Political BIAS Emails Act of 2022

Mr. President, on Sunday, a bipartisan group of Senators announced principles for addressing the concerns over shootings like occurred in Uvalde, TX, 3 weeks ago, and other places as well.

And I would say we have been making good progress, but we have run into a couple of bumps in the road that have slowed things down a little bit.

One of them is over crisis intervention programs, something we agree is very important. I believe that we ought to put every State in the position of seeking and receiving funds for crisis intervention programs that they have in place already, even if they don't have a red flag law.

``Red flag'' has been what has been discussed and discussed many times, but 19 States have red flag laws, but that means 31 States have other crisis intervention initiatives that are designed to address the same problem, which is people who are a danger to themselves and others because of their mental health. It includes things like assisted outpatient treatment programs, drug courts, mental health courts, and veterans courts.

The other issue that we are wrestling with relates to the domestic violence provision and the way nontraditional relationships are handled. We need to define this in a very crystal clear way. It can't be overly broad or open to interpretation. It needs to be something that can actually be applied because we are talking about very serious consequences here.

Of course, with both of these provisions, we must include rigorous due process protections. That is a redline for folks on my side of the aisle.

I know Senator Schumer, the majority leader, wants to put this bill on the floor next week, but unless we can resolve these differences over these two provisions and do it soon, hopefully today, then we won't have time to prepare the text so Senators can read the bill for themselves, which we would expect them to do. And so that is going to require some continued work and good faith negotiations on all sides.

The details of these provisions are critical for support from my colleagues on this side of the aisle, and I hope that our colleagues across the aisle will understand, if we continue down this path without resolution, that we are jeopardizing the timetable that the majority leader has set out for us, or we are jeopardizing the likelihood we can get to 60 votes for anything, and we know how hard this is.

I am eager to wrap up our negotiations, but we are not going to cut corners or capitulate for the sole purpose of passing something. I am not willing to compromise on some of my basic principles or throw the Constitution out the window so we can have something we can hold up and say: Look what we did.

There is a bipartisan appetite to get this done--that is good--and I am optimistic about how far we have come, but we are not there yet, and we need to continue and do so quickly to reach an agreement on language so we can then write the text and have the vote.

From the outset, I said I wanted to identify targeted reforms that could have prevented the recent tragedies in Uvalde and elsewhere. That includes stronger mental health resources, which could have helped Salvador Ramos before he became so sick that he killed innocent children, and he

committed suicide, essentially, in the process. That includes school safety measures, which could have prevented the shooter from actually getting inside Robb Elementary School. It includes reforms to prevent violence by criminals and other dangerous individuals.

The National Instant Criminal Background Check System is one of the most effective tools we have to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and people who suffer from severe mental illness, but it is not a perfect system. It is only as good as the information contained in the system.

For example, in 2017, in the shooting in Sutherland Springs--a little town outside of San Antonio, TX, my hometown--what happened there highlighted the gaping hole in the background check system. Despite the fact that the shooter had a long and disturbing history of violence that should have prohibited him from purchasing a gun, he was able to do so because the Air Force in this instance had not uploaded his felony convictions, his domestic violence conviction, or his mental health commitment.

In response to Sutherland Springs, Senator Murphy and I introduced the Fix NICS Act to ensure that all Federal Agencies accurately and correctly upload the required conviction records on a timely basis.

Yes, this is the same Senator Chris Murphy whom I am working with now to try to achieve success here. We have done it before, and I believe we can do it again. Our bill was signed into law in March of 2018, and in the first 3 years, 11\1/2\ million more records were uploaded into the three national databases that the FBI checks. The number of records in one of those databases increased by more than 30 percent alone. So I think I can say with assurance that what we did together in 2018 has saved lives because if it kept a gun out of the hands of somebody who is already prohibited from getting a gun under current law, we will have saved a life--maybe even the life of the shooter. Sixty percent of the gun deaths in America are suicides. But I know we have saved at least those lives and I think many others as well.

But, as the Uvalde shooting demonstrated, there is another hole in the background check system, and that is juvenile records.

Salvador Ramos showed up at the age of 18 and had a clean record as far as the background check system was concerned because it couldn't look back at his troubled history, struggling with mental health and law enforcement problems. So he showed up as if he had been born the day before, and nothing else previously mattered because it wasn't in the background check system.

If there are disqualifying criminal or mental health records, that information should show up in the NICS system. In other words, if there are things in your life that would disqualify you if you were an adult but that happened before you turned 18, I think that is the information we need and would want to have for purposes of determining who should be able to purchase or possess a firearm. So that wall that prevents the lookback into pre-18-year-old records is obviously a problem.

