A bill to reauthorize the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, and for other purposes.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I rise to comment briefly on Russian interference in the electoral processes in this country and across the West and governments of many of Russia's own neighbors.

We are in the middle of a civilization warfare crisis of public trust in this country. This isn't about the last 2 months. This isn't just about the last Presidential election. This is fundamentally about the last few decades of declining public trust in a broad range of our institutions: the press, political parties, executive branch agencies, the Congress, and beyond.

Russia is not unaware of our own distrust of each other. Russia is not unaware of our own increasing self-doubt about our shared values. Russia is today very self-consciously working to further erode confidence in our self-government by pulling at the threads of our public and civic life. Moscow's influence campaigns don't start by creating wholly new problems out of thin air, but rather by exploiting fissures that already exist in our civilization. The simplest way for Russia to try to weaken us is by trying to exploit the places where we are already weak, the places where we are already distrustful, and the places where we are failing to pass along a shared understanding of American values to the next generation.

The sad state of modern politics and the explosion of digital media are proving to be ripe targets for many of our own internal doubts and our own discord. We--all of us, Republicans and Democrats, the legislature and the executive branch--are ill-prepared for the challenges that are already on our doorstep, let alone what comes next with the acceleration of these kinds of technologies.

Today in the Wall Street Journal, we in this body were rebuked-- rightly rebuked, I think, and rebuked in a bipartisan way by former Congressman Mike Rogers. Chairman Rogers, a Republican, served as the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee from 2011 through 2015. I am going to read his op-ed rebuke into the Record today, but I would humbly ask that all 100 Members of this body calmly and self-critically consider carefully Chairman Rogers' argument, for his argument is not fundamentally against Republicans alone. It is not against Democrats alone. He is offering double-barreled criticism of all of us in the Congress--criticism of both parties. Why of both parties? Because Russia's influence campaign is a really big deal. Are we Republicans listening? Also, because our response to Russia's influence campaign is not primarily about who you supported last November in the Presidential election.

Listening to the Democrats, it is sometimes hard to understand if that side of the aisle remembers that basic fact about what Russia's influence campaign was up to. Russia's goals in our most recent election were not initially about one candidate versus another candidate. We need to underscore this. There are particulars that those of us who spend time reading classified intelligence know we can't discuss in this unclassified setting. But the big, broad point is simple and needs to be shouted, and that is that Putin's fundamental goals are about undermining NATO. Putin's fundamental goals are about making us doubt our own values: freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, the right of protest or redress of grievances.

The Kremlin isn't attempting an influence campaign to make Americans believe that the sky is green or the grass is blue. He is trying to undertake an influence campaign to make us doubt our own First Amendment values. The Kremlin wants us to believe that our society is as corrupt as the thugocracy that Putin and his cronies are trying to advance. That isn't true, but if you listen to us in this body, we regularly do very little to restore the kind of public trust that Putin is actively working to undermine.

So I ask that each Member of this body would humbly and carefully consider Chairman Rogers' rebuke to the Congress this morning. This is from the Wall Street Journal, Chairman Rogers; headline: ``America is Ill-Prepared to Counter Russia's Information Warfare.''

When historians look back at the 2016 election, they will

likely determine that it represented one of the most

successful information operation campaigns ever conducted. A

foreign power, through the targeted application of cyber

tools to influence America's electoral process, was able to

cast doubt on the election's legitimacy, engender doubts

about the victor's fitness for office, tarnish the outcome of

the vote, and frustrate the new President's agenda.

Historians will also see a feckless Congress--both

Democrats and Republicans--that focused on playing partisan

``gotcha'' and fundamentally failed in its duty to gather

information, hold officials accountable, and ultimately serve

our country's interests.

Whether or not the Trump campaign or its staff were

complicit in Moscow's meddling is missing the broader point:

Russia's intervention has affected how Americans now view the

peaceful transition of power from one president to the next.

About this we should not be surprised. Far from it.

Propaganda is perhaps the second- or third-oldest

profession. Using information as a tool to affect outcomes is

as old as politics. Propaganda was familiar to the ancient

Greeks and Romans, the Byzantines, and the Han Dynasty. Each

generation applies the technology of the day in trying to

influence an adversary's people.

