mr. leahy: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from from vermont. mr. leahy: i ask unanimous consent that the call of the quorum be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. leahy: madam president, what may seem like a long time ago but is only three months ago, when congress came together in a rare bipartisan fashion and we passed the cares act. we did that to help address the unprecedented needs of the country and the american people as it began to address a global pandemic. it was the third emergency appropriations bill congress has passed this year to address the impact of the coronavirus. yet despite its scope and its size, we knew then -- and we all acknowledged then -- that it would not be the last one required. and since that time, we all know the number of covid-19 cases have continued to grow at an alarming rate, as have the number of deaths. i wish we could say we were through the worst of it and that things could now return to normal. we know we c

mr. leahy: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. leahy: mr. president, this afternoon we've heard a lot of rhetoric. i'd like to now deal with some reality, and as so often happens, the reality is different than the rhetoric. since i last spoke on the senate floor in the wake of george floyd's murder, america's people's calls for justice have not diminished. fortunately, they've grown stronger, and rightfully so. and even since then, our nation has had to confront yet another needless killing of an african american man when an atlanta police officer shot rayshard brooks twice in the back when he was fleeing from officers. now, i know from my own experience in law enforcement that nobody can dispute that officers have incredibly challenging jobs. no one will dispute that they are faced with difficult split-second decisions that impact life and death. but that difficulty does not excuse the fact that something is deeply wrong in our country. it does not excuse the fact that people of color have disproportionately suffered from police misconduct.

blackburn. >> ay. >> mr. leahy? >> no. >> mr. whitehouse? >> no. >> no. >> mr. blumenthal? >> no. >> mr. booker, --? >> no. mr. chairman. chair graham: the motion is favorably reported. judge walker goes to the floor. as to the subpoena authorization, i call up the june 4, 2014 motion related to crossfire hurricane investigation, maybe i can feinstein,senator and we will open it up for debate and anything you all would like to do in terms of amending it. here's what i have come to conclude, that the transition issues are probably better left to senator johnson. so, i know that there was a by vice president biden to unmask general flynn, there were requests by people, samantha powers made a lot of requests. maybe there is a legitimate reason, i do not know. quite frankly, i think our time would be better served to go and look at crossfire hurricane and the mueller report itself, so i do not expect us to be calling people in the transition period. we will let senator johnson do that. do isat i do expect us to try to find out -- rosen assigned stead -- rosenstein said he signe

mr. rosenstein: that is my understanding, yes. sen. leahy: and the 17 errors with respect to the carter page application all came after, so they would not impact the launch of the broader russian investigation, is that correct? mr. rosenstein: i believe that is correct. sen. leahy: thank you. now, the mueller report is 448 pages. do you know how many pages of the 448 refer to carter page? mr. rosenstein: i do not. sen. leahy: i will let you know. it is seven pages. that means 441 on other matters. i mentioned the carter page case because it demonstrates the fisa application process itself is flawed. another report last march, the inspector general found 29 fbi applications for fisa surveillance he reviewed. 25, or 86% of them, had an average of 20 issues each. that is what i mean about the scrutiny. now, the intelligence community made a unanimous assessment that was shared by the bipartisan, republicans and democrats alike in the senate intelligence committee, that russia interfered in our elections. do you agree that the fbi's errors in th

mr. leahy: mr. president, we know that america is hurting.it's reeling from a diddly pandemic that's taken more than a hundred thousand lives. and then witnessing the broad daylight murder, murder of yet another black man by an officer of the law. seeghting with rage -- seething with rage and about the racial injustices that still plague our society. america is suffering from unprecedented political divisions. routinely worsened deepened by a president whose utterance only tears us further apart. in my decades in the united states senate, i've never seen our country so in need of healing. i was a prosecutor and when i first saw the video of george floyd's murder, a human being pinned down by the neck crying i can't breathe, desperately calling out for his mother, i was shocked to my core. and for millions of americans and for me, that shock swiftly turned into anger. how could a police officer who ihas sworn an october to protect and -- an oath to protect and swerve so casually take a human beings' life. and why did his fellow officers witnes

mr. rosenstein: i was not aware of any reason to object. sen. leahy: and while supervising the russian investigation, you never rejected explicit requests by the special counsel to take investigative steps or pursue an indictment, correct? mr. rosenstein: that is correct. sen. leahy: thank you. i want the chairman to notice this. my colleagues on the other side, exactly five minutes. chairman graham: you have set the standard for the rest of us. sen. leahy: yeah, right. chairman graham: [laughter] thank you. but you did mention a very important point, i cannot remember what it was but i will think about it in a minute. senator cornyn. senator cornyn: i know you dedicated almost your entire adult life to serving the department of justice. and i know you love and revere that institution, the people that work there. and rightly so. but i can only imagine how disappointing it must be to you now to learn following the revelations of the inspector general's report and other investigations some of the facts nd circumstances leading up to the investigation of

leahy: he lied to vice president pence? sen. graham: we will figure all of that out. we have not heard testimony in this committee on that. that i asked mr. rosenstein last week that i did not get a straight answer to is whether the fbi was surveilling and intercepting general flynn's communication. there is an inference one can draw because we know from the unmasking's that there was not a request of the conversation that became part of all the controversy, i think december 26. surveillance of kislyak, then flynn's name would have been redacted and required unmasking. there was not an unmasking request for that conversation. that raises the inference that this was an fbi intercept and not a cia intercept. we do not know that because nobody has answered that question. i think senator leahy does a good job of pointing out the sorts of questions this committee needs to get an answer to. was the obama admin is patient targeting of three-star general retired and the incoming national security advisor of the incoming president? sen. leahy: did he lie to vice president pence? >> if i can go back to process for just a moment and in response to

mr. jarman what troubles me why support the motion afraid it's an ill-fated motion by senator feinstein's were about to do something in this committeeth that is painful, senator leahy explained what happened years ago withme the torture issue will remember their mutual friend what the senate with through in those days. the battle went on for years and years and years. yet what we are being asked to do today is to give authority to this chairman that is really going to end put an official end to the bipartisan which is been part of this committee forever. that is unfortunate. the list of 53, how do we happen to just happen to have the campaign managern' for joe biden's presidential campaign on that list? i'm afraid it's. very obvious this is by a president who just cannot get over it, maybe he never will and buy a chairman who wants him to have another day to make his point about how he was mistreated. >> with all due respect, i don't buy what you're saying at all. >> i didn't expect you to. >> here is the deal, senator durbin, for two and half years it looked if they colluded russian spread widely known now? the demo democratic party nominee was using gps, spent ov

mr. leahy: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. leahy: mr.president, this morning the senate narrowly invoked cloture on the nomination of justin walker to the d.c. circuit. and within the week, the senate is expected to confirm by the thinnest of margins both judge walker and a separate nominee, cory wilson, to the fifth circuit. that fills the final two available seats is on our circuit court. in one case there isn't a vacancy yet, but it's preemptively filling it. and this will complete leader mcconnell's rush to pack our appellate courts with president trump's nominees. now, i want to speak about this because i've had more experience only because of tenure, on nominations than anybody else in this body. and i note that both judge walker and judge wilson are partisan ideologues who have given no indication that they will leave area that politics outside the courtroom. and this has become par for the course under this president, choosing nominees not for their judicial qualifications, and in spite of any political leanings but because of th