mr. portman: i ask unanimous consent that rene sheehy, a postal i.g. detailee with my staff, be granted floor privileges for the roo minder of this -- remainder of this congress. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. portman: this is the fourth time i've come to the floor of the senate in the past month to talk about the crisis in ukraine. and to talk about what we can do here in the united states congress to try to help the great people of ukraine. today i come to the floor to express my solidarity with the courageous people of ukraine, who as we speak are under attack in kiev, in kharkiv, and in so many other cities and towns throughout ukraine. russia's attack on ukraine is a brutal, unprovoked invasion of a democracy, an ally, and a sovereign nation. it must not be allowed to stand, or it will create a precedent that unravels the international order that has kept the peace in europe for nearly 80 years. earlier today senator durbin and i organized a meeting of the ukraine caucus. we're the cochairs. we had ambassador marakova come, the ukra

mr. portman: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. portman: are we in a quorum call, mr. president? the presiding officer: we are not. mr. portman: mr. president, i come to the floor again today to stand in solidarity with the people of ukraine. this is the seventh week in a row i've come out here to talk about the atrocities being committed by russia and what more the united states and this congress can do to support ukraine in its fight for survival. it's been more than a month on an independent, sovereign, democracy, a democracy that just wants to live in peace. earlier today, russia continued its brutal bombing attacks on civilian targets in ukraine. some civilians like those trapped in mar -- mariupol, they are -- fleeing the conflict and for lifesaving humanitarian aid to come in to those who can't get out. you may recall the theater in mariupol, where people took refuge in the basement, using it as a bomb shelter. the words children in russian were emblazed with huge letters, clear enough to see from the sky, so that it would no

mr. portman: thank you. i yield the floor. mr. tuberville: mr. president. presiding officer: the senator from alabama. mr. tuberville: thank you very much. mr. president, before i start my speech today on another topic, i want to take just a moment to discuss what's on all of our hearts across the country and across the world. and that's we should be praying for the ukranian people. we have got a mess in ukraine. a lot of us have been to ukraine over the last few months. we made friends. i went over and met with the president a few months ago and a lot of his staff. what good people. but they told us then that they needed help. and for some reason this administration decided to drag its feet, tried to talk its way out of it. sometimes when you try to talk your way out of it instead of putting facts in front of you, you have problems. well, we've had real problems. president putin who is a murderous tyrant thought this was going to be easy. he didn't realize that the people of ukraine were going to stand up and fight for their country, and they've done just

mr. portman: mr. president, i appreciate the comments from my colleague from rhode island. i would say that all-of-the-above energy, so i do support the energy efficiency he talked about and other opportunities to ensure we have the ability to be energy independent, but at a time when the price per gallon is over $4 on average we also need to produce more in this countries. here we are at a time where we have an executive order from the president saying we're goes to freeze all leases on lands and waters. we have an executive order from the president stopping keystone xl pipeline. we have executive action by the mr. to rewrite the policies with regard to permitting in the waters in the united states, very important to energy products. we've got to do it all. without certainty, we're not going to get oil and gas production we should have here to be able to substitute what we're getting from places like russia. the president did the right thing by banning the russian oil, but we also should do the right thing with regard to north american production. i stand today to support

mr. portman: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. portman: mr.resident, i come to the floor again today to stand with the people of ukraine. what russia is doing to ukraine and its citizens is an atrocity. ukraine is an american ally and an independent and democratic country of 41 million people who simply want to live in peace. the russian invasion is an illegal, unprovoked, and brutal assault that over the past 19 days since the full-scale invasion began has targeted and killed thousands of civilians. americans have seen this atrocity in real time with horrific videos online or on our television screens. the videos and photos have sometimes been shocking. remember the one of the woman who was on a stretcher, pregnant leaving the maternity hospital that had been bombed by the russians. we now learned that that woman and her baby have died. today we learn more journalists have been killed including an american journalist, fox news camera person. i just returned last night from a bipartisan congressional delegation trip to poland neighboring ukrai

mr. portman: mr. president, i want to thank my colleague who just spoke about some real important issues. senator grassley from iowa talked about the fentanyl crisis that's facing our country. unfortunately this synthetic opioid is now killing more and more americans. we're back to record levels of overdose deaths and probably two-thirds of them are caused by fentanyl. he's absolutely right, we need to be sure it's scheduled clearly as an illegal drug as well as all the variants of it. i'm coming on the floor today to talk about another issue that is real important to our country, and that is protecting us from cyberattacks. last night i commend this body because the united states senate passed legislation called the strengthening american cybersecurity act of 2022. what does that mean? it means that we took the time to do our homework, had hearings, and reported out legislation that helps protect our government data, including personal data of american citizens, but also our national security data an