What's new today is the reach of social media, the

anonymity of the internet, and the speed in which falsehoods

and fabrications can propagate. Twitter averaged 319 million

monthly users in the fourth quarter of 2016. Instagram had

600 million accounts at the end of last year. Facebook's

monthly active users total 1.86 billion--a quarter of the

global population. Yet each of these staggering figures

doesn't fully capture the internet's reach.

In February, Russia's minister of defense, Sergey Shoigu,

announced a realignment in its cyber and digital assets. ``We

have information troops who are much more effective and

stronger than the former `counter-propaganda' section,'' Mr.

Shoigu said, according

to the BBC. Russia, more than any other country, recognizes

the value of information as a weapon. Moscow deployed it with

deadly effect in Estonia, in Georgia and most recently in

Ukraine, introducing doubt into the minds of locals,

spreading lies about their politicians, and obfuscating

Russia's true intentions.

A report last year by RAND Corporation, ``The Russian

`Firehose of Falsehood' Propaganda Model,'' noted that

cyber propaganda is practically a career path in Russia

now. A former paid troll told Radio Free Europe that teams

were on duty around the clock in 12-hour shifts and he was

[personally] required to post at least 135 comments of not

fewer than 200 characters each.

In effect, Moscow has developed a high-volume, multichannel

propaganda machine aimed at advancing its foreign and

security policy. Along with the traditional propaganda

tools--favoring friendly outlets and sponsoring ideological

journals--this represents an incredibly powerful [new] tool.

Now [let's] extrapolate that one step further: Apply

botnets, artificial intelligence and other next-generation

technology. The result will be automated propaganda, rapid

spamming and more. We shouldn't be surprised to see [more] of

this in the future.

Imagine [if you will] an American Senator who vocally

advocates a new strategic-forces treaty with European allies.

Pausing from the article for a minute--it is interesting to note that is the debate we are actually having in the Senate today. We are talking about expanding NATO to include Montenegro.

Picking back up:

Moscow, feeling threatened, launches a directed information

campaign to undermine the senator. His emails are breached

and published, disclosing personal details and family

disputes, alongside draft policy papers without context.

Social media is spammed with seemingly legitimate comments

opposing the senator's policy position. The senator's phone

lines are flooded with robocalls. Fake news articles are

pushed out on Russian-controlled media suggesting that the

Senator has probably broken campaign-finance laws.

Can you imagine the disruption to American society? The

confusion in the legislative process? The erosion of trust in

democracy? Unfortunately, this is the reality the U.S. faces

[next], and without a concerted effort it will get [much]

worse.

Congress is too focused on the trees to see the frightening

forest. Rather than engaging in sharp-edged partisanship,

lawmakers should be investigating Russian propaganda

operations and information warfare. They should be figuring

out how to reduce the influence of foreign trolls, and

teaching Americans about Moscow's capabilities. This would go

a long way [toward saving] the republic.

That is the end of the op-ed. Again, this was Chairman Mike Rogers, who led the House Intelligence Committee from 2011 to 2015, writing an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal this morning.

Here is what he is really saying. What he is saying is that America has a future in foreign policy and national security and global security that is going to have a lot more propaganda, and a body like this--the Congress generally, but the Senate in particular--has an obligation to help make sure the American people understand Moscow's capabilities and their intentions.

Their intentions are to make us doubt our values. Their intentions are to make us doubt our investment in NATO, the most successful military alliance of last 2,000 years. Their intentions are to exploit the ways that we already distrust each other in ways that should be Republican versus Democratic policy, fighting about particular forms of government intervention and the economy, for instance, but that are subordinate to fundamental American beliefs about who we are as a people and the things that we believe together before we are Republicans and Democrats.

But if you listen to this body right now, would you have much confidence that the American people hear people who come together and believe things that are prepolitical and prepartisan first? Do we have shared American values that we know how to trumpet? Do we have ways to celebrate the things that fundamentally make us Americans well before we are Republicans or Democrats?

