mr. carper: sure. mr. kennedy: then i would suggest, mr. president, senator carper through the president that we sit down with senator wyden and try to address these very legitimate concerns. for the moment, i happen to be chairman of the fsgg subcommittee in appropriations, and it may be that we can addresses those concerns later and i will be more than happy to. but i am equally happy to report to the american people that the united states senate finally did something to stop paying dead people hard-earned taxpayer money. and i want to give most of the credit to senator carper, because he's a patient man. he's been working on this for seven years. he's a more patient man than i am. so i yield back to the good senator. mr. carper: i thank my colleague for his words and for his efforts and tenacity. with that, mr. president, we yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from minnesota. ms. klobuchar: mr. president, i come to the floor today to discuss the threats facing our upcoming elections. threats from the coronavirus and threat

mr. carper: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from delaware. mr. carper: are we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: no. mr. carper: good afternoon. i rise today to highlight some recent work we've done that could help not hundreds, not thousands, not hundreds of thousands, but millions of americans save some money while filing their federal income tax returns this year and in future years. as the ranking member of the subcommittee called permanent subcommittee on investigations in the senate, my staff and i work closely with a fellow named rob portman from ohio, chairman of the our subcommittee and with his team. if you put us all in a room together, senator portman's team, republicans, our team, democrat, and wonder who's who and who's side they're on, you wouldn't know one side from the other. sort of us working on the recycling issues with your team and mine, mr. president. but we studied a big problem and big challenges facing america and we try to identify commonsense solutions in a truly bipartisan, almost nonpartisan approach that has ch

mr. chairman. >> i apologize to my colleagues. i didn't realize his time expired. senator carper. >> mr. ambassador, welcome. always good to see you and to work with you and members of your staff. i want to start off by thanking you and members of your team. we met recently with a nominee by the president to be one of your two deputies and had a good conversation and were encouraged by that. i want to start off by thanking your team on your hard work on the u.k./u.s. trade negotiations. opening up the uk market is a priority for us expect we think it's important to seize the opportunity to open the uk market to our poultry farmers throughout the country. thank you for that. i'll probably go to my grave on an issue we don't see eye to eye on, thinking that we made a big mistake in pulling out of the transpacific partnership and the idea of having the u.s., part of 12 nations, encompass about 40% of the world's trade, and holding china outside of it because of their bad behavior on any number of fronts regarding trade and encroachments in the south china sea for us to walk away from that. i will go to my grave

mr. carper: i ask to vitiate the quorum call. madam president, the bill before us today, the great american outdoor act, is a landmark legislation. it would fulfill a long-standing promise to the american people to fully fund the land and water conservation fund. the measure would make the down payment on deferred maintenance. i'm out of practice. make a down payment on deferred maintenance of our nation's beloved public lands, that includes over 400 national parks. it also includes more than 500 national wildlife refugees that is on the committee which i serve as ranking member. while i am proud to support the great american outdoors act, we would be remiss if we did not put the senate's consideration of this legislation in the context of everything else that's happening in our country today. as we've learned in the 15 days since the death of george floyd, we also have other long-standing promises to fulfill. let me mention four of them. first, is the promise of an end to be racial violence in this country and a new beginning in

carper. without objection-- >> mr. chairman i would ask unanimous commit to submit a report-- benefits of transit and safety, quality, economic development and more, turs out $1 billion in transit can turn into economic growth. >> thank you for your testimony, i agree with members of bow both sides of the aisle that we have the a-team here. members may submit questions for the record and we ask that you respond to those so the hearing record will stay open for the next two weeks. i want to thank the witnesses for your time, your testimony, thank you mr. mayor for joining us remotely. the hearing is adjourned. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> live wednesday on the c-span networks, the house judiciary committee holds a hearing on policing practices and accountability. the committee will hear from george floyd's brother and family attorney ben crump. other witnesses includ

