mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, a number of us are here today with a very simple, straightforward demand. we must act now to pass a dream act. very simply, the honor and integrity of this chamber are at stake. young people who would be covered under the dream act are americans in all but name. they came here as children. they grew up as americans. they go to our schools, serve in our military, and support our economy. they work hard and they give back and they believe in the american dream. deporting dreamers would be cruel and irrational, inhumane, and very simply repugnant to basic american values. just think of jonathan gonzalez cruz. he is a college student at southern connecticut state university. i had the privilege of meeting him in december. his story has stuck with me. his story haunts me when i think of the moral imperative of this nation to pass the dream act. jonathan was born in mexico. he came to this country when he was just 4 years old. the united states is home for him. it's the only coun

mr. blumenthal: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: it thank you, mr. president. i ask that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. i'm here to talk about our fellow americans in puerto rico. even as the northeast is gripped by a storm of impressive proportions, puerto rico is still recovering from the hurricane that hit that island 106 days ago. i visited puerto rico with my friend and colleague senator murphy yesterday and the day before to bring back to my colleagues here a fact-based report on how the recovery effort is going and how ample federal support has been. and i come to the floor today furious and frustrated. and the people of puerto rico have a right to be furious as well. because they have been denied the basic help and relief that this great nation, the greatest in the history of the world, owes to all americans. let there be no doubt the people of puerto rico are our fellow americans. they have fought in our wars, they have come to the mainland and gone bac

mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. i'm here to talk about our sen. blumenthal: i am here to talk our -- about our former -- sen. blumenthal: i am here to talk about our fellow citizens in puerto rico. the hurricane that hit that island 106 days ago. i visited puerto rico with my friend and colleague senator murphy yesterday and the day before to bring back to my colleagues here a fact-based report on how the recovery effort is going and how ample federal support has been. and i come to the floor today furious and frustrated. and the people of puerto rico have a right to be furious as well. because they have been denied the basic help and relief that this great nation, the greatest in the history of the world, owes to all americans. let there be no doubt the people of puerto rico are our fellow americans. they have fought in our wars, they have come to the mainland and gone back, contributing to our communities as well as theirs, they are in our communities in connecticut which has the highest concentration of people from puerto rico and their i did se

mr. blumenthal: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. we are here at an historic moment. the president of the united states will come before us for his first state of the union tonight, at a time when there is a credible case of obstruction of justice against him and an overwhelming case to show that the campaign that elected him was aided and abetted by the russians. but the immediate threat is even more dire. yesterday was a new low for the house intelligence committee. the house republicans, in an act of partisan gutter politics, voted to release a four-page misleading and deceptive characterization of warrants submitted to the foreign intelligence surveillance court. this partisan gutter politics brings us to a dark day of character assassination, much like the mccarthy days, when members of this chamber were counted in history as to whether they stood up and spoke out against this kind of smear campaign. not only i is there character s.a.s. nation at work here -- character assassination at work h

mr. blumenthal: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. we have heard some highly partisan and passionate speeches on the floor of the united states senate and a lot of finger pointing. the american people are done with the blaming and the finger pointing. they want the government to be reopened. and all of us do too. and that's why a number of our colleagues are working hard, and we have been involved, many of us, directly and indirectly in promoting and suggesting possible solutions. reaching across the aisle, working to reach a consensus and to make sure that the government is reopened. the president has been absent. some would say absent without leave, a.w.l., from these negotiations. and ironically he is the only one in america who has referred to this good shutdown. it is a trump shutdown because the president has enabled, indeed encouraged it to happen. and so across the aisle in the united states senate there are efforts to provide leadership and to fill the gap that has been created by a presid

mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, a number of us are here today with a very simple, straightforward demand. we must act now to pass a dream act. very simply, the honor and integrity of this chamber are at stake. young people who would be covered under the dream act are americans in all but name. they came here as children. they grew up as americans. they go to our schools, serve in our military, and support our economy. they work hard and they give back and they believe in the american dream. deporting dreamers would be cruel and irrational, inhumane, and very simply repugnant to basic american values. just think of jonathan gonzalez cruz. he is a college student at southern connecticut state university. i had the privilege of meeting him in december. his story has stuck with me. his story haunts me when i think of the moral imperative of this nation to pass the dream act. jonathan was born in mexico. he came to this country when he was just 4 years old. the united states is home for him. it's the only coun

