senator whitehouse: what are s.c.l. canada and aggregate i.q.? mr. wylie: those were subcontractors set up during the time i was there to build out software infrastructure. they played a very significant think of ilding the them like a franchise. senator whitehouse: the ripon program was the one to develop the software to use the facebook data? mr. wylie: yes. once you have algorithms and a target -- set of targets, you need something that can connect those targets with an online display network. that's part of the role. senator whitehouse: global science research? mr. wylie: it was the company that was set up by dr. cogan. senator whitehouse: you said it became a company simply to serve cambridge analytica. mr. wylie: it became a company, as i understand it, it became a company so it could sign a contract with cambridge analytica, or technically s.c.l. senator whitehouse: is it fair to describe the entities i have all just described as a coordinated network? mr. wylie: yes. senator whitehouse: what was the role of robert mercer in funding that networ

whitehouse: what are scl canada and aggregate iq? mr. wylie: those were subcontractors that were set up during the time i was there to build out software infrastructure. they played a significant role in building the infrastructure. sen. whitehouse: are they the same entity? mr. wylie: you could think of them like a franchise. sen. whitehouse: the ribbon program was a program that developed the software to use the facebook data? mr. wylie: yes. once you have algorithms and a target, you need something to connect those targets with an online display network. that is the role we are going to play. sen. whitehouse: what is global science research? mr. wylie: it was the company that was set up by dr. cogan. sen. whitehouse: you said it became a company to serve as cambridge analytica. -- service cambridge analytica. mr. wylie: it became a company so that it can sign a contract with cambridge analytica. or rather, technically scl. sen. whitehouse: is it fair to describe the entities that i have just described as a coordinated network? mr. wyli

mr. whitehouse: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, situated off the northeast corner of australia lies one of the seven natural wonders of the world. a wonder that is visible from space, the great barrier reef. each year around two million visitors come if around the globe to experience the great barrier reef. they come to see hundreds of species, of sharks, dolphins, fish, mollusks, whales, sea birds and other marine life thriving in nearly 133,000 square miles of coral reef. some of these coral structures are thought to date back as long as 25 million years when pope francis spoke of the wonder world of the seas, this is the kind of beauty and bounty he had in mind. it is difficult to imagine something so expansive and ancient threatened so profoundly by one of earth's more recent inhabitantses, humans. inhabitants, humans, but it s. the oceans are taking the brunt of our modern carelessness. they're warming, acidifying, and literally suffocating under our carbon dioxide emissions. they're fouled with our plastic garbage

mr. whitehouse: madam president, are we currently in a quorum call? the presiding officer: we are. mr. whitehouse: i ask unanimous consent that the pending quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. whitehouse: thank you, madam president. as a personal matter, this is the first time i have seen you presiding in the senate. it is a nice sight, and i welcome you. i'm here today to talk about the eroding and perhaps even vanishing tradition that we refer to in the senate as the blue slip. people don't necessarily know what a blue slip is, but there has been a tradition with respect to united states attorneys, local united states district judges, united states marshals, and the seats on the united states circuit courts of appeal that are by tradition associated with a particular state. with respect to all of those nominations, there has been a tradition that they require the approval of the home state senators. and the mechanism for that approval is called a blue slip, and there actually is a blue slip. and the tradition in the senate judiciary committee that was

mr. whitehouse: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: mr. president, are we presently in a quorum call? the presiding officer: it is. mr. whitehouse: may i ask unanimous consent that the present quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. whitehouse: thanks, mr. president. in this, my 207th speech about the climate changes and ocean changes being driven by fossil fuels, i would like to discuss america's largest oil company, exxonmobil. for decades exxonmobil did everything in its power to deceive the american public about the existence and causes of climate change. i believe that full transparency would show exxonmobil and its agents still obstructing efforts here in washington to resolve the climate crisis. but i want to focus on one particular audience i believe exxon has long misled: its shareholders. an exxon c.e.o. once went so far as to cite a bogus scientist petition to its shareholders. yes, that infamous petition cooked up by climate deniers that included cartoon characters and spice girls a

mr. wylie: i know the person you are referring to, yes. senator whitehouse: what you mean by pivotal role connecting cambridge analytica, black cube, the nigeria project and leave e.u.? mr. wylie: the person played a -- joined the company and played a substantial role in setting up the company's projects in nigeria. senator whitehouse: which involved black cube? mr. wylie: which involved the procurement of hacked material. and in addition, this person was also at the press launch sitting on a panel with other directors of leave e.u. senator whitehouse: and black cube figure into this how? she was a pivotal role between the two? mr. wylie: as she testified at parliament, she made introductions to a group of israelis to cambridge analytica. senator whitehouse: and they are the ones who work through the black cube corporation or entity? mr. wylie: you will have to ask cambridge analytica and black cube that. >> i will defer to senator blumenthal and then i will go after him. senator blumenthal: thanks to senator klobuchar. mr. wylie, are you aware of services p

