mrs. ernst: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mrs. ernst: mr. president, i rise today to urge each of my colleagues to support the pain-capable unborn child protection act. this critical legislation would prohibit a child from being aborted at five months of development. now, for those that we have watching today, i'd just like you to focus a little bit on these photos, focus on those photos and i'll return to them here in a moment. again, i'm urging my colleagues to support the pain-capable unborn child protection act. by any measure, at five months of development, an unborn child is a child. at five months, babies have grown nails on their fingers and on their toes, hair has just begun to grow on their heads, and an ultrasound can tell an expectant mother and father whether their baby is a boy or a girl. these babies can detect light, hear sounds, they can swallow, and even experience taste as their tastebuds grow and develop. these unborn babies in all ways are babies. there is also significant scientific evidence that at five months of devel

mrs. ernst: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mrs. ernst: mr. president, i rise today to urge each of my colleagues to support the pain-capable unborn child protection act. this critical legislation would prohibit a child from being aborted at five months of development. now, for those that we have watching today, i'd just like you to focus a little bit on these photos, focus on those photos and i'll return to them here in a moment. again, i'm urging my colleagues to support the pain-capable unborn child protection act. by any measure, at five months of development, an unborn child is a child. at five months, babies have grown nails on their fingers and on their toes, hair has just begun to grow on their heads, and an ultrasound can tell an expectant mother and father whether their baby is a boy or a girl. these babies can detect light, hear sounds, they can swallow, and even experience taste as their tastebuds grow and develop. these unborn babies in all ways are babies. there is also significant scientific evidence that at five months of devel

mr. daines: senator lankford, thank you for leading this effort here today, this very important conversation. i want to thank senator blunt, senator ernst, senator sasse for joining us today as well in this discussion. mr. president, 28 years ago, i became a first-time dad. by the grace of god, we got to see three more children born after our first child, david, was born. i can tell you, my wife, cindy, and i, we were excited, a little bit terrified when we welcomed david into the world. and as a parent, one of the toughest things is to see your child in pain. i remember when david cried, i would have given an arm and a leg to stop that pain. iemember when he was just a little baby, taking david to the pediatrician, maybe to get that shot and so forth and the pain david felt and the screams and the crying. i think it was much, much harder on the parents than on the baby. and i think we all recognize the pain a child feels after they're born. but as i have gone on and researched this issue of pain and babies and so forth, the science tells us that a baby feels pain before they're born. and senator sasse mentioned earlier that we are one

mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator gillibrand. senator ernst? >> thank you, mr. chair. a number of my coastal colleagues have mentioned the detriment to hurricanes and so forth. and i would just offer them the opportunity to come inland a little bit. iowa has about a thousand miles of coastal setback in either direction. but regardless of those large scale effects that come from hurricanes, we do have flooding issues in iowa that occur on a much more regular basis than those 100-year floods or 500-year floods that are recorded out there. senator whitehouse mentioned that black hole that exists within the army corps of engineers. you know we get the projects in one side. and as he said, the funding in from the other side. and i tend to agree with the senator in that there is a black hole, and we need greater transparency there. part of that black hole i feel is the benefit-to-cost ratio. and mr. cochran, in your testimony, you encourage congress to direct the corps to modernize that bcr, the benefit-to-cost ratio analyses because you believe they are often inaccurate. a

mr. chairman. >> thank thank you, senator chi. senator ernst. >> thank you, thank you, mr. ch. number of my coastal colleagues have mentioned the detriment to hurricanes and so forth and i would just offer them the opportunity to come in and a little bit. iowa has about 1000 miles of coastal setback in either direction. but regardless of those large-scale effects that come from hurricanes, we do have flooding issues in iowa that occur on a much more regular basis and those 100 year floods or 500 year floods that a recorded out there. senator whitehouse mentioned that black coal that exist within the army corps of engineers. we get the project and once at an easy said the the other side. i tend to agree with the senator in that there is a black coal and we need greater transparency. part of that black coal i feel is a benefit to cost ratio. and, , mr. cochran coming to testimony you encourage congress to direct the corps to modernize that vcr, the benefit to cost ratio analyses, because you believe the estimated costs are often inaccurate. and a priority of mine has also been to

ernst. >> thank you, mr. chair, and thanks to all of you for joining us today. we had a great forum this last weekend. the reagan national defense forum, and secretary lord, i'm glad you were there. secretary esper and i sat together on a wonderful, wonderful panel. i think everybody was engaged at one point or another through those discussions, and it was very helpful to see so many people that agreed on some of the challenges that we have, including the crs, as was just mentioned, sequester, our budgeting issues here in congress. and secretary lord, from this past weekend, you had mentioned the need to redirect our investments to meet the demands of a shifting world. and i agree with that as well. and we do need to invest in innovation to keep our competitive edge over near peer adversaries like china and russia and that's a topic that secretary esper and i were engaged in on our panel. can you talk about some of the emerging capabilities the department of defense should be investing in to ensure that we are keeping that technological edge? and how do we balan