mr. blumenthal: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: thank you, madam president. madam president, today is a proud but also painful one for me. proud because i am honored and proud to join my distinguished colleague from new hampshire, senator shaheen, and others on the floor. i was proud to join connecticut organizations and advocates this morning in hartford for a rally that involved planned parenthood of southern new england, naral, pro-choice contract, the women'e connecticut, the women's march of connecticut, aids connecticut, proud and steadfast and strong activists who joined me to support a woman's right to determine her medical future, the right of privacy, the constitutional right to be left alone, as one of the supreme court justices once called it. and a proud moment for me also because it reminded me of my days as a law clerk for justice harry blackmun, who was the author of roe v. wade, and who taught me the constitutional principles that underlie a woman's right to determine her own health care decisions. harry

mr. blumenthal: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. we are in the midst of the trump shutdown, aptly named for him because he is the one -- perhaps the only one in america -- who thinks it's a good shutdown. in fact, his head of office of management and budget, mick mulvaney, gloated that it was, quote, kind of cool that he was the one who got to shut down the government. kind of cool, he said on friday in a radio interview. as i speak tonight, all americans know, there is no such thing as a good shutdown. all of us in this body strongly believe that we must end this shutdown. we mark the first year anniversary of the trump presidency with the trump shutdown and his now infamously saying on may 2 that our country needs a good shutdown. but this shutdown has damaging, even potentially devastating, effects on millions of america americans, our troops, whose pay will be delayed, our families who rely on the children's health insurance program and who will soon be without funding, community health cente

mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. and thank you to my colleague, senator whitehouse, for his very insightful summary of the bright, shiny toys and rabbits and rabbit holes that a number of our colleagues have used to distract the judiciary committee and this body from what should be its quest for the truth, that is the truth about russian attacks on our democracy during the last election and potential collusion by americans with that attack, specifically collusion by the trump campaign, and obstruction of justice. indeed obstruction of justice is within the direct purview of the virm. i want to thank my -- judiciary committee. i want to thank my colleague, senator whitehouse, for joining me in a letter we wrote to the chairman of the judiciary committee, senator grassley, asking that he, very simply, make public the transcript of the interview with glen simpson conducted by our staff. senator grassley declined but earlier today senator feinstein released the interview. advancing the american people's right and need to

mr. blumenthal: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: thank you, madam president. madam president, today is a proud but also painful one for me. proud because i am honored and proud to join my distinguished colleague from new hampshire, senator shaheen, and others on the floor. i was proud to join connecticut organizations and advocates this morning in hartford for a rally that involved planned parenthood of southern new england, naral, pro-choice contract, the women'e connecticut, the women's march of connecticut, aids connecticut, proud and steadfast and strong activists who joined me to support a woman's right to determine her medical future, the right of privacy, the constitutional right to be left alone, as one of the supreme court justices once called it. and a proud moment for me also because it reminded me of my days as a law clerk for justice harry blackmun, who was the author of roe v. wade, and who taught me the constitutional principles that underlie a woman's right to determine her own health care decisions. harry

mr. blumenthal: mr. president, every day in america, the greatest nation in the history of the world, children, young women and teenagers are sold for sex. that's not a proud fact about america, but it is the stark reality. every day in america young women, children, and teenagers are trafficked in large part because they are advertised now on the internet. in open, visibly and obviously, even though code words may be used, sometimes doctored photographs, they are sold for sex because the traffickers are able to do so using the internet. we're here to stop it. we're here to stop the trafficking, and most important for today, here to stop the advertising. in support of a measure known as the stop enabling sex traffickers act, sesta, we have a strong bipartisan coalition. this bill is about as bipartisan as any bill is. i worked together with my colleague and friend, senator rob portman of ohio, on this legislation from the very beginning. we have been joined in this effort by two democrats and two republi