I worry that if you watch cable news any given night right now, you would not, as an American citizen, have that as a takeaway. Instead, you would hear Americans saying--American public listeners and viewers to those radio shows and cable shows thinking that the great divide in the world is between Republicans and Democrats. That is actually not true.

By voting record, I am the third most conservative guy around here out of 100, so I care deeply about Republican versus Democratic answers to most of the policy fights we have. But those things are radically subordinate to the things we believe in common about the dignity of people who are created with rights. The government doesn't give us rights. God gives us rights by nature, and we come together as a government to secure those rights. The rights of free speech, press, assembly, and religion are fundamentally American things well before we get to any of our policy bickering.

Yet, if the Americans listen to us in the Congress most days or most weeks or most months, I bet their takeaway is that Republican versus Democrat is the great divide, and we shouldn't trust anybody across that aisle.

Well, guess what. That is exactly what Putin is trying to do. His fundamental objective is to make Americans doubt our own values and to doubt our own civilization so that we fight with each other first, instead of agreeing as Americans first then fighting about a bunch of important policy things--but first agreeing who we are as Americans.

The future that we face is a future where there is going to be a lot more propaganda that tries to exploit our internal divisions to begin with. It makes it all the more critical that a body like this exists to help 320 million Americans with a lot of diversity and a lot of disagreement about really important things. They ought to trust that an institution like this exists to restore some sense of those shared values and exists to restore some of that shared trust. Right now that is not usually what they take away from us in the Congress. So I call on the 100 Members of this Senate to consider carefully Chairman Rogers' rebuke of us this morning in the Wall Street Journal.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, redundancy is often a virtue, so I am about to practice redundancy.

Last week, I made a speech on the floor of the Senate about the upcoming votes in connection with the President's nomination of Neil Gorsuch to be Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, and I talked about the 230-year history of this body to always have Presidential nominations for judges--for Supreme Court Justices, for Federal district judges, and for circuit judges up to 2003 by a majority vote. Never in the history of this body has the Senate refused to allow a vote, an up-or-down vote on a Supreme Court Justice.

Because I hear that may be what the Democrats are planning to do-- even though Mr. Gorsuch may be one of the most remarkably talented nominees in a long, long time--I want to make the address that I made last week again, and I am going to deliver it word for word in hopes that someone may actually hear it.

President Trump's nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to be a member of the U.S. Supreme Court will be considered on the floor of the Senate next week. Some have suggested that instead of allowing a majority of Senators to decide whether to approve the Gorsuch nomination, there should first be a so-called cloture vote to determine whether to cut off debate.

Now, you can see what would happen. Cutting off debate requires the approval of 60 Senators. There are 46 Democratic Senators, so if 41 of the 46 Democrat Senators vote not to cut off debate, we would never get to a vote on Judge Gorsuch. We would never get to a vote. In other words, the 41 Democratic Senators would have filibustered to death the Gorsuch nomination to the Supreme Court of the United States, a partisan act that has never happened before in the 230 years of the Senate.

Filibustering to death the Gorsuch nomination or any Presidential nomination, for that matter, flies in the face of 230 years of Senate tradition.

Throughout the Senate's history, approval of even the most controversial Presidential nominations have required only a majority vote. For example, in 1991, President George H.W. Bush nominated Clarence Thomas to be Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme

Court. The debate was bitter. The vote was narrow. The Senate confirmed Justice Thomas 52 to 48.

Although Senate rules have allowed any one Senator to try to filibuster the nomination to death, to insist on a 60-vote vote, not one did. In fact, Senate rules have always allowed Senators the option to filibuster to death a Presidential nomination, yet it has almost never happened.

According to the former Senate historian, with one possible exception, which I will describe later, the number of Supreme Court Justices in our country's history who have been denied their seats by filibuster is zero. The number of the President's Cabinet members in our country's history who have been denied their seats by a filibuster is zero. The number of Federal district judges in our country's history who have been denied their seats by a filibuster is zero. I know that for a fact because an attempt was made to filibuster one--Judge McConnell from Rhode Island--and I voted against that, as did other Republican Senators, because we thought it was wrong to break the Senate's 230-year tradition of always considering judges by majority vote, and we prevailed.

