may very well have a criminal element to it, still ongoing, i cannot support moving forward on carolyn colvin's nomination. i hope this matter can be resolved quickly and cleanly. but until such time i plan to vote against confirming her to the next social security commissioner unless we can resolve these matters beforehand. with that, i yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: quorum call: the presiding officer: the senator from kansas. mr. moran: i would ask the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. moran: thank you very much. mr. president, i have visited hospitals in my state many times. in fact, there are 128 community hospitals in kansas, and i have visited each and every one of them once and in many instances two or three times. in fact, just last weekend when i was home in kansas, i visited my hometown hospital mercy in manhattan, kansas, and it's a very useful exercise. i would encourage my colleagues to spend time with health care providers. in the case of hospitals, it gives y

hatch: i want to take a few minutes to talk about the nomination of carolyn colvin to be the commissioner of the social security administration. in recent weeks a number of disturbing facts have come to light about her. her tenure as the acting social security commissioner. these coupled with the facts that there is an ongoing investigation of conduct of people in her immediate office raise serious questions about whether she is qualified to serve in this position. let me make one thing clear: my doubts about ms. colvin's nomination have nothing to do with partisanship. i, along with 2161 of my colleagues voted to vote her out of the committee and saw no reason to oppose her nomination. i like her personally. but like i said, madam president, since that time, new facts have come to light that are extremely disconcerting. just lace before ms. colvin appeared before the finance committee, we became aware of allegations concerning potential waste and mismanagement at the s.s.a. as well as allegations about a possible cover-up of that waste and mismanagement. several sources including the hou

social security administrator and we need a competent, qualified person to lead it, and that is carolyn colvin. had miss colvin's nomination is important because the work of the social security administration is important. over 60 million americans rely on social security. 900,000 in maryland. seniors, individuals with disabilities and children depend on the benefits and services of the social security administration. it is a big agency with big responsibility. it supports 63,000 social security employees, 11,000 are at the social security headquarters in woodlawn. it's not about the numbers. it's about what they do. guess what they do. they administer 950 billion benefit payments. approximately 25% of all government spending. last year, over 40 million people came to its field offices. 47 million people called its 800 number. five million came for retirement. 2.8 million came for their disability. i go through the numbers because it shows an agency with the magnitude of its responsibility making sure that we determine who is eligible for social security, that there is no fraud in social secur

the clerk: nominations, social security administration, carolyn colvin of maryland to be commissioner of social security. mr. reid: there is a cloture motion. i ask the chair to order it reported. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the cloture motion. the clerk: we, the undersigned senators in in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 the standing rules of the senate hereby move to bring to close to debate on the nomination of carolyn colvin to commissioner of social security signed by 18 senators as follows: reid, wyden, mikulski, cardin, murphy, warren, gillibrand, harkin, king, blumenthal, schumer, hirono, klobuchar, boxer, sanders, whitehouse and merkley. mr. reid: madam president? madam president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: a number of senators have come to me indicating that they've read -- the presiding officer: the senate will be in order. mr. reid: they've read the rules and the time for a vote is 15 minutes. through the chair, is it true the extra five minutes is not in the rule? the presiding officer: would the senator restate the las