cicillin mr. speaker, i move touspend the rules an ps.r. 2938, th honoring american ters and extreme need haven act o2019, as amended. the speaker pro tempore: the clerk will report the title of the bill. the crk: h.r. 2938, a bill to exempt from the calculation of monthly incom certain benefi paid by the department veterans affairs and the department of defse. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant t theule, the gentleman from rhode island, mr. cicilline, and the geneman fromirnia, mr. kline, each will -- m kline, ach ll control 20 minutes. the cha recognizes the gentleman from rhode island. mr. cicillin thank you, mr. eaker. i a unanimous consenthat all members may have five legislate days to vise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on e bill under consideration. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. cicilline: i yield myself uchime as i may consume. the overriding principle of the bankptcy system is to give people ovehelmed with unimginable debt a freshtart throh meani

cicilline: mr. speaker, i move to suspend the rules and pass h.r. 2336, the family farmer relief act of 2019, as amended. the speaker pro tempore: the clerk will report the title of the bill. the clerk: h.r. 2336, a bill to amend title xi, united states code, with respect to the definition of family farmer. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from rhode island, mr. cicilline, and the gentleman from wisconsin, mr. sensenbrenner, each will control 20 minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from rhode island. mr. cicilline: mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent that all members have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the bill under consideration. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. cicilline: i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. cicilline: mr. speaker, h.r. 2336, the family farmer relief act of 2019, would increase the current debt limit used t

cicilline. nobody would tell some west virginian from scotch irish background to go back to scotland or northern ireland. nobody would think of that because they're white. >> that's right. >> it's so obvious. >> it's so obvious, and what's so disappointing is you look at the president's language. you look at his policies. this is clearly racism, and that was an opportunity for everyone to stand up and say enough is enough. we need to move forward on a whole range of important policy issues. we've passed 230 pieces of legislation that are sitting on mitch mcconnell's desk. we have lots of work to do for the american people. but it would have been very helpful today if everyone in the congress said this is not america, this is not acceptable and condemned and voted to condemn the president for what he did. and it was very disappointing that we only had four republicans that were willing to add their voices to this. this is -- doesn't reflect who we are as a country. we cannot let the president say

cicilline ne of -- of rhode island. the chair: the chair recognizes the gentleman from rhode island for five minutes. mr. cicilline: the republic of cyprus has played a role in combatting terrorism and proliferation. the united states participates in joint exercises including multinational search and rescue and we coordinate training programs for cyprus, cybersecurity, counterterrorism and maritime safety and security. through information sharing, training programs and other international initiatives, the united states and cyprus work hand in hand to combat terrorist activity in europe. the united states works with cyprus to stop weapons of mass u.s. tion and in 2015 joined cyprus as members of the proliferation security initiative in co-hosting a work shop focusing on inspecting and identifying proliferation material. despite the partnership between our two countries, the united states has had an arms embargo in place since 1997. this policy was to prevent turkey to use weapons and provide for reunification talks. howe

cicilline: good morning. house democrats promised the american people in the last election that if you gave us the responsibility of leadership again, we would fight for the people against the special interests and we would deliver on the important priorities of the american people. driving down health care costs, driving down the cost of prescription drugs, raising family incomes as we rebuild the infrastructure of america, and taking on the corruption and self-dealing in washington and getting the government to work for the people of this country again. we are delivering on those promises. today, we mark 200 days in the majority. we passed nearly 400 pieces of legislation, 50 major bills. this is the most productive house in modern history. last week, we voted to give a raise to 34 million americans. guaranteed equal pay for equal work. 10 bills to drive down the costs of prescription drugs and protect coverage for pre-existing conditions. and, the biggest and most comprehensive anti-corruption bill seen in

sorry, cicilline. tell me this. when you're looking at tomorrow, what is the most important thing you think mueller has to speak to, outside of the discreet issue about lewandowski? >> i think the special counsel has to make clear, first of all, the investigation did not exonerate the president of the united states. that, in fact, there are specific instances of obstruction of justice. and obstruction of justice is a serious offense that goes to the heart of our criminal justice system. >> do you think he says, no collusion, no obstruction, and then answers the opposite of that? >> i think he's going to make it clear that his report says, in fact, there is not sufficient evidence to prove a criminal conspiracy between the trump campaign and the russians. that is different than saying no collusion. there's a lot of evidence that the trump campaign welcomed that assistance from the russians, benefited from that assistance. so i think he'll walk through that. i think he will also say that with respect to obstruction of