We could have done it, but we didn't do it. That is the point.

Next week, the Democrats can filibuster Judge Gorsuch to death, but they shouldn't do it. They shouldn't do it.

Until 2003, the number of circuit judges in our country's history who have been denied their seats by filibuster was zero.

Senator Everett Dirksen did not filibuster President Lyndon Johnson's nominees. Senator Robert Byrd did not filibuster President Reagan's nominees. Senator Howard Baker did not filibuster President Carter's nominees. Senator Bob Dole did not filibuster President Clinton's nominees.

During most of the 20th century, when one party controlled the White House and the Senate 70 percent of the time, the minority never filibustered to death a single Presidential nomination.

On the other hand, there have been plenty of filibusters on legislation--so many that in 1917, the Senate adopted the so-called cloture rule as a way to end filibusters. The idea is, after you talk enough, you should bring it to an end, so they had a supermajority for that purpose. The rule was amended in 1949, 1959, 1975, 1979, and 1986--always in response to filibusters on legislation, never on nominations. It was the 1975 change that established the current cloture standard of 60 votes to end debate, except on amendments to the Standing Rules.

Filibustering a Presidential nomination has always been treated differently than filibustering a legislative matter. The filibuster of legislation is perhaps the Senate's most famous characteristic. It has been called ``democracy's finest show, the right to talk your head off.''

As the actor Jimmy Stewart says in the movie ``Mr. Smith Goes to Washington'': ``Wild horses aren't going to drag me off this floor until those people have heard everything I've got to say, even if it takes all winter.'' That was Jimmy Stewart talking about his filibuster.

The late Robert Byrd described the importance of a legislative filibuster in this way in his last speech to the Senate: ``Our Founding Fathers intended the Senate to be a continuing body that allows for open and unlimited debate and protection of minority rights. Senators have understood this since the Senate first convened.''

In fact, the whole idea of the Senate is not to have a majority rule on legislation. Throughout Senate history, the purpose of the legislative filibuster has been to force consensus on issues, to force there to be a group of Senators on either side who have to respect one another's views so they work together and produce 60 votes on important matters. We did that last December in a piece of legislation that the majority leader called the most important legislation of the Congress, the 21st Century Cures Act. There were enormous differences of opinion about it, but because Senator Murray, the ranking Democrat and I, and the Democrats and Republicans in the Senate and in the House, and President Obama and Vice President Biden all wanted a result, we formed a consensus. We resolved our differences, and we agreed on this most important piece of legislation that will help virtually every American family by advancing cures for cancer, Alzheimer's, diabetes, and a variety of diseases.

Nominations have always been treated differently from legislation. For example, under Senate rule XIV, any Senator can bring legislation directly to the Calendar of General Orders, bypassing committees. There is no such power for nominations. There is no rule XIV for nominations. Senate rules allow debate and, therefore, the possibility of filibuster on a motion to proceed to legislation. Debate is not allowed on a motion to proceed to nominations. So there can't be a filibuster on a motion to proceed to a nomination. In summary, while Senate rules have always allowed for extended debate or filibusters, the filibuster was never used to block a nomination until recently.

As I mentioned earlier, it was never used to block a Cabinet nomination, never used to block a Federal district judge, until 2003, never used to block a Federal circuit judge, and never used to block a Supreme Court Justice, with one possible exception. The exception occurred in 1968 when President Lyndon Johnson sought to elevate Associate Justice Abe Fortas to be Chief Justice. There was bipartisan opposition to that idea. When it became clear that the Senate majority would not agree, President Johnson engineered a 45-43 cloture vote so that Fortas could save face and appear to have won something, according to the former Senate Historian. Fortas then asked the President to withdraw the nomination.

