services committee, ms. gabbard stated, quote, this war and suffering could have easily been avoided if the biden administration and nato had simply acknowledged resolution's legitimate security concerns regarding ukraine becoming a member of nato, which would be u.s. and nato forces right on russia's border. after ukraine bravely withstood russia's initial assault, the kremlin began a campaign of

misinformation designed to legitimize its illegal war. these things were repeatedly amplified by gabbard in her public comments, including with respect to the widely disputed russian allegation of a u.s.-funded covert biological weapons program in ukraine. as our former colleague, mitt romney, tweeted at the time, she made those bogus claims, quote, tulsi gabbard is parroting false russian propaganda. her treasonous lies may well cost lives. in review ms. gabbard's statements, "the new york times" found, quote, ms. gabbard honed her pro-russian views on tucker carlson's show on fox news before his program was canceled. she became a regular guest and -- clips from her appearances on mr. carlson's show that

reaped -- repeated kremlin talking points were picked up by the media. she echoed the storilines that the russian propaganda created, which the russians said that the conspiracy theories they had manufactured was true. for the kremlin, it was a vertus cycle. ms. gabbard has been criticized for her 2017 trip to syria where she met with syria's then-president bashar al-assad. she said, quote, we've got to be able to meet with anyone we need to if there's a possibility that we could achieve peace. ms. fwaur's decision to -- gabbard's decision to carry out this mission in the midst of a civil war where bashar al-assad was using chemical weapons

against his own people showed incredibly poor judgment. her visit didn't do anything to advance peace. just months later, ms. gabbard criticized president trump's decision to use military force to deter further chemical weapons use by assad and even expressed skepticism if about a saharaed used -- mr. assad used chemical weapons. she has -- but it's more than just that. ms. gabbard claims to have misjudgments even when she is shown to be wrong. this is a disturbing character flaw for this critical role. above all else, the dni must be unquestionably loyal to our national interests and trustworthy of our national

secrets. the intelligence they control has life or death consequences. some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, some who have indicated great discomfort with ms. gabbard and her troubling disregard for her security interests appear willing to go for a confirmation despite the misgivings. at this critical moment, all senators must honestly answer these questions. given everything you know about tulsi gabbard, do you trust her with life or death national secrets? can you look members of our intelligence community in the eye and say that you believe tulsi gabbard will serve and protect them and this nation? i've seen enough to know my answer and i urge my colleagues to vote against this nominee. madam president, i would note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

the clerk: ms. alsobrooks. lots of the many things they've done that are long, yes, we're going to make an effort to do that. yes. >> i understand concerns about going around the legislative branch. but politically, democrats -- they like the idea the president is doing these cuts. is that tone deaf political --

[inaudible] >> simple. everyone knows there's waste incumbent and should be cut. but doge is using a meat ax and the cutting things that are efficient and effective. i was in albany and syracuse monday talking to community health centers, many of them have had their funds cut temporarily. some even has up and restore jet. that the most efficient healthcare providers around. take a idea, maybe this programs they don't like. but most people agree that far was extremely effective, cost effective. most people would want to see us continue our fight in central africa against the bozo doesn't come here. the bottom line is simple. if you want to make cuts, then you do it through a debate in congress. not flawlessly by just implementing it. we want to make sure waste isn't there but the cutting out the meat of this going to hurt millions of american families, tens of millions. when they learned that, when

veterans see they're not getting the benefits, when people and medicaid see they're getting cut, when all of these happen the american people say that's not what donald trump campaigned . no, that lady over there. you, you. >> senators had said doge should be in federal agency. others is a doge should be cutting the pentagon budget. are you on the same page? >> we are on the same page. thou to be done to the congress unlawfully. not by just an agency coming in and getting. that's unlawful. the old one majority of courts have said it's a lawful buspar and that's how it ought to be done. we have rule of law. with separation of powers. i've never seen it by litter on such a massive scale and that's why the courts are and doing lots of it in the temporary hearings.

>> mr. president, this week the senate will consider the nomination of rfk jr. to be secretary of health and human services. president trump has kept mr. kennedy to lead the charge in

making america healthy again. something that's been a concern mr. kennedy's throughout his career. mr. kennedy promises to make hhs a collaborative, transparent, and science driven agency under his leadership. i will say, mr. president, that's good to hear. many americans trust in health authorities has eroded in recent years with the pandemic being a big factor. a lot of americans grew frustrated with confusing and sometimes contradictory guidance from government agencies. measures like requiring toddlers as young as two years old to wear masks indefinitely, not only defied common sense, there was no scientific research to back it up. mr. president, our public health agencies do critical work and i am a supporter of their research and i'm proud of the contribution they make to american leadership in medicine and innovation. but if are going to make a

celtic in the agencies doing to support work have to rebuild trust with americans. so i was pleased to hear mr. kennedy pledged to increase transparency and accountability including unprecedented level of collaboration with congress that allows for regular and robust oversight of his agencies activities. i was pleased mr. kennedy acknowledged the importance of vaccines and the concerning reality vaccine uptake in this country is increasing. mr. kennedy has pledged he will maintain the best vaccine standards. and he's committed to work with an existing vaccine approval of systems and maintain the fda's regime standards. mr. president, i look forward to mr. kennedy being a partner to congress on some very important issues. he's brought attention to america's chronic disease epidemic and i'm pleased he wants to put a focus on chronic diseases that affect too many americans and costs far too much

in lives lost and dollars spent. i'm also encouraged he's committed to implementing president trump's pro-life policies at hhs. president trump has been one of the most pro-life presidents we've ever had. mr. kennedy's agency will be critical to protecting life and supporting mothers and babies. mr. kennedy has also committed to working with farmers and ranchers are policies that affect her food supply. america's farmers and ranchers are a valuable resource and a look forward to working with him to ensure that the voice of south dakota's agricultural producers is heard. mr. president, i believe mr. kennedy's collaborative approach to the job will help restore some of the trust in our public health agencies that of an lost in recent years. i look for working with him on a number of issues as we restore that trust and work to make america healthy again. mr. president, before i close oh to highlight the nominations process were having here in the

united states senate. mr. kennedy's confirmation will be the 15th sense president trump's inauguration. democrats are obviously trying to slow down the process but we've been moving right along. we will continue to maintain an aggressive pace until president trump has an entire team in place. mr. president, it's interesting democrats have saved some of their fiercest opposition for two two of our nominees this week. mr. kennedy and tulsi gabbard who interestingly enough are both former democrats. i wonder if democrats aren't happy to see the elevation of two individuals individuals who became disillusioned for the democrat party. most americans are pleased to see president trump have a diversity of backgrounds in his cabinet. in fact, it's not uncommon. president bush and first cabinet included a democrat. president obama set two republicans. president trump elevated and

obama appointee to his first cabinet. but this trend stopped with president biden. i'm sure the american people are glad to see president trump living up to his promises to be a president for all of america. it's up to democrats whether they want to participate or just obstruct for the next few years but republicans will be working to deliver results that benefit all americans. mr. president, i yield the floor and i suggest the absence of a quorum. >> now, mr. president, in his first three weeks in office donald trump has waged a scorched earth campaign against the rule of law. we all know donald trump of course won the election last november. and as we all know he campaigned on a platform to cut back large part of the government. but nothing, nothing in the

constitution, nothing in our grand tradition of american separation of powers allows donald trump to break the law and order to achieve those goals. goals. let me repeat that. nothing donald trump campaigned on cutting back the government, that's true, but he is not allowed, not allowed to break the law to achieve those goals. that is not how america works. you campaign, you put your ideas forward, in this case donald trump one, but he did not campaign on breaking the law and the american people don't want him to break the law. the reason we have a system of checks and balances is so that even when one side wins an election, there's a check, there's a balance. that's what america has been all about for over 200 years. and at this point donald trump

is trying to break that tradition. in area after area after area. and so the courts have begun to speak here and their message is very simple. the law is not optional. not even for a president of the united states. yesterday at least five rulings were handed down in federal courts against the president brazen conduct in office. court rulings against his attempts to freeze trillions in federal funding at omb. court decisions against his heartless, cruel decision to stop billions in medical research funding through the nih. courts ruled against his unlawful attempt to hollow out the federal workforce regardless of the job they do.

.. his office and when courts the donald trump must accept the . now there is some are right donald trump should ignore the courts even though vice president seems to suggest the courts can will control the powers of the executive. with respect to the vice president, the issue is the courts trying to control the

president. the president trying to control the law. he wants to decipher himself what the laws are, which ones should be applied and wants one's shouldn't and what they mean. congress the law, courts interpret the law. we'll burn fat in grade school. that's how checks and balances work. donald trump does not reign supreme. when courts speak, president must adhere to their judgment. that's his oath. the courts will be important thing for holding donald trump accountable whenever he breaks the law and breaks his promise to the american people. it's one tool in the tool kit for how democrats and all americans the rule of law will make sure donald trump does not break the law and do just what he wants. our records be just one resource

of several but among the most important and does we've already seen the store to uphold the rule of law and prevent america from sliding into other laws. in five weeks funding for the federal government will run out. let us remember when this talk, trump and publicans are already shutting down large parts of the government. democrats do not want a government shutdown. it's the republicans charge, there's responsibly to avoid shutdown. vitiated. the presiding officer: the senator from michigan is recognized. without objection. ms. slotkin: i rise today as a very new senator, a freshman senator, to talk about the confirmation prospects for the

nominee for the director of national intelligence tulsi gabbard. and i think contacts matters here. i am the first cia officer to ever be elected to the u.s. senate. before i ran for office in michigan, i had a career in national security. i'm what's called a 9/11 baby. i happen to be in new york on my second day of graduate school when 9/11 happened. it changed my life. i decided to go into national security, got recruited by the cia right out of grad school. and then was quickly sent on my first of three tours in iraq alongside the military, providing intelligence to the u.s. military to deal with the groups that were shooting at u.s. forces and noting against the u.s. homeland. i worked in national security roles very proudly in both administrations, democratic and republican. i worked in the white house for george w. bush and i was there the friday that he left office and the monday that barack obama walked in.

i did the same job for two very different presidents, one from each party. i went on to be a pentagon assistant secretary of against. but in between all that time, one of the things i got to do was help stand up the office of the director of national intelligence. i was the intelligence briefer in baghdad for ambassador job negroponte who was the first ambassador to iraq. i would provide him intelligence briefings early early in the morning. one day he came back from a trip to washington and said, i'm going to be nominated to be the first director of national intelligence. it's this completely new position. it's a position that has been created because of the failures of 9/11, our failures to anticipate the attacks of 9/11, to put the pieces together between the fbi, the cia, the military, all those who had a piece of the story but didn't have a place and a venue to combine it all together to

anticipate the most devastating attacks on the u.s. soil since pearl harbor. i came home and happened to be one of those first employees to set up the director of national intelligence. i think i was employee number five, john negroponte's first special assistant. so i was his body person, helping him set up that office. so when i talk about the nomination of tulsi gabbard, i don't do it willy-nilly. i don't do it without a background on these topics. and i believe that the people who should be taking the positions that are critical for national security should be people of competence and character. what does the director of national intelligence do? the office was created as i said to combine all the different threads of information at the 17 different intelligence community agencies that we have to prevent

intelligence failures like the failures that we had on 9/11. this is a serious position. this is a position that in the past has been in the oval office every morning with the intelligence briefings provided by the agencies. this is the position in the dead of night that makes consequential decisions on the security and safety of people here. and most americans have no idea the number of threats that we still thwart every single month against our homeland. we sleep well at night because the intelligence community is working together to prevent those threats along with our partners and our allies and our military. so for me, i want to know that the person who is going to be woken up in the middle of the night to make those last-minute decisions, do we move on that intelligence, do we act based on that threat, that they are someone again of competence and

character. and what i have seen from ms. gabbard does not meet that threshold. she has first of all repeatedly questioned the integrity of the intelligence community. she's gone after the intelligence community that she hopes to lead. she has labelled tens of thousands of intelligence personnel as deep state without even a semblance of understanding of what they do every day to keep her safe. she's questioned the findings of the intelligence community, and i think more egregious than anything, she has shown a repeated preference for our adversaries over the intelligence community in the united states of america. most notably, a surprise trip to visit the now ousted president of syria bashar al-assad. imagine the decision-making that goes into planning a secret trip to visit a man who has killed

