then, senator patrick leahy blocks military aid to egypt while denouncing the sentencing of 683 supporters of the muslim brotherhood to death in what he called a sham trial. >> nobody, nobody can justify this. it does not show democracy. it shows a dictatorship run amok. >> we will go to cairo to speak with democracy now correspondent sharif abdel kouddous and to a member of the muslim brotherhood living in exile in england. all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. an oklahoma death row prisoner has died of a heart attack after a botched execution tuesday night. clayton lockett was injected elite -- with lethal drugs. doctors halted the killing 13 minutes and when discovering he was still conscious and trying to speak. dr. say he suffered a ruptured vein interrupting the flow of the drugs. he died of a heart attack when the drugs had spread through his body. the botched killing forced officials to cancel the execution of another prisoner, charles warner. won alocket and warner stay of execution earlier this month a

. >> joining me now patrick leahy. were you aware of this program in cuba? >> no, absolutely not. if i had been i would have said what in heavens name are you thinking? this is dumb, dumb, dumb. now, u said has done april lot of important things to the world. but this is not something that was declared to us. if you're going to do a covert operation like this foreregime change, assuming it ever makes any sense, it's not something that should be done through usaid. they do a lot of great things around the world. i applaud a lot of things they do. i've visited in different parts of the poorest parts of the world. things that they are doing well. this is not one of them. dr. shaw will be before the appropriations subcommittee on tuesday. he's going to have to answer some very specific questions. this -- what they were trying to do here makes me think of people i somehow think still at the state department and writing memos they were writing back to president ice eisenhower, if wey tough, the castro brothers will be out of there any day now. they've been saying that for 60 years. this

. >> i want to play a comment of democratic senator patrick leahy of vermont.sterday and talked about the secret cuban twitter program. >> what they're trying to do makes me think of people -- i somehow think they're still at the state department and writing memos that they were writing back to president eisenhower. if we just stay tough, those castro brothers will be out of there any day now. they have been saying that for 60 years. this may no sense at all. i was not briefed. nobody was briefed on this. i think most people would say, are you out of your mind? usaids not a program should be involved with. for one thing, it accomplished practically nothing. government, we saying, thisney wasn't secret. yet ap gets these memos from a like the one in 2010 from mobile accord, one of the projects contractors -- there's no mention of the u.s. government involvement. this is crucial for the long-term success of the service and to ensure the success of the mission. peter kornbluh? >> of course it is secret. jay carney is misleading the american public. this is one of

senator patrick leahy of vermont, chair of the committee, voiced concerns about the possible merger and the lack of competition in the cable t-v- marketplace. medicare is becoming more transparent for the first time in decades as figures on doctor compensation are released. data from 20-12 finds of 77 billion dollars in federal spending...payments topping 10 million dollars each went to only seven doctors. the top 2% of doctors in the system made a total of 15 billion dollars. doctors tell abc news they dispute the data because they say much of the money goes to drug companies. teens are pulling back on prom spending. a survey by visa shows the average american high schooler will plunk down $978 dollars this year for attire, limos, dinner and prom tickets. its 14% less than last year when spending topped $1,000. consumers are hopping to the mall in a wave of easter spending but are still expected to spend less than they did, last easter pent up demand after a long, cold winter will likely see consumers ready to spend on new spring dresses and chocolate eggs says the national retail fede

the house judiciary committee plans to look at this may 8th, and aides to chairman patrick leahy have said they might hold another hearing on this partly because comcast filed formal documents with the fcc just hours before the senate judiciary committee ultimately held its inquiry. we heard there are plenty of questions on capitol hill. there may not be as many critics on the hill who share some of senator franken's very serious concerns with the deal, but plenty of members who have lots of questions, lots of concerns, we'll hear that going forward. >> host: well, you attended yesterday's hearing, what'd you hear from the other senators? were senator franken's views widely shared? was there some support for this potential merger? >> guest: there were definitely questions about consumers and competition. plenty of folks are concerned that potentially this could mean higher cable rates. plenty of folks are concerned this could affect broadband just considering the fact that comcast would touch so many millions more homes, but there was also that typical partisan breakdown between democ