Other than that, never has a Supreme Court nominee been filibustered to death in the Senate. Other than the Fortas nomination, the filibuster was never used to block any judicial nomination until 2003 and 2004, when Democrats for the first time decided to use the 60-vote cloture requirement to block 10 of President George W. Bush's nominees. I had just arrived in the Senate. I remember it well. I was really outraged by it because, as for the nominees, it was the right of the President to name them and the right of the Senate to reject them. But throughout history it was always by 51 votes. This unprecedented action by the Senate Democrats produced a threat by Republicans to change the Senate rules to make it clear that only a majority is required to approve a Presidential nomination. There was a negotiation, and eventually five of Bush's nominees were approved, five were blocked, and the rules weren't changed.

Then in 2011 and 2013, Republicans returned the favor. That happens around here--a precedent set by that side then becomes a precedent that this side, then, undertakes. In 2011 and 2013, the Republicans returned the favor by seeking to block five of President Obama's nominees for the circuit court by insisting on a 60-vote cloture on each. Republicans alleged the President was trying to pack the Federal Circuit Court of the District of Columbia with three liberal justices. To overcome Republican objections, the Democrats invoked the so-called nuclear option. They broke the Senate rules to change the rules. The new rule eliminated the possibility of 60-vote cloture motions for all Presidential nominations except for the Supreme Court, which is where we are today.

There have been other examples of minority Senators filibustering nominations to death, all of them during the last three administrations and all involving sub-Cabinet nominations. Then, of course, there have been delays in considering nominations.

My own nomination in 1991 as U.S. Education Secretary was delayed for 51 days--I thought improperly--by a Democratic Senator. President Reagan's nomination of Ed Meese as Attorney General of the United States was delayed 1 year by a Democratic Senate. No one has ever disputed our right in the Senate, regardless of who was in charge, to use our constitutional duty of advice and consent to delay and examine and sometimes to cause nominations to be withdrawn or even to defeat nominees by a majority vote.

But, as we approach the vote next week on Neil Gorsuch on the floor of the Senate, it is useful to remember that the tradition of the Senate has been to treat legislative matters one way and Presidential nominations a different way: to filibuster to death

legislation, yes; to filibuster to death Presidential nominations, no.

Should the Gorsuch nomination come to the floor soon, as I believe it will, overwhelming Senate tradition requires that whether to approve it should be decided by a majority vote and there should be no attempt by the minority to filibuster the nomination, especially of such a qualified man.

I thank the Presiding Officer, and I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, first I want to thank my colleague for coming to the floor today to speak about Montenegro and the importance of its accession into NATO, as well as for his focus on the Balkans and for his comment that right now the people of the Balkans and, for that matter, the people in Ukraine and other countries in eastern Southern Europe are feeling a lot of pressure. I applaud him for working on a bipartisan basis over the last couple of years to help us push back against some of the disinformation and propaganda that is primarily being promoted by Russia.

In each of these countries--and I know my colleague Senator Murphy has visited these countries--the first issue I hear about when I go on a trip to Latvia, where I went recently, and certainly Ukraine and even Poland is concern about this sort of unrelenting campaign of disinformation, as we call it; maybe the other term would be ``propaganda.'' We do need to stand up and be counted. The new department of global engagement at the State Department is beginning to do that. I know Senator Murphy has had some meetings recently--and I have, too--where they are starting to get their feet on the ground and being able to allow people to be able to see the objective truth; in other words, to sort of separate narratives from reality, to be able to ensure that we don't have an undermining of these great democracies-- these fledgling democracies, many of them.

So we are talking today, as my colleague from Nebraska did earlier, about the meddling in our own election here and the effect it is having on the level of trust in this country, and this is true not just here but in other democracies. I appreciate Senator Murphy standing up and being counted on that issue and then today specifically being able to help Montenegro to have the opportunity to develop its own institutions. As I said, it is not perfect, but they have made progress, they have made reforms, and they have followed the directions many of us have given them to enable them to be responsible members of NATO. So I thank Senator Murphy for being here today and talking about that.

Read Aloud Month

Mr. President, I am actually speaking out today about another issue, which is one that is a little closer to home, and that is about the importance of reading to our kids. It turns out that this month of March has been designated as Read Aloud Month, and this group called Read Aloud is doing fantastic work around the country. They actually started in my hometown of Cincinnati, OH, so I am a little biased about them, but what they are doing is incredibly important. It is about education, it is about the economy, and more importantly, it is about the lives of young people around the country and the ability to achieve their dreams. It is about child literacy.

