mr. portman: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed legislative session and be in period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. portman: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to consideration of s. res. 196, submitted earlier today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: senate resolution 196, recognizing the american peanut shellers association for a century of effective leadership in the peanut industry and the beneficial work of the peanut industry in the united states and the state of georgia. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding to the measure? without objection. mr. portman: i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. portman:

mr. portman: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. portman: mr. president, i understand there are two bills at the desk due for a second reading en bloc. the presiding officer: the senator is correct. the clerk will read the titles of the bill for the second time. the clerk: h.r. 986, an act to provide that certain guidance related to waivers for state innovation under the patient protection and affordable care act shall have no force or effect. h.r. 2157, an act making supplemental appropriations for the fiscal year ending september 30, 2019, and for other purposes. mr. portman: in order to place the bills on the calendar under the provisions of rule 14 i would object to further proceeding en bloc. the presiding officer: objection having been heard, the bills will be placed on the c

come on in ohio senator rob portman. mr.there is any way you will ever get a cut in government spending ever. it will never happen. what do you say? >> well i say that spending is the problem. one of the things we've been hearing as you know, stuart over the past year, is that the tax cuts and tax reform package have led to these larger deficits. we now know from numbers from the deficit that is not true. in fact revenues have increased. so again think about this, after the tax cuts, the tax reform, revenues have increased. not substantially. two or 3% but that is billions and billions of dollars. so it is not the tax cut that have caused higher deficits. it is the spending. stuart: politics of the day which will not allow us to cut spending. you're right, that is the problem, mr. senator. >> spending is clearly it. part of the spending something that republicans and administration supported. trump administration was right. the military was cut to the bone in many instances. we had training fatalities year before last than b

mr. chairman and ranking member peters, members of the committee, senator portman. i appreciate the opportunity to appear before you today. it is a sincere honor to serve as acting secretary and represent the dedicated men and women of the dhs. i really do believe that dhs has the most compelling mission in government to safeguard the american people, our homeland, and our values. as acting secretary, i intend to work with this committee, and i have been, and serve as an advocate of the department to measure the people have the resources and the authorities they need to carry out their critical mission on behalf of the american people. as we are highlighting the president's 2020 budget, i do want to point out a few of the key areas where there is a critical investment across dhs and the multimission we carry out. i want to ensure this committee we are not going to be losing any momentum from several security to disaster response. we see what is happening this morning with the floods in oklahoma, the tornado that touched down in missouri. we are going to stay on top

mr. chairman, we will have a chance to markup addition aal legislation that you were talking about, many of us had suggestions and senator portman mentioned what's included in the bill. it builds on what we've already done that's worked. automatic enrollment, that's worked. and income sources, and we have to look at that in a defined contribution. and for me it's extremely important for lower wage workers to get them to start early enough in retirement savings. i thank the chairman for holding this hearing. >> thank you, mr. chairman. let me add my comment to senator cardins. i would pass resa, one of the things we would take up shortly thereafter is the bill i have with senator brown and senator casey, the american miners act and senator dudley is talking about folks losing benefits. we're about to have thousands and thousands of miners lose benefit if we don't back up the contract and 1974 pension plan. pbg is not here, but in my state 7,000 miners lose those benefits and my hope would be we'll be able to move to that as well ap you'd have great support from senator casey and senator brown on that. i want to move on a variatio

mr. chairman, i want to underscore the point that we have got to get this bill done. a lot of us have improvements we would like to see. i know senator portmanhas already mentioned the bill, i want to get that done. but to me, the first priority is to get risa across the finish line as soon as possible. and then, i hope we will have a chance to markup additional legislation that many of us have had suggestions about. senator portman has already mentioned a lot of provisions included in the bill, but they build on what we have already done, it has worked. simplify the system. automatic enrollment, it has worked. encouragement for lifetime income sources, we know that, we have to deal with that. and the refundable savers credit, to me, that is an extremely important point for lower wage workers to get them to start early enough in retirement savings i think the chairman for holding this hearing. -- savings. i thank the chairman for holding this hearing. pass thed hope that we bill, one of the things we would take up shortly thereafter is a bill i have with senator brown, the american minors act. talking about folks losing benefits, we are abou

mr. chairman, we'll have a chance to mark up additional legislation that you were talking about that many of us have had suggestions. i just -- i know senator portman has already mentioned a lot of the provisions that are included in the bill that we filed today, but they build on what we've already done. that's worked. you simplify the system as you pointed out. that's worked. automatic enrollment, that's worked. encouragements for lifetime income sources. we know that. we have to deal with that since we're in a defined contribution world. and the refundable saver's credit some of you talked to that. to me that's an extremely important point for lower wage workers if we're going to be able to get them to start early enough for retirement savings. i thank the chairman for holding this hearing. >> thank you, mr. chairman. let me add my comments to senator cardin's that we need to pass resa and i appreciate the good work that you and senator wyden is doing. i would hope as we pass resa one of the things that we would take up shortly thereafter though is a bill i have with senator brown and casey, the american miner's act. as miss dudley is talking ab

mr. portman: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. portman: mr. president, i'm here on the floor today to talk about international trade, a very complex issue but also a really important issue to our country. our goal with trade should be pretty simple. it's to level the playing field for america's workers, america's farmers, america's businesses. one, we have got to be sure they aren't hurt by unfair imports coming into our country. so that's really a fairness issue and a trade enforcement issue. but second, wee should expand or exports. opening up more foreign markets to our products is great for america. that's the balance. as a trade lawyer and as the u.s. trade representative in the george w. bush administration and as a member of the finance committee which has jurisdiction over these issues, i've worked on the trade matters quite a bit, and it's really important to my home state. ohio has products that are manufactured by workers and crops grown by our farmers that are shipped all aro the in ohio, one of every three acres is now planted for

mr. portman: mr. president, today i'm on the floor to talk about the men and women in uniform, our police officers who protect us every day. they're here in the capitol today protecting us in this chamber. they're back home in ohio protecting the citizens of ohio, and they do it every day. they put their lives on the line for us in many cases. this is national police week. it's a week when tens of thousands of law enforcement officers come to washington, d.c. they come to the police memorial. it's been a wonderful week because i've had the opportunity to meet with law enforcement officers from ohio today, yesterday, the day before. we've seen them on the streets. we've seen them in uniform. their opportunity to come here is to talk about the important issues that relate to our law enforcement but also to pay tribute to their fallen colleagues. sadly, ohio has lost its share of officers recently. officers who have lost their lives in the line of duty include two so far this year and four last year. on