thousands of his countrymen, thousands of relatives of michiganders that i represent, a man who we know has used chemical weapons, violating international law, devastating communities, a man who has seemingly set aside as insurgent groups, terrorist groups took territory in his area and allowed them to project attacks into neighboring states and to plot against the u.s. homeland. she makes the decision to go and visit this man, throw flowers at his feet, do public tv with him, go publicly and show her support. now, i don't know if she's just deeply naive. i don't know if in some twisted way she thought that this was her way of being helpful. but whether she did it out of naivete or she did it knowing what this man has done and the

implications of her actions, either way shows a complete lack of judgment. same goes for her seeming glorification of vladimir putin. it is hard to understand coming from the country that defeated the soviet union in the cold war, that we would put a woman in charge of our entire intelligence community who has shown over and over a repeated interest in vladimir putin, taking his side of the argument, wondering what he's done right and our intelligence community has done wrong. can you imagine what it feels like to be a member of the intelligence community right now with everything going on, with all of the discrediting of what they have done and what they do every sipping gal day and -- single day and now this woman is going to be in charge of this agency? it is an insult to people who have dedicated their lives and put themselves in harm's way to have her confirmed into this

position. now, we've watched her flip-flop on a bunch of issues, right, issues that democrats and republicans have concerns with. she used to have a lot of concerns concern about what's called section 702 of the foreign intelligence surveillance act. she fought against it. now she's somehow for it. i'm not saying people can't change, but i'm just saying someone who doesn't have the backbone to stand up and be clear with their principles, i'm having a hard time imagining them lead in the heat of the moment when you're in the situation room and consequential decisions are being made. i think the feeling that i have about where we are in this country right now is that we're sort of in this fever dream. there's this race to discredit,

to attack, to cut, and, look, i'll be the first person to say that there is fat on the bone in the federal golf. i worked in the federal government. there are plenty of things that can be reformed in the federal government. but the double whammy of attacking the people who keep us safe every day, of trying to push them out. i just had a republican on my way here, member say hey, i just heard about what's going on at cia. are they trying to get everyone to leave or what about people who are insensitive positions? great question. but the other punch is to put someone in charge of the intelligence community that has such disdain for our allies, for our intelligence officers, and such love for our adversaries. so i urge all of my republican colleagues to seven their soul, right? play the long game. don't live in fear of the trump

administration and donald trump specifically. you know in your heart that these people aren't qualified and that the life and lymph american citizens is in their hands. so i urge all of my colleagues to vote against tulsi gabbard. i will be voting against her here later today. and i hope that we as american citizens can come up for air from this fever dream and remember that reform of the federal government does not mean slashing the people that keep us safe every day. and with that i yield back.

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from alabama mrs. britt: i rise today to discuss an epidemic that is affecting our nation's youth. a crisis each and every parent should be concerned about and one that so many parents i know already are. our kids' worsening mental health is an emergency and it's an emergency clearly and un-deanably linked to social media. emergency room visits among adolescents for anxiety, mood disorders and self-harm have all

risen dramatically in the year since social media apps exploded on to the scene. over that same time period and during the second decade of this century, rates of depression amongst tablers -- teenagers more than doubled. by 2019, 20% of teenagers agreed with the notion that, quote, life often feels meaningless. almost a 100% increase from a decade earlier. according to the cdc and 2021 -- and buckle up for this -- one in three high school young women said she actually considered death by suicide. 25% of teenage girls made a plan to do so. 9% of high schoolers and 13% of

teenage girls actualliy attempted -- actually attempted death by suicide. as a mom, that is beyond horrifying. i worry for my own kids. i worry for their friends. as a sehrt, i -- as a senator, i worry for the future of the next generation of americans. to make matters worse, social media companies know the harm their platforms create. instagram's parent company, meta, conducted internal research that showed that one-third of teenage girls who use the app report it makes them feel worse, but they cannot stop. and while social media companies have taken some steps, it is clear that there is work for congress to do. the last time the united states -- the last time a united

states president signed a major piece of legislation addressing children and the internet was, wait for it, 1998. so, you look almost 30 years ago, the children's online privacy protection act was signed into law. for reference, at that time that the law was signed, myspace didn't even exist. it's time for an update, and there is a clear place to start. studies have shown the most damaging time for an adolescent to use social media is during their preteen years, and the 1998 law tried to address that. the law says that websites and other online services cannot collect personal information from children under 13 years old without parental consent. now, the catch is that those websites have to know that the child is under 13. the standard minimum age for

social media platforms is 13. but current law creates an obvious incentive for companies not to verify whether their users are old enough to be on the app, and because social media companies have to know that a child is under 13 for the law to apply, they simply choose not to verify this information. look, anti-child sex abuse organization thorn actually conducted a study in 2021 that showed that 49% of respondents between the ages of 9 and 12 years old said they had used instagram. 52% said they had used facebook. 58 said that they had used snapchat. it was just last week in a senate judiciary hearing where i heard not one, but two parents tell about their painful story where their children had died of fentanyl poisoning from a pill

that they had bought on snapchat, thinking it was something else, thought they bought a percocet, thought they bought an oxycodone, it was laced with fentanyl, and now they're dead. 68% of these people in this survey between 9 and 12 years old said that they had used tiktok. the age limits social media companies claim they have mean absolutely nothing. that's why i introduced the kids off social media act, alongside senators ted cruz, chris murphy, and brian schatz. the four of us approached this not as democrats or republicans, not as someone who sits on the right or the left, but as four concerned parents that are raising teenagers right now and dealing with this issue. our bill would set a minimum age of 13 years old for social media platforms, but that's not the only thing that it would do.

the kids off social media act would also prevents platforms from feeding targeted content picked by an algorithm to users under the age of 17. for anyone who's curious about why that's in the bill, all you have to do is ask a teenager, especially a teenage girl. former u.s. surgeon general vivek murthy wrote that nearly half of all adolescents say that social media makes them feel worse about their bodies. that doesn't seem like an accident. if you read, and many people have, jonathan height's book "the anxious generation" you will learn that these apps use algorithms that, quote, home in on and amplify girls' desires to be beautiful in socially

prescribed ways, which includes being thin, end quote. once that starts, once the algorithms start feeding teenage girls images and videos of increasingly thin and unhealthy women, the visual cycle begins, and those girls end up finding images or videos promoting anorexia and, or as hyte says, emaciated young women urging their followers to try extreme diets like the, quote, corpse bride diet, or the, quote, water only diet. these algorithms on social media platforms are not just leading our daughters to starve themselves. they are leading them to torture themselves as well. by turning the kids off social media act into law, we can put a stop to this.

i am so grateful that senator ted cruz, from the great state of texas, prioritized our bill in the commerce committee. and i am sure that parents everywhere are grateful too. after all, parents overwhelmingly support our mission. a survey conducted by the count on mothers group showed that over 90% of mothers agreed that there should be a minimum age of 13 on social media platforms, and 87% of mothers agreed that social media companies should not be allowed to use personalized algorithms to deliver content to our children. mr. president, if there has ever been a theme of the legislation that my colleagues and i have pursued so far this congress, it is keeping american families and children safe. the laken riley act will help

keep kids safe from criminal illegal aliens. the halt fentanyl act, which i spoke about on this very floor just last week, will help kids be safe from deadly fentanyl and fentanyl poisonings. and the kids off social media act will help keep kids safe from mental health effects that these platforms and their algorithms produce. there is nothing more important we can do as a body than protect the people we serve. so, let's do it. let's get the kids off social media act through congress and to the president's desk. there are parents across this country that are counting on us to step up, to put the proper guardrails in place so their children can be safe and their children have an opportunity to both explore and to succeed.

all of our country's children are free to pursue their own american dream, just as our generations were, and this will enable them to do that. thank you, mr. president.

services little will and fomenting the administration's agenda is secretary, kennedy spent his time focused on the help of keona holley americans being accountable and expecting

whistleblowers i think kennedy is very clear as a citizen and improving the health of all americans to date and focus on health and human services. obviously i'm asking him to focus on things and issues dear to my heart and take up a lot of my time as a senator from iowa and the person concerned about huawei healthcare in rural america. our country spends more foreign a half trillion dollars healthcare cost and healthcare

is a major driver on the budget deficits and federal government unsustainable outlaws. we are not getting our money's worth for all of that spending. major healthcare programs spending at 34% of the federal revenue today and that will grow to 41% of revenue by 2053. mr. kennedy must, and i think he's committed to ensuring the health programs such as medicare and medicaid are protected and strengthened by rooting out waste, fraud and abuse.

the nominee must increase transparency and accountability. these actions will help make our healthcare system more efficient for the taxpayers and consumers. on the author of major recent updates of the federal government's most powerful tool in fraud and that's evil that use claims the enactment of this legislation about reforms to the claims act, the federal government halves covered more than 78 billing dollars lost to fraud and saves billions more by deterring would be fraudsters. people in the justice department, both republicans and democrats say the false claims

act is the best tool to get after fraudsters. in the one year of this the 24 and attorney general garland reported this a couple of days before he left office in 2024 is more to it have billing dollars in false claims act, one seven tenths billions of it involving the care industry. i listen to a lot of whistleblowers and whistleblowers were responsible for helping recovered nearly all of that one in seven tenths billion. i think i discussed the false claims act by soon to be

secretary kennedy. he seemed to be very enthused about listening to whistleblowers and use of false claims act and i think he probably was aware of it for the first time. i hope he will look into this particularly listening to reports from whistleblowers in the waste of taxpayers money's. the justice department and hhs to more aggressively go after healthcare, waste, fraud and abuse and empower and encourage whistleblowers.

and the cost of prescription drugs and put more sunshine on managers and businesses and holding them accountable. we should also establish price transparency on prescription drugs. knowing what something cost, people buying it is common sense and helpful to the consumer. transparency will bring more accountability and more cost to consumers. mr. kennedy must protect and improve access healthcare. the previous administration drag its feet opening spots for

what's termed world community demonstration programs. hhs must listen to rural mercies and ensure benefits from these slots congress authorized. i look forward to strengthening the new involuntary emergency program to ensure there is working rural entities and telehealth access and supporting physicians an affair reimbursement. i also expect hhs to support healthy moms and babies improving coordination and using telehealth and rural areas. hhs supports kids complex

medical needs so these kids and their families are getting the right care at the right time and at the right place. our programs and support kids with complex medical needs covers 64 -- depending on how many problems these kids have but they have to navigate across several different programs. what we are trying to do through legislation is have someone you have to see five or six different specialists, you have somebody saying what's available we can do to help you assess. i also expect hhs joe the most vulnerable.

i've spoken at length with mr. kennedy about comments made in regard to agriculture. i've heard from farmers in iowa and agriculture formal organizations and commodity groups and ideas on agriculture. at the end of the meeting i had an's office prior to the hearing before the finance committee i was called credit looking about his news on agriculture, i hope that coal can be maintained but if not, mr. kennedy is sure to hear from me so when we talk

about this, he prefaced our initial conversation by saying he has secretary will not have jurisdiction over agricultural issues so you can expect, i will expect the practices and regulations and for the most part, the u.s. department of agriculture and environmental protection agency. i also sent letters to secretaries of agriculture hhs requesting to provide information regarding conflicts of interest on dietary guidelines and increase transparency long members of the advisory meeting that they have

and the type of diet have i expect provide congress financial disclosure from the advisory committee before finalizing dietary guidelines so we know that nobody has a vested interest. issues of healthcare and agriculture, mr. kennedy said in the nomination hearing i agree with all the provisions, i agree with all of those. my approach to the administration of hhs will be liable transparency.

the doors are open congress as me for information, he will get it immediately. i don't know whether people even in the senate particularly outside no how refreshing it is to have a member of the cabinet say congress asked for information, he will get it immediately because over the years i've been a senator, republican or democrat administration carrying out our responsibilities for the checks and balances to see executive branch and executes the laws, not an easy process and when you have difficulty pricing.