Four years ago, the Uvalde Police Department received information about two male juveniles, 13 and 14 years old, who were plotting a school shooting for their senior year. That was 4 years ago, and they were plotting a school shooting when they graduated in--you guessed it--2022. Now, there is no way for us to know for sure whether one of those individuals was Salvador Ramos because those juvenile records are not available to us. But I am here to say that if it is not Salvador Ramos, then we have even a bigger problem. If there are two additional, young, 13- and 14-year-old boys out there saying they are going to shoot up the school when they become seniors, we have even a bigger problem.

One of the provisions we are discussing would encourage the States to upload similar relevant juvenile records into the NICS. This is standard practice in some but not all States, and it is easy to see why it is important.

If an 18-year-old is convicted of aggravated assault--a felony--the record will show up in his background check and prohibit him from purchasing a gun, but if a 17-year-old is convicted of the same crime, the record will not necessarily be uploaded into the National Instant Criminal Background Check System. If he tries to purchase a gun at 18, the background check is likely to come back clean--again, because the system is only as good as the information in it.

Let me give you another example. An individual can be adjudicated mentally ill on his 17th birthday and actually be civilly committed for multiple months in a mental institution, but that same person could likely purchase a gun at the age of 18 without anything showing up on his record. Existing law prohibits that purchase, but not all the States are sending that information to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.

Those are examples of why it is so important to be able to get that lookback in the pre-18-year-old history for mental health or criminal justice encounters.

This is not actually an expansion of the background check system because it doesn't add any new restrictions to gun ownership, but it would permit the background check system to actually have access to relevant and material information. It is a commonsense step to ensure that the data in the NICS system is accurate.

That is easy enough to say, but we need to ensure this idea would work in practice, and that is exactly what we are examining now.

No. 1, we need to ensure this provision would protect due process of law. That is a constitutional right that is fundamental. Under current law, anyone who receives a denial has the right to appeal that decision or challenge the accuracy of the record. Of course, those same protections should exist for juvenile records as well.

Secondly, we need to establish an interim plan while these records are being uploaded into the background check system, a process that will take some time.

Now, my colleagues across the aisle suggested a mandatory waiting period for all purchasers under the age of 21, but we didn't agree to that. There is no reason why somebody who passes a background check with all relevant information in the database should be denied the ability to purchase a gun. In fact, we are talking again about a constitutional right. So no mandatory waiting period. But we are looking at extending the investigatory period for juvenile records that are unclear or ambiguous. Let me explain what I am talking about.

Under current law, a person who wants to purchase a gun from their local retailer must complete a background check. We talked about that. In nearly 90 percent of the cases, the background check is resolved almost immediately because these are computerized records. The average processing time is, in fact, less than 2 minutes. In those cases, the seller receives an immediate answer--either the sale can proceed or it cannot.

In the remaining roughly 10 percent of background checks, the system doesn't return a green light or a red light. In short, this happens when there are question marks or other things that need to be inquired about. This could be caused by a number of factors. If the buyer has a common name, the system could pull records on the wrong individual with the same name. It could also be caused by incomplete criminal history records. For example, if somebody was convicted of assault but the record doesn't say whether it was a felony or misdemeanor or in some cases whether the assault was a domestic violence incident, that would have consequences in terms of their ability to purchase a firearm. So further review, further investigation sometimes is necessary to see whether the light should be green or the light should be red.

Under the current law, the FBI has up to 3 business days to complete a background check and give the seller a clean answer on whether the sale can proceed. That is current law, up to 3 days. In many cases, this review that we are talking about adding for persons between 18 and 21--this review can clarify that the sale can proceed, and that is a great thing. That is how we safeguard Second Amendment rights for law- abiding gun owners.

We discussed the idea of extending that investigatory period when there is a question mark surrounding juvenile records. Again, this is the exception to

the rule, where more information is required because the answer that you get is ambiguous or unclear.

Under this enhanced review, an 18-year-old with a clean record would be able to expeditiously purchase a firearm. The extended investigation period would only apply to those rare cases and, again, only for those 18 to 20 for whom the system does not return a clear answer--yes or no, green or red--but, rather, a yellow light.

We believe this is a commonsense and straightforward way to improve the existing background check system without adding new restrictions.

As I said, negotiations are ongoing, but time is of the essence because we need to get to an agreement so we can get text to our colleagues so that the majority leader can bring this bill up on the floor next week after giving everyone a chance to read it and understand it and have their questions answered.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, it was 10 years ago today that President Obama walked into the White House Rose Garden and said he had an announcement to make.