all that was the chairman of the appropriations subcommittee overseeing usaid funded senator patrick leahy demanding to know who came up with the idea of the cuban twitter. question the administrator of usaid are correct you shop couldn't answer me this sunday. as it was supposed to be a boring hearing about us its fiscal year twenty ten budget instead it turned into a debate over whether the agency is working outside its primary mission to indonesia in activities that are endangered stop but could ruin the agency's reputation around the world. off to the doctor showed defended us its activities in cuba saying they fit well within the law governing its democracy assistance programs in the bishop's though congress has given us to roughly two hundred million dollars since nineteen ninety six for democracy assistance in cuba the lawmakers say they weren't adequately informed about how that money was being spent by us that chance when some are accusing the agency is running a covert program. senator leahy also mentioned u s government contractor allen groups who was arrested by cuban authoriti

government the repeated claims by us in the program was not covert were belied by lawmakers late sen patrick leahy has two claimed earlier this month but he didn't know about it the legislation say anything about setting up a mini idea in cuba with twitter accounts and all for now the coast region government claims that they didn't know about it either. despite reports the base of operations present scenario was run from within their country. cursory his communications minister told the ap quotes. the government of the republic was not aware of this. we are waiting the reply of the government of the united states. history does largest newspaper revealed the foreign ministry officials were tipped off to us its plans for zoos emailed back in two thousand i tell us embassy they want no part of it and refusing to grant diplomatic status to two u s government contractors working on the program according to an internal memo to the coaster region foreign ministry. there were concerns that the project quotes could create a situation politically inconvenient. since it can be interpreted that would violate

another democrat, patrick leahy from vermont received $52,500 in the last decade.ght up questions but he did not openly propose the merger. some of the toughest questions on wednesday came from those who received the least amount of money from comcast. republican mike lee from utah has received only $17,500. he's still a freshman senator, but here's what he said on wednesday. >> i've heard some concerns expressed that the emerging comcast, the post-merger comcast might have the incentive or even the predilection, but certainly enhanced capacity due to its larger size to discriminate against types of content, including political content. >> and who is the senator who is way down the bottom of the list of comcast generosity? that's al franken, senator of minnesota. he was the only one to openly oppose the merger. so what is it about this money and how senators treat this merger? and why does senator franken think this merger is such a bad idea? he joins me now to talk about all these issues. senator, thank you for coming here. >> thank you, brian. >> i was rattling o

senator patrick leahy joined a number of politicians who want to stop the obama administration sendingid to egypt. patty culhane, white house correspondent, has this report. >> 683 egyptians sentenced to death in a lightening kick trial. it was one step too far, chairman of the committee that approves overseas funding. >> if i was not chairman of that, i would have been watching this situation with great interest and growing dismay. hundreds of people could be sentenced to death after a sham trial lasting barely an hour. >> it's a flaunting of human rights by the egyptian government. an appalling abuse of the justice system which is fundamental to any democracy. nobody, nobody, can justify this. >> he says the u.s. won't help pay for it. he's blocking the 650 million in military aid, the obama administration just announced it would give to the egyptian military for counterterrorism and upholding the treaty with israel, money it promise even after 529 egyptians were sentenced to death in another quick trial in march. meeting with the foreign minister, secretary of state john kerry descr