admiral how much of the trouble is hhs but pam bondi into my office, i showed her a file of 158 letters that i've written in the last four years to get information and documents in regard to my investigations wrong doing and we got answers, was in the paper. very helpful so thank you, mr. kennedy and of congress asked me information, he will get it immediately because that's what our job is. every high school student about checks and balances of

government not only passed laws, not only appropriate money but a responsibility to but taxpayers and citizens of this country to make sure the constitution does what it says it should do, faithfully execute the laws. every cabinet member that comes to my office to tell about the importance of our constitutional responsibly and listening to whistleblowers everybody who comes in, will you answer our letters? verbally says yes and i advised them to say maybe so they don't turn out to be liars so to

kennedy's agency and oversight allows us lowball so i look forward to this. mr. sanders: mr. president, we are living in a extremely dangerous time. future general rapingses will look -- future generations will look back at this moment, what we do right now, and remember whether we had the courage to defend our democracy against the growing threats of oligarchy and authoritarianism. they will remember whether we

stood with president lincoln at gettysburg, who in 1863 looking out over a battlefield where thousands of people are died, thousands of soldiers died in the fight against slavery, and he stated that, quote, this nation, under god, shall have a new birth of freedom and that a government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth. do we stand with lincoln's vision of america, or do we sit idly by and allow this country to move into a new vision, and that is a government of the billionaire class, by the billionaire class, for the billionaire class?

but it is not just oligarchy that we should be concerned about. not just the reality that today three people own more wealth than the bottom half of american society -- 170 million. three people, more wealth than the bottom 170 million americans. it is not just that the gap between the very, very rich and everyone else is growing wider, and it is not just that we have more income and wealth inquality today than -- inequality today than we have ever had. on top of all that, the reality is that today we are moving rapidly under president trump toward authoritarianism, more and more power resting in fewer

and fewer hands. mr. president, as we speak right now, elon musk, the wealthiest man on the planet, is attempting to dismantle major agencies of the federal government which are designed to protect the needs of working families and the disadvantaged. these agencies were created by the u.s. congress, and it is congress' responsibility to maintain them, to reform them, or to end them. it is not mr. musk's responsibility. what mr. musk is doing is patently illegal and unconstitutional and must be ended. mr. president, two weeks ago president trump attempted to suspend all federal grants and

loans in outrageous and clearly unconstitutional act. and as i hope every sixth grader, every kid in the sixth grade in this country knows, under the constitution and our form of government, the president can recommend legislation, he can support legislation, he can veto legislation. but he does not have the power to unilaterally terminate funding passed by the congress. it is congress -- the house and the senate -- who control the purse strings. by in it this move toward authoritarianism it is not the congress that is being attacked.

it is our judiciary. this weekend the vice president of the united states, a graduate of yale law school, who clerked for a supreme court justice, said that, and i quote, judges aren't allowed to control the executive's legitimate power. end quote. really? i thought that one of the major functions of the federal courts is to interpret our constitution, and when appropriate serve as a check on the unconstitutional power of the executive. that's not just what i believe. that is what i suspect every legal scholar and lawyer in america understands to be the case. further, mr. musk meanwhile has proposed, and i quote, that the l worst 1% of appointed judges be fired every year, end quote,

and he demanded the impeachment of judges that have blocked him from accessing sensitive files. no doubt under mr. musk's rule, it will be him and his billionaire friends who determine who the worst judges are. and, no, mr. musk, i must tell you, you don't impeach judges who rule against you here in the united states. you may or may not know this, mr. musk, but under the u.s. constitution, we have a separation of powers brilliantly crafted by the founding fathers of this country in the 1770's, and it has worked pretty well throughout our country's history. we have an executive branch, we have a legislative branch, and

we have a judiciary. mr. president, what we are seeing now is not just an organized attack on the power of the congress and the responsibility of the judiciary. mr. trump and his friends are not just trying to undermine two of the three pillars of our constitutional government, congress and the courts, they are also going after the media in a way that we have never seen in the modern history of this country. trust me that every member of congress will tell you that the people working in the media and media organizations are not perfect. we have all had our experiences with the media. media, like everything else,

makes mistakes every day is, but i do hope that every member of congress understands that you cannot have a functioning democracy, you cannot have a free flow of information, you cannot have the pursuit of truth without a press, a press not intimidated by a president of the united states, but a president who writes it and sees it the way they understand it to be. and in that regard, i want to mention to my colleagues what president trump has done just in recent months. mr. trump has sued abc and received a $15 million settlement. he has sued meta, the parent

company of facebook and instagram, received a $25 million settlement. he received cbs and its parent company paramount and is in negotiation with a settlement. he sued the "des moines register" for a poll result he didn't like and the fcc is threatening to investigate pbs and npr, major news outlets in our country. in other words, we have a president of the united states who is using his incredible power and the power of his agencies to go after media in this country who are saying and doing things he does not like. how are we going to have an independent media if journalists are looking over their shoulders fearful that their reporting will trigger a lawsuit from the most powerful executive in the

world? mr. president, in the midst of all of this, i think that now is the time to ask a very, very simple question, something i think that is on the minds of millions of americans. what do mr. musk, mr. trump, and their fellow billionaires really want. it's not really taking over greenland or the panama canal, all that stuff. the real question is what is their end game? what is their goal? what are they striving for? and in my view, the answer really is not complicated. it is not novel, it is not new. it is in fact exactly what ruling classes throughout history have always wanted and have always believed to be their

right, their right, and that is more power for themselves, more control for themselves, and more wealth for themselves. and in their pursuit of more power, more control and more wealth, they are determined to not allow democracy and the rule of law to get in their way. for mr. musk and his fellow oligarchs, the needs, the concerns, the pain, the ideas, the dreams of ordinary people are simply an impediment to what they, the oligarchs, are entitled to. and that is really what they believe, they are entitled to all of the wealth and the power they have, and they are

determined to stop anyone who gets in their way. mr. president, this process, this phenomenon that is going on right now is not the first time that we have seen this in our country's history. as i think many americans understand, in prerevolutionary america, before the 1770's, before the creation of the united states and the writing of our constitution, the ruling class of that time governed through a doctrine called the divine right of kings. the belief that the king of england was an agent of god, that god appointed him and that he was not to be questioned by mere mortal human beings. he was appointed by god.

in modern times, we no longer have the divine right of kings. what we now have is an ideology being pushed by the oligarchs which says that as a very, very wealthy group of people, often self-made, often the masters of revolutionary new technology, and as high i.q. individuals, it is their absolute right to rule. in other words, the oligarchs of today are our modern-day kings. mr. president, it is not just power that they want. despite the incredible wealth that they currently have, they

want more and more and more. their greed has no end. today mr. musk is worth $402 billion. mr. zuckerberg is worth $252 billion. and mr. bezos is worth $249 billion. with combined wealth of $903 billion, these three people own more wealth than the bottom half of american society, 170 million americans. and not surprisingly, since trump was elected, their wealth has soared. musk has become $138 billion richer. zuckerberg has become $49 billion richer and bezos has become $28 billion richer. since election day in november.

meanwhile, mr. president, while the very rich become much richer, 60% of americans live paycheck to it paycheck. 85 million americans are uninsured or underinsured in terms of health care. 25% of our seniors in this country are trying to survive on $15,000 a year or less. 800,000 americans are homeless. and we have the highest rate of childhood poverty of almost any major country on earth. and real inflation adjusted wages for the average american worker has not gone up in 50 years. does anyone really think that the oligarchs give a damn about

ordinary americans? trust me, they don't. musk's decision to dismember usaid means that tens of thousands of the poorest people in this world will either go hungry or die of preventable diseases. tens of thousands of people. but it's not just usaid and what's happening abroad. here in the united states, mark my words, if we do not stop them, they will soon be going after the health care, nutrition, housing, and educational programs that protect the most vulnerable people in our country, all so that they can raise the money they need to provide huge tax breaks for themselves and for

other billionaires. as modern-day kings who believe they have the absolute right to rule, they will sacrifice without hesitation the well-being of working people in order to protect their power and their privileges. further, they will use the enormous media operations they own to deflect attention away from the impact of their policies while they entertain us to death. mr. musk owns twitter. mr. zuckerberg owns meta which includes facebook and instagram. and mr. bezos owns "the washington post" and twitch. further, they and their fellow oligarchs will continue within our corrupt campaign finance system to spend huge amounts of

money to buy politicians in both major political parties. bottom line -- the oligarchs with their unlimited amounts of money are waging a war on the working class of our country, and it is a war that they are intent on winning. i'm not going to kid anybody. the problems that our country faces right now are enormously serious and they are not easy to solve. our economy is rigged. the rich get richer, poor get poorer, and the middle class struggles. our campaign finance is system is totally corrupt. billionaires can now pour as much money as they want into both political parties, and climate change is ravaging our country and the world with

unprecedented levels of extreme weather disturbances, among many other crises our country faces. mr. president, in the midst of all of these crises, this is what i do know, and this is what i do believe. p and that is that the worst fear of the ruling class of our country is that the american people, whether they are black or white or latino, whether they are young or old, gay or straight, whatever, the fear of the world ruling class is that the american people come together to demand a government that represents all of us, not just the people on top.

the oligarchs' nightmare is that we will not allow ourselves to be divided up by race, religion, sexual orientation or country of origin and will come together and have the courage to take them on. will this struggle be easy? no, it will not. and one of the reasons that it will not be easy is that the ruling class of this country will constantly remind us that they have the power, they control the government, they own the media. but our job right now in these difficult times is to go back and remember the great struggles and sacrifices that will millions of americans have waged

over the centuries in difficult times to create a more democratic, justin humane -- just and humane society. think about all of the sacrifices and the struggles that are americans went through to create a more democratic, just and humane society. and think about trying to put yourself to where they were in those times of crisis. think about what was being said at those times. think about the 1770's, overthrowing the king of england, the most powerful person on earth, the british empire to create a new nation and have self-rule here in the col colonies, impossible. so many people thought it could

not be done. establishing universal suffrage, the right of all people, whether they were wealthy or not, to vote. imagine that, what a radical idea, extending the right to vote to poor people. impossible. don't be done. -- couldn't be done, but it was done. ending slavery and segregation, taking all of the power of the slave holders. impossible. but it was done. granting workers the right to form unions and ending child labor, taking on the power of big business. impossible, but it was done. giving women over their own bodies, taking on sexism, taking on the powers that be.

impossible, but it was done. passing legislation to pass social security, medicare, medicaid, clean air and water standards. impossible. it couldn't be done, but it was done. in other words, mr. president, i think back to what nelson mandela told us, and he said everything is impossible until it is done. so in these difficult days when we find ourselves against the most powerful people, wealthy people, people who want to expand the oligarchy, people who want to move toward authoritarianism, i know that people get discouraged that we cannot take them on and we cannot create a government that works for all, not just a few, that we cannot do what other

countries do, guarantee health care to all people as a human right, that we cannot raise the minimum wage to a living wage so that tens of millions of people do not earn starvation wages, that we cannot make sure that all of our kids get the quality education that they deserve, that we can't expand social security or lower the poverty -- to lower the poverty rate among seniors. i know in this moment people say that's an impossible dream, can't be done. but if you look back on american history, you will find in very difficult and dark days when people came together, they did the impossible. so this ain't going to be easy. we're taking on enormously powerful people who really do not believe in democracy or the rudolph law, but if we -- or the rule of law, but if we stand together, we're going to win

this fight and not only will we save american democracy, we're going to create the kind of nation that i think most of us know we should become. with that, mr. president, i yield the floor. thank you.

the presiding officer: the senator from delaware. mr. coons: mr. president, trust -- trust is at the very center of our national security. the trust that we share with allies and partners around the world, the trust that the american people have in us and in our armed services and in our intelligence services, the trust that vital allies have that causes them to share with us information about threats, challenges, opportunities, that's the very foundation of our national security. and today i rise to warn my

colleagues about the risks to our national security posed by the nomination of tulsi gabbard to be the director of national intelligence. as the ranking member of the senate defense appropriations subcommittee, i have a significant involvement in our nation's intelligence apparatus. and over the course of the confirmation hearings and the debate here on the floor about former congresswoman gabbard, i've concluded that she has an alarming record, revealed more fully in her confirmation hearings but also in a review of her speeches, her travels, her positions, as a democrat, as a congresswoman, as a candidate for president, as a supporter for president trump. she has gone quite a distance. she has defended edward snowden.

