ms. klobuchar: mr. president. the presiding officer: . the senator from minnesota. ms. klobuchar: thank you very much. and i will continue my remarks about the importance of passing the dream act and also the work of the commonsense caucus of which the presiding officer has been involved in to try to find a path forward to protect these dreamers while understanding the combination that we could have for increased border security at the same time. what you have going on right now in our country, as senator durbin has pointed out, is fear with over 800,000 people who have been here, as i said, through no fault of their own. 97% of them working or in school. yesterday i met with the catholic conference, people from the catholic church in my state and some of the dreamers and heard again the account of someone in school, doing well, wants to work, wants to stay in our state. when i hear these stories, i'm always reminded of the oldest dreamer i have ever met, joseph madina who was born in mexico, came over to this country, didn't know he wasroughtver tohe country. his parent

ms. klobuchar: thank you, madam president. we're very pleased by this bipartisan work and what this will mean for our country. i want to thank both leaders for their work. so i want to finish the remarks that i started before the leaders took the floor, pertaining to another issue that's very important to this country, and that is the issue of a free election in 2018. i mentioned the importance of the bill that senator lankford and i are leading, along with senators harris and graham that would put, along with house support, republican and democratic support, some much-needed resources to the states to help them with their equipment. many of the states have not updated their election equipment for over ten years. i mentioned the reliable backup measures that we're going to need for things like a paper ballot system. ten of our states don't have that. if they were hacked, there would be no backup to prove what had happened. that must change. third, we have to make sure our elections are free from foreign influence campaigns. we

ms. klobuchar: mr. president, i appreciate my colleue, senator ernst's remarks as well as ranking member stabenow and of course senator grassley, who has been such a leader on ag issues, as well as senator ernst, in their state. and i come here to join senator grassley and not only from the other side of the aisle, but also where iowa and minnesota are concerned, across the border. our states have rivalries in football and many other things, but one thing we always agree on is having strong people to be the voice of agriculture at the usda. i supported secretary purdue when president trump nominated, and i believe that he needs a team to be able to do the complicated work of agriculture at a time when we've seen difficulty in everything from the dairy industry to cotton to issues with prices for so many of our commodities to just only a few years ago the avian flu, which was such a threat to the pulte industry -- poultry industry in minnesota and iowa and the thought that we wouldn't have an under secre