mr. merkley: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from oregon. mr. ley: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for up ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of calendar number 87, s. 65. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: calendar number 87, s. 65, a bill to ensure that goods made with labor force in the xinjiang region not enter the country. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent is that the committee-reported substitute amendment be degreed to and that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. merkley: i know of no further debate on the bill as amended. the presiding officer: if there is no further debate, the question on passage of the bill, as amended. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no, no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do ha

mr. merkley: thank you very much. mr. president, this is a critical time for america. it is a moment in which the actions we take or don't take will affect the very design of our government for generations to come. our founders had a vision that we're all created equal. in our initial constitution, it wasn't fully manifested, but we have worked through several hundred years to come to that point that we recognize that every american should be able to participate in the direction of their country. and we had some key moments in that national debate. i was always fascinated that when my father was born in 1919, women couldn't vote in america. and we had all kinds of other barriers for communities of color, for black americans, for native americans. and those barriers we struck down time after time after time, and then we came to 1965, and we said there are still so many ways that communities are trying to keep every citizen from participating in voting. and we're going to make sure that that ends from this point forward. president johnson, who said that the power of the

mr. merkley's effort with self certification there with fema. it's fair to say though ms. harden that once we get this third leg of the project done there will be less need for fema to come in because the flooding will be in an area where people will know in advance that you shouldn't plant their and if you do you're assuming the risk. >> because you know and we have dealt with the salty sears and people say well, move. this is our home. it's been our home for many years. we can't just up and move and then a lot of the lower income, how are they going to move? >> it's been there property for generations. but they ask you briefly because the chair is going to wield that gavel. with this project benefit or harm wildlife? would it benefit or harm aquatic species? .. it should not be. people saying this will harm our life. all they had to do was come to the delta and look and see how this flooding harmed our wild diaper. >> thank you ma'am thank you mr. trevor. >> thank you, senator carper. >> thank you both, good to see you. thank you for joining us today, tell me where from

mr. merkley: thank you very much. mr. president, this is a critical time for america. it is a moment in which the actions we take or don't take will affect the very design of our government for generations to come.

mr. michael merkley. we received this letter after she had testified in front of the senate committee a few months ago. he wrote, the grand jury issued subpoenas for hair samples, handwriting examples, and fingerprints. these subpoenas were served on persons suspected of having knowledge of the incident, including tracy stone-manning. but don't take his word for it. let's listen to the words of tracy stone-manning herself. in a 1990 article about law enforcement's investigation at the university of montana, she complained about how the investigation made her feel. she said it was degrading. it changed my awareness of the power of the government. through this entire period, she did not tell the truth to the investigators. remember she knew who spiked the trees. she sent the threatening letter to them. she never went to the police and she never identified the ecoterrorists. she also didn't cooperate. the lead investigator said in his letter that the committee has received since the time that she testified t

mr. sund, welcome back. senator merkley, you're up for questions. sen. peters: thank you very much, mr. chairman, and thank you to our witnesses. mr. sund, on january 4th, mpd arrested the leader of the proud boys for destruction of property and possessing high capacity firearm magazines, and on the following day, on january 5th, the fbi issued a report through the joint terrorism task force, which includes going to the us capitol police. that report noted that on far-right media, the threats included things such as, the comments such as, “be ready to fight. congress needs to hear glass breaking, doors being kicked in, blood from their blm and antifa slave soldiers being spilled. get violent, stop calling this a march or a rally or a protest. go there ready for war. we get our president or we die. nothing else will achieve this goal.” did you get that fbi intelligence report? steven sund: i addressed that right when we started. the united states capitol police department did get that report. i was just advised to that in the last 24 hours. that report made it from the joint terrorism ta

mr. sund, welcome back. senator merkley, you're up for questions. sen. peters: thank you very much, mr. you to our witnesses. mr. sund, on january 4th, mpd arrested the leader of the proud boys for destruction of property and possessing high capacity firearm magazines, and on the following day, on january 5th, the fbi issued a report through the joint terrorism task force, which includes going to the us capitol police. that report noted that on far-right media, the threats included things such as, the comments such as, “be ready to fight. congress needs to hear glass breaking, doors being kicked in, blood from their blm and antifa slave soldiers being spilled. get violent, stop calling this a march or a rally or a protest. go there ready for war. we get our president or we die. nothing else will achieve this goal.” did you get that fbi intelligence report? steven sund: i addressed that right when we started. the united states capitol police department did get that report. i was just advised to that in the last 24 hours. that report made it from the joint terrorism task force over to our

merkley: thank you. thank you, madam chair, mr. chair. senator: the chair recognizes senator sinema. senator sinema: thank you. last week, we heard about coordinated security planning efforts between law enforcement and federal partners for january 6, including areas where planning could be improved. the committee heard about intelligence shared by the fbi office in norfolk virginia on january 5, warning of extremist planning to travel to provoke war. we heard from the chief of capitol police that he never saw that and heard of no intelligence suggesting a coordinated, violent attack on the u.s. capitol. they had of the washington fbi field office said publicly the bureau did not have intelligence suggesting the rally would turn violent fire to the january 5 report. however, on january 8, a podcast from "the new york times" outlined activity across social media showing coordination of groups ahead of the january 6 attack. it highlighted social media conversations about coordinating travel, using weapons, language like occupy the capital in the revolution will come to washington. miss

mr. garza, because i met today with a number of texas legislators along with senator warnock and senator merkley, because senator merkley and i lead the for the people bill. which provisions of the build being considered in texas are you most concerned with question mark --? mr. garza: it's a bad bill all the way around. there are provisions limiting the timeframe for when people can vote. i think that is bad. there was a misstatement made about how local elections -- elected officials are prohibited from sending ballots to voters. actually, they are prohibited from sending applications for mail-in ballots. those actions are crucial, there are efforts than -- then that intimidate local election officials from trying to help people vote. assist people in voting. >> isn't there also the fact that if you have more than three people you're taking to the polls you have to -- ? >> there are restrictions on assisting voters to the polls and assisting voters at the polls. >> and defining your disability? is there something in there on that? >> yes, there are additional affidavits that need to be filed b

mr. merkley: madam president, i rise today to add my voice to my colleagues in remembering and paying my respects to our dear friend and former colleague, senator carl levin, whom we sadly lost last night. my colleagues have been sharing their stories and their experiences of this incredible human being, this amazing senator. and i want to share one of my own, a story of how he made an impact on my life and my approach to being a senator. it was back in 2009 when we had an enormous collapse of our economic system, and i came here as a freshman senator, and we were working to say what happened and how can we prevent this from happening again. and a lot of what happened were enormously leveraged bets made in the wall street casino. and a staff member of my kept saying you've got to read this essay by chairman volcker about how we take and shut down this wall street casino and how it puts our entire economy at risk and will do so again in the future if we don't act. and after two or three times, my team member had approached me on this, i put out an e-mail to all of the senators and said he