snowden is widely viewed by folks in our intelligence community, our national security apparatus, our armed forces, and many here as a traitor who betrayed some of the most important secrets that are critical to keeping the united states secure. she would not, in her confirmation hearings, answer the question, is edward snowden a traitor? ms. gabbard bemoaned the rise of hts in syria, which recently overthrew the brutal dictator bashar al-assad, without mentioning the fall of assad. she mentioned how tragic it was that hts overran da mackus without mentioning the side benefit of the fall of a brutal dictator and in her confirmation

hearings repeatedly dodged questions about fisa and section 702, key tools for our intelligence community. all of this is in keeping with a long-standing record as an apologist for authoritarians and even enemies of the united states. she has repeatedly blamed the united states and nato for russia's full-scale invasion of ukraine in 2022. i will tell you as someone who is about to go to the munich security conference this weekend with a broad and bipartisan delegation from this body and from the house, i will never forget being at the munich security conference just before russia invaded ukraine. they had been in eastern ukraine for years. they had occupied crimea and then launched a war into the eastern part of ukraine. it was days after the munich

security conference in february of 2022 that tens of thousands of russian troops, whole divisions, poured over the line in a broad spectrum invasion that included brutality against civilians, bombardment of the entire nation, ultimately cruel acts of violence against women and children fully documented in the press and courts around the world. and, yet, ms. gabbard blamed the united states and nato for provoking this invasion by russia of a sovereign nation. a nation where the united states in writing guaranteed its sovereignty in the 1994 agreement that led to them giving up their nuclear weapons. ms. gabbard visited syria and met with bashar al-assad for 20 eddies in 20 -- days in 2017 and

relied on pro-assad sources to cast doubt on the use of chemical weapons against his own people. he has a history of repeating pro-kremlin talking points and is a favorite on russian state media. she appears frequently because she frequently is attacking the united states in russian state media. mr. president, this body will all too soon take up the confirmation of tulsi gabbard. we should not proceed. we should not vote for her. our nation -- our nation faces massive threats that are growing day by day. our nation is facing threats around the world from north korea and iran, from china and from russia and we need an intelligence service equipped to respond to these challenges.

can we trust tulsi gabbard to lead our intelligence services and to respond to these threats? i cannot, we cannot, and we should not. this body should not vote to confirm tulsi gabbard as the next director of national intelligence. thank you.

mr. durbin: mr. president, do you remember where you were on september 11? most americans do. i do. it was right outside that door. i was at a meeting at 9 o'clock in the morning and as we had the meeting, we looked down the mall, we watched a television set and watching planes going into skyscrapers in new york. at first we thought it was accidents, but when the second plane hit we knew there was more. then there came a moment when somebody said, look down the mall and we looked down the mall and saw black smoke billowing across the mall here in washington from the pentagon because a plane crashed into the pentagon and there was this moment where people didn't know which way to turn, where to get answers, what was going on. as someone came raising into the

room, they said, evacuate the capitol building, another plane is coming to capitol. we didn't know which way to turn. tourists were coming up to me because i had a suit and tie on, and said, where are we supposed to go. i told them where the metro stations were and pointed them in several directions. it's a day most of us won't forget. we had to figure out what happened and to stop it from happening again. where did we turn? first we turned to law enforcement for obvious reasons, that's who you call, 911 to see if they can give you information and give you advice and keep you safe. also in this townings, we -- town, we hope our intelligence agencies know who those people were is so we can sop stop them. -- stop them.

they were critical for the security of this country and the survival of this country. the most historic attack on our nation's history, we learned the hard way that agencies within the intelligence community need to be good, effective, and coordinate what they're doing. and so we embarked on several projects and one that i was a small part of in rewriting the laws creating intelligence agencies and making sure that each of our intelligence agencies, as good as they are, speak to one another. it seems so obvious. they need to coordinate. they had what they called smokestacks, where they kept their information to themselves and didn't share it with other agencies. well, that changed. and we changed the whole attitude towards intelligence and coordinating information. we created the office of the director of national intelligence. it oversees 18 different

intelligence agencies that span the cia, defense department, state department, energy department and others. it is now essential to modern safety in america. but yet the president, donald trump, has selected a person to run this critical agency, coordinating 18 different intelligence agencies, who has little or no experience leading this critical american security apparatus. her name is tulsi gabbard. during president trump's first term, he made clear his fondest for certain leaders in the word who were controversial, such as lat mile an hour putin of russia, and kim jong-un of north korea. he picks a person to run an intelligence network who shares terrible judgment on critical leaders. tulsi gabbard, former congresswoman, is infamous for

spending time with despots and autocratic leaders in the word, including vladimir putin of russia and bashar al-assad of syria and traders to the united states like edward snowden. her fondness for these oppressive, anti-democratic regimes does not go unreciprocated. they know her. they like her. and they say quite a few things about her. let me show you one of these posters. hosts of russian state media cheered her nomination, russians cheering her nomination as director of national intelligence because they will, quote, dismantle america. some russian state channels have even referred to her affectionately as their girlfriend. russian state tv also called her a russian comrade and trump -- in trump's emerging cabinet.

a problem-putin problem gandzist once called gabbard our friend. later when asked if she was some sort of russian agent, he replied, of course, yes. what's going on here? this woman wants to head up the intelligence agencies and she's being cheered on by russians? in a glowing profile on russian state newspaper, it said of tulsi gabbard, and i quote, the cia and fbi are trembling noting that ukrainians consider her, quote, an agent of the russian state. imagine that. a person tapped to head america's intelligence community being called a puppet of an adversary country by that very same country. it seems ridiculous to be true but i'm sorry to say it is. to merely join america's intelligence community, never mind lead it, candidates have to go through a vigorous background check and earn a security clearance. i'll just tell you based on what

she's done since serving in congress, she could not pass a routine security clearance. if tulsi gabbard was applying for an entry level position, her relationship with russia alone would disqualify her from the job. why then would we trust our entire intelligence network to the number one friend of our number one enemy? why then would we want to put that sort of person in charge? given the examples that abound of tulsi gabbard proving publicly, shamelessly and carelessly her sympathy for nations that undermine u.s. interests and security, that is inexplainable and irresponsible. perhaps this was suped up best -- summed up best by one of her people who work with her -- worked with her for years. here's what he had to say, quoted by atlantic magazine. quote, she was willing to do or say whatever. it was like she had absolutely no moral compass. and to head up all of our

intelligence agencies? it's as controversial as choosing kash patel to head our federal bureau of investigation. no experience, no experience which qualifies him, nor does she have any experience either. our allies depend on us as much as we depend on security. and to share critical intelligence. now they are looking at us in disbelief that we would let someone like tulsi gabbard with such an appalling record anywhere near the leadership of the intelligence community. intelligence professionals from canada and the united kingdom, members of the critical fveys intelligence surveillance along with new zealand have expressed concern about even working with her if she's in charge. in order to keep americans safe throughout the world, we need to have the trust of our allies and their cooperation. this position she is aspiring to of dni just not -- not just impacts the intelligence

collecting but the action taken on it. because of this i have great concern about the impact tulsi gabbard's confirmation would have on our support in ukraine, defending against russia. since russia's full-scale invasion, gabbard has taken russia's side many times, claiming, quote, in reference to ukraine and russia, russia had a legitimate security concern, the words of tulsi gabbard. then she blames nato, our alliance, as one of the most significant security alliances in the world. let me be clear. supporting democracies has not historically been -- for example, contrast tulsi gabbard's nonsense with former president ronald reagan and his clear understanding of the danger of the communist russian empire. nearly 40 years ago ronald reagan stood at the gate in west berlin and famously challenged the soviet union to tear down this wall. reagan understood the true

nature and threat of the russians. we've all seen the horrific cost of russia's war in ukraine and the increasing attacks on nato allies. is there a deal to be made to end this war? perhaps. but doing so must be with the best intelligence available, a clear eye about who we're negotiating with and for. and long-term guarantees of the security of ukraine and of europe and the transatlantic alliance. one would think any american president navigating such difficult waters would want a top official to serve as head of national intelligence. tulsi gabbard fails that test. she would not be qualified for an entry-level position within the intelligence community and certainly not qualified to lead it, period. some of the president's cabinets are hard to imagine because they are so unqualified but for the position of director of national intelligence, putting someone unqualified in charge is not funny at all. it's life-or-death dangerous. i yield the floor. i suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

the presiding officer: the senator from vermont -- the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. the senate is in a quorum call. a senator: i request unanimous consent to vitiate the quorum

call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. welch: thank you, mr. president. i want to speak about what elon musk is doing to destroy the u.s. agency for international development. here's what's happening. mr. musk, of course a nonelected billionaire who knows really nothing and cares less about how the federal government works, is demolishing one of the most important agencies we have for countering russia, china, authoritariansism, and anti-american extremism around the world. all being done in the name of, quote, efficiency. as one former state department official said, disbanding u.s. a.i.d. is a strategic equivalent of scuttling the navy. mr. musk, he bragged -- he bragged about feeding u.s. a.i.d. into a wood chipper.

what he's really doing after locking usaid's staff out of their offices and blocking their access to e-mail is destroying the careers of thousands of professionals who administer programs that are critical to u.s. national security, not to mention the well-being of their families. and mr. president, i want to acknowledge something. many americans asking me and they ask you why should we send aid to other countries when we have so many problems here at home? and we do have problems at home. so that's a legitimate question. in my view, we haven't done enough, congress, to solve our own problems. the cost of food, housing, health care, or dealing with drug addiction, gun violence, homelessness. the challenges facing our farmers and small businesses and the devastation to communities from wildfires, flooding,

drought, and other natural disasters. both partishave that obligation to -- parties have that obligation to address these issues. and our citizens do come first. but we also have a role in the world that is absolutely vital to our own national security. and there is a sense magnified by a lot of the misinformation mr. musk and others put out that foreign aid is this huge cop point of our budget -- component of our budget, compromising our ability to meet those needs that afflict all of our seasons here -- citizens here in the country. people think it's like 25% to 30% of the budget. foreign aid is less than 1% of our budget. so as a percentage, really quite modest. and incidentally, not that we necessarily want to compare, but as a per capita spending portion of our budget, what we spend in

the united states on foreign aid is a lot less than our european allies and japan. so it's modest but significant. but even at this less than 1%, the foreign aid budget is very important to america and it serves our national interest. why is that? our usaid program started 64 years ago under then-president john f. kennedy. and he asked the question, is foreign aid program really necessary? his answer? the answer is that there is no escaping our obligations, our moral obligations as to a wise leader and good neighbor in the interdependent of knee nation and political obligations as the single largest counter to the adversaries of freedom.

they were adversaries then. they're adversaries today. president kennedy went on to say, quote, to fail to meet those obligations now would be disastrous and in the long run more expensive. for widespread poverty and chaos lead to collapse of existing political and social structures which would inevitably invite the advanced of totallyism into every weak and unstable area. thus, our own security would be in danger and our own prosperity in peril. a program of assistance to underdeveloped nations must continue because the nation' interest, that is our nation's interest, and the cause of political freedom require it. the words of john f. kennedy. t

bush's secretary of state, condoleezza rice said about continuing engagement in the world, quote, the united states has got to make both a statement and a reality of america's willingness to remain engaged in the world, because great powers don't just mind their own business. if we don't shape the international environment, then others will, and they are others that we do not want to cede the territory for our values and our interests, powers like china and powers like russia, unquote. the words of former secretary condoleezza rice. so, the question that we need to answer today is not why we spend money on foreign aid. i don't believe we need to answer that, because i think president kennedy and secretary rice explained that very well. the question is how can we make

the best use of the 1% of the federal budget to protect our interests in an increasingly unstable and dangerous world? as secretary rice said, if we don't shape the international environment, then others will, because no matter how many times president trump and elon musk say america first, isolationism, this is a decision that each of us in the united states senate must make, isolationism isn't an option. what does happen in central america, in africa, in the middle east, in asia does threaten our own security, far more so today than in president kennedy's time. our secretary of state, marco rubio, an environmentaled former colleague, someone we're -- an environmentaled former -- a valued former colleague, someone we're proud of said this

administration will not eliminate foreign aid and many of usaid's programs will continue. he and others in the administration have called what the administration is doing a, quote, review. let's talk about that a minute. if this were a review, i'd be all for it. we should always be looking at the best way and the best use of taxpayer dollars to get the best outcomes from the programs we fund. i've been calling for a review of fema, an organization that was very helpful to vermont to recover from the floods of 2023 and 2024. my view, we should be doing a review of every agency, from food stamps to the pentagon. so, if it were a review, i'd be all in favor of it, but it's not a review. it's a frontal assault to destroy usaid. just consider, e-mails go out

telling people not to go to work. e-mails go out telling people in foreign lands they've got to come home. websites are closed down. work is stopped in its tracks. that's not a review, that's a decision, it's an action to dismantle and destroy an organization. by the end of the so-called 90-day review, people in africa, working for usaid, will be in the u.s. there won't be anything left. and the administration really makes no secret about it. it acknowledged that it has decided to reduce the number of usaid staff from 14,000 to a few hundred. that's not a review, it's a decision. mr. president, many of us know a

lot about usaid. bring on reform, yes. but this organization has helped our country by doing good work in other countries. many of us have met usaid staff at posts overseas, often in some of the world's most dangerous places. the folks in that organization are serious, purposeful, and patriots. they put their lives at risk every day, and they don't have body armor. if the goal really is reform of usaid, then i say to secretary of state rubio and i say to my republican colleagues, i want to work with you. anything we can do to make any program that we're responsible for better, i am absolutely all in, and we know there's ways we could make usaid better. but what elon musk is doing is

dang dangerous, it's cruel, and it's illegal. it's illegal because this congress has appropriated money for these programs, and elon musk is making a unilateral decision, without any congressional oversight or authority, to discontinue those authorized programs. also, what does it really say to the millions of people in governments around the world when we've made a commitment, whether it's one that you agreed with or i did, but as a body, as a country we made a commitment, and then suddenly there's an e-mail out saying we're just kidding, we're not going to follow through. and what does it mean when you think about it, that because of, infest, this stop-work order, we have food for hungry people that's not being delivered.