mr. chair. >> thank you, senator padilla. i need to step away to attend briefly an armed services committee. ranking member portmanwill take the gavel and has some additional questions. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i have a number of questions, looking for some quick answers just to help us to be able to figure out a better way to move forward in terms of the fragmentation that's currently out there we've heard about today in terms of responding to buy bio threats and trying to figure out what's working and what's not working in the current system. let me start with regard to a question about academia and maybe, dr. parker, you're the best person to answer this, since that's where you reside now. does dhs and do other enties including cdc that have biosecurity programs effectively leverage u.s. research universities? is there a good relationship with academia? >> i think early in the -- i'll make this short. early in the life of dhs, there was creation of the universities centers of excellence. that's been a very good and effective program to engage academia. now, the threats have evolved and threats have evolved o

mr. portman: i want to commend my colleague from south carolina.spoke about his passion and commitment for this issue, which comes from his heart, and i hope that the other side was hearing that, because i think there's an opportunity now to come together , in light of the speech the other night by the president, to say let's do two things -- one, help these communities to be safer, help the people that live there, but also let's increase the amount of respect and gratitude for our police officers. those two are not inconsistent. in fact, they're complementary. that's why i appreciate the work he's done and will do. madam president, tonight in ukraine the bombs are already raining down on the cities of kharkiv, of kiev, and other towns and cities throughout ukraine. indiscriminate bombing, artillery, missiles, killing innocent civilians, already thousands of civilians have been killed. this was a totally unwarranted, unjustified, atrocious invasion of a free country, an independent, sovereign country. here on the floor of the senate, we have a oppo

mr. kaine: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that myself, along with senators hagerty, peters, and portman, be recognized to speak for up to five minutes each before the scheduled recess. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kaine: madam president, i was not intending to speak, as you know. i was presiding, and you were kind. as i was hearing colleagues talk on the floor about the state of our country, what i was hearing from my republican colleagues were words like malaise, funk, disaster. i was seeing visuals of a house on fire. and so i was compelled to stand and just offer a few extemporaneous remarks. i don't think america is a disaster. i don't think america is on fire. i don't think america is in a deep, unyielding malaise. i've heard colleagues talk about the situation in the world and use the appeasement word. i've heard language both in committee hearings this morning and here on the floor that i would characterize as kind of a blame america first attitude, if something is going on, if a dictator like vladimir putin acts in a horrific way, it's got to be america's fault.

mr. chair in ranking member portman.hank you to our witnesses not only for coming before the committee today to discuss critical issues but also for your service to our country and for your commitment to our security. and senator portman mentioned, he and i introduced bipartisan legislation directing a centralized clearinghouse safety and security best practices grant application information, and other assistance all dedicated to securing houses of worship and faith-based operations the safe act passed out of this committee with bipartisan support way by action of the full senate. do you agree that passing the place safe act with this clearinghouse would help houses of worship access federal resources to secure these communities? >> i do agree indian community on —- conversations with community partners one of the challenges they have is to go through multiple sources of information to get information from a federal perspective many community-based organizations often overlook the opportunities to : one —- connect with t

mr. chairman. >> thank you, ranking member portman. it's a practice of the homeland security and government affairs committee to swear in witnesses, so if our witnesses would please stand and raise your right hand including our witness who is joiningg as virtually. [witnesses were sworn in] all have answered affirmatively. you may sit down. anne o'connell. ms. o'connell is a professor of law at stanford law school. she is also a contributor to the center on regulation and markets at the brookings institution and an appointed senior fellow of the administrative conference of the united states. most recently her work has focused on acting officials and delegations of authority in federal agencies, the loyalty and competent of agency appointees and inspectors general. her research and teaching also focuses on administrative and constitutional law. so ms. o'connell, welcome to the committee and you may proceed with your opening comments. ms. o'connell: thank you. chairman peters, ranking member portman and members of the committee, thank y

