mr. durbin: mr. president? the presiding officer: the assistant democratic leader. mr. durbin: mr. president, if we are in suspension -- i ask to suspend the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. durbin: mr. president, it is difficult to believe that it's happening, but i've seen it. it was about three weeks ago. i was in el paso, texas. i went down to see what was happening at our border. you can't escape all the stories that have been written about the number of people who have been coming to our border and what's happening to them. i wanted to see for myself. i saw what was a detention facility for people who had been stopped at the border. it was a cell -- there was a cell with a plate-glass window so you could see everything inside. above the door of the cell it said, capacity 35. and i looked inside, took the time to slowly count, and i counted 150 men in that cell, standing shoulder to shoulder. a few of them could sit on the benches on the side of the walls. 150. there wa

mr. durbin: last month, mr. president, on friday, april 12, i visited the port of entry in el paso, texas. it's known as paseo del norte. and a nearby border patrol station known as station number one. what i saw was heart breaking. the migrants who presented themselves at our border are being detained in cramped cells known as hellaros, spanish for the word icebox. these are metal-sided detention rooms which the detainees complain are kept painfully cold. the sign above one door -- one of these detention room doors read capacity 35. i took a few minutes and counted the number of men in that cell. the capacity may have been 35, but there were over 150 men standing in that cell. one toilet. the large, heavy glass window on the cell gave me a clear view of the detainees. but for a few benches along the walls which accommodate a very small number, there is literally no room to sit or lie down. meals are provided to the standing migrants to eat in the cell. many wait for up to three weeks in this so-called icebox to

mr. durbin: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from illinois. mr. durbin: madam president, i see another colleague on the floor, so i will make my comments brief. madam president, we had a briefing this week in a room in the capitol where the public is not allowed to enter. it's called the scif. it is a briefing that is given to members of the senate of top-secret classified information. it related to the situation we now find ourselves in in relation to iran. it was troubling, troubling to hear the comments being made by the leaders of the trump administration, secretaries of defense and the secretary of state as well as military leaders and leaders in the intelligence community, because you see what we are engaging in in the united states is a confrontation with iran. we are moving toward that. it started with this president's insistence that the united states step away from a treaty entered into by the obama administration to stop the development of nuclear weapons in iran. what president obama succeeded in doing over many years of diplomatic effo

mr. durbin. rbin: thank you, mr. chairman. some spokesmen, even president, -- even though president, claim 3% of asylum-seekers and 2% of immigrants attend immigration courts. can anyone shed light on the statistics that have been used? i don't -- kierstin nielsen said as secretary asylum-seekers more , than not failed to appear in immigration court. have any of you heard that? ms. asher: thank you, senator. what i have heard that -- better? yeah? what i can tell you is the overwhelming majority of individuals, particularly family members who are coming across in fact are not attending even their first hearings. the situation that we have, just sort of piggybacking on the ripple effect of the sheer volume of individuals coming across, i don't have the capacity, as you well know to , house family members beyond what is restricted there in texas. sen. durbin: i hate to interrupt you, but i have got to stop this right now. in fiscal year 2018 the department of justice figures show 89% of all asylum advocates attended their final

durbin. >> thanks mr. chairman. it appears my colleagues are going to work together on the lock her up defense what about travel gate, whitewater. there's a lot of material we should be going through according to their response to this that is totally unresponsive to the reality of what the american people want to know. they paid a lot of money, $25 million for this report. i want m i respect mr. mueller. i find some of the things you be engaged in leave me wondering what you believe your role as attorney general is when it comes to something like this. listen to what -- since its put in the record, let me read it. listen to what you received in a letter on march 27th from bob mueller. march 24th, did not fully capture the context, nature and substance of the office's work and conclusions. we communicated that concern to the department on the morning of march 25th. there is now public confusion about critical aspects of the results of our investigation. this threatens to undermine a central purpose are for which the

mr. owen. >> good afternoon, chairman cornyn, senator durbin, members of the committee. my honor to testify. by testimony this afternoon we'll focus specifically on the current situation we're experiencing along our southwest border with mexico. as america's unified border security agency cbp has four priority missions, national security, counter-narcotics, economic security, and facilitation of lawful trade and travel. every day along our southwest border with mexico, over 535,000 travelers enter the united states through one of the 42 lawful border crossings. each day 215,000 privately owned vehicles, 450 commercial buses and 2100 commercial trucks and railcars arrive from mexico. each of these pathways presents differing levels of risk to our national security, our public safety and our economic prosperity. the volumes of crossing we see each day along our southern border ports of entry along with outdated and inadequate facilities presents clear operational challenges for field leadership. decisions must be made daily on how best to allocaternel, technology and finan