we have vaccines, medicines that can save lives, avert injury, and they're not being delivered. why are we doing that? why would anyone do that? it would be like your neighbor's house is on fire, you have a hose, and you won't let them use it. that's not the way we operate. at least i hope so. you know, the usaid work, it's invisible to most people. it shouldn't be invisible to us. we're supporting civil society leaders who are inspired by our own declaration of independence. these folks fight for human rights and democracy, and they do that in the face of corrupt and abusive governments that imprison their political opponents. these programs have been stopped. there are programs that have strong bipartisan support, and have had it for decades, and i want to acknowledge many of my republican colleagues who have done so much, in particular

senator lindsey graham, who knows this does protect our national security, and they present the best face of america that the rest of the world sees. you know, the administration talks about waste, fraud, and abuse, and when they talk about that, i ask myself the question, is there a single american any of us can identify that is in favor of waste, fraud, and abuse? so, they raise the question without proof of where that waste, fraud, and abuse is found, and instead of looking to identify it specifically so they can actually take action to eliminate it, they just leave it out there as an explanation to

justify shutting down a valuable program and not doing the hard work of reform. that's applying not just -- as an approach, not just to usaid, but to many other programs like farm programs, where i'm getting calls from farmers, what happened to the agreement i had with the federal government, the u.s. department of agriculture, about doing new type of crop rotation in exchange for getting a contract price? what's happened to folks running domestic violence shelters who can't get on the portal to get money paid to them that they're owed? this is happening throughout our nonprofit systems, including our community health centers. we had a woman who had an appointment with a dentist at a community health center and got the notice it was closed because of the order that went out from

the administration. so, mr. president, i believe in usaid. i believe it's wrong for the administration to essentially make the decision to feed it to the wood chipper. i believe in reform. but i do not believe that this is a serious effort at reform. it's a serious effort to destroy the program started by president kennedy, that has been embraced by republican and democratic presidents since president kennedy started it 64 years ago. and while there is a perception that it's 25% to 30% of our budget, it's 1%, and it's at a time when the reputation of the united states as a country that is going to stand behind the

commitments it made is being jeopardized. so my hope is that all of us, whether we agree or disagree about the ultimate value of usaid, will stand up for protecting what we've already committed ourselves to, and that to the extent there is reform to be made we work together on that, so that the american taxpayer and american national security interests can continue to be served by the men and women of the u.s. agency for international development. mr. president, i conclude my remarks on usaid, and i request the opportunity to speak about the nomination of tulsi gabbard. the presiding officer: the senator is recognized.

mr. welch: thank you, mr. president. as you know, mr. president, the director of national intelligence is a very critical position. the director is the primary intelligence officer serving the president. she or he is tasked with managing america's 18 intelligence community agencies, and more than $100 billion, $100 billion in national and military intelligence program budgets. it's an awesome responsibility. the dni also has access to information about literally the most sensitive programs within the united states government. these programs are so sensitive that most members of congress and senators are not briefed about them, including even rank-and-file members of the intelligence committees. that alone indicates the magnitude of this

responsibility. in my view, on the basis of everything i've seen, is that the nominee will put loyalty to donald trump first and my apprehension is that if there is information that he does not want, or wants it interpreted a certain way, there will be excessive deference to the pressures that the president has shown. he has the capacity and the inclination to insert. also, in the hearings ms. gabbard did not reflect independent thoughts about the security of issues like taiwan, the territorial integrity of ukraine, nor the endless, ongoing theft of u.s. data by the chinese government. she was asked quite rightly,

where are you on these? what should we be doing? she indicated she'd leave that up to donald trump. now, i get it that as someone who is serving the president, it's ultimately his decision. but a person who is in the highest level of national security, i would expect, would have opinions from prior experience, and ms. gabbard did not disclose what those opinions were at all. my concern as well is that ms. gabbard does not have the sober experience where it's needed most. we're a few weeks into the second term of president trump, and there's an immense amount of disruption. and depending on the point of view, disruption is a good thing. i actually see the argument for

it. but what i'm seeing is that it's done in such a meat cleaver way, it's much more about destruction. and i want to make certain that whoever is the director of national intelligence has the experience and the credibility within the intelligence community to defend the legitimate role that that intelligence community plays in our national security. ms. gabbard has maintained a security clearance for many years. however, this job is much more than about having had a security clearance. it's about judgment and character and integrity that must go along with that. you're required to prepare a full-eye -- clear-eyed -- that's a very, very challenging task

for a person who serves in the trump administration. i have also been concerned about some of the judgment calls that ms. gabbard has made, refusing to acknowledge what we all know. edward snowden broke his oath to protect classified information. edward snowden betrayed the trust given to him and every other american who holds a security clearance. and, by the way, mr. snowden had a whistleblower protocol he could have followed by chose not to. people's lives were put in jeopardy. mr. snowden, as you know, intentionally gathered and deliberately walked out the door with more than 1.5 million classified files and withent to china -- and went to china and eventually found safe harbor in russia. also, i have some concern about where ms. gab gab is getting

her -- where ms. gabbard is getting her news. getting access to the nation's most tightly held secrets to a person who has amplified russian talking points -- the spread of misinformation -- and who watches russia state-owned tv, i have concerns about that as well as the trip to syria to see bashar al a sad, who was in the process of murdering his own people. and of course ms. gabbard said she was skeptical that his government was responsible for the 2017 chemical weapons attack that killed dozens of syrians. our intelligence community was not skeptical about that a both sides of the aisle hold our national security in high regard, as you do, mr. president, & i do as well.

on the basis of the lack of experience, questionable judgment, lack of confidence that i think many of us have in the capacity of this person to be the director of the -- director of national intelligence, i urge that we vote no on her nomination. with that, i yield back. thank you, mr. president.

a senator: mr. president, i come up to the floor this afternoon to join a number of my colleagues because of my concern for the national security of the united states. mrs. shaheen: whether it's a terror attack, a cyberattack from a non-state actor, whether it is a threat in russia or china or iran, we in the united states are the targets of foreign adversaries every single day. but thanks to our intelligence community and the thousands of americans who dedicate their lives to our security, we're safe. these brave men and women are counting on us to have their backs which is why the nomination of tulsi gabbard is so concerning. our adversaries will be thrilled if we confirm tulsi gabbard as director of national

intelligence. no one more so than russian president vladimir putin. ms. gabbard has not hidden her positive views of russia and president putin. while ukrainians fight valiantly to keep their homeland an defend freedom and democracy, tulsi gabbard cozies up to putin and defends russia's brutal invachgs the former congresswoman has parroted russian propaganda saying that the war could have been avoided if nato and the biden administration had simply -- and i'm quoting -- simply acknowledged russia's legitimate security concerns. and we know that a nominee is problematic when the kremlin has such nice things to say about her. on november 17, 2004 -- 2024, a major russian state-controlled news agency called tulsi gabbard

superwoman and noted her past appearances on russian tv. well, i don't relish the idea of america's director of national intelligence, a role that includes such sensitive responsibilities such as producing the president's daily brief and setting u.s. policy for intelligence-sharing with foreign entities -- i don't appreciate the fact that she's called superwoman by a mouthpiece for the kremlin. not only does putin have kind words for ms. gab, aed but they also share -- ms. gabbard, but they also share mutual friends; namely, out offed syrian dictator bashar al-assad. since her clandestined meeting with him in 2017, former congresswoman gabbard has faced numerous questions about why she went to syria and arranged in meeting in the first place.

she's answered none of those questions; nor has she provided any substantive details on her conversation with assad. and, in fact, ms. gabbard has repeatedly refused to call assad what he is, and that is an enemy of the united states, a beirutal dictator who -- a brutal dictator who is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of syrians. assad, who's putin's best buddy in the middle east, assad, who is backed by iran, whose regime openly seeks to undermine and destroy american interests and values worldwide, this is the person whose copersons musk and trump want to lead our intelligence agency, to spearhead our national security operations. well, that doesn't make me comfortable sleeping at night. to talk amiably about a brutal

dictator openly opposed to american interests and human rights, a dictator like assad, and like putin for that matter, shows at best a lack of judgment and, at woifshths allegiance to our -- at worst, allegiance to our adversaries. and even in cases of proven espionage against the american intelligence community, tulsi gabbard instead has sided with criminals. of course, i'm speaking about her support for edward snowden. in 2020, while she was a member of the united states house of representatives, she introduced a resolution suggesting that the federal government should drop all charges against edward snowden. there was only one other member who cosponsored this resolution, and that was former congressman matt gaetz. now in 2025, ms. gabbard still refuses to call snowden what he is -- a traitor to the united

states. when she was asked about that at her hearing, she was given several opportunities to indicate that she understood that he had yard snowden is a -- edward snowden is a tax rater who put at risk the -- is a -- the lives of thousands of men's. she refees us to acknowledge that he is a traitor. such a track record. how are we supposed to expect that she will properly classify our enemies? how are we to expect that she would label xi jinping or kim jong-un as enemies of the united states or simply as foreign leaders or as friends? who knows what ms. gabbard will do. i think there's a stark difference between our adversaries who want to undermine the united states and

those who are our allies, and it doesn't appear that tulsi gabbard understands the difference. so how can the men and women of the intelligence community trust that ms. gabbard will protect their secrets? that she'll protect our secrets, the secrets of the united states? how many russians are going to risk their lives to pass along information to our intelligence officers if they're worried that ms. gabbard will sell them out? how much will our allies in nato, in the indo-pacific share with ms. gabbard in charge? the work of american covert operations and intelligence-gathering is based on one central principle, and that is trust. i wouldn't trust tulsi gabbard any further than i can throw her. i think this chamber faces a choice. we can choose to defend

america's national security and keep our promise to our constituents to protect their lives and safety and their interests or we can choose to give a gift to vladimir putin and our adversaries, to usher them into the inner halls of the american intelligence system. i know which choice i intend to make. i intend to vote no on tulsi gabbard, and i hope that my colleagues, particularly those across the aisle, at least some of them, will have the courage to do the same. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from nevada. ms. rosen: thank you.