mr. blumenthal. >> harris: as we watch what's happening on the senate floor, we will have further from the leaders on the democratic side, chuck schumer and dick durbin just then talking about the fact that what this does and the reason why they are going to vote yes to reopen the government today. part of that was for the senate, most of that was for their constituents i would imagine. the reason they are going to vote yes is they feel now that they have that firm confirmation that it's the end of the continuing resolution period on february 8th, they can bring to the senate floor of a deal for daca and dreamers which they say, and i am going to durbin now, they've gathered the largest group of bipartisan senator support to move on daca and of the dreamers. what will that bill look like? we've been talking about the gang of six and some things with immigration that have been talked about in recent weeks. >> pete: i think the big take away is this is senator chuck schumer blinking. they said they were going to stand up to the president, get a daca bill or shut down the government. they got

mr. blumenthal. neil: i want to explain what is going on here. they are voting on this measure would effectively clear the way for the government eventually to reopen. i also feel compelled to correct something i hear often on, not to politicize this issue, this is the first time government has had a shutdown under one party rule. that is simply not the case, my friend. i don't care whether you're a democrat or republican on this this happened self times under jimmy carter when democrats ruled the house and senate as well. the big difference back then, no government workers were furloughed but the government shut down, not once, not twice, but three different times there. is precedent to this they try to make this seem it is historically unique. it is getting to be historically common, no matter what the shape of government and who controls what branch and when. but the fact of the matter this is not a first for one party rule. the difference now, is that it is extended to government workers getting furloughed. something not an option back in the

mr. chairman. >> i have one question. senator blumenthal has two questions, and then we'll be done with this panel. i'm going to ask mr. lindquist and mr. fine, when dod inspector general issued a report in 2015 showing that the department of defense had serious nics reporting issues, what did the obama administration do in response? either one of you. start out, and then both of you answer it. >> well, i don't know what the obama administration did. we made the recommendations to the services, and it's quite clear that the services did not take appropriate action to follow up on those recommendations. >> mr. lindquist. >> i don't have that answer in front of me, senator. i came into office here in april, so i didn't look back that far to see what was taking place there. >> would you answer in writing? >> we can, yes, sir. >> then i have two questions i'm going to submit to the panel for answer in writing. senator blumenthal. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i will be very brief because we have a panel afterward, but i would like to pursue quest

mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator blumenthal. and we have in our bill safety requirements that address a lot of those concerns that you've voiced today. and i'm hoping that the panel has been influential in getting you to vote for the bill. eventually, when the time comes. i think sen. peters:'s a question. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and you are right we have , thought long and hard safety is foremost, making sure we find the middle ground being careful about making sure these vehicles meet standards before they get onto the road. proving grounds as you talked about as well which we need to have more government involvement as well to make sure you have the resources to test these vehicles. and we'll collect the data as time goes on. and a lot of data collected and it will get better and better. but the question for me is we have to get to the point, mr. klay where we deal with hundreds of deaths on the highways and hundreds of thousands of debilitating injuries. we are on the verge of making major progress to eliminate all of th

mr. chairman? >> thank you, senator young. next up is senator blumenthal. >> thanks, mr. chairman. thank you for holding this hearing, and thank you to this really all-star panel for being here today. mr. watts, i find your testimony absolutely chilling. the internet is a potential monster when it comes to extremists and terrorism. and it requires the kind of inventive and robust investment attitude that in fact created the internet. i have been reading a book called "the innovators" by walter isaacson. and it is an inspiring account of how we came to have the internet and social media involving heroes whose names have been largely lost to history, including some nobel prize winners. but the point that he makes that i think is so relevant to this discussion is that the internet itself is the result of a partnership between private industry and inventors, government, and academia. and those partners are as necessary for this effort in combatting terrorism and extremism as it was in inventing the platforms themselves. i want to join in thanking you for your commitment to net neutrali

security implications of trump's racist remarks in the oval office with senator richard blumenthal in two minutes. >>> mr. president, will you give an apology for the statement yesterday? >> oh, boy. >> mr. president, did you refer to african nations as shitholes? >> mr. president, are you a racist? >> mr. president, can we have your comment -- >> mr. president, will you respond to these serious questions about this statement, sir? >> no, absolutely not. >> we're talking to the president, not you. mr. president, are you a racist? >> while donald trump continues to duck the question of whether he considers himself a racist, house democrats are pushing to publicly reprimand, censure trump, next week for conduct unbecoming a president. they're demanding gop house leaders bring that resolution to the floor. while senator dianne feinstein all but called for the president to resign. "in the president can't control himself and lead this country with the authority, dignity, and leadership it requires, then he shouldn't be the president." with me now is senator richard blumenthal, democrat of connecticut. do you