He made an announcement which changed the lives of hundreds of thousands of people living in America. He announced the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. Now, we call it DACA.

And with that announcement, I joined with, I guess, thousands of young leaders across this country and breathed a sigh of relief.

Over the past decade, DACA has allowed more than 800,000 Dreamers to remain in the only home they have ever known: America. These young people we call Dreamers came to this

country as children, some as young as a few months old. They grew up studying in our classrooms. They grew up befriending our children and grandchildren. They went to church with us, and when they were kids, every morning they stood up in that classroom and pledged allegiance to that flag. And the reason they did it, of course, is they believed it was their flag.

In the years since DACA was announced, a lot has changed in the world. Presidents have come and gone, wars have ended, and a once-in-a- century pandemic has rocked the world.

But in the face of all these changes and upheavals, one thing remains steady, constant, and predictable: the devotion of Dreamers to America. These young people have demonstrated an unwavering commitment to America. They served as our school teachers, first responders, members of the military, essential workers in the pandemic.

More than 200,000 DACA recipients were classified by our government as ``essential critical infrastructure workers'' during the pandemic-- 200,000 of them. And, remember, they don't enjoy the benefit of citizenship yet. Among them are 40,000 healthcare industry workers, doctors, nurses, paramedics.

Over the years, I have come to the floor of the Senate over 125 different times to tell the stories of the Dreamers. These stories show us what is at stake when we consider the fate of DACA and the Dream Act.

Today, I want to tell you the story of Yazmin Ruiz. She is the 130th Dreamer story that I have told on the Senate floor.

This is a photograph of Yazmin.

She arrived in this country at the age of 3, along with her twin sister and her mom. And even though her extended family remained in Mexico, she said she never felt alone growing up in Arizona because ``we were surrounded by community.''

But when Yazmin was 16, the family suffered a tragedy that ignited her passion for medicine. Her mother had a stroke, and when the family arrived at the hospital, they were shocked to discover that none of the healthcare providers spoke Spanish.

At a young age, Yazmin, who was grappling with the trauma and fear that her mother might die, was forced to play the role of interpreter and translator to save her mother's life.

It was at that moment, even as a terrified 16-year-old, that Yazmin resolved to become a healthcare hero if her mom needed her.

She studied hard in high school. She graduated with honors. She made her way to the University of New Mexico, where she earned a bachelor of science in biology and Spanish.

Yazmin then matriculated to the University of New Mexico School of Medicine, but then she hit a speed bump. She discovered that her immigration status was going to stop her from receiving a professional license to practice medicine. Her dream was interrupted.

What did she do? She said: No way. She wouldn't accept no for an answer.

She joined a coalition of like-minded students and rallied support in the New Mexico Legislature to change the State law on licensure.

Now Yazmin Ruiz is fulfilling her childhood dream. Every day she delivers care and support to families like her own and offers the guidance that she once sought as a teenager lost in our healthcare system.

Yazmin is in the third year of her general surgeon residency at the University of New Mexico. And at the height of the pandemic, she was deep in the trenches of our healthcare system.

Back in the summer of 2020, when COVID was new and basically unknown, Yazmin was working 80 hours a week, providing daily care to COVID- positive patients, performing CPR, and wearing protective gear from head to toe.

Like so many Dreamers, Yazmin's commitment to serving her community was unshakeable. Even when her own family members came down with COVID, she didn't stay home and take care of them. She went to work. Day after day, she put her life on the line to save the lives of others.

And she has continued that journey as a healthcare professional against improbable odds.

Yazmin considers it ``a privilege and an honor to serve America in the midst of an unprecedented public health crisis.''

I want to thank Yazmin Ruiz for her service on the frontlines of the coronavirus pandemic. She is an immigrant health hero. She is a DACA health hero. She has put herself and her family at risk to protect American lives. She shouldn't also have to worry about whether she is going to be deported tomorrow and whether her family will be deported as well.

Think about that for one moment. This young woman, against all the odds, is pursuing her residency in surgery. She is determined to serve this Nation and to make people's lives better.

And what is our response, our official government response? Sorry. You are not a citizen, and under the current law, you never will be.

So you ask yourself, what are we thinking? If a quality, contributing person like Yazmin Ruiz is willing to defy the odds and to risk everything to be a doctor, why aren't we applauding that, rewarding that, giving her an incentive and others like her to be a generation of service to America?

Basic question we have to ask, would we be a better nation, a better country, if we deported Yazmin Ruiz? I hope the answer is pretty obvious. It is to me.