mr. president, every member of this body is sworn to protect our national security and safety and the well-being of the american people. there is no more important responsibility for congress to fulfill than this. senators take an oath to defend the constitution of the united states against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and when the american people go to sleep at night, they rest assured that our homeland will be kept safe. as senators, we play a key role in making sure that the men and women in charge of our nation's security, well, that they're up to the task, that they are hale experienced, that they're -- that they're experienced, that they're qualified, that they're prepared. these are jobs with enormous responsibility. there is zero, zero room for failure here. unqualified or inexperienced candidates make mistakes in

these jobs, often the result is that innocent people get hurt, and in some cases die. that is why the senate's confirmation process is just so important, because the stakes are so high because there's no room for error when it comes to those who are placed in national security roles. i take this aspect of my job incredibly seriously. our intelligence community is made up of courageous men and women who collect and analyze information on our threats from around the globe. they're an integral part of our nation's defense. the director of national intelligence oversees and compiles intelligence from domestic, from military, from foreign sources for the president of the united states who then uses it to make life or death decisions. the director is in direct line

from our intelligence community to the president. that's why this position needs to be filled by an experienced and trustworthy candidate, key qualities that tulsi gabbard does not have. at a time of rising global threats, having tulsi gabbarding serving in this role would make america less safe. and i want to say that again -- would make us less safe full stop. our allies are dumbfounded and our adversaries, well in moscow, beijing, tehran, and all over the world, they're laughing at us. they're laughing at the idea that the united states of america would weaken its national security by placing someone so deeply unqualified in such a critical role for our safety, for our security. our adversaries, well, they are overjoyed that they're going to

have an ally leading the american intelligence community. and my concerns are not political. after all, ms. gabbard and i used to serve in congress together in the same caucus when she represented a district from hawaii as a democrat. my concerns are that she not only lacks the qualifications needed, but that she has also peddled talking points straight from the kremlin. think about it. tulsi gabbard has never worked in intelligence before. as a member of the house of representatives, she didn't even serve on the house intelligence committee. during her time in the house, ms. gabbard actually voted against -- she voted against critical national security-laelted legislation like increased funding for preventing terrorism in high density, high threat level urban areas like my city of las vegas.

she voted against all of that security for nevada. this will funding was actually pursued by former nevada congressman joe heck, as a republican and it's something i've continued working to secure here in the senate. and yet, tulsi gabbard, she voted against bipartisan proposal to protect our cities from terrorism. p and she was the only member of house armed services committee to vote against a national p defense authorization act every year during markup. as concerning as her lack of experience and tendency to vote against security is, ms. gabbard's history of cozying up to america's adversaries is far, far more troubling. her actions and words suggest that she has been directly influenced by foreign propaganda, whether that comes

from russia, from syria, or other brutal dictatorships. and this isn't just me saying this. it's the view of many of ms. gabbard's former staff members during her time here on capitol hill. we have public reporting that states, and i'm going to quote here, former advisors to gabbard suggested her views on russia and its polarizing leader vladimir putin have been shaped by her un-orthodox media consumption habits. three former aides said gabbard regularly read and shared articles from the russian news cite r.t., formerlily known as russia today which the u.s. intelligence community characteridesed in 2017 as the kremlin's principal propaganda outlet. end quote. is this who donald trump wants to lead america's intelligence community? is this who he wants in a

prominent national security role, someone who is so easily swayed by foreign propaganda? and it's clear that she's taken this propaganda and disinformation to heart. just look at her justification of russia's brutal invasion of ukraine, which she did not blame vladimir putin, who let's be clear is entirely responsible for the invasion. instead ms. gabbard has parroted putin's talking points and placed blame on the united states and on nato for russia's vile assault upon the ukranian people. we can also look at her attempts to give cover to syria's former dictator bashar al-assad who used chemical weapons on his own people, killing kids, killing babies, killing babies in his own attempt to hold on to power. ms. gabbard even went to syria to buddy up with assad and then came back to the u.s. to defend

his killing of innocent men, women, and children. those babies he killed to hang on to power. it's sickening actually. it's a betrayal of our country's values. time and time again ms. gabbard rejected the findings and conclusions of our own intelligence officials and has instead chosen to cozy up to dictators and our adversaries. she did so again at her defense of edward snowden, a man who committed treason against the united states of america by leaking highly classified information that jeopardized our national security, the safety of our troops, our men and women in uniform who take an oath to serve and protect us every day. and she jeopardized the

clandestine intelligence operatives who are out there working behind the scenes, again, to keep us safe and secure every day. after committing these serious crimes against the u.s., mr. snowden fled to russia in his continued attempt to escape justice. those weren't the actions of a whistleblower. they were the actions of a traitor to the united states of america. a traitor who tulsi gabbard, who repeatedly defended. buff -- background check these incidents, america is rightly concerned about what tulsi gabbard if chosen to lead our intelligence community. in fact, there have been reports that if ms. gabbard is confirmed, our allies might stop sharing crucial information with us in order to protect themselves, to protect their own country, to protect the people

they love. so think about that. if our allies no longer share intelligence with us, think about the damage that does to our national security, to our safety, to our men and women in uniform, to our operatives around the world, and to each and every one of us here in the united states of america. it doesn't make us safer. i can tell you that. our allies do not trust her, and neither should we. i urge my colleagues to review ms. gabbard's recent hearing before the senate intelligence, a select committee on intelligence, in response to almost every question, tulsi gabbard avoided providing any real answer, whether it came from democrat or republican. she simply dodged the questions over and over and over. and that's not leadership. this is not an example of someone who's qualified and this

is not a candidate who will keep america safe. i urge my republican colleagues to join me in listening to common sense, to thinking about our men and women who serve, think about folks around the globe, to be about everyone here in america, to reject this clearly unqualified and dangerous nominee. it doesn't have to be this way. let's have president trump nominate someone else who we can agree is qualified for this critical and consequential role who has our nation's best interest in their heart. tulsi gabbard is not that person. the safety and well-being of our country depend on having a qualified nominee. again, i urge my republicans to join us to reject tulsi gabbard

and put someone up who has the heart and experience to do this important job. thank you. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana. mr. kennedy: thank you, mr. president. with me this afternoon are three of my colleagues from my office. ms. jess andrews, my communications director, mr. henson webber; and mr. john l lawry. as i said, they are three of my colleagues in my office. i depend on their counsel and their advice and their good judgment every day. i want to talk for a few

minutes, mr. president, about public broadcasting on america. but p first i want to make a brief comment about the continuing saga that our new president is doing, in my judgment, a good job of prosecuting here in washington. i'm talking about his audits of federal government spending and all of the wasteful spending. i call it spending porn, that he is finding. and i want to make two quick points. number one, it strikes me as breath takingly ironic, the

senate might say cynical, that the people who are screaming so loudly about president trump's decision to audit federal spending are the very same people under president biden who wanted to hire 80,000 new irs agents with guns to audit the american people. as i've said before, if it weren't for double standards, there wouldn't be any standards at all in this town. the battle lines are drawn, mr. president. the battle lines are drawn. some of my colleagues have decided to support the bureaucracy and the spending

porn over the american taxpayer. that's what they've done. and some of the same people -- it's not just my democratic colleagues. there are many people in washington, d.c. that have grouped together and they've circled the wagons, and they decided to support the spending porn and the bureaucrats over the american taxpayer. that's their right. it's not against the law or unconstitutional to be foolish in america. but these are the same people, these are the same people who chose to support illegal immigration over the rule of law. these are the same people who have chosen to support teachers unions over parents and kids. these are the same people who have chosen to support criminals

over cops and victims. these are the same people who have chosen to support transgender athletes over women's sports. and these are the same people who have chosen to support hamas over israel. he they think they're win -- they think they're winning. maybe in this town, in this town they are, if you listen to a lot of pundits up here. if you listen to a lot of members of the woke-a-radi in washington. but they're not winning in america. they're just as thick as coming and i'm very proud to be part of that effort. let me say a there was a time, mr. president,

i don't know if you remember it, but i do, when families would gather around a single radio, they used to have one radio in the house or one tv, often a black and white tv. and in many areas, particularly rural areas, public broadcasting was the only option for them. that was true in some parts of our country, they could only access public broadcasting to get news and information. those days are gone. things are much different today. today americans get their news everywhere -- everywhere, websites, pod casts, social media posts, radio shows, cable tv, streaming, broadcast television. the world has changed, particularly the world of mass communications. i think back 10, 15 years ago in

my state of louisiana newspapers were king followed closely by local television stations. newspapers led with the news and everybody else followed in terms of what was news for it. boy, have those days changed. i polled recently in louisiana to find out where my people in louisiana get their news. 4% -- 4% of the people in louisiana get their news from the newspapers. that's just a fact. number one, as you might imagine, is the internet. the world has changed. this trend is not partisan. it's not a republican thing or it's not a democratic thing. president trump and former vice president harris, they both did

popular podcasts in their election, and many of my fellow senators and many in the house also did pod casts as well. many of the pundits called the 2024 race the presiding officered cast election. no american today, not one -- the presiding officered cast election. no american today not one is looking at one thing to stay informed. it may have made sense many years ago for the federal government to subsidize and fund public broadcasting. 50 years ago that might have made sense, but the ability of the american people today to access whatever news they would like to hear from whatever form of media they choose is no longer limited. it's virtually unlimited to --

just only by the imagination. so here's my question, mr. president, and something that we need to think about. if all of this is true, media's changed and it's successful -- accessible to everyone, why is the united states congress -- why is the united states congress still spending half a billion dollars a year -- not half a million dollars a year, half a billion dollars a year to fund the corporation for public broadcasting? it makes no sense. the corporation for public broadcasting, we call it cpb, mr. president, as you know, it's a nonprofit entity that takes taxpayer money that it gets from congress and distributes it to local tv and radio stations.

now, you might not have heard of cpb, but you probably heard of two of its, i won't call it subsidiaries, but two of its closely affiliated entities, i'll call it. the public broadcasting station, we call it pbs and national public radio, npr. now, here's how it works. every year congress gives the corporation for public broadcasting $500 million, and the corporation for public broadcasting takes that money and gives it to a lot of the local tv and radio stations. and a lot of those local and radio stations are encouraged to, and indeed do, buy programming if they're radio stations from npr or if they're television stations, they buy a

prerecorded, predeveloped programming from pbs. congress established this system and established the corporation for public broadcasting in 1967. what? over 50 years ago. at the time congress tasked cpb -- and i'm not saying it didn't make sense then, it probably did make sense then -- but congress tasked the cpb with the mission to ensure that the american people had -- and i want to be quote here -- to quote here -- had universal access to universal, high-quality content and telecommunication services. and indeed cpb boosts on its website that 99% of americans have access to public media. hell, they ought to.

we're spending half a billion dollars of your taxpayer money to make sure they do. that's not the question because americans have access to all different types of -- and forms of media today. they don't need to get their news from public broadcasting. this isn't the old days when people had one television set or one radio and lived in a rural area and that was the only source of news. the world has changed. the issue today is whether the american people need taxpayer-funded public broadcasting to access high-quality content anymore, and they don't and we all know they don't. you don't have to be walter kr cronkite to know that

everybody's heard of podcasts and cable and many people have streaming services. 97% of americans have access to the internet. why do we need public broadcasting? that's more than double the number of americans who could access the internet two decades ago. things have quickly changed. people now have a bottomless supply of news sources right at their fingertips whenever they need them. why do we have to give half al billion dollars a year -- a billion dollars a year to subsidize a certain small favored section of the media? parents can also very easily find free educational programming if they want to. they don't have to go to public broadcasting. all they've got to do is go to youtube, all they have to do it go to other popular streaming

services. the popular show crash course has millions of subscribers, for comparison, pbs only has 1.4 million subscribers. you know what the difference is? you give them half al billion dollars of your hard-earned money. that's the difference. now, some may argue, well, we still need public broadcasting because it offers noncommercial programming. they argue, oh, it's really cool because you don't get interrupted by commercials. well, the new chamber of the -- chairman of the federal communications commission, mr. brendon carr called that into question and whether npr and pbs are noncommercial broadcasts. he has noted that npr and pbs

run regular commercial during their broadcast in contravention of federal law. and, in fact, the fcc has lauvend an investigation in the -- launched an investigation into npr and pbs to determine whether they've been violating federal law. there seems to be no distinction between the advertiser on npr and the content americans can access for free anywhere else. there is a key difference. i'm going to keep coming back to it. pbs and npr receive a truckload, a bucket lode of cash -- bucket load of cash from the american people. in total congress will send the corporation for public broadcasting and indirectly npr

and pbs $535 million until 2025. that's an increase of 20.2% since 2020. has your income gone up 20.2% since 2020? i know your expenses have. by 2027, cpb wants congress to send it nearly $600 million. for what? pbs alone received roughly $130 million last year in taxpayer-funded grants from the federal government through the corporation for public broadcasting. that's 35% of its total budget. npr similarly receives $96 million through

taxpayer-funded grants from cpb. that's also roughly 32% of npr's total budget. why? why? why -- why cpb? why npr? why any of these alphabet soup entities? why not "the new york times"? why not "the washington post"? why not fox news? why these three particular entities? that's a question we have to ask, and we're not talking chump change here. we're giving them a half a billion dollars a year. npr is one of the few, as far as i know they're the only newsroom in the country that gets taxpayer funding. and you would think after

receiving nearly $100 million from npr, i want to single out npr for a second, you would think after receiving nearly $100 million from taxpayers, that would motivate npr to play it right down the middle. to only publish fair reporting. you would think that with the american taxpayer giving npr100 billion bucks every year, you should be able to go to npr and say, i don't know what party they are, i don't know if they are conservatives or left of center or right of center, i just know they fairly report the news. but that's not the case, mr. president. that's not the case. i want to give you a few examples of stories that npr as published using taxpayer money.