mr. warner. senators voting in the negative. baldwin, blumenthal, booker, brown, cantwell, casey, durbin, feinstein, graham, harris, hasson, heinrich, cane, king, leahey, menendez, murphy, murray, paul, peters, reed, sanders, shots, schumer, shaheen, smith, stab now, van hol lin, warner, warren, whitehouse and widen. mr. lee, no. mr. jones, aye. mr. tesser, no. mr. gill grabrand, no. >> we heard that senator lindsey graham did vote no. at least one republican vote no. we also just heard senator jon tester vote no. a democrat of montana who was one of the senators the republicans thought they were going to be able to get. this vote is clearly going against the republicans. >> to hear lindsey graham voting no as we just did, jon tester voting no immediately after that call of the roll, at this point it doesn't look like there's a possibility for the republicans in this vote. >> no. i think thenlyhance mitch mcconnell has is slim to none and slim left town. you heard bob casey vote no. i only heard four democrats voting yes and with most of the democr

mr. chairman. >> i have one question, senator blumenthal has two questions, we'll be done with this panel. i'm going to ask, when dod inspector general issued a report showing they have serious nix reporting issues, what did the obama administration do in response? >> either one of you? start out, and then both of you answer it? >> i don't know what the obama administration, we obama administration did. we made the recommendations to the services. and it's quite clear the services did not take the appropriate action to follow up on those recommendations. >> senator, i came in office here in april, so i didn't look back that far to see what was taking place there. >> would you answer in writing? then i'll have to questions i want to submit to the panel for answer in writing. senator bloomenthal. thanks, mr. chairman. and i will be very brief because we have a panel afterwards. let me just say in listening to the testimony from this panel, an excellent panel this morning i am reminded of all of the work i have done and i know other former u.s. attorneys and attorney general have done with t

mr. alcorn: we are adjourned. >> sunday night on afterwards, john newman looks at his 38 year judicial career in his book bench. he is interviewed by richard blumenthal. years, judge of 45 having gone from that active life of making decisions, going to court, and advocating a case, to judging, was that a difficult transition for you, and if you ever miss the life of advocacy? >> it was not difficult. it has been for some i have known. i have on people who became judges and so disliked the decision-making process they left the bench. i was in that the kids. i was glad to be an advocate. i found the decision-making process, while difference, in a loosely challenging and satisfying. while i liked to being an attorney, i like being a judge because the opportunity to resolve disputes, large and small, they all matter to somebody, what some have large public significance, and that is a very satisfying role. >> watch afterwards sunday night at 9:00 eastern on book tv on c-span2. next, a discussion on how to balance free speech with hate speech on

blumenthal. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. and thank you for spending the extra time with us. and being so forthcoming in your responses. i want to come back to some of the questions that have been asked about the vacancies. and the 9% turnover that you described. >> yes. >> has the composition of that turnover or the vacancies changed at all, in other words, are they more physicians, more psychiatrists? i know we've talked about the difficulty of recruiting people in particular specialty to the v.a. >> they do, and they change by location. in montana, our biggest vacancy is physician assistance, so 36% vacancy rate. but we have about 15 occupations that we see as critically hard to hire right now. they are the ones that we've gone to the -- to opm, office of personnel management for direct hire authority that they're working with us on. we have difficulty -- we have 2,428 vacancies for physicians right now. last year we had annette gain of 266. while we're making an improvement, it's only about 10% of the improvement we need. we have 5,507 nurse vacancies right now, last year