. >>> senate judiciary committee chairman patrick leahy says the concept of a social network to stir unrest in cuba was a cockamamie idea doomed to failure. >>> search crews in the indian ocean have failed to pup more of the faint underwater sounds. two hits were heard over the weekend but nonsense. >>> it was another emotional day of testimony for south african olympic hero oscar pistorius. he recounted what happened the night he faittle shot his girlfriend. >> i heard a noise from inside the toilet, that i perceived to be somebody coming out of the toilet, before i knew it, i fired four shots at the door. >>> now to an unconventional challenge about global warming. >> reporter: the u.n.-backed intergovernmental panel on climate change, recently concluded that the manmade impact on the environment will cause increased duration and frequency of storms, drought, and decreased food production and disease. the nongovernmental international panel on climate change concludes it's not that bad. nipcc says there's more carbon in the area but in change in temperature is in the range of what

under questioning from senator patrick leahy at a hearing tuesday, the usaid minister ater denied the program was covert. >> working on creating platforms to improve communications in cuba and in many other parts of the world is a core part of what u.s. aid has done for some time and continues to do -- usaid has done for some time in continues to do. our policy is to support efforts to allow for open communications. to the extent the ap story or any other, creates the impression that this effort or any other goes beyond that for other alter your purposes, that is simply inaccurate. >> is it a covert program? >> absolutely not. edward snowden suggests the government has spied on leading human rights groups inside the united states, appearing by video link before the council of europe, snowden said the nsa has targeted either leaders or staff members of civil and nongovernmental organizations within u.s. borders. snowden did not specify which groups, but asked whether they include amnesty international and human rights watch he replied, yes, absolutely. in his comments to european lawma

when the administrator will be before senate patrick leahy and a senate committee. and the question comes down to this, if this were a covert operation, where the president properly notified were house and senate communities properly notifies. i think this will be a question for people is at what point does discrete become covert and require a whole new set of laws. >> a lot of issues raised by this, coming up a new book on pack span relations that is so controversial parts of it were blocked out, also the most extensive account yet of the boston bombing from the people that experienced it first hand, and our social media produceser tracking the stop stories on the web. >> a lot of people are saying a red sox player picture with with the president 20 into foul territory. i will tell you more coming up. is while you are watching let us know what you think, you can tweet us at a.j. consider this, or leave a comment on our facebook page. [ male announcer ] it's here -- xfinity watchathon week, your chance to watch full seasons of tv's hottest shows for free with xfinit

patrick leahy is live with us from capitol hill.nk you so much. >> glad to be with you. >> in the last hour the usaid administrator said it wasn't a covert program and they found it was all done legally. do you take issue with those claims? >> i take issue with the fact that they are not being covert? covert is such an elastic thing. they can say it wasn't covert but you'd have to really stretch it. but the thing that gets ignored in all of the debate didn't make any sense? it didn't. it was dumb. we have people in our state department and past administrations and same thing, where if we just be tough and do these things, we'll get rid of those castro brothers and making the same argument to president eisenhower. it doesn't work. we have so many good things we can do in the united states openly with cuba if we wanted to show a little initiative. we're not going to change everything about society, of course not, nor are they ours. but openly having exchanges of students lift the embargo that stops americans from freely traveling to c

so a few weeks after that senator patrick leahy who oversees the appropriations for usaid programs anate department programs was disturbed by this very fact saying that, you know, we have an american contractor down there who is arrested. and now-- for doing technical work and now we're starting this project that he says could have put people at riting. >> ifill: this bigs the question f this was happening in cuba y wouldn't it have been happening someplace else? do we have any evidence to support that idea? >> when we tried to unspool these contracts and it was a combination of both looking into internal documents and government documents and interviews with people, you know, even when we were able to dig down and get to very detailed contract numbers and be able to punch those into federal databases to say hey, how is your money spent, even then when you plug that in, it looks like it went, you know, it was for a project in pakistan. so you know, even in the sliver of information that is publicly available there is no indication. so you know, absent doing reporting or freedom of inf