Here is the information. Elementary schools and libraries are talking about this more and more back home. If you read to your kids when they are young, they will have a much better chance of succeeding in life. According to a study that dates back to 1995--kind of a famous study-- by the time a child born into poverty reaches age 3, he or she has heard 30 million fewer words than his or her peers. Let me repeat that. A kid who is born into poverty is going to hear 30 million fewer words by the time he or she is 3 years old. Why does that matter? Why does this word gap, as they call it, matter? Well, it matters because it turns out these verbal skills, like other skills, develop as they are used, and if they are not used, they don't develop. So a lot of kids who already have the challenge of growing up in poverty are also burdened with the disadvantage of not developing these verbal skills. That makes it harder for them to get good grades, harder for them to develop social skills, and harder for them to get a good job and ultimately to be able to live out their dreams.

I know Washington, DC, may be the only place on Earth where 30 million sounds like a small number, but it is a big number. It makes a huge difference. This word gap leads to an achievement gap later in life based on all the studies. Experts tell us that a child's vocabulary is reflective of his or her parents' vocabulary. It makes sense. Kids learn what they see and what they hear.

There is a 2003 study by Elizabeth Martin and Tom Risley studying word gaps which found that by age 3, before even reaching school age, children's ``trends in the amount of talk, vocabulary growth, and style of interaction were well established and clearly suggest widening gaps to come.'' So having poor reading skills makes it harder to make a living, it affects self-esteem, and it makes life more difficult in so many small ways. Think about this: unable to read a manual when you buy something, unable to read a list of ingredients, unable to read a newspaper to understand what is going on, to be online.

Millions of our friends and neighbors are struggling with these consequences every day. According to the Department of Education, about 32 million adults in this country can't read. Think about that. That is a group nearly 3 times the size of the State of Ohio and maybe 25 to 30 times the size of the Presiding Officer's State--32 million. Too many of these adults, of course, started off life with the disadvantage of this word gap, and they never caught up.

That is why this Read Aloud Month is so critical. Parents and other caretakers need to know they can steer their child in a better direction--develop vocabulary skills and end the word gap just by reading aloud to them.

Developing these skills, according to experts, affects the biology of the brain. Dr. Tzipi Horowitz-Kraus of Cincinnati Children's Hospital-- a great institution in my hometown and one of the top three children's hospitals in the country, based on U.S. News and World Report. Anyway, he is an expert on this topic, and this is what he said: ``The more you read to your child, the more you help the neurons in the brain to grow and connect.'' So it is physiological.

Dr. Kim Noble, a brain scientist at Columbia University, has found that this word gap actually translates into a brain-sized gap in the areas dealing with language.

Dr. Dana Suskind of the University of Chicago has found that more than 80 percent of a child's brain development occurs by age 3--80 percent--and the effects of the word gap are detected in brain development in babies as young as 9 months old. These aren't children; these are babies. Doctor Suskind says that by reading aloud, every parent has the ability to grow their child's brain.

So certainly before a child can read, before a child can even speak, it is important to be speaking to that child. Think about that. Think about the impact you can have. So get out a book and do some reading to a child, a grandchild, someone who is in the neighborhood, one of your kids. Do it tonight.

Sometimes when I talk about this, people say: Well, Rob, parenting is pretty tough. Everybody is busy. Some people are working two shifts. Both parents are working. Where do you make time for this? Here is my answer to that: Fifteen minutes a day. That is the goal here. Fifteen minutes a day makes a huge difference to be able to close that gap.

Others say: We can't afford it. How do you afford to buy these books if you are going to read all the time? To me, that is pretty simple. Buy a library card. They are free, usually. If not, they are cheap. You don't need a lot of new books, but you do need a library card, and that is very helpful. They helped Jane and me to be able to have books to read to our kids.

Again, I am very proud Ohio has led on this issue. In 2008, this group Read Aloud was started in Cincinnati, OH. It has now become a national movement. It has more than 10,000 grassroots partners-- including daycare facilities, schools and libraries, and rotary clubs-- in all 50 States.