mr. portman: parliamentary inquiry come to the floor today to stand in solidarity with the people of ukraineas they suffer through the brutal and cowardly russian assault. i have spoken on the floor each of the last six weeks about the horrific events we have all watched unfold and what role the united states should play. simply put, we need to do more. and we need to do it more quickly. as do our allies. as we talk this evening, the shelling and killing of innocent civilians continues in the dark of night in places like kiev and kharkiv and mariopul. putin seems intent on destroying what he can't have because of the brave outgoing ukrainians who refuse to surrender and refuse to live under his despotic rule much those horrific ukrainian defenders of their homeland deserve our support. even if they didn't, this blood did i war launched by an authoritarian regime matters to world freedom, to our own national security. it must not stand or else all of us in freedom-loving countries are at risk. as we talk this evening, the ruthless bombing continues. something happens is happening. president b

senator portman: thank you, mr. chairman. i'm glad we're having this hearing and a chance to visit with the witnesses before today. we look forward to having others virtually. we spent a lot of time on vetting executive nominees and it's an important part of our constitutional duty. so we should. this committee in particular sees a lot of nominees. the process can be long and difficult, i understand that. i went through two confirmations myself. but there's a reason for that. we want to make sure the nominees are well qualified and well qualified to serve the american people. just in the past year we've seen a number of troubling issues with nominees. i'll give you a few examples. the comptroller of o.m.b.'s office of federal financial management is required by statute to have a, quote, demonstrated ability and practical experience in accounting, financial management and financial systems and extensive experience in financial management and large government albies entities, end quote. there's a reason congress put those crite

mr. baron ranking member portman, you are recognized for your questions. >> thank you to our witnesses. we talked about ambiguity a little earlier. i mentioned no clarification is needed. and professor turley, you have talked to how ambiguity can lead to problems. complexity can too. which is part of ambiguity, i suppose. but specifically, keeping it as simple as possible. i was associate counsel to the president under george h.w. bush. the first bush. one of my jobs was to try to help interpret the rules at the time, which were actually far different than they are now. and then i served in the second bush administration as well. including -- management and budget. so i had the same issues with some of my team, which is just confusion about what the rules are. and, you know, people come in and out of the executive branch, particularly at the white house with some frequency. maybe in some of of the agencies, people stay longer, but a lot of them are younger and a lot of them don't have a sense of what this is about. because it doesn't make sense given their private lives and work lives w

mr. chairman bricker asked thank you, senator portman. it's a practice of homeland security and government affairs committee to swear in witnesses. so if each of you would please stand and raise your right hand. do you swear the testimony will get before this committee be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you god? thank you, you may be seated. our first witnesses jason, serves as a professor of the practice at the university of maryland college of information studies where he taught the first graduate level seminar on key discovery. a form of digital investigation here in the united states. he brings 33 years of experience in public service including 13 years as a first appointed director of litigation and previously served as a trial attorney and senior counsel at the u.s. department of justice. regulate rights and speaks on subjects involving preservation of and access to electronic records he has also served as cochair of the working group on electronic document retention and production at the sedona conferen

mr. coleman. as senator portman mentioned, he and i introduced bipartisan legislation, the prey safe act. it directs the federal government to establish a centralized clearinghouse of safety and security best practices, training resources, grant application information and other assistance. all dedicated to securing houses of worship at faith-based organizations. and recently, the prey safe act passed out of this committee with bipartisan support, and now awaits action by the full senate. mr. coleman, do you agree that passing the prey safety act creating this clearinghouse would help houses of worship access federal resources to securities communities? >> i do agree. and conversations with many faith-based communities partners i think one of the challenges that they often have is that they have to go to multiple sources of information, to get information from a federal perspective. and also, i think many faith-based and community based organizations often overlook the opportunities to connect with our state partners. senator, a good example i think is the new hampshire houses of worship

mr. chairman. >> thank you. just an observation, they're not the only country that can do that. senator portman. >> thank you, mr. chairman. so secretary, nuland, unfortunately you were right about putin. so here we are. we have a brutal, illegal, totally unprovoked, unjustified attack on our ally, a democratic country, a sovereign country. and tonight, as we sit here, in ukraine they are continuing to bomb civilian targets. they shelled civilians who chose to walk down the humanitarian corridors that they had agreed to. they killed people who were on these corridors. so we have to remember this is something that requires us, along with our allies, all countries really, certainly all freedom-loving countries who care about what might happen to them, to step up and do more. so i appreciate what was said today. but we've got to do more, both in terms of military assistance and in terms of sanctions. and it's a matter of days or weeks, not months that we have to do more, because it will be too late otherwise. i think putin miscalculated. he miscalculated about the resolve of the ukrainian people a