mr. graham: i think -- i talked with senator durbin yesterday. we've had our moments. but dick durbin knows this topic as well as anybody i've ever met. i think senator durbin understands this is a crisis, it's going to get worse. and here's what to think about. if we do nothing, what's it going to look like next year? can you imagine if these trends continue, by the summer of 2020. i think congress has been put on notice by the experts. and if you think this is a trump-created problem, you really just hate trump. because this problem has been long in the making before trump got here. as a republican, if you think we can just do this by building a wall, you're wrong. so, my hope is that the pressure from the national security point of view, the humanitarian crisis , some allegiance to the men and women that we task to do this job will compel us to act. reporter: in the past, you have shown you are able to reach agreement with democrats on compromises. every time the administration has gotten involved in these immigration discussions the last two years -- [inaudible] --

durbin next. >> thank you mr. chairman. innovation, it appears there is more innovation among lawyers dealing with patent and medical researchers. i cannot believe that what we started off with in the constitution with a patent right for obvious reasons has now been so convoluted and distorted that we have reached the point we have reached today. i have listened to some suggestions there. i think we are dangerously close to building a bipartisan consensus about change. it rarely happens around here. it may just happen in this circumstance. mr. stansel you have an unenviable task dissenting from most of the views that have been expressed. let's address for the moment direct to consumer advertising. how many countries in the world allow pharmaceutical companies to put ads on television in the media? >> i believe there are two. >> to know the other one? >> new zealand. >> new zealand and the usa. to have any idea how much is spent by pharma on television advertising? >> i don't have that figure. >> $6 billion per year. the ave

durbin? >> thank you, mr. chairman and general barr. i have been listening carefully to my republican colleagues, and it seems they're going to coordinate a lock her up defense. this is not about the mueller investigation, the russian involvement, the trump campaign and so forth, it is really about hillary clinton's e-mails. finally question get down to the bottom line. hillary clinton's e-mails, questions have to be asked about benghazi along the way, travelgate, white swwater, a lo of material they should be going through for this nap is unresponsive to the reality that the american people want to know. they paid $25 million for the report. i respect mr. mueller and believe he came up with a sound report. i don't agree with all of it, but i find general barr that some of the things you engaged in really leave me wondering what you believe your role is when it comes to something like this. listen to what, since it is in the record, let me read it and listen to what you received in a letter on march 27th from bob mueller, the letter did

senator dick durbin: according to mr. mueller and his report, this involvement of george papadopoulos had something to do with their conclusion. i would like to ask you a separate issue. it's been reported in april 16 you received a waiver to participate in the investigation and litigation of the so-called 1mdb matter. an investigation regarding money laundering. the u.s. attorneys for the eastern district of new york is investigating whether a malaysian nationally illegally donated to the trumpet inaugural committee with money taken from 1-mdb. you saw a waiver to participate even though your former lawyer represents an entity involved in the representation, goldman sachs. how many waivers have you received to allow you to bridges -- to participate in investigations involved in trump business is the trump campaign or the trump inaugural committee? atty. gen. barr: none. senator durbin: you did seek a waiver in this case? atty. gen. barr: the impetus did not come for me. i was asked to seek a waiver in this case. senator

senator durbin: i'll just say this, mr. barr, if you received a letter from bob mueller afew days after your march 24 letter, it was clear he had genuine concerns about what you had said and done to that point. we'll move to another topic. atty. gen. barr: i would analogize it to this. after months' long trial if i wanted to get out to the public what the verdict was, pending preparation of the full transcript, then i'm out there saying here's the verdict, and the prosecutor comes up and taps me on the shoulder and says, well, the verdict doesn't fully capture all my work. how about that great cross-examination i did, or how about that third day of trial where i did that, this doesn't capture everything. my answer to that is i'm not trying to capture everything. i'm trying to state the verdict. senator durbin: you used the word summarize in the letter. atty. gen. barr: summarized the principal conclusions. senator durbin: the office 6 legal counsel's decision as to whether or not you can prosecute a sitting president, you h