So what can you do to help? I would say that this issue is not going to be found here in this body. It is not about Washington, DC, doing anything except encouraging people to do what makes sense, which is to spend time with your kid, to ensure that if you have a kid in school, that you know that kid gets the right start in life, to ensure that everybody has the ability to have a successful life.

Senator Harris and I introduced a resolution about this recently in the U.S. Senate. It is called the Read Aloud Month resolution. It encourages parents and caregivers to read to their kids for 15 minutes a day. We are asking our colleagues on both sides of the aisle, Republican and Democratic, to sign off on that resolution. That would help raise the visibility of this issue.

Again, I hope everybody listening today takes the opportunity to follow up, to read to a kid, to help ensure they can close that words gap in their lives and therefore have a better chance of getting better grades, getting a better job, and achieving whatever their dream is in life.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, along with Senator Collins, I am introducing legislation that would eliminate the sunset date for U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness--the Council--so that this independent agency can build upon its success in helping to prevent and end homelessness nationally.

The Council was established under the Reagan administration as part of the landmark McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act of 1987. Since that time, it has worked across the Federal Government and private sector to coordinate homeless assistance nationally. In 2009, the Homeless Emergency Assistance and Rapid Transition to Housing, or HEARTH Act, which I authored and introduced along with Senator Collins and others, expanded the Council's role to work with public, nonprofit, and private stakeholders to develop a national strategic plan to end homelessness. On June 22, 2010, the Council unveiled this plan, called Opening Doors, which has guided its work to develop and expand on effective strategies across the country to prevent and end homelessness.

Since Opening Doors was unveiled, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, HUD, reports that overall homelessness has decreased by 14 percent, chronic homelessness by 27 percent, and family homelessness by 23 percent. In addition, we have seen veterans' homelessness drop by 47 percent. This progress is not only a result of the more than $500 million Federal investment in housing and supportive services through programs like HUD-VASH but is also because of the direction the Council provides to the Departments of Veterans Affairs and HUD, as well as public housing agencies administering assistance at the local level. Specifically, the Council helped various partners align their resources, efforts, goals, and measures of success for serving homeless veterans. Under this approach, the Commonwealth of Virginia, Connecticut, Delaware, the city of New Orleans, and DeKalb County in Georgia, to name a few, have all declared an end to veterans' homelessness.

Yet more work remains. And here, too, the Council is an important part of developing solutions. For instance, nearly 36,000 unaccompanied youth under the age of 25 experienced homelessness in 2016. While some communities have started to develop responses to youth homelessness, it is a complex problem that requires a tailored approach taking into account the local variables of foster care, primary to postsecondary education, housing, and healthcare systems. Finding new ways to deliver and fund assistance to this diverse population is essential, and that is why Senator Collins and I held a hearing in our subcommittee on this matter and worked together to include over $40 million in targeted resources to address youth homelessness in both the fiscal year 2016 and 2017 Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, THUD, appropriations bills. As part of this new funding, the Council will be executing a broader collaborative effort with foster care networks, the juvenile justice community, and education partners to create and find

success in coordinated, cost-effective solutions that meet community needs. The Council's expertise in implementing complex Federal programs at the local level will continue to be critical to the success of this initiative.

For all of this good work the Council has done and continues to do, it is vital that we keep its doors open. The Council, as the only agency at the federal level charged specifically with addressing homelessness, has helped communities not only reduce homelessness, but it has also helped to save money. We know that people experiencing homelessness are more likely to access expensive health care services and spend more time in incarceration--which are extremely costly to taxpayers, states, and local governments. According to the National Alliance to End Homelessness, ``Based on 22 different studies from across the country, providing permanent supportive housing to chronically homeless people creates net savings of $4,800 per person per year, through reduced spending on jails, hospitals, shelters, and other emergency services.''

The Council has helped to build upon these estimated savings by identifying and tailoring cost-effective solutions that reduce the level of health care services, as well as recidivism, for individuals experiencing chronic homelessness. In fiscal year 2016 alone, the Council's modest $3.5 million budget catalyzed more than $5 billion in combined Federal resources that aim to address homelessness. It develops national strategies that inform the work and improve the cost- effectiveness of programs administered by 19 Federal agencies, and as a result, communities and Sates are able to leverage housing, health, education, and labor funding more strategically and effectively.