. >> thank you, chairman cicilline and members of the committee. i really appreciate this opportunity to participate in this hearing and this historically important investigation. america's independent businesses are in trouble. they are declining rapidly across many sectors of the economy. and it's not because they can't compete. on the contrary, research shows that in many sectors they actually outperform their rivals on many measures including price. whether the evidence suggests that the problem can be traced to changes in policy, and particularly our antitrust enforcement that have allowed a few dominant corporations to consolidate markets and given them free rein to hobble their smaller competitors. this is magnified in our digital markets. a handful of dominant players now act as gatekeepers. amazon in particular. last year amazon captured about 1 of every $2 that americans spend online. the more consequential measure of its marketing power is half of all online shopping searches start on amazon's platform. what this means is that for virtua

when you talk to lawmakers and david cicilline, the chairman of the committee and say what do you thinkill come out about this, he says, look, i don't know. it is difficult to know until we know what the problem is what the solution will be. but he has leaned in the direction of saying there is bipartisan concern and maybe we could move some laws forward. some folks say they may be interested in doing that. you can tweak how mergers are looked at. or what they cost, to be examined by the ftc. those sorts of things can change the competitive landscape even though they are little. that might be something the committee is looking to do. emily: in what direction is the ball going to go? some of these are shorter-term sentiment issues. and of course the antitrust investigation by the ftc could take five or 10 years. if such an investigation happened. what do you see happening over the shorter-term versus the longer-term? >> i think the role of the congressional investigation is really important. because antitrust can take a long time. and these markets move quickly. what i am looking for fro

cicilline. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from rhode island is recognized for two minutes. mr. cicilline: i thank the gentleman for yielding. i rise in strong support of h.r. 582, the raise the wage act. americans are working harder than ever and labor productivity is overperforming expectations. however, the profit of this increased product pivity -- productivity is not being felt in the checkbooks of working people. the american workers have experienced a pay cut in real income due to inflation and the government's failure to raise wages. it is unconscionable that people working full time in the wealthiest nation in the history of the world are unable to afford basic essentials or live in poverty. that's why it's critical that we pass the raise the wage act. here are the facts. the bill will increase wages for nearly 34 million american workers. about 28% of workers in my own district in rhode island will get a raise of about $2,100 a year. it will lift 1.3 million americans out of pov

cicilline of rhode island. the chair: a is a request for recorded vote oned -- a recorded vote has been requested. those in support of the request for recorded vote will rise and be counted. a sufficient number having arisen, a recorded vote is ordered. members will record their votes by electronic device. this is a two-minute vote. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of representatives. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u.s. house of representatives.] the chair: on this vote the 254 -- the chair: on this vote the eas are -- the chair: on this vote the -- are 253 the chair: on this vote the yeas are 252. the nays are 173. the amendment is adopted. the unfinished business is the request for a recorded vote on amendment number 29 printed in part b of house report 116-143 by the gentleman from new york, on which further proceedings were po

amy: on tuesday, democratic congressmember david cicilline of rhode island questioned the associate generalounsel at amazon, nate sutton. oftry to give you an example notch printer who create a better set of headphones. sells it on amazon. great for her and great for amazon because the more people to become amazon prime customers to buy this product. instead of seeing the fruits of her success, this hard-working rhode island are discovers amazon has rolled out a direct replica of her product. amazon gives itself top billing and to moats the entrepreneur to page through results, which most people will never see. how would anyone in light of that sequence of events, how would any entrepreneur invest in this kind of environment where that can happen, where there is no assurance it won't? >> our incentive is doubt ththe seller succeeded. they have many options. we apply the same criteria to vote and we do not use their individual data when we're making decisions to launch private brands. nate sutton answering the questions of the rhode island congress membeber david cicilll. stacy y mitchell, u

democrat david cicilline, who sits on the house judiciary committee, weighing in on that.will not be easy. we just have to be very smart about how we use the time, and really give a special counsel the time to tell the story." meanwhile, democrats trying to manage expectations on mueller's testimony. california democrat jerrod hoffman said this. "i think it's unlikely to see little more than a book on tape, where he cites the report that he wrote and refuses to go beyond the four corners." that's because that what he told us. that he would take more questions on this and go and you are new with mueller. >> alex: what more is the specter going to tell us? the man laid it out and report that cost the american taxpayers millions of dollars. it took many months. it took incredible resources. the best legal talent in this country has to offer, to dress to get all of this, and it was put out that the russians had interfered in our elections but had not included with the trump campaign to do so. i think the american people are going to look at this and they are going to look up a