you have top lawmakers including patrick leahy of vermont, this is the combination of the number one and number two -- or wants to make sure that the number one and number two cable companies combining will not hurt consumers and the companies are making their case for the deal and you have the top republican chuck grassley of iowa saying that he is more the mystic about the combination of these two countries and how they will not harm consumers. take a listen to chuck grassley. >> we don't know about the future but you have to have some faith in the free market system in america, that competition will make the difference. the other thing you want to have make a difference is -- there is a lot of other competition out there where you're developing content as well. >> this is the case that comcast is making as well. there is a whole host of competition from google and other cable companies and all of those internet companies as well. that is why the deal will not harm consumers. they want to hear more from chuck grassley and less from al franken, who expresses reservations. we will he

senator patrick leahy says he plans to block the delivery of u.s. military aid to egypt over human rights concerns like he raises objections in response to the recent sentencing of six hundred eighty three people to death including the top spiritual leader of the muslim brotherhood well he called this latest trial a sham for decades my total violation of human rights and charm are prepared to sign off a little. of additional oil. for the egyptian military. i'm not prepared to lead to so you could reduce the government is committed to the rule of law. for decades cairo has received a one point five billion annual aid package from the us which has come under increasing scrutiny ever since the early days of the popular uprisings against hosni mubarak in two thousand and eleven there was a partial suspension of aid last july after the military ousted mohamed morsy and brought. sisi to power within congress senator rand paul of kentucky has been the only major voice pushing to halt the flow of aid to egypt historically one of the us is close allies in th

but senator patrick leahy said he was not and called the program dangerously misguided. >> we've hadd of those castros. it hasn't worked for 60 years. it won't work. >> reporter: zun zuneo didn't work and it was halted in 2012. one of them led to arrest of usaid contractor alan gross. he's in ill health and is serving 15-year prison sentence in a cuban jail. >> fascinating. margaret, thank you so much. >>> this morning the woman who used to run the state department hillary clinton remains uncommitted on a possible run to the white house but she raised some eyebrows last night. she spoke last night along with imf chief christine lagarde. one of the highlights their reaction when the moderator suggested lagarde would lead the european union and clinton could become president of the united states. >> it needs new leadership. christine lagarde can be the change. president of the european commission which would be very interesting if you're president. >> it was interesting to see the reaction about women ruling the world, two of them. >> it was a great moment to see two powerhouse women i

senator patrick leahy, chairman of the judiciary committee tweeted this -- the house commerce committee, which oversees the fcc is looking to revamp the rules right now. the issue is last time it took a plus years. it is a long process. something that takes a while. complicated law. not like a simple cut and dry kind of thing. there will definitely be .olitical divides the interesting thing is currently the way the industry works is that regulates industries based on how they are classified. require all phone companies connect to one another so that if you are making a long-distance call, it goes through. it does not regulate the internet that way right now. could declassify internet providers so that they are more heavily regulated like the phone companies. that is an option that would definitely be a political battle that was start a war on capitol hill. no one wants the government to regulate the internet in terms of content. there are definitely democrat to push for that. that is an option on the table. still out there but does not look like one he is here to pick up. this could be

senator patrick leahy chairs the senate judiciary committee. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible] [inaudible] >> all took the oath. and i welcome everybody here. i'm going to be the chair and ranking member of the committee with jurisdiction was senator klobuchar in senator lee taking over the hearing at some point during the morning and i appreciate the work both of them have done in getting us here. the original business that cable industry develop -- delivering cable television programming as we all know migrated to the internet. the industry has been changed in response. consumers can now watch what they want and when they want and if any of us have any question about it ask our children or grandchildren. they will explain it to us. but when companies like comcast and time warner cable were founded the term binge watching was unheard of and now it describes how many americans watch their favorite shows. cable companies have moved beyond television and networks to provide broadband. they now sole-source the service for millions of americans

signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i'm told s. 2223 is due for a second reading. is that right? the presiding officer: the clerk will read the title of the bill for a second time. the clerk: s. 2223, a bill to provide for an increase in the federal minimum wage, and so forth. mr. reid: mr. president, i would object to any proceedings with respect to this legislation at this time. the presiding officer: objection is heard. the bill will be placed on the calendar. mr. reid: i move to proceed to calendar number 345, s. 23199, paycheck fairness. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: motion to proceed to calendar number 345, s. 2199, a bill to amend the fair labor standards act of 1938, and so forth and for other purposes. mr. reid: mr. president, following leader remarks and those of senator mcconnell, the senate will -- the senate will be -- all time will be equally divided and controlled until 11:00 a.m., and at that time there will be a cloture vot