In our current budgetary environment we need a wise and creative arm to help our communities identify and maximize resources and opportunities where possible, to ensure we are actually addressing homelessness, and not contributing to it. The Council is proof that the government can work and save money in the process, and our bipartisan legislation ensures that the Council's doors remain open until there truly is an end to homelessness nationwide.

I thank the National Alliance to End Homelessness, the Rhode Island Coalition for the Homeless, HousingWorksRI, the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities, A Way Home America, Community Solutions, the National Low Income Housing Coalition, the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans, the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, Funders Together to End Homelessness, the True Colors Fund, the National Housing Trust, the National Health Care for the Homeless Council, LISC, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials, the Public Housing Authorities Directors Association, National Network for Youth, LeadingAge, Heartland Alliance, National Housing Conference, the National AIDS Housing Coalition, Covenant House International, the Coalition for Juvenile Justice, the Forum for Youth Investment, the Housing Assistance Council, Volunteers of America, the Coalition on Human Needs, the Corporation for Supportive Housing, the Technical Assistance Collaborative, and the National Coalition for the Homeless for their support. I urge our colleagues to join Senator Collins and me in supporting this legislation.

Mr. President, border security is one of the Federal Government's most important responsibilities, and the Federal Government has no better partners than local law enforcement agencies from border communities like those in my home State of Arizona. These officers and deputies serve on the front lines. They provide critical assistance to the missions of Federal agencies.

Unfortunately, these efforts are expensive and the locals end up picking up most of the tab. For example, local law enforcement agencies hold those facing immigration violations at county-operated jails, and they provide medical care for the undocumented inmates while they are in custody. In providing these services, Arizona's counties have incurred more than $310 million in costs associated with criminal undocumented immigrants since 2009. That is $310 million since 2009.

Despite these enormous costs, the Federal Government has left many local jurisdictions to shoulder the burdens of illegal immigration on their own. This is particularly frustrating when so many of our local law enforcement agencies are already struggling to carry out basic duties on overstretched budgets.

I hope we can all look forward to a time when we have the appropriate resources for securing the border, the means for those seeking to fill the needs of our economy to enter the country legally, a remedy for those who are here already illegally, and also a way for employers to ensure that those whom they hire are legally present.

These critical steps toward solving our immigration problems will require Congress to act. However, in the meantime, we can't continue to allow the Federal Government to pass off immigration responsibilities onto cash-strapped local agencies.

That is why I wish today to introduce a bill to reauthorize and reform the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, better known as SCAAP. This bill is cosponsored by my friend and colleague, John McCain, and is supported by the Arizona Sheriffs Association.

SCAAP is a Federal program that reimburses State, local, and Tribal law enforcement for the costs associated with incarcerating and caring for criminal undocumented immigrants while in custody.

To ensure that local law enforcement receives sufficient reimbursement under SCAAP, my bill would make some commonsense reforms under the program. The bill would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to reauthorize SCAAP through fiscal year 2021. Reauthorizing this program will provide local law enforcement agencies in Arizona and across the country with the certainty that any costs incurred from incarcerating criminal immigrants will be covered by Federal reimbursements.

Our State, local, and Tribal law enforcement agencies are committed to partnering with the Federal Government on immigration enforcement. But that partnership can't succeed unless the Federal Government provides the necessary reimbursements for those services.

As Cochise County Sheriff Mark Dannels said:

Arizona's counties continue to struggle under the fiscal

strain of anemic growth in rural areas and cost-shifts from

the State of Arizona. Housing criminal aliens without federal

assistance diverts needed resources away from our

communities' public safety priorities.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this letter from the Arizona Sheriffs Association in support of my bill to reauthorize SCAAP be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, the SCAAP program is the foundation of the immigration partnership between local law enforcement and the Federal Government for keeping our communities safe. I urge all of my colleagues to support this legislation to reauthorize and reform the SCAAP program.