mr. lutnick, welcome. on monday night president , trump's budget office issued a memo that directed agencies to cut off all federal spending. all federal spending. outside of payments to individuals. the trump administration issued this order even though the spending was authorized and appropriated by congress, and intended to benefit the american people. a bargain was struck here with the article i power of the purse. the benefit is supposed to flow to the american people. the freeze could affect semiconductor groups, broadband groups, fisheries, disaster relief, habitat conservation. all programs in the department of commerce. mr. let nick do you believe this , action by president was lawful? mr. lutnick: i rely on the president. if his advisers say it was, then i will rely on him. and his advisers. sen. markey: that is an unacceptable response, because this action has caused mass confusion, disrupted critical payment systems, and violated directly federal spending statutes passed out of this committee a

mr. lutnick: i am trying to. sen. lujan: yes or no. mr. lutnick: yes, i work for the president of the united states. sen. lujan: i appreciate you being cute. mr. lutnick: i'm not trying to be cute. sen. lujan: is not cute to the american people that don't have access to these programs when they are being promised a i will get tutoring to every student. it won't happen if people don't have -- mr. kennedy was in the air -- other room saying every person in america who get the access to an ai doctor to cure the cancer they have or whatever other critical illness. it's not cute. this is serious business. we are talking about carrying programs out for the country. i understand you are a very successful person. we are asking simple questions. we had an incredible conversation in the office. incredible conversation. very respectful. this is not that. i just don't understand. i am not asking for a response. i'm not. mr. chairman, one of the areas we agreed is we should work in a bipartisan basis to get these things done. i have a reputation of bein

mr. lutnick. >> great. good morning, mr. chairman, ranking member cantwell and i see senator curtis has my old chair so hopefully you do as -- have as much fun as i did and do as much good as i tried to do. senator moreno and all the members of the committee, i'm thrilled to be here and introduce my dear friend howard lutnick, who i think will make an amazing commerce secretary for the united states of america. one of my mentors in business always said that any good business has both productin peoe and salespeople, and howard is one of the few people who is both a product guy and a sales guy. p i want to talk about that because i think that america as commerce secretary needs a product guy and sales guy. if you look at his career, howard is the kind of guy that developed innovative products and has a number of pat tents to his name and -- patents to his name and i didn't know that when i first met him but learned later. he's an incredible sales guy and a person on the world stage will say more and do more and convince busine

mr. lutnick to give his own remarks. mr. lutnick: thank you. and thank you, jd, mr. vice president, for the kind introduction. i appreciate your friendship. i'm profoundly grateful to president trump for the confidence and faith he has placed in me. it is an honor to appear before you as your nominee for secretary of commerce. my family is here with me today. i would like to introduce you to my wife, who is behind me, who for 30 years has been my great partner, advisor, and a spectacular mother to our wonderful children. and my oldest son kyle behind me. brandon. casey. and ryan. my extraordinary sister is also here as well as alison's brother rick and my sister-in-law abby and many of my closest friends who have chosen to come down and support me. i grew up on long island, new york. my mother was an artist and art teacher. my father was a professor of american history. my mother taught me how to appreciate life. when i was 14, she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. she decided if she was going to die, before that, she was going to live. i will never forget the day

mr lutnick suggested the fund could even be used to facilitate the sale of tiktok, which is currently sovereign wealth fund is news news that is heats that is iiikeiit; fantastic news that is likely to greatly accelerate us economic growth shore us economic grdwtbabta'sbors up us security economic grthbano'sbors up us security a economic grthbano'sbore up us security a time national security at a time when we are coming under iglcgeasing from when we are coming under insceasing from china. increasing threat from china. to answer your question, what is a sovereign wealth fund? it is a sovereign wealth fund? it is a sovereign wealth fund? it is a on the us government is a on which the us government would take equity stakes, it would take equity stakes, it would be acting as a giant venture capitalfirm, taking venture capital firm, taking equity in venture equity sta keslinjoint mental re are being equity sta keslinjoint mental re the |re being equity sta keslinjoint mental re the country's equity stakeslinjointventore the country's best entrepreneurs and scientists. this is quite differ

mr. lutnick: i do. i think my job is to give you the benefit of the bargain you pass chips and science. my job is to bring domestic production of semiconductors home to america. and then we're going to attack the supply chain so much we have the full supply chain so we could be independent from a national security perspective. so if we need help -- >> we're going to leave this program at this point. you can watch it on our website at c-span.org. we're going to look at the federal government waste and efficiency. witnesses include iowa governor kim reynolds. live on espn3. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2025] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org.] >> and reform the unchecked federal bureaucracy and he is delivering on his programs made to the american people. president trump created the department of government efficiency or doe. at the helm of president trump's effort is elon musk. one of the most successful entrepreneurs ever. members of this committee have lamented th

the clerk: nomination, department of commerce, howard lutnick, of new york, to be secretary. mr. cloture motion to the desk. prooip the cloture motion -- the presiding officer: the clerk will report the cloture motion. the clerk: cloture accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby bring to a close debate on the nomination of howard lutnick, of new york, to be secretary of commerce, signed by 17 senators as follows. mr. thune: i ask that the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: mr. president, i'm going to move here to go to legislative session in a minute. i have to point out these next noms coming up are bipartisan noms, we're coming up on the department of agriculture secretary whose nomination was reported out of the senate agriculture committee unanimously. not a single dissenting vote. so it seems like me might be able to expedite that. i don't know how long that last vote took, but we're going to keep grinding away here, i would ask that we proceed to legislative session. the presidi