mr. whitehouse: thank you, john. and thank you all for being here. one donor gave speaker paul ryan $24.6 million for a super p.a.c. one donor gave $17.9 million to influence this election of our latest supreme court justice. and this election, phony front groups with names like rhode islanders for puppies and peace and prosperity are going to show up on our televisions and pour their smear ads into our living rooms. and all of it is anonymous. the donor behind the $24.6 million to speaker ryan, the donor behind the $17.9 million to judicial watch, and the donors behind those smear advertisements will all be anonymous. people in this country feel like they're not being listened to by government. it's because they're not. academic studies prove almost zero statistical correlation between what the public wants and what gets done in congress. and the reason is the unlimited money and the dark money that are the scourge of our politics. the scourge of unlimited money open the door to the worst scourge of dark money, which open the door to the even worse

mr. chair. >> thank you. senator whitehouse. >> mr. chairman, it looks like i'm bringing up the rear here, we are just down to us and dr. hall. dr. hall, you and i have talked before about the healthcare spending projections graph and this is the one from -- that i've used before, but, guess what, we have a new one, a new year has gone by and just for the record back here when the affordable care act passed cbo did the yellow line equipment of what federal healthcare spending all in all the different federal healthcare programs was expected to look like. then as time went on and we had the experience of the affordable care act and we had whatever else took place we got this actual result, which came in below what was expected and then here there has been a new projection that is made going forward. so this is the old projection, this is the actual through this period and this is the new projection. now, in the graph that i used to use all the time this savings delta was $3.3 trillion in savings between the expected spending and the new

mr. wylie: i know the person you are referring to, yes. senator whitehouse: what you mean by pivotal role connecting cambridge analytica, black cube, and leave e.u.? mr. wylie: the person played a in setting uple the companies projects in nigeria. senator whitehouse: which involved black cube? mr. wylie: which involved the procurement of hacked material. in addition, this person was also at the press launch, sitting on a panel with other directors of leave e.u. senator whitehouse: he said she was a pivotal role between the two? mr. wylie: as she testified at parliament, she made introductions to a group of israelis to you cambridge analytica. senator whitehouse: and they are the ones who work through the black cube corporation or entity? mr. wylie: you will have to ask cambridge analytica and black cube that. >> i will defer to sen. blumenthal: then go after him. thanks toumenthal: senator klobuchar. mr. wylie, are you aware of services performed by a cambridge analytical for american clients for free or as in-kind contributions at the expense of another ent

mr. alteri. >> good morning, chair capito, ranking member whitehouse, and members of the subcommittee. my name is sean alteri, and i currently serve as director of the kentucky division for air quality. i'm honored to testify today and i thank you for this opportunity to share a state's perspective related to cooperative federalism under the clean air act. in addition to my work with the kentucky division for air quality, i also serve as the past president of the association of air pollution control agencies. our association is a national, non-partisan, consensus-driven organization focused on improving air quality. the association represents more than 45 state and local air agencies. as senator inhofe remarked during a 2016 hearing, cooperative federalism is a core principle of environmental statutes, including the clean air act, where epa and states work together to meet environmental goals. obviously, mutual respect is essential and necessary to forge a strong working relationship between epa and state regulators. working together cooperatively will allow all of us to achieve our en

senator whitehouse: thank you. mr.wylie i would like to go to , the brexit campaign and the role that aggregate iq played in it. in the aftermath of that campaign, a person named dominic cummings, a campaign strategist for vote leave, tweeted out that cambridge analytica had a small -- a

mr. president, on another matter, earlier today the house judiciary committee took action on the first step act, which is companion legislation to the bill that senator whitehouse, the junior senator from rhode island, and i introduced here in the senate. the committee's passage of this bipartisan legislation advances prison reforms tried out and proven in states like texas, rhode island, and georgia and elsewhere, which if successfully implemented rehabilitate low-risk offenders and save taxpayer dollars while reducing the crime rate and helping people reestablish themselves as productive members of society. this is not true across the board. i'm not naive enough to think that people that go prison will be able to salvage and save every single one who comes out. but i do believe we can do much better if we give people the opportunity, those who have the will and the determination to take advantage of the opportunity to turn their lives around, to deal with their addiction, to deal with their lack of skills and education, and if when given the opportunity to do so decide they want to take advantage of that to turn their lives around. to help low-risk offenders

mr. whitehouse: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: mr. president, i'm here today my 206th "time to wake up" speech. for colleagues who may be having a hard time keeping up with the ethical scandals swirling around environmental protection agency administrator scott pruitt, i thought today i would lay them out one by one. i think we all heard donald trump's pledge to drain the swamp and put an end to government corruption. that hasn't exactly worked out, has it? instead, swamp creatures abound, and pruitt -- a longtime enemy of the agency he now runs and a longtime toady is absolutely wallowing in the swamp. indeed, he is so swampy that he now faces more than a dozen federal and state probes exploring how he has been advancing his own interests and those of his polluter donors. so let's take a look. investigation number one -- travel expenses. between march and may of 2017, just that short period, mr. pruitt spent 43 out of those 92 days traveling to his home state of oklahoma. pruitt appears to have conducted little or no o