senator carper. >> mr. chairman, thank you for the hearing you and senator wyden and the ranking member into the witnesses. especially the one that i think was an undergraduate at the university of science a few years ago. we are happy to welcome you ints the task to pass on to our colleague a sincere appreciation for the work you do every day for the country. >> thank you. >> i have a question or two of the witnesses. i want to make some brief comments. racial disparities in these countries are rampant and the pandemic is only exasperating some of those issues as we know. people of color are less likely to work a job that will allow them to work from home and in addition to having increased exposure to the virus, people ou color can now have access to insurance, healthy foods, economic opportunity to increase their likelihood of a pre-existing -- these make people disproportionately more likely to contract a covid-19. 23% of the over 100,000 covid-19 deaths in the united states are african-americans while

mr. chairman and ranking member carper and this outstanding panel but i agree with senator carper we have the a-team in front of us and i appreciate this discussion very much. i think it's a timely discussion. i've been a strong advocate for including the transportation infrastructure as part of the recovery since the beginning. because it has a number of advantages and some of you talked about that. it does have the advantage of creating a stimulus. they create jobs for building things that stimulate the economy and people working to stimulate the economy. it has the additional advantage of profitability of the private sector with movement of goods and services and products whether manufactured in st. louis and going to california or tourists going to yellowstone in delaware or north dakota. thirdly it's our responsibility. it's the responsibility of the federal government and the highway transportation bill another of the structure transportation infrastructure. it's a perfect time to do it. to that end that's why wrote an op-ed at the beginning of discussion about the recovery promotin

carper. senator hassan. >> thank you, mr.chairman, and thank you again to our nominees for your willingness to serve the american people. my first question is to you, as i stated in my opening remarks, we find ourselves in a time of crisis due to the covid-19 pandemic. the postal service has projected revenue losses up to $13 billion this year and $10 billion next year. and there are concerns that it may run out of funds by september if congress does not intervene. what in each of your experiences has prepared you to take on this massive challenge and if confirmed what will you do as a member of the board of governors to address the financial problems facing the u.s. postal service. >> i'm not a postal expert, but i would like to give an example of where i've dealt with issues like this in the past. if i was to pivot and tell you that it's often -- it's often hard to get people to act, to get groups to act collaboratively. if you look at the challenges that are facing the postal services, as you just pointed out, i believe, w

mr. chairman. >> senator carper. >> i would like to say, mr. secretary, welcome. i want to stay on point that the senator just raised. i spoke last week with our own secretary of labor at the department of labor in delaware and the issue of fraud came up. he mentioned foreign involvement and he talked about the folks -- a criminal element in nigeria, i think is what he said, and -- >> that's correct. >> and the amount of money that may have been stolen, literally, by these folks, pretty smart. in the billions of dollars. and i would just ask as a followup question with respect to what mike enzi was just raising, i think you've said this, would you commit to provide jo and the agency inspector general with the information they need to conduct oversight of the responses with respect to ui benefits? >> we will certainly cooperate with -- in investigations being conducted as to that. we're working with the inspector general. i actually sent a joint memo to all labor department employees, joint with the inspector general, about a month or so, maybe six weeks ago, empha

carper: thank you. mr. chairman, there is a fellow named charles throckmorton who an attache.onel, he is doing great work for our country. i just want to say he reflects well on dr. throckmorton's family. chair grassley: before i call on the next senator, without objection, i want to put in the record, letters of oversight that i sent to hhs, fda regarding the foreign inspection regime. those letters were sent on june 27, 2019. ad on august 6, 2019, i sent second oversight letter to hhs and fda. we received responses to both, including thousands of pages of records. and these records will be inserted in the record without objection. or i will go back, is sasse cantwell ready? ok? is senator cardin ready? ahead. sen. cardin: thank you, mr. chairman. i want to ask a question to dr. it relates toas the supply chain issue and the shortages of drugs. we recognize that covid-19 makes life more challenging in regards to the supply chain and we want to make sure our supply chain is safe. we also want to make sure w