mr. lankford: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. lankford: i ask the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. lankford: mr. president, just to give the senate and the body a quick update on what's happening in my state right now, we've had some pretty dramatic flooding. over 15 tornadoes in the last 48 hours across the state. thankfully, most of those tornadoes hit in open areas; did not hit structures. there have been some structures that have been damaged. the flooding has been far worse than the tornadoes and the high winds. we've had in just one of our counties -- osage county -- just two nights ago now, severe flooding from 10:00 p.m. until 2:30 in the morning, over 100 different homes had to be evacuated in the middle of the night. many of the folks from law enforcement, firefighters, first responders arriving at their home with boats, with a truck to get them out of their homes literally in a boat. they spent the entire night saving homes and saving people getting out. when dawn broke and th

mr. lankford: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. lankford: mr. president, the month of may is military appreciation month. it's a time when we, as a country, we come together, we pause, we recognize the sacrifice of those who have raised their right hand, worn the cloth of our country and they continue to serve the world's greatest military day in and day out. they have exceptionally long days, difficult tasks. sometimes they fight the fight of boredom in hanging out and guarding a spot and sometimes they are in an exceptionally stressful full-on combat mode. throughout the month of may there are six different days of observation to honor our nation's military and their families who sacrifice so much. loyalty day, public service recognition week, victory in europe day, military spouse appreciation day, armed forces day, and, of course, at the end of the month a pause for memorial day. all of these observances within one month, may. it's a clear sign that our military is one of the most important cornerstones of our country and their sacrifices un

mr. chair, senator lankford, i think part of what we're doing is an answer to that that allows people to take their retirement from job to job. this is an ira, it's owned by the employee, by the saver and they get to take it with them. it's under their control. no one has control on it and it can go and grow with them throughout their careers. >> there are changes for other proposals for portability? >> one thing i would mention, portability is hugely important and educating people on how to track their benefits-- >> but there are a lot of people who say i'm not going 0 opt in because i'm only going to be here a year or two and it's hard to shift it over and i want to leave it. >> and making it automatic, helping people make it automatic to roll forward and roll to their next employer, that's something that the private sector has been working on that's very useful. developing data base so at that people can easily track and find their benefits is something that we're supportive of and working on as well. >> all right, thank you. >> thank you, mr. chair and i want to thank you and the ran

senator lankford: thank you. thank you, mr. chairman. senator manchin: thank you. chairman pai, i think i was the only member of congress to formally and successful challenge federal broadband. you recognized that. we're fighting it all over. we knew the maps have been wrong from day one. the problem i'm concerned with is the amount of time it's taking. that's $4.5 billion. rural states and rural areas of any state is dependent on connectivity. also, we brought to you basically the cost in certain areas. t's much costlier in the mountainous areas of west virginia to build out the infrastructure that would be in the flat lands of our neighboring friends. we want to make sure that was in consideration of that. the time element as far as deploying these funds, what timetable are y'all on? i'm not being critical except you don't know how desperate it is. we can't keep people. businesses can't function. nothing happens. chairman pai: i appreciate that more, senator. when i visited capen springs and i visited with a small business owner who is consistently losing busines

mr. chairman. senator kennedy: senator coons. senator coons: i want to follow up something senator lankford said. i was part of the investing in opportunity act which helped create them. i really want to see the program succeed. i believe it can. i was disappointed that some of the transparency measures in the original bill were stripped oud when it was enacted. i know in order for us to assess whether opportunity zones are succeeding, whether we need to tweak them. we need data. so i think treasury should be collecting transaction level data. senator bennet and i urged in a letter to you in november that you move forward on it. thank you for your response to the letter and for issuing the r.f.i. i just wanted to hear a commitment that we'll work together to implement strong transaction level reporting requirements for opportunity zones so that congress can conduct appropriate oversight and can work to make sure that opportunity zones are actually delivering the benefits for communities which i think all of us supported in the initial drafting. secretary mnuchin: first, let me just say that it's

mr. lankford: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. lankford: mr. president, typically when we talk about federal employees or federal agency, the story starts something like this. there was a mix-up in paperwork for our constituent who has social security retirement benefits. she ended up not having part b medicare coverage until later and there was a lapse in coverage. everyone gets frustrated over the mix-up, the dropped paperwork, the problem, and they never hear the story of amber craft, who works in the tulsa social security office. she chased the whole issue down. she did everything possible with the payment center to get input switched on the medicare application. ended up getting the constituent's coverage to begin with in the desired month to be able to get them taken care of. they were taken care of on their medical bills because a federal employee saw the gap, ran to the need, and helped somebody in our state. this is public service recognition week, and i wan

mr. lankford: i ask the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. lankford: i ask unanimous consent an air force defense fellow in senator sullivan's office be granted floor privileges for the remainder of the congress. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. lankford: i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: quorum call: quorum call: quorum call: mr. sullivan: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from alaska. mr. sullivan: mr. president, is the senate in a quorum call? the presiding officer: we are. mr. sullivan: i'd like to ask permission that the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sullivan: mr. president, i'm going to be on the floor here with some of my colleagues in the next hour, and i want to thank my colleague from iowa, senator ernest, lieutenant colonel ernest, by the way, iowa national guard, for organizing the series of discussions we're going to have here in a couple minutes on the senate floor, focus on military appreciation m