portman. senator you are recognized for your questions for. >> thanks much mr. chairman.r witnesses good morning, thank you all for joining us today. i have three questions i will try to get to one of those deals with the importance of federal records, management for accountability and transparency. the second one is how the presidential records act amendments of 2014 help improve transparency across executive branch of the gaps that still remain. third question will focus on the role in records management. >> kicks i was fortunate to be chairman of this committee in 2014. ranking member was tom he and i took on a very important issue of modernizing presidential records to try to capture archives public servants argued he was to provide transparency to deliver results to the american people. mr. wiseman, briefly can you provide more context as to why every american should pay attention to this conversation? why is this important? rex we cannot understand how to chart a course forward if we don't understands what happened in the past. this committee and other committees de

mr. president, on another matter, senator ron portman of ohio and i are cochairs of the bipartisan senate ukraine caucus. tomorrow we're hosting a meeting for senators with members of the ukrainian parliament. the parliament there is known as the ratta. they are coming to washington to discuss how we can help even more assisting the valiant people of ukraine defending against this barbaric invasion by vladimir putin. i hope our colleagues on both sides of the aisle will join us to send a clear message to ukraine that we stand united this their efforts. putin's unprovoked, unconscionable war on ukraine has revealed what he is really all about. he's a tyrant, seething with resentment, driven by delusions of great mother russia, willing to slaughter innocent men, women, and children to restore a lost russian empire. we know from his current ravings and past actions, putin's ruthless pursuit of russia's lost empire didn't begin with this war, and if we don't do something about it, it won't end there either. in 2003 the people of georgia, another soviet republic, waged a resolution to claim th

senator portman is next then. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i appreciate it. i appreciate the testimony and the fact you are in the trenches every day doing great work with our young people. dr. hoover, you talked about telehealth. i want to be sure we are focused on the broader behavioral health and substance abuse. telehealth is one of the few silver lineings with regard to covid and with regard to substance abuse treatment there have been some real improvements. would you agree with that? >> i would. the opioid crisis has brought attention and that has been exacerbated during covid. the funding provided by the federal government to states and communities to support the opioid crisis has been tremendous and an improvement in care. telemental health has improved that. >> that's why we have to continue the reimbursement under medicare/medicare for substance abuse at a time when we had 100,000 drug overdose deaths in the period from april this year to last year. in one year a record level, a 28.5% increase in overdose deaths. really hard breaking because we mad

ranking member portman, you are now recognized for your opening comments. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you to the witnesses for being here. transparency in government is obviously a pillar of our democracy. and something we should ensure continues into the digital age because it's harder and harder and something we'll talk about today. it's an area i have worked on a lot. i have sponsored the data act to a congressionally open courts act, accountabilitity act and a lot the of others. i put all earmarks online which had an interesting effect. what the government is doing right or wrong, that way citizens can learn and hold their government and officials accountable. having a record of government activity is also important to the future. it's important to media, it's important to citizens to have that think tanks can play an important role. if they have access to information as an example. so it's good we're having this hearing on how to look at the presidential records act and the federal records act. it's a bipartisan issue. i can see from the prepared comments that som

representative portman, you're recognized for your opening remarks. >> thank you, mr. chairman.nk you to the witnesses for beingg here, look forward to hearing from you. this is another important hearing we're having to discuss the elevated threat of violence and terrorism against our houses ofur worship. just over two years ago a terrorist made a his way to texs and held four people hostage for over 0 hours. the perpetrator -- 10 hours. the perpetrate ther traveled to the united states from the u.k. with the intent to commit violence. i'm concerned that this attack was not prevented. why was this person not on the government's radar considering his criminal record and history of being investigated for terrorism in the united kingdom? why was he granted to the access to the united states especially after he lied on his paperwork to customs and border protectionsome in spite of his dangerous past, he was able to travel to the united states, fly fromo new york to texas, illegally purchase a fire arm. it was only after he attacked a synagogue that our law enforcement or homeland se

senator portman and myself, that included the revocation of pntr for russia, along with the global. and first and foremost removes the sunset in the legislation that would sunset this year. mr. zelenskyy asked us for us to be resolved in being willing to stand up to mr. putin. he said it would take some time. a clear message is that we remove the sunset on the global statute and we know how difficult it is to get legislation passed in this body. it expands to include the enablers, exactly what mr. zelenskyy asked us to do. those that enabled, the oligarchs that allowed him to be able to finance this. language included here is similar to the language that was included in president trump's executive order. this is critical legislation. now, let me just tell you how appropriate it is that it's included in a pntr bill, because the first sanctioned bill and senator wyden was very important in getting this done, was included in the original pntr bill for russia. and we were able to get it done at that time. we then made it a global, and my partner on that was the late senator mccain. it's always been bipartisan. my partner now is senator wicker. the two of us have joined forces t