mr. trump jr. we didn't know what that was about at the time. but senator richard blumenthal said that whatever donald trump jr. said in those transcripts it's important and should be released, if not to the public at least to the special counsel, should be given to robert mueller, because they say that transcript of what donald jr. said is relevant to mueller's investigation. so what this means, bottom line is that congress is freaking out right now. i mean, whatever you think of the various investigations or lack thereof on the russian scandal and congress, there is a wide scale, fast-paced freakout happening in both the house and senate as of today. and it's creating a lot of pressure to publicly release stuff the public has not yet seen. and i don't know if we'll ultimately get those documents. i don't know what is causing that freakout, but we have had a ton of developments on this story in the last 36 hours, and maybe all of this stuff is starting to flood out all at once, but it really does feel like it's happening all of a sudden for a reason. and one of the reporters

mr. chairman, i'd like to have the blumenthal grassley letter and university of iowa report put in the record. >> without objection. >> a year ago i think it was in the omnibus appropriation bill, a group of doctors and house of representatives tried to gut this legislation. we prevented that. so very simple question to you, will you commit to continuing to collect and post all the data currently available on the open payments website? >> yes, senator grassley. as you know, i'm a big supporter of the sunshine act and your work there and supported it at the time you had first proposed it. i think that transparency is extremely helpful. >> yeah. my second and last question, since the epipen misclassification fiasco, i focused a lot of my oversight on medicaid drug rebate program. in the course of my oversight, i found that during the obama administration, cms did not properly oversee the program causing billions in taxpayer dollar losses. for just the epipen, the taxpayers may have lost out on more than a billion dollars. it's kind of this way. one in 7/10 billion lost but doj record $75 billio

mr. chairman. >> senator, we have a task force looking at all of the requirements to hire people, how we can streamline those, both regulatory and that we can get onboard. >> i want to apologize to senator blumenthal because obviously, there is an event on the floor of the senate, which i know he's very interested in. and so -- >> if i may, mr. chairman. i'll submit my questions for the record, and i hope we'll get prompt responses focusing on, among other issues, on the huey replacement program. thank you, mr. chairman. >> i thank the witnesses. this has been very helpful. again, i hope the message is from this committee to you, is that we want to work with you. we also have our responsibilities. and we will try to carry those out as well. so i think this hearing has been very helpful, including the recent one we just had, and i thank the witnesses for their willingness to help. and this crowded hearing will adjourn. >> well, thanks, heather. >> here's what's ahead this afternoon and into the even on c-span3. up next, the senate judiciary committee reviews legislation to tighten gun background checks including banning devices designed to increase the firing rate. dianne feinstein is sponsoring th

richard blumenthal/(d) connecticut"there's a credible case of obstruction of justice against the president of the united states."cnn has learned that in recent weeks mr. trump has been complaining about wanting to fire deputy attorney general rod rosenstein as well. rosenstein oversees mueller and the special counsel investigation. the new york times reports that the controversial memo, spearheaded by house intelligence chairman devin nunes, reveals that rosenstein approved an application to extend the surveillance of former trump campaign associate carter page last spring. indicating "that republicans may be moving to seize on rosenstein's role as they seek to undermine" the special (pam) that was kaitlan collins reporting. and we will have complete coverage of the state of the union.... we are (pam) that was kaitlan collins reporting. and we will have complete coverage of the state of the union.... we are airing the president's speech tomorrow night at 6:00. (steve) a live look outside right now... (pam) as we get our first look at the four zone forecast with chief meteorologist lawrence karnow. lawrence karnow: there were plenty of high clouds tod

senators blumenthal and portman and others operating in and i believe that it is a step in the right direction but the senate bill is not the full solution. backpage.com is currently asked mr. doyle stated the largest of the websites that facilitate trafficking in america, but it is already under federal investigation. and it is just a small, small piece, small piece of this growing criminal echo system. hundreds, let me underscore, hundreds of advertising sites have jumped into the marketplace of illegal sex pic for instance, arrows serves as a high-end market. s-corps in college advertises women close to and under the age of consent. and massage troll is sadly popular in my own district. thanks your senator portman investigation of wealth of evidence against backpage.com has been discovered over the past year and while it may now be possible, though still in kobe difficult to prove that backpage.com knowingly, is not possible to gather this level of evidence for the hundreds of others websites that are profiting from the sex trade. i have spoken with prosecutors across the country who had asked the house to pass a practical solution that will allow them to take predatory