durbin: thank you, mr. chairman. iit appears there is more innovation around lawyers dealing with patents and medical researchers. i cannot believe that when we started with a patent law for obvious reasons has now becomes so convoluted and distorted that we have reached the point we today.ached i listened to some of the suggestions here and i think we are dangerously close to building a bipartisan consensus around change, really happens here, but it may just happen in this circumstance. you have the enviable task, mr. stansel, dissenting from most of the views expressed. let's address for the moment direct-to-consumer advertising. how many countries in the world -- i love how much local companies to put ads on television for pharmaceuticals in the media. >> i believe there are two. 's event and the united states of america. sen. durbin: do not how much is spent on advertising? >> no. >> $6 billion a year. they have any idea what the most heavily advertised drug is on television? sen. durbin: it is humira. we have ta

mr. carper, the ranking member of jurisdiction who oversees some of what we are talking about, richard neal, our distinguished them accredit leader in the --,e and the steny hoyer steny hoyer. where is dick durbin? the senate whip. whatever the title is in the senate. >> number two. >> debbie stabenow, a leader in michigan. speaker from new mexico. our distinguished democratic whip of the house, mr. clyburn the chair of transportation infrastructure committee. mr. defazio. and the top democrat on the finance committee and the united states, senator ron wyden. so we came with heft, commitment, knowledge, and hopefully a shared vision of greeting this great jobs , iniative for our country the spirit of president eisenhower when he instituted the interstate highway system. it was important for jobs and mobility. it was a national security initiative, and it was bipartisan. lyndon johnson and sam rayburn in the house and senate, president of the united states, dwight eisenhower. we had hoped that we could do something comparable. unfortunately, the president is not ready for that. thank you very much. we have been listening to speaker pelosi and minority doder schumer, and improv news conference wh

durbin. and they've invested energies in this effort and we pledge to work with all of them and we can come together on behalf of our young people. with that, mr. president, i thank you for the time and thank you to the majority leader and leave the floor. >> and the senate about to gavel in continuing debate on judicial nominations, this aftern a

durbin? >> thank you, mr. chairman and general barr. i have been listening carefully to my republican colleagues, and it seems they're going to coordinate a lock her up defense. this is not about the mueller investigation, the russian involvement, the trump campaign and so forth, it is really about hillary clinton's e-mails. finally question get down to the bottom line. hillary clinton's e-mails, questions have to be asked about benghazi along the way, travelgate, white swwater, a lo of material they should be going through for this nap is unresponsive to the reality that the american people want to know. they paid $25 million for the report. i respect mr. mueller and believe he came up with a sound report. i don't agree with all of it, but i find general barr that some of the things you engaged in really leave me wondering what you believe your role is when it comes to something like this. listen to what, since it is in the record, let me read it and listen to what you received in a letter on march 27th from bob mueller, the letter did

mr. secretary, we have to leave it there. >> thank you, ma'am. >> brennan: we turn now to the number-two democrat in the senate, dick durbin of illinois.joins thus morning from chicago. senator, i want to get to a number of domestic issues. you have visited venezuela within the past few years. do you support the administration's approach? >> i support with their approach. i don't agree with lindsey graham. i am not in favor of military intervention. i can tell you i listened to secretary of state pompeo trying to explain this president's conversation with vladimir putin, and i just don't get it. this president is totally dazzled by vladimir putin, by the crown prince of saudi arabia, by authoritarian lead centers countries like brazil. he gets on the phone with them and he loses it. he gets all googly eyed over their assertions they have nothing to do with what's going on in venezuela. listen to what john bolton says. listen to what secretary of state pompeo said. russia has sent at least a planeload full of these little green men that we've seen in eastern ukraine, and they are destabilizing the situation there. they're there to suppo

mr. carpenter, the ranking member on the committee of jurisdiction that oversee what's we're talking about here. richie neal, the chair of the ways and means committee and steny hoyer. where's dick durbin? senate whip, whatever the title is in the senate -- >> number 2. >> debby stabenow of michigan, a leader on all of these issues in her committees in the congress. our assistant speaker, the whip of the house, democratic whip, mr. clyburn. chair of the -- i love saying chair. the chair of the transportation infrastructure committee appropriate to this discussion, mr. defazzio and the top democrat on the finance committee in the united states senate, ron widen. so we came with commitment, with knowledge, with hopefully shared vision of creating a great jobs initiative for our country and the spirit of. eisenhower when he instituted the highway -- the interstate highway system. it was important for jobs and mobility. it was a national security initiative. it was bipartisan. lyndon johnson and same rayburn and the house and senate, president of the united states, dwight eisenhower. we hoped we could do something comparable. unfortunately the president isn't ready for that. thank you all

