mr. thuneadam president? the presiding officer: the republican whip. mr. thune: madam president, are we in a quorum call? madam president, i ask unanimous consent that i be able to complete my remarks. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: madam president, i rise today to speak on a topic of global importance, and that's russia's mounting aggression toward ukraine. after months of shifting tens of thousands of troops and military equipment, some from its eastern most military district, russia has built up a military presence around the northern, eastern, and southern flanks of ukraine. russia has also amass add forces in belarus under the guise of joint military exercises. and unfortunately, madam president, there are no indications that the situation with ukraine and russia has taken any steps towards dehe de-escalation. in anything, ukraine and the european partners think that russia's buildup is to support an tac in mid to late february. as the so-called exercises in belarus c

quorum call: mr. thune: mr. president? the presiding officer: the republican whip. mr. thune: is the senate? a quorum call? the presiding officer: yes, it is. mr. thune: i ask that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: the a.p. headline from last thursday said it all -- u.s. inflation highest in 30 years with no letup in sight, end quote. with no let-up in sight. that's life in the democrats' america. but in january, inflation was te highest since february of 1982. inflation has now been above 5% for the past eight months. there are family raising families today who have never experienced this kind of up nation in their entire lifetimes. american families are utter hadding, mr. president. -- american families are hurting, mr. president, hurting badly. the average american household spent an average $3,500 more last year as a result of inflation. 3 $3,-- $3,500. that's a lot of money for an ordinary family, a lot. everywhere they turn, families are facing higher prices. whether it's ground beef for the chili, bunk beds for the kid

mr. thune: mr.nt? the presiding officer: the republican whip. mr. thune: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: mr. president, we're currently in the midst of the worst border crisis in our nation's history. it's no exaggeration to say that the situation at our southern border is out of control. the u.s. customs and border protection apprehended more than 178,000 individuals attempting to cross our southern border illegally. 178,000, one month. that's more than double the number of individuals apprehended by the border patrol the previous december. and this is no isolated incident. almost from the day the president took office, our nation has been experienced an unprecedented border surge. fiscal year 2021 the border patrol encountered more than 1.7 million individuals attempting to cross our southern border. the highest number ever recorded. the situation at our southern border is a security enforcement and humanitarian

mr. thune: mr. president, one of the big drivers of our inflation crielings is was the democrat' decision to flood the money with unnecessary money last march, with the $1.9 trillion-dollar spending bill. another contributor to the problem has been supply chain bottleneck. americans are getting used to long delays in receiving the goods they've ordered. to big holes on grocery store shelves. to being able to reon a store to keep product in stock consistently. since the start of the pandemic, this has been a challenge. as with the larger inflation crisis, the white house seems largely uninterested in addressing the probable he almost. the tragedy of the treadmill that's delayed, that was a quote of the white house press secretary joking in october a typically tone deaf comment from a administration often oblivious to the difficulties facing ordinary americans. in fact, supply chain issues are not a minor inconvenience. they're a real problem. it's not easy for an already overstretched mom or dodd to

mr. thune: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, the average american household spent an estimated $3500 more in expenses last year as a result of inflation. $3,500. that may not sound like much to a wealthy democrat politician but for most american families, that's a lot of money. for a lot of families $3500 is the difference between putting something in savings or living paycheck to paycheck. the additional $3500 in expenses could mean having to forego essential home retears or car work, putting off braces for a child or needed medical care. the white house chief of staff may have the budget to regard inflation as a high-class problem, how she referred to it, described it, but for ordinary americans inflation is a very real problem, a problem that is eating up their wage increases and lowering their standard of living. mr. president, we are in the midst of an inflation crisis. the supply chain crisis. and if those weren't enough, a border crisis. huge numbers of illegal immigrants are pouring across our southern border

thune? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i appreciate your continued focus on youth mental health, and i appreciate the panel for joining us today, and as i discussed last week when i talked to parents, teachers and school administrators across south dakota addressing the behavioral health needs of students is a big priority. dr. hoover, your testimony you mentioned we need to be looking for more formal partnerships with community behavioral health providers. we have multiple cooperatives in place in my state where schools that are in close enough proximity share a provider but in some circumstances distance is a barrier. do you know of instances where the partnerships you refer to have been formed using telehealth or a combination of in-person and telehealth services and what are the biggest barriers schools or school boards encounter in forming these types of partnerships? >> thank you for the question, senator thune. absolutely we've seen actually tremendous partnerships that rely almost exclusively on telehealth especial

so senator thune is next followed by senator hassan and senator daines. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and thanks to our panelists for your testimony. my offices in south dakota get a lot of phone calls and emails about the irs and south dakota generally call about getting help with a refund or simply can't get in touch with the irs. a report seems to back that up. according to the report the end of last year at least 10 million returns remained unprocessed and the irs only answered about 11% of taxpayers' calls. the report found the processing time for some taxpayer correspondence runs six months or longer. ms. collins, how have the new responsibilities placed upon the irs including new transfer payment programs and the six-month advance program impact basic customer service such as picking up phones and taxpayer correspondence? >> basically it impacted it in a number of ways. telephones has been a real challenge because although a lot of the legislation has been helpful to taxpayers it creates a lot of confusion and that confusion causes folks to reach for the phone logically. and so

thune about a similar thing. and yeah, you are right, south dakota suspect always a frozen tundra. >> let's follow up. i am out of time. but mr. strickland, let's follow up because i want to learn more. i yield back. >> the gentleman from arizona, mr. o'halloran s recognized for five minutes. >> thank you chairman scott, ranking member thompson, appreciate the opportunity. very good meeting today. as excited as we should be by the increase in evs, it is important to emphasize the importance of evs in rural communities as we've talked about today. like much of arizona, my arizona district, oftentimes discussions about electric vehicles center around consumers and businesses urban, suburban, or ex-urban settings. however, the move the electric and clean energy vehicles can provide profound economic opportunity for rural communities. and we are already seeing these benefits in arizona. my district is the proud home to the manufacturing centers of two major clean energy start-ups. lucid motors, which began delivering electric vehicles to consumers in october 2021, was built a massive factory in casa grande in southern arizona and

mr. thune: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, we recently passed the one-year anniversary of president biden's inauguration. it's a natural time for taking stock of the first year of his presidency. mr. president, in president biden we were supposed to get a leader, a leader home and on the world stage. the grown-ups, we were told, were back in the room. but the truth of the matter is, mr. president, that president biden's first year in office has been marked by a lack of leadership more than anything else. again and again president biden has simply abdicated his responsibilities. take, perhaps, the two defining domestic crises of the biden presidency -- our inflation crisis and our border crisis. in both cases, the response of the president and his administration has, by and large, been to stick their fingers in their ears and pretend the crises don't exist. sure, the president or his people make a gesture toward the problem every now and then, but mostly you'd be forgiven for thinking that neither the border crisis n