we're just now getting into the question and answer session with senate judiciary chairman patrick leahyrst big public questioning on a controversial merger proposal. back to everybody. >> hampton, thank you for that. of course, comcast the parent company of cnbc and nbc universal, and despite all the headlines about them having an uphill battle that filing, guys, 175 pages, argues that they'll bring super fast speeds to u.s. households on wireless and there's still a lot of competition from web video companies and isps all over the place. >> and they talk about, of course, broadband which will be a particular area of focus and the fcc here is more important than perhaps the doj, the fcc with the public interest doctrine. they will make an argument about technology, having also increased speeds every year for the last 12 years when it comes to broadband and to the home. and the exfunnity platform being a strong one. theirs is going to be we're going to make life better for consumers at home. >> i wonder how that's going to go down, the changing technology landscape, netflix, apple and am

i wrote about this quite a bit lately, and there's a new coalition where you have people like patrick leahy dick durbin getting together with ted cruz and rand paul to look at and implement alternative pirnlts. you've got the obama administration now announcing the release of more nonviolent offenders. you have a big push now, the right wants to reduce the population to save money, and the left wants to help integrate folks back into society. this has become a leader in reducing the prison population. rick perry doesn't brag about it, and because of the way texas politics are set up, there's democrats in the texas legislature that are taking the lead on this mostly. but what we are seeing now a turnaround and the thing to me steve, you've got the right and left working together quite a lot in this town and across the country. you almost never read about it. we in the media, one of our pathologies is that we love bad news. we love conflict. if you are throwing down somebody, we'll be there to cover. but when you're working together, what's up with the back pages? host: some new hampshire act

mission yet it was publicly earmarked for an unspecified project in pakistan furthermore senator patrick leahy chairman of the foreign operations subcommittee had this to say about the program there is the risk to young unsuspecting cuban cellphone users who had no idea that this was a u.s. government funded activity there's a clandestine nature of the program that was not disclosed the appropriations subcommittee with oversight responsibility yeah sounds like something that was definitely debated in congress to me look it's absurd that a cold war era grudge means that u.s. taxpayers are still funding efforts to overthrow the cuban government not to mention that the us and israel are the only two countries that continually vote to uphold and bargo against cuba because apparently even fifty three years of the bay of pigs this small island nation filled with taliban is is an enormous threat to american security. turkey's recent elections landed another victory for its ruling party the justice and development party or a.k.p. however this time the opposition party is calling foul play citing every

who that was the chairman of the appropriations subcommittee overseeing usaid funding senator patrick leahy demanding to know who came up with the idea of a cuban twitter a question the administrator of usaid dr rajiv shah couldn't answer first let me just say it was supposed to be a boring hearing about usaid specifically year twenty fifteen budget but instead it turned into a debate over whether or not the agency is working outside its primary mission and now engaging in activities that not only endangered staff but could ruin the agency's reputation around the world off the bat dr shah defended u.s. aids activities in cuba saying they fed well within the law governing its democracy assistance programs in that nation now congress has given us aid roughly two hundred million dollars since one thousand nine hundred six for democracy assistance in cuba but lawmakers say they weren't adequately informed about how that money was being spent by usaid and why some are accusing the agency of running a covert program senator leahy also mentioned u.s. government contractor alan gross who was arrest