i had david cicilline on from rhode island. it's not him i don't like. he said the interference matters so much. people have to know that and understand how bad it was. i said here's the problem. you all know that and you've done nothing about it. he goes we passed hr-1 -- all ha matters are laws, not bills. either you can make a deal and show something can get done or people are going to get upset. mueller can't argue a lot of those points tomorrow. what he can do is tell you what he found and why they found it. and he can explain a few things that are outside the corners of that report that really matter. >> i also agree that i think he can actually bring the mueller report to life. >> yeah, he can. >> because people don't -- >> who's going to read it? >> we barely have time to read all this stuff. >> 3% they safety population read it. and that's people probably lying in favor of having read it. you don't want to say you didn't read it. 3% say they read it. >> don't you think the expectation, especially from the democrats, that it may be -- i mean the

. >> harris: and i mentioned cheering, you've got people like congressman david cicilline of rhode island talking about kind of tearing down how he got there in the first place, acosta. i just remind everybody, eat democrats doing all of those republican senators to confirm alex acosta as labor secretary. >> chris: and alex acosta is a moderate. he was not the kind of conservative hard-charger that a lot of republicans wanted to see in the department of labor. they wanted the flaming sword out against big labor and those things, and acosta was quite moderate. that's part of the reason democrats not only voted to confirm them but protected him. this case, this plea deal, has been hanging over them for years. he was not a suitable choice for this job, in fact, because of this plea deal. it was a known fact. if it wasn't for the reporting of the "miami herald," the good investigative reporting that reopen this thing, i don't think epstein would be facing these charges today and i think acosta would still be labor secretary. >> harris: jessica? >> jessica: i agree completely. julie kate brown

allegations that they are monopolies just this afternoon the congressman leading the effort, david cicilline, criticized the answers as evasive, incomplete or misleading. now the justice department is launching its own review it is not officially an investigation of any single company but it could lead to that back to you. >> ylan, you know, a couple of months back or maybe a month ago we heard news that they were divvying what we cull big technology this specific release though says dominant online platforms which leads you to think that apple may not be included in this group. >> well, it is unclear at this point. they don't name any specific company names in the release, but one thing that was decided on earlier, we thought, was who would have jurisdiction over these companies. these are big reviews, big companies, complex issues, and it seemed that the regulators had agreed to split that up. now this review appears to go beyond that and be bigger than that are there going to be turf battles that could perhaps jeopardize the speediness of these reviews and inquiries? we will certainly hav

. >> chairman cicilline, ranking member sensenbrenner, distinguished members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. my name is adam cohen and i'm director of economic policy at google. in my role, i lead our public policy work on antitrust issues. google was founded in 1998 by 2 students who had a big idea. organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. in their earliest form, google search results were simply ten blue links on a web page. 20 years later, we provide our users with much richer results including direct answers to questions, pinpoints on a map when they search for a address and direct links to flights, products and other information. as a responsible and sack sis l f sauccessful company -- we're proud offer record of continued innovation. we face constant pressure to improve our products and services, both sure signs of a competitive marketplace. i'll focus on the power of google and wider technology sector with creating for the u.s. economy. our investments in new technologies and entry's competitive

let's bring in a member of the judiciary committee, democratic congressman david cicilline of rhode islandwhat are the questions that you hope will be asked, that you plan to put to the table that will help american voters, the american people better understand what happened? and is it potentially your point of view that this could be a difficult road in terms of what those questions might be and what exactly the answers are that you could get? >> well, i think it's important that mr. mueller make it clear to the american people that he did not exonerate the president from the offenses of obstruction of justice, that obstruction of justice is a serious charge that really strike at the core of our judicial system and then he walked the american people through the actual evidence that the president directed the white house counsel to fire the special counsel, then he directed him to lie about it and even generated a fake document or a report to memorialize that lie. that he instructed a third party, corey lewandowski, to go tell the attorney general to tell the special counsel to limit his i

cicilline. the chair: the gentleman is recognized. mr. cicilline: i thank the gentleman for yielding and rise in support of the en bloc package. i want to thank chairman smith and ranking member thornberry for their support of two amendments i have offered, particularly my amendment declaring the statutory right of service members under the statutory relief act. for too long, forced arbitration clauses buried deep in fine print of everyday contracts have blocked service members from having a day in court to hold companies accountable. service members could serve in the national guard, be called for duty, and be fired on the st day they were due to work before deploying. and because of the contract, they couldn't take them to court. the forced arbitration clauses an ed companies to choose ar by ter. this bipartisan amendment would end this shameful practice by declaring arbitration clauses agreed enforceable if to after a dispute arises. colleagues, k my for their strong bipartisan support for this amendment to protect our men and women in