mr. asken, i'm a survivor of cancer. four years ago, i was diagnosed with stage 4 chronic lympho sattic leukemia. i took a pill that keeps me alive. senator durbin said to me recently because he knows of my health struggles, he said how is your health. and i said fine, dick, i have a pill in my pocket i take every day and it keeps me alive. and he said how much does it cost? and he said $400 and he said that's outrageous and i said not to me, it keeps me alive. my oncologist said 15 years ago somebody who came in with the same diagnosis and we would sprinkle some water on your forehead and say good luck. now the live expectancy is 85 merz if you can get through the first five years and i'm almost there. and a lot of this as i've become familiar with it and gone to nih actually was developed with taxpayer dollars. a doctor who worked for the army for years and is now at ohio state, that dr. moynihan, the key person. and most of his research was taxpayer-funded. much of the deployment. i went over to nih and met with these young people making 60, $65,000 a year that went to hopkins and stanford and harvard. and they're working at nih, because that

mr. asken, i'm a survivor of cancer. four years ago, i was diagnosed with stage 4 chronic lympho sattic leukemia. i took a pill that keeps me alive. senator durbin said to me recently because he knows of my health struggles, he said how is your health. and i said fine, dick, i have a pill in my pocket i take every day and it keeps me alive. and he said how much does it cost? and he said $400 and he said that's outrageous and i said not to me, it keeps me alive. my oncologist said 15 years ago somebody who came in with the same diagnosis and we would sprinkle some water on your forehead and say good luck. now the live expectancy is 85 merz if you can get through the first five years and i'm almost there. and a lot of this as i've become familiar with it and gone to nih actually was developed with taxpayer dollars. a doctor who worked for the army for years and is now at ohio state, that dr. moynihan, the key person. and most of his research was taxpayer-funded. much of the deployment. i went over to nih and met with these young people making 60, $65,000 a year that went to hopkins and stanford and harvard. and they're working at nih, because that

mr. durbin: i'd have to hear more about that. i can tell you that the situation in iraq and afghanistan is hard to imagine, that we are this many years after our entry into waters in those -- wars in those country, still present with no resolution. i didn't know that we were going into afghanistan for the longest war in the history of the united states. as far as iraq is concerned, it is still a situation of turmoil. eporter: [inaudible] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2019] >> tom president trump discusses his plan more -- tomorrow, president trump discusses his plan for modernizing the immigration system in a speech from the white house rose garden. you can watch that tomorrow night at 8:00 eastern here on c-span it. will also be available online at -span.org. >> c-span's newest book, "the presidents: noted historians rank america's best and worst chief executives." provides

mr. durbin: it's my understanding that senator graham's proposal is the white house proposal. and i know that it's going to be closely scrutinized. we want to make sure that there's humanitarian treatment of those who present themselves at our borders. we understand as well that there are some conditions in central america which are creating this exodus toward the united states. i hope the administration will take this challenge as an opportunity to sit down and address the reality of the need for comprehensive immigration reform. reporter: he said he'd hold a hearing on it. does that give you hope this would be different than the last couple of times? mr. durbin: there have been so many aborted efforts when it comes to immigration reform under this president. i'm skeptical as to whether he truly wants to deal with immigration reform. i know he wants a wall. he said that so many times. everybody knows it. but i would just take at face value senator graham's offer. if we're going to have a real committee markup, a real committee discussion, and it might lead to a bill coming to

mr. durbin: thank you. mr. cornyn: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, i'd ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule 22, at 5:30 p.m., all postcloture time on the lee nomination be considered expired. if confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the the president be immediately notified of the senate's action. i ask that following disposition of the lee nomination, senate vote on the cloture motions for the vitter, bulatao and rosen nominations. finally, if cloture is invoked on those nominations, the cloture votes on the vitter and bulatao nominations be occur at noon on thursday and the rosen vote on cloture occur at 11:45 on may 16. and if confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, and the president be immediately notified of the senate's action. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. cornyn: mr. president, i have ten requests for committees to meet during today's session of the senate. they have the approval of the majority and minority l