i'll just read the headlines. first headline, npr news service, michael avanati, quote, a profile of the media savvy attorney. they love michael avanati. do you know where he is today? he's in jail. do you know why? he's a crook. but for a while he was a media darling on npr. here's another headline from npr. how racism became a marketing tool for country music. i kid you not. the american taxpayers are spending a half a billion dollars a year to pay a local station to buy content that says country music is racist.

here's another headline from npr. donald trump's long embrace of vladimir putin. remember the -- the russiagate, the steel dossier? npr was right in there promoting it. a couple more headlines. that npv putting out there using your tax dollars. this headline, monuments and teams have changed names. let me say it again. monuments and teams, presumably sports teams have changed names as america wreckons with racism. birds are next. i don't know any birds that are

racist. here's another headline. eating less beef is a climate solution. eating less beef is a climate solution. i don't have anything that's -- against vegetarians. i eat beef and cows eat grass. so that makes me a semivegetarian. but that's my choice. not on npr. eating less beef is a climate solution. here's why that's hard for some american men. here's a final headline. i could go on the rest of the evening. how the taliban adds to afghanistan's woes when it comes to climate-fuelled disaster. boy, i can tell you that's on the mind of every person in afghanistan today is climate change and the taliban. i can guarantee you.

i don't have a problem with these headlines. this is america. if you want to publish articles like this which no person with a brain above a single-cell organism would call fair and balanced, if you're a news outlet and you want to publish this kind of stuff, that is your right as an american. we have freedom of the press. we have the first amendment. you're not free in our country if you can't say what you think. you're not free in our country if you can't express yourself. i'm all for this if that's what these outlets want to do. but i'm not for taking $500 million every single year and giving it to these stations at the -- to the exclusion of everybody else so they can do it. that's immoral. that's illegal as far as i'm concerned or should be.

now, i'm sure that there's an audience in some campus coffee shop that wants to learn about racist birds. or the different ways in which cheeseburgers and the taliban are contributing to climate change. but most american taxpayers would probably prefer that congress spend their money on something other than these controversial points of view that appeal to only a small segment of america's population while the rest of us foot the bill. that's just not just my opinion. a former editor at npr, a gentleman by the name of euri burrliner. mr. burrliner, he used to be an editor at npr. he published a column last year.

and he -- in the column he outlined the extreme bias at npr. he detailed how npr decided to censor the hunter biden laptop story. they wouldn't run stories about it, said it wasn't real. mr. burrliner, the former editor at npr, said that npr told its readers -- and i'm quoting -- quote, we don't want to waste our time on stories that are not really stories. and we don't want to waste the listeners and readers' time on stories that are just pure distractions. end quote. the hunter biden laptop is real. the fbi has it. it's there at the fbi headquarters bigger than dallas.

of course we now know that the laptop was not just a distraction. every bit of it was real. but npr censored it using american taxpayer money. npr also similarly covered the covid-19 lab leak theory as though it was a conspiracy. that's how the news coverage reads, in my opinion. that if you believe in -- that covid-19 originated from a lab leak, you're a conspiracy theorist. i would point out we're going to have to get some new conspiracy theories in america because all the old ones turned out to be true. the conspiracy theorists are up something like 37-0. not if you read npr. they say or said that the covid-19 lab leak theerp theory, you had to be some kind of cone

head, a meat head, a whack job to believe in that stuff. now the federal government, the cia, the fbi, they've stated publicly that the pandemic likely originated from what? a lab leak. you can't -- i can't make this stuff up. now, other independent analysts have shown that npr's content also leans left, and that's fine. as i say, that's fine. many americans lean left. i've got a lot of friends who lean left. i lean left on some issues. i think it's great. but i'll tell you what isn't great. having american taxpayers spend half a billion dollars a year to fund a news service that in turn we all have to pay for. that's not right. since 1970, the united states congress has given npr more than

$14.5 billion. with all those taxpayer dollars, npr bought a $201 million office space just up the road from the capitol. it's swell office space, 200 million bucks worth. npr pays its hosts as much as $532,000 a year. it pays its chief diversity officer $320,000 a year. pretty good work if you can get it. not npr money. it came from you. you paid those salaries. and despite all the spending, npr's audience continues to decline because they're obsolete. now, congress does not send taxpayer money to the most

popular podcast hosts in america. we don't. the anchors on fox news, the anchors on cnn, the anchors on msnbc and their stations, they don't get any taxpayer dollars. nor do any of the journalists that ask me questions every day in the hallway of this building unless they work for npr. or pbs. or their affiliates. or the corporation for public broadcasting. congress should not be picking winners and losers in the news media. but that's what we're doing. the united states of america has $36 trillion in debt. we can't afford any more to blow a half a billion dollars for public broadcasting when americans can find the same content and in many cases better content online for free. now, if you want to support npr

and pbs or any other public media outlet, that is great. god bless you. this is america. you're free to do it. you are free to donate to those nonprofits as you see fit. donate to them. but congress should not compel taxpayers to fund them, to fund a service that the american people don't need, especially when the content -- well, you can read what the content is and maybe you agree with it. but a whole bunch of americans don't. a whole bunch of americans don't think that birds are racist. president trump's department of government efficiency is looking for fat to trim, mr. president. as far as i'm concerned, this gravy train, this gravy train

with biscuit wheels called a corporation for public broadcasting is the perfect example of a project the american people no longer need and should not fund. mr. president, i suggest the absence of a quorum unless senator peters would like me to yield the floor. i take that back, mr. president. i've been given instructions to read this. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule 22, -- oh, i love this. this is great. i ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule 22 -- this makes me so happy -- the

confirmation vote with respect to the gabbard nomination occur at 11:00 a.m. on wednesday, february 12. further, i ask that the cloture motions filed on thursday, february 6, ripen following disposition of the gabbard nomination. and finally, if cloture is invoked on the kennedy nomination -- that's mr. robert kennedy -- the postcloture time count -- let me try that again. the postcloture time count as if invoked at 1:00 a.m., wednesday, february 12. thank you, jesus. the presiding officer: is there an objection? without objection, so ordered. mr. kennedy: mr. president, i suggest the absence of a quorum unless senator peters would like me -- i withdraw that motion and

yield to senator peters, my good friend. mr. peters: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from michigan. mr. peters: mr. president, i rise in opposition to the nomination of former representative tulsi gabbard to serve as our nation's director of national intelligence. intelligence is absolutely fundamental to our national security. our intelligence community is spread out all across the federal government, has built the world's greatest network of information gathering and analysis. this information keeps us and our communities safe by providing the people who make policy decisions with a full picture to understand the current as well as potential threats to our national security from terrorism risk to our homeland to emerging conflicts across the globe. spearheaded by the director of national intelligence, the u.s. intelligence community is

responsible for monitoring terrorist activities, tracking foreign military capabilities, and even intercepting nefarious cyberattacks. the courageous men and women in this community stationed both here as well as abroad put their lives on the line to identify and neutralize espionage efforts against americans by our foreign adversaries. their work is absolutely critical, particularly in today's modern digital era where information is power. but the foundation of intelligence is trust. we must trust that our intelligence experts are providing completely unbiassed, fact-driven analysis of the intelligence that our agencies are collecting. our experts must trust their ability to pursue intelligence that keeps americans safe wherever it may lead without fear that discovery of the wrong

issue might result in the end of their career. and our intelligence agencies must trust that government officials will protect their sources and their methods to ensure that critical missions and safety of americans all across the globe are not placed into jeopardy. and unfortunately, i do not believe that tulsi gabbard has the qualifications nor has she earned our trust to serve as director of national intelligence. she has spread conspiracy theories peddled by our adversaries. she claimed that those who are investigating domestic terrorism and the deadly january 6 insurrection were, quote, domestic enemies, end of quote. more dangerous than the individuals who violently stormed the u.s. capitol, attacked law enforcement officers, and tried to overturn a free and fair election.

she cannot differentiate between our adversaries and allies, two those who seek to harm our country and those who seek to defend it. time and time again, ms. gabbard has proven that she does not hold the judgment to serve as the leader of our intelligence community. so let's start with russia. let's start with russia. as we know, russia engaged in a widespread disinformation campaign before its deadly invasion of ukraine. in an attempt to justify its actions and manipulate public opinion. russia actually claimed that the united states was to blame for the war, for failing to recognize russia's, quote, legitimate security concerns about ukraine's ascension to nato. tulsi gabbard agrees with putin and russia. she said that the united states was entirely to blame for the

war in ukraine. russian propaganda efforts also pushed lies that the united states was supporting biowpons labs -- bioweapons labs in ukraine, a claim debunked by ukraine's government, u.s. government, news organizations and independent researchers around the world. but ms. gabbard posted on her social media in 2022 supporting this conspiracy and accusing the biden administration -- the biden-harris administration of a cover-up. former senator myth romney -- mitt romney called this post tre treasonous, saying she was parroting fake russian propaganda, end of quote. now let's talk about syria. tulsi gabbard has a long history defending former syrian ruler, bashar al-assad. in 2015, she even introduced a

bill to end u.s. support to the opposition to the assad regime. she didn't think the opposition to assad, who is responsible for crimes against humanity, and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of his own people should be supported. not only did she oppose the support, gabbard then traveled to syria and met with assad in 2017. gabbard tried to justify her meeting, going as far as to say that assad is not the enemy of the united states. and, despite u.s. intelligence, tulsi gabbard continued to turn a blind eye to assad's horrific use of chemical weapons on civilians, claiming there was no real evidence linking this regime to those attacks. even though the intelligence community under the first trump administration attributed these chemical attacks to the assad regime.

ms. gabbard has promised to, quote, end the politicalization of the intelligence community, but what we have seen in just the last few weeks from the administration, in the name of freeing our government from politicalization, weaponization, should certainly give us pause. this administration has fired dozens of prosecutors in a matter of days for doing their duty to provide justice on criminal cases stemming from the january 6 attack on our nation's capitol. the administration has also fired most of the senior leaders of the fbi, and is trying to go after every single fbi agent who was involved investigating january 6, even if they were just doing their job as ordered by their superiors. let's be clear, january 6 was an attack on our nation, our constitution, and our democracy. but to be a part of the trump administration, you have to show absolute loyalty to him over

anything else. don't worry about facts. just show loyalty, and don't worry about the law, just show loyalty. so this pattern certainly begs the question, with ms. gabbard at the helm will the intelligence analysts and operatives who worked on investigations into january 6, or any other domestic terrorism plot, are they now going to be fired as well? will ms. gabbard follow the lead of trump's newly confirmed attorney general and shut down u.s. efforts to collect intelligence on malicious foreign adversaries on our adversaries like china and russia? will she penalize anyone who has been responsible for tracking our adversaries' misinformation and disinformation campaigns that target our elections? will she stand up to president trump if he seeks to use the powers of the u.s. intelligence community against the american people? will individuals in the intelligence community, who

disagree with her views on russia, syria, or the threats of chemical and biological weapons be in danger of censorship, or worse, even retribution? we have no reason, no reason to trust ms. gabbard will not simply follow the leads of others in his administration and oust those who do their jobs to serve all the american people and not just donald trump. but in addition to this questionable lack of judgment on who our nation's enemies are, tulsi gabbard is simply, simply unqualified. tulsi gabbard does not have the extensive experience needed to oversee this highly complex network of intelligence operatives and an lists, experience that directors of national intelligence that, until this point, have all poss possessed, because it's understood how essential this position is and why these

qualifications are critical. there are is broad bipartisan consensus we are facing one of the most dangerous times in american history. threats from our adversaries like the chinese and russian governments continue to grow and evolve with every passing minute. we need the person leading our intelligence community to be the most qualified candidate avai available. this is the person briefing our senior leaders, all the way up to the commander in chief, on the real threats that face our nation each and every day. this is the person tasked with protexting our vast -- protecting our vast network of sources and highly classified methods of collecting information. we need someone we can trust to safeguard the tools that our intelligence agencies need to access the darkest corners of the world. but also someone with the knowledge and understanding of this community to protect the