cicilline: and the three bipartisan bills -- mr. cisneros: and the three bipartisan bills. i am most proud of the constituent services in my district. in just 200 days in office, we have retrieved over $190,000 from federal agencies for our constituents and worked on over 250 cases. i work for the people of my district. it's in what i have attended hundreds of local events and met with thousands of my constituents. i look forward to the next 100 days and beyond working for the people, bringing change to washington, d.c., and ensuring i give my constituents a representation they deserve. thank you, and i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition? mr. lamalfa: i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. lamalfa: mr. speaker, today the democrats got their wish and special counsel robert mueller testified before not one, but two, house

cicilline? sasol will votes aye. mr. raskin? aye.askin votes miss deming? ms. korea -- mr. korea? mr. korea votes aye. ms. scanlan votes aye. ms. garcia? ms. garcia votes aye. ye. negus votes a mcbeth voteas aye. mr. stanton votes aye. votes aye.hur powell miss escobar votes aye. mr. collins votes no. mr. sensenbrenner? mr. schappert -- chabot? mr. gummer? mr. gummer votes no. mr. jordan votes no. mr. buck votes no. mr. radcliffe? miss robie? miss robie votes no. miss gates? johnson of louisiana? mr. big? mr. biggs votes no. mr. mcclintock? mr. mcclintock votes no. ms. lesko votes no. mr. rush and dollar? mis-direction taller votes no. mr. klein votes no. mr. armstrong? mr. armstrong votes no. mr. stu b? mr. steve b votes no. >> the gentleman from new york? >> mr. jeffrey votes aye. >> the gentleman from washington? >> votes aye. >> has every member voted that wishes to vote? critical report. >> mr. chairman, there are 21 ayes, and 12 no's. >> the ayes have it. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. vi

cicilline? mr. raskin? mr. raskin votes aye. ms. jayapal? ms. deming? mr. korea votes aye. ms. scanlan votes aye. ms. garcia? ms. garcia votes aye. mr. negus votes aye. ms. mcbath votes aye. mr. stanton votes aye. ms. macarthur powell votes aye. ms. escobar votes aye. mr. collins votes no. mr. sensenbrenner? mr. chabot? mr. gombert votes no. mr. jordan votes no. mr. buck votes no. mr. radcliffe? ms. robie votes no. mr. gates? mr. johnson of louisiana? mr. biggs votes no. mr. mcclintock? mr. mcclintock votes no. ms. lesko votes no. mr. russian dollar -- mr. -- mr. kleinr votes no. mr. armstrong? mr. armstrong votes no. >> the gentleman from new york? >> mr. jeffrey votes aye. >> the gentleman from -- gentlelady from washington? >> votes aye. >> has every member voted that wishes to vote? the clerk will report. >> mr. chairman, there are 21 ayes, and 12 no's. >> the ayes have it. the resolution is amended as agreed to. ♪ >> c-span's washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. coming up friday morning, clifford monday will join us to talk about t

cicilline. mr. swalwell. >> aye. >> mr. swalwell votes aye. mr. raskin. >> aye. >> mr. raskin votes aye. ms. demings. mr. core rayia. >> aye. >> ms. scanlon. >> aye. >> ms. scanlon votes aye. >> ms. garcia. >> mr. neguse. >> aye. >> ms. mcbeth. >> aye. >> mr. stanton. >> aye. >> mr. stanton votes aye. ms. dean. >> aye. >> ms. dean votes aye. ms. powell. >> aye. >> missessms. escobar. >> mr. collins. >> no. >> mr. gomer. >> no. >> mr. jordan. >> no. >> mr. jordan votes no. >> mr. buck. >> no. >> mr. buck votes no. >> mr. radcliffe. ms. roby. >> ms. roby votes no. >> mr. gates. mr. johnson of louisiana. mr. biggs. mr. biggs votes no. mr. mcclinton. >> no. >> mr. mcclinton votes no. ms. lesko. >> no. >> mr. rugs that you willer. >> no. >> mr. klein votes no. >> mr. armstrong. >> no. >> mr. armstrong votes no. mr. steube. >> mr. steube votes no. >> the gentleman from new york. >> aye. >> mr. jeff frees votes aye. >> gentle lady from washington. >> aye. >> ms. jie opal votes aye. >> has every member voted who wishes to vote? the clerk will report. mr. chairman, there are 21