mr. chairman, with your indulgence, i would like to yield the rest of my time to senator portman, who wantso get a couple words in before he goes. >> thank you. secretary carlin, you've said that you cannot give planes to them because they really need better air defense. we don't think they need planes. they think they need planes. are you saying the only reason the department of defense is against providing these mig-29's to ukraine is that you know better than them what they need to protect himself? >> thank you for raising this issue, senator portman. >> quickly. >> of course. we are trying to get ukraine everything it can use immediately in the field today. >> so in your judgment -- so your judgment is overriding their judgment? because they say they need airplanes. >> we spoken closely to them and ultimately it is a sovereign decision from poland. >> we have spoken closely with them also, including the president of ukraine. are you saying that that's the reason? >> senator, i will convey all of your concerns back. >> just answer my question. are you saying that that is the reason, that

mr. chairman. i fully concur with the introductory comments made by the chairman and the ranking member and by senator portman and senator shaheen. i simply do not understand the logic for not getting the migs to the ukrainians community. there is no logic for the lack of rapidity and in making ts decision and giving them the migs. it makes no sense and if there the administration that knowid the answer, i would suggest we get the occasion to meet with them brats in a classified setting that we need to know the reason why those migs have not been transferred already. i believe there's a sentiment that we are fearful about what putin might do and what he might consider as an escalation. it's time for him to be fearful of what we might do. don't wait to get putin to act in a way that may be able to save lives of ukraine's is if he hears us more than we fear him. the truth of the matter is that his military is exposed in ukraine, bogged down, unfed, without fuel. they are in a very precarious position. he's got to think about what happens if he provokes us. because they could be obliterated by the forces of nato

mr. putin, the oligarchs to be able to fund his aggression against ukraine. what did the house send over to us? in their bill they sent a global magnitsky modification, identical to legislation filed by senator portman and myself that included the revocation of pntr for russia along with the global magnitsky. first and foremost, it removes the sunset that's in the legislation that would sunset this year. mr. zelenskyy asked us for, for us to be resolved in being willing to stand up to mr. putin, that it would take some time. a clear message is that we remove the sunset on the global magnitsky statute. and we know how difficult it is to get legislation passed in this body. it also expands the global magnitsky to include the enablers, exactly what mr. zelenskyy asked us to do. those that enable, the oligarchs, that allow him to be able to finance this. the language that's included in here is very similar to the language that was included in president trump's executive order. this is critical legislation. now let me just tell you how appropriate it is that it's included in a pntr bill. the first magnitsky sanction bill, and senator wyden was very important in getting this done, was included in the orig

mr. chairman. i will submit questions for writing. >> senator cantwell you are next. are you online? >> senator through? senator menendez? senator portmannator barbara? for our guest you should know this is a particularly hectic day in the senate the members are coming in. senator cassidy. a very valued member with his expertise on healthcare as a position. >> thank you very much for that. i thought i i had 15 or 21 minutes to listen but everybody else's out. i used to work with school-based clinics with hepatitisoi b immunization and how well they can function bringing care. 's new have to acknowledge the child is not school it's difficult to be evaluated. so now kids are back in school. so let me ask so my understanding is that the school system would benefit with updated guidance from that venue. any comments. >> that is exactly right. i appreciate the correction. you are right it is easier to get school-based care when they are in school. we are hoping congress can support is to urge to modernize w existing school. this guidance has not been updated since 2003. it is critical for states and state medicaid agencies to work together.

mr. curry and dr. parker, one way we can detect biological threats is screening patients in hospitals and other health care facilities. there was a discussion with senator portman on the issue of what kind of data that we have. as i understand, much of the data would be collected by nonfederal entities. federal agencies would need to be closely correlating with them. as the government cabability office reports, it does not assess nonfederal bio defense capabilities nor does it establish a mechanism for nonfederal entities. mr. curry and dr. parker come how the federal government ensure that its nonfederal partners have the capabilities to detect and collect information about potential biological threats and how can congress act to better coordinate the efforts? i will start a mr. curry and them will go to dr. parker. >> thank you, i could not ink of a better example of a lesson learned from covid -- ink of better lesson learned from covid-19 then coordination. we saw this with issues related to the strategic national stockpile, and how supplies are distributed throughout the country, different from every state. perfectly encapsulating the challenge. the thing t