ernst. thank you, mr. chairman, thank you, mr. pruitt for being here today and taking the time to answer our questions. americans expect good governance from all of us, and they expect accessibility, participation, responsiveness and accountability. and since taking the rains at the epa you have shown that you are not afraid to engage with the american population. and you just gave that example of going out, visiting those sites for superfunds. you have also shown that you are willing to hear firsthand the concerns of americans, while giving those that are affected an opportunity to engage in the decision-making process. so thank you for that. in addition to the superfund issue that you just addressed, in august of last year you traveled to des moines, iowa, and you met with over 50 stakeholders from across the ag industry at the farm bureau. we left that round table really encouraged by what we heard, and what we were able to engage in. knowing that we do now have a partner in epa. under your leadership epa has taken necessary ac

ernst. senator merkley? sorry. senator duckworth here next. i apologize. >> thank you, mr. chairman, mr. pruitt, i'm holding in my hands a memorandum from the epa dated march 21, which is after you were confirmed as head. i would like this submitted. >> without objection. >> thank you. >> it's titled fy-'18 budget. it communicates final resource levels and policy guidance to support the environmental protection agencies fy-'18 budget submission. it suggests elimination of the great lakes restoration program. numerous programs betalked about including my previous mentioning of the statement about shutting down epa office region five as a cost avoidance rent cost avoidance measure. potomac yards region one, nine and five. you might want to make yourself familiar with this. in addition to your hefty domestic travel schedule, you have taken at least four foreign trips to include a recent trip to morocco a at a cost to $40,000 where according to the "washington post" you spent four days promoting the sale of american natural gas while your home state of oklahoma is the third largest sale of n

you probably heard from senator ernst who's been a stalwart on this issue, was born at 20 weeks and is alive today to tell about it. this is not about medical liability, mr. president. roe v. wade says there's a compelling state interest to protect the unborn at medical viability. i would argue that the difference between medical viability in 1973 and 2018 is enormous. what we're trying do is provide a new theory to protect the unborn, and it goes something like this. can a legislative body prohibit an abortion on demand at a time science tells us the baby feels excruciating pain? at a time science tells us the parents should sing to their child. at a time science tells us that this baby has well-connected tissue and can feel pain, and on occasion people survive. my answer is yes, it is okay for the congress and state legislators to pass laws saying at the fifth month we're going to disallow abortion on demand. there will be exceptions but they'll be rare. there's about 10,000 cases every year that is affected by this law potentially. so what are we trying to do? we're trying to proceed forward to a better day in america. we're trying to get out of a clu

mrs. ernst: dal i rise to talk about the possible impact that the tax cuts will have on our iowa farmers. our iowa economy is important and the men and women serving as farmers, ranchers and growers in the great state of iowa mean the world to me coming from a farm that my family had there in southwest iowa. we all understand that this has been a very, very challenging time for farmers and our rural communities. the community that i come from in southwest iowa, just 10,000 people in our county, many of them have faced the challenges of the economic downturn. since their peaks in 2012, corn prices have declined by 60% and soybean prices have declined by 47%. my neighbors are hurting, folks. farm income has nearly been cut in half since 2013. a lot of our producers are hurting, especially our young and beginning farmers who've gotten their start just in maybe the last ten years or so. but fortunately for our farmers, our ranchers, and our growers, tax relief is on its way. the tax cuts and jobs ac

mrs. ernst: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mrs. ernst: mr. president, i rise today to urge senate democratic leadership to end their reckless government shutdown. it's no secret that over the years i've made clear that i don't like funding our government from one short-sided band-aid bill to another. we must establish a path forward to responsibly fund our government for the long term. it's responsible and right thing to do for our military, for future generations, for our veterans, and for the american people. but rather than finding a long-term funding solution to ensure stability in our military, the senate democratic leadership has decided to shut down the government. so what does that mean for our military? well, for starters, critical defense projects have come to a halt. we can also see delays in maintenance of our critical aircraft, ships, our weapon systems at a time when our adversaries are becoming more aggressive and more advanced. and our service members who put their lives on the line every day for our country don't know when th

mr. mcconnell: i ask unanimous consent that the ernst amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to, the bill as amended be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: i understand there is a bill at the desk and i ask for its first reading. the presiding officer: the clerk will read the title of the bill for the first time. the clerk: h.r. 4667 an act making further appropriations and so forth and for other purposes. mr. mcconnell: i ask for a second reading and under the provisions of rule 14 i object to my own request. the presiding officer: the bill will be heard for the second time on the next legislative day. mr. mcconnell: i ask unanimous consent when the senate completes its business, it adjourn until 11:00 a.m., january 4, the morning hour be deemed expired, the journal of proceedings be approved to date, and the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day further following leader remarks the senate proceed to executive se