brave americans who are risking their lives gathering this information and intelligence firsthand on the front lines. we need someone who our allies will trust to share their own intel intelligence, to help protect our people and our interests, because without america's utmost confidence in ms. gabbard's ability to do this job, where will that leave us an as country? it will leave us in the dark, vulnerable against our adversaries. it will make our allies question whether or not they should share their intelligence with us, because they do not know whether the head of our intelligence community will actually share that information with our adversaries instead of our allies. it will leave us with an intelligence community that is afraid to speak truth to power or even just do their jobs for fear of offending the trump administration and then getting

fired. we are in unprecedented times, with an administration that has shown that it's willing to break the law in order to break our government. we are in uncharted times, with an administration that would rather target our institutions than protect our people. we are in perilous times, with foreign adversaries waiting to pounce as the administration strips away the tools that we have used to protect ourselves. mr. president, our national security is on the line. we cannot destroy our intelligence community and the progress that generations of americans have built to keep our country safe, by confirming someone who we cannot trust to act in the united states' best interests, or who simply lacks the necessary experience to lead this critical organization. mr. president, that's why i'm voting no on ms. gabbard's

nomination, and i urge my colleagues to do the same. ms. cortez masto: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from nevada. ms. cortez masto: thank you, mr. president. almost three years arc president vladimir putin launched a massive, illegal ground invasion of ukraine, which has become the largest and deadliest conflict in europe since world war ii. now, i've stood up again and again with my fellow senators, leaders of both parties, and our allies across the world to condemn putin's war, which has killed thousands of civilians, including hundreds of children and left millions of ukrainians displaced. it is not a hard position to

take, but tulsi gabbard has repeatedly justified putin's expansionist war. she chose to blame the united states, our nato allies, and even ukraine itself for putin's war. now, mr. trump -- excuse me, president trump, wants ms. gabbard to be the director of national intelligence. the day the war started, she echoed russian state media and said the war could have been avoided if the u.s. and nato had acknowledged russia's, and i quote, legitimate security concerns. she made baseless claims that russia was justified in invading ukraine because the u.s. had secret biolabs there. where did she find that claim? it came directly from a kremlin propaganda website.

the director of national intelligence position was created after september 11 terrorist attacks to act as the principal advisor to the president. the national security council, and homeland security council on intelligence matters related to our national security. it seems obvious to anyone who holds this position that they should have extensive national security experience, something ms. gabbard doesn't have. and somebody who holds this position should not be parroting russian talking points. i've worked with colleagues on both sides of the aisle to make sure putin is held accountable for the atrocities committed in ukraine. it is shocking to me that we are on the cusp of confirming a director of national intelligence who was so quick to defend one of the u.s.'s biggest adver

adversaries. now, cozying up to putin would be bad enough, but unfortunately he's not the only autocrat that ms. gabbard has ties to. she also has an alarming connection to the ousted syrian president, bashar al-assad. assad was a ruthless dictator who engaged in human rights abuses, and that is a documented fact. but inexplicably, ms. gabbard disputed credible accusations that assad used chemical weapons against his citizens, and queers of all -- worst of all she chose to travel in her personal capacity to syria to meet with this dictator in person. all the while, she repeatedly cast doubts on our intelligence community's assessments of the ex ten of the horrors of assad's regime. now, i understand the desire to seek out multiple points of

view. but again and again, miss gabbard has taken healthy skepticism too far, suggesting to the american people that they can't trust our intelligence while instead echoing russian and syrian disinformation. that's just unacceptable. president trump claims that he wants to make america safe. he says he wants to maintain america's standing in the world. he says he wants to forge stronger ties with our allies. well, confirming ms. gabbard to be director of national intelligence is in opposition to those goals. the director of national intelligence oversees 18 agencies in the united states intelligence community, including the cia and the nsa. the director has the legal

authority to direct intelligence gathering and choose which intelligence to share with foreign agencies. as director of national intelligence ms. gabbard would have access to our most closely guarded secrets. she would know the identities of the brave men and women who gather intelligence from our foreign adversaries. there should be absolutely no question about the trustworthiness or the judgment of our director of national intelligence. the director of national intelligence should not sympathize with autocrats, blame our allies for wars of aggression, or parrot kremlin talking points. this is a low bar to clear. mr. president, i am here in the senate to represent the people of nevada. they are relying on me to work to keep them and our communities safe. i tell you what, i pledge to

help keep nevadans safe by opposing ms. gabbard's confirmation, and i hope my colleagues follow suit. and with that, mr. president, i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from new mexico. mr. heinrich: are we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: no. mr. heinrich: mr. president, every one of us remembers where we were when the first plane

struck the world trade center the morning of september 11, 2001. and that day we watched in horror as the north and south towers fell. terrifying debris clouds flooding the ground beneath them. we witnessed the pentagon, the heart of our national defense, engulfed in flames as a hijacked plane crashed into it head-on taking the lives of all the people aboard that flight and over 125 employees in the building itself. we saw yet another plane go down in an open field in patt after brave americans decided to fight back and regain control of the aircraft before it reached its intended target, here in this very capitol building. from that day forward, we pledged to never forget the nearly 3,000 americans who lost

their lives that day and the thousands more who were first responders that have died since. that pledge led us to immediately establish a bipartisan commission devoted to understanding how our nation's intelligence agencies could have left us vulnerable to this attack. and the 9/11 discovered that our -- and the 9/11 commission discovered that our intelligence community had received warnings about the dangers posed by al qaeda but that a systemic lack of coordination in communication between intelligence agencies that were effectively stovepiped off from one another had left glaring blind spots at the highest levels of our government. and to fix this the commission recommended that our government establish a new cabinet-level position called the director of national intelligence. the dni.

and the dni is specifically dedicated to coordinating all of our intelligence-gathering operations that protect the safety and security of the american people. for the last two decades, the director of national intelligence has played a vital role in every administration, as the leader of our intelligence community overseeing and coordinating 18 of our intelligence agencies. the director of national intelligence is also one of the main voices that any president hears from literally each and every day. that's because the dni serves not only as the coordinator of our intelligence community but as the compiler and presenter of the president's daily brief. this is the daily high-level, highly classified briefing on the most pressing and sensitive national security matters. this is where all of our

presidents have gathered critical information needed to make incredibly difficult military or foreign policy decisions, and it's where our presidents learn about potential threats from our adversaries, from non-state terrorist organizations, and to think through how to combat those. put simply, our national security depends on the person that we entrust in that role. in fact, we need to implicitly trust that this person is relying on and providing credible and accurate information so that our country's commander in chief can make the decisions that will determine our security as a nation. and as a member of the senate select committee on intelligence, for the last 12 years, i do not say this lightly -- i do not believe that

ms. gabbard has demonstrated the judgment to merit our trust as director of national intelligence. ms. gabbard's statements and actions leading up to and during the confirmation process should make all of us question her qualifications for this essential national security role. and they should make us seriously question her basic judgment. time and again, ms. gabbard has elevated conspiracy theories, parroted dictators' talking points and repeatedly undermined our country's national security. let me give you some specific examples of her statements and her legislative track record. in 2017, while she was still

serving in the house of representatives, ms. gabbard exercised seriously questionable judgment in scheduling a foreign trip into bashar al-assad's pariah state of syria. this was after assad had committed well-documented crimes against his own people, including the use of chemical weapons, and plummeted his country into a bloody civil war and devastating humanitarian crisis. both before and after this trip, ms. gabbard undermined u.s. intelligence and echoed russian and syrian disinformation regarding assad's use of chemical weapons on his own people. and she has made statements that appear to defend assad. for example, on february 6, 2019, ms. gabbard claimed in an interview that, quote, assad is not the enemy of the united states because syria does not pose a direct threat to the

united states. this is a shockingly narrow view of threats to u.s. national security. during the course of syria's civil war, assad used chemical weapons more than 300 times against his own people. killing and wounding thousands. to this day, syria has still not accounted for this. the u.s. has also described syria as being in flagrant noncompliance with the chemical weapons convention, and there is no question that assad's regime posed a serious threat to international peace and security. it is mystifying to me how ms. gabbard could not understand this then and still apparently doesn't understand it today. ms. gabbard's 2020 presidential campaign stated that she remains skeptical about two particular

chemical weapons attacks in syria in 2017 and 2018. her website wrongly stated that, quote, both attacks occurred in towns under the control of al qaeda-linked opposition forces. both attacks resulted in multiple civilian casualties. and both were immediately blamed on the is asad -- on the assad government. however, there is evidence to suggest that the attacks may not have been staged -- may have been staged by opposition forces for the purpose of drawing the united states and the west deeper into the war, end quote. of course, there never was such evidence. disturbingly, ms. gabbard decided to take the views of a discredited professor who was himself taken in by a syrian-australian youtube influencer. that somehow the opposition forces had staged these chemical weapons atufts as a member of

congress, she could have taken the time to read the summary of a declassified u.s. intelligence report released the week after the 2017 attack, warning that claims shifting blame to rebel groups reflected the false narratives spread by syria and its patron state, russia. instead of looking into the intelligence community for answers -- or to the intelligence community for answers, gabbard sought out fake intelligence, demonstrating her distrust in the very intelligence agencies that she could soon coordinate and oversee. her trip to syria and her visit with assad himself should be alarming to all of us. normally if any member of congress goes ton a foreign fact-finding trip like this, we take precautions to not jeopardize our vital national

security interests. we cowshed nate with the state -- we coordinate with the state department, the pentagon. we carefully account for our schedules and we sure as hell make sure we are not giving a platform to state sponsors of terrorism or terrorist leaders. ms. gabbard did none of these things on this rogue trip into assad's syria. in fact, she sat down for an unscheduled meeting with assad himself not once but twice. she also met with the grand mufti of syria. the grand mufti was appointed in 2005 to be syria's most senior cleric. in 2011, he threatened western countries including the united states against taking military actions in syria. and he said in ahis speech, i say to all of europe, i say to america, we will set up suicide

bombers who are now in your countries. now, during her confirmation hearing last month, i asked ms. gabbard directly about this meeting with the grand mufti, mr. hassoun. she claimed that this was the first she had ever heard about his threats to set up suicide bombers to target america and our european allies. however, records from her congressional office suggest that almost immediately after returning from her controversial trip, she was fully aware that she had met with a leader with direct ties to terrorism. according to recent reporting in "the washington post" that helped to unearth these records right after she returned from syria, ms. gabbard and her congressional staff worked feverishly to account for her meetings in official paperwork and to contain the political fallout. in the documents that the "post"

reviewed, ms. gabbard's staff asked her, did you know you were meeting with people with direct ties to terrorist organizations? and her response in those documents, is this question reason the mufti? i want to be clearly, i am not suggesting that ms. gabbard endorsed or endorses the despicable views or actions of this particular syrian terrorist leader. what i am suggesting is that ms. gabbard's false denial to me in her confirmation hearing of any prior knowledge of this terrorist leader whom she personally met with should be evidence enough that we cannot trust her. and in the position that we are being asked to confirm her for, telling the whole truth accurately is the whole point. on top of this, ms. gabbard has repeatedly made public statements that echo russian justification for putin's

unjustified, unprovoked invasion of ukraine. she has blamed our nato allies for failing to recognize russia's legitimate security concerns. those are literally her words. and she has amplified russian and putin's disinformation campaigns alleging ukraine's development of bioweapons. on february 23, 2022, ms. gabbard echoed russian talking points blaming putin's invasion of ukraine on the biden administration. she tweeted, this war and suffering could have easily been avoided if biden administration and nato had simply acknowledged russia's legitimate security concerns regarding ukraine's becoming a member of nato, which would mean u.s. nato forces right on russia's border, end of quote. as my colleague, senator bennet,

said so powerfully, as he pointed out at ms. gabbard's confirmation hearing, she sent this tweet at the very moment that russian tanks were rolling over ukraine's border. essentially saying that vladimir putin was justified in invading the free nation of ukraine. then-senate intelligence committee vice chair -- now secretary of state -- marco rubio tweeted in response saying, this is, quote, simply not true, end quote. noting that the week before the invasion, putin once again demanded nato leave every country that joined after 1997, including bulgaria, romania, and 12 others. ms. gabbard chose not to listen to the vice chair of the intelligence committee or the intelligence community itself, which had issued a