chuck grassley a senator and he was talking about a briefing that happened and he was there with patrick leahy and in this meeting the head of the insider threat program said that whistleblowers should register with the f.b.i. so that their communications would not get swept up now this is a big this is a big issue primarily because people in these agencies when they know the names of the individuals who are trying to expose corruption often give those names over to the justice department for a criminal investigation right i mean it kind of defeats the purpose of you know having the anonymity i guess safe as a whistle blower i mean to the to be told by the f.b.i. now you know just register with us and and it's all good and that was the point that grassley made in the meeting and then ten minutes later they stormed out like children and didn't want to participate in the briefing anymore and they also didn't bring the training materials that he had requested because we really would like to know exactly how people are being told to snitch on each other inside the government and and exactly what a

freedom act one of the more stronger reform proposals working its way through congress with senator patrick leahy you were you mentioned earlier talking about egypt as well as congressman jim sensenbrenner who in the house who wrote the patriot act this would do away with the n.s.a.'s bulk metadata collection program snowden said that this was a good piece of legislation that he supports well this isn't the only award that snowden and the journalists he's working with have collected since these disclosures came out what do these accolades do for snowden as far as his efforts to eventually return to the united states well i think they validate what he did i mean he's won he won the polk award he's won several awards over the last year but i think even more important are what we've seen in the courts we saw a federal court here in washington d.c. last year were ruled that the and it says program phone dragnet program was likely unconstitutional we've seen president obama himself come out and changed. way this program operates so all of these continue to validate what edward snowden did and we learn

senate judiciary committee chairman patrick leahy says he is troubled by the secret program, that it creates a risk to young cuban cell phone users who had no idea it was u.s. funded. leahy also questioned whether it was even legal and what the potential impact could be on the fate of the u.s. aid's contractor in a cuban jail, allen gross. matt and savannah? >> andrea mitchell on this unusual story for us out of washington this morning. andrea, thanks. >>> meantime, natalie is following the story in chile. major aftershock overnight. >> major aftershocks rattling a lot of people's nerves understandably. following tuesday's massive earthquake, there was a 7.6 quake that struck that same area late wednesday, and it triggered tsunami alerts and evacuations. this video shows hotel guests running out of the shaking building. there were no immediate reports of serious damage or injuries as a result of the aftershocks. tuesday's 8.2 quake killed six people. >>> malaysia's prime minister has vowed to not give up the search for flight 370 nearly a month after that plane disappeared. nbc's kat

repeated claims by usaid that the program was not overt were belied by lawmakers like senator patrick leahywho claimed earlier this month that he didn't know about it the legislation doesn't say anything about setting up a clock i mean the idea in cuba was twitter accounts and all and now the coastal region government claims it didn't know about it either despite reports that a base of operations for zooms in a.o. was run from within their country because communications minister told the a.p. quote the government of the republic was not aware of this we are awaiting the reply of the government of the united states because to rica's largest newspaper revealed that foreign ministry officials were tipped off to us its plans for resumes in a.o. back in two thousand and nine telling the us embassy they want no part of it and refusing to grant diplomatic status to to u.s. government contractors working on the program and according to an internal memo at the coastal rican foreign ministry there were concerns that the project quote could create a situation politically inconvenient since it can be i

signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i move to proceed to calendar number 250. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion. the clerk: motion to proceed to calendar number 250, s. 1737, a bill to provide for increase in the federal minimum wage, and so forth. mr. reid: mr. president, following my remarks and those of the republican leader the senate will resume consideration of h.r. 3979, which is a legislative vehicle for the unemployment insurance extension. the time until 10:00 will be equally divided and controlled. the filing deadline for second-degree amendments is 9:30 today. 9:30 a.m. today. at 10:00 a.m. there will be a cloture vote on the reid substitute amendment. additional votes are expected throughout the day. senators will be notified when we schedule them. there are two bills at the desk due for second reading, mr. president. the presiding officer: the clerk will read the titles of the bills for the second time. the clerk: s. 2198, a bill t

signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i move to proceed to calendar number 354, the minimum wage legislation. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: motion to proceed to calendar number 354, s. 2223, a bill to provide for an increase in the federal minimum wage and so forth. mr. reid: mr. president, following my remarks and those of the republican leader, the senate will be in morning business until 10:30 this morning. the republicans will control the first half. the majority will control the final half. following that morning business, the time until noon will be equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees prior to a cloture vote on the minimum wage. at 4:00 there will be votes on nominations. later today, as i just announced, we're going to have, we hope, the beginning of a debate on the increase of the federal minimum wage. mr. president, millions -- millions of american workers will be watching how each senator votes

signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i move to proceed to calendar number 354, the minimum wage legislation. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion. the clerk: motion to proceed to calendar number 354, s. 2223, a bill to provide for an increase in the federal minimum wage, and so forth. mr. reid: mr. president, following my remarks and those of the republican leader the time until 10:30 will be equally divided and controlled. at 10:30 there will be a vote on the ninth circuit judge whose name is michelle friedland. if cloture is ininvoke cloture there will be up to 30 hours of debate prior to a vote on the confirmation of the nomination. we have two votes we need to have before we leave here this week. we can have the vote at 4:00 tomorrow afternoon, and the second vote would be around 7:00 or thereabouts tomorrow afternoon, tomorrow evening. we have to finish these two matters before we leave here this week. the schedule is up to not republicans, but

signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i ask unanimous consent that all postcloture time now be considered expired and on monday, april 28 at 5:30 p.m. the senate proceed to vote with no intervening action or debate on calendar number 574. further following disposition of the nomination the senate proceed to vote on cloture on executive calendar number 613 and if cloture is invoked all postcloture time be yielded and the senate proceed to vote on confirmation of the nomination. that if confirmed the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid on the table, with no intervening action or debate and no further motion be in order to the nominations. if any statements related to the nominations be printed in the record and that president obama be immediately notified of the senate's action and partisan -- the senate resume legislative session. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: i ask unanimous consent on monday april 28 following disposition of the exec

signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: mr. president, every time that i see the presiding officer lead the senate in prayer and certainly introducing the prayer, but directing the attention to us all to follow the presiding officer in reciting the pledge of allegiance brings back to me a lot of memories. when i first came to the senate, we had lots of members of congress who had been to war. now that's not the case. we all look at john mccain with such idealism of what he did in the vietnam war. and there are others, but there aren't many. and to have now the presiding officer having not only been to war but being a general and leading hundreds of people from montana to war, when that pledge of allegiance, i'm sure is said by the presiding officer, your feeling is a little different than everyone else's, because during those bitter battles in iraq, members of your unit were killed and injured. so even though we don't say much publicly about the new addition to the senat

signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: following leader remarks and those of the republican leader if there are any, the senate will be in morning business until 5:00 p.m. at 5:00 p.m. the senate will resume consideration of h.r. 3979, the unemployment insurance extension. at 5:30 there will be a roll call vote on passage of that legislation. mr. president, nascar fans can easily find their favorite drivers by simply looking at the cars as they fly by because there are corporate emblems on the hood of the car. in fact, they're all over the car. for our clothing here in the senate we don't bear commercial logos. many republican senators might as well koch insignias, but as members of the united states senate there should never be any doubt as to our sponsors, the american people. we're here in the senate for one reason, to give americans a fair shot at providing for their families and having their voices heard. but republicans seem more willing to identify themselves wit

signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i now move to proceed to calendar number 354. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: motion to proceed to calendar number 354, s. 2223, a bill to provide for an increase in the federal minimum wage and so forth. mr. reid: mr. president, i have a cloture motion at the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the cloture. the clerk: cloture motion: we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to proceed to calendar number 354, s. 2223, a bill to provide for an increase in the federal minimum wage and so forth signed by 17 senators as follows: reid of nevada, harkin, merkley, leahy, booker, warren, reed of rhode island, durbin, cardin, carper, coons, nelson, franken, gillibrand, whitehouse, casey, sanders. mr. reid: i ask unanimous consent that the mandatory quorum under rule 22 be waiv