Over the past 20 years or more, I have had the privilege of sharing more than 100 stories like Yazmin's on the floor of the Senate--the stories of Dreamers who have given everything they can to America and who have more than earned their place in America's story.

Yet these brilliant young people are still waiting on us, on Congress, to finish the job that President Obama started with DACA. This program was always supposed to be a temporary solution. Ten years ago we knew that. The permanent solution was enacting a piece of legislation that I introduced 20 years ago called the DREAM Act. It provides a path to citizenship for Dreamers, including young immigrants eligible for DACA.

Congress has been on the cusp of passing the DREAM Act for years. In 2013, we included it in a larger immigration package that passed the Senate with 68 votes. It was a glorious day. Can you imagine it--68 votes in the Senate for anything?

And that broad bipartisan support reflected America's public opinion; that the Dream Act was the right thing to do. In fact, over the years, ``Dreamers'' have become a household word. When we came up with the name for this legislation over 20 years ago, and you said the word ``Dreamers,'' people would say: Oh, I know that. That is a rock group, a British rock group, and it might have been Freddie and the Dreamers, but that wasn't the group we were describing at all.

These Dreamers have touched the hearts of America because in the Dreamers we see our own history as a nation of immigrants. We know that they deserve permanent status in this country, their home. They have earned it, but time and again the Senate has failed DACA recipients.

Instead of making these protections permanent, we have left them in doubt. The former President of the United States, Donald Trump, even attempted to terminate the DACA Program to turn people like Yazmin Ruiz away from the country.

Can you imagine what that would have meant to her, to her family, to New Mexico, to America, for all the Americans whose lives have been saved by Dreamers like Yazmin or for the Nation's classrooms and businesses that count on these idealistic, hard-working people who want to be part of our future?

And our failure to protect Dreamers is not only a human disaster, it is an economic disaster. It doesn't add up.

DACA recipients and their households pay more than $5 billion in Federal taxes, more than $3 billion in State and local taxes every single year. That is money that funds the construction of roads and bridges, pays Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. And the economic upside of enacting the Dream Act is even bigger.

Last year, the House passed the bipartisan Dream and Promise Act. If the Senate just followed their lead and passed that legislation today, we could increase America's GDP by more than $800 billion over the next decade and create hundreds of thousands of jobs in the process.

Our broken immigration system is embarrassing. It is failing America, and it is failing our families. It is also failing our economy. Beyond the Dream Act, Congress on both sides of the political spectrum agree, comprehensive immigration reform would boost our economic growth and help ease inflationary pressures in the United States. The United States Chamber of Commerce even called for doubling the number of legal immigrants in America to address the worker shortage and in turn alleviate inflation. With the Dream Act, we are talking about a bipartisan measure that is very simple in scope. It allows young people who have grown up in America to continue contributing to our economy. For decades now, Dreamers have been stuck in legislative purgatory. Only a subset of them have been able to secure DACA protections, and even for those who do, they have to renew their status every 2 years, which means they can only plan their lives in uncertain 2-year increments. That is unfair. No, it is cruel.

Dreamers are living with the sword of Damocles hanging over their head. In the coming weeks, a Federal judge could strike down DACA and deport these young people to countries they barely remember, if they remember at all. Just last year, a Federal judge in Texas limited the program to only renewing applications. That ruling was wrong. It excluded a whole generation of Dreamers from stepping out of the shadows of a broken immigration system.

If there is one lesson we can learn from the bipartisan gun safety framework that is being debated this week in Washington, it is that the Members of this Senate are not as divided as the American people think. We can come together to support commonsense policies that secure a brighter future for America. That is exactly the opportunity we have with the Dream Act.

I can think of no better way to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of DACA than by finally passing this legislation, offering every one of our amazing Dreamers a path to American citizenship, which they deserve and they have earned. An overwhelming bipartisan majority of voters want Congress to pass the Dream Act. They know it will dramatically grow our economy and strengthen our Nation. Most importantly, it is the right thing to do.

It is time for Congress to step up and meet our responsibility-- Democrats, Republicans and Independents alike. Let's get this done.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, we continue a productive week here on the Senate floor.

Today, the Senate will take another step closer to passing the largest veterans' healthcare bill in decades, the Honoring our PACT Act. In a few moments, the Senate will vote to adopt the substitute amendment and then immediately vote on cloture on the bill, bringing us to the brink of passing this long-sought piece of legislation.

Frankly, the Senate should come to an agreement to finish the PACT Act work A-S-A-P. We should pass this bill as soon as we can and finally tell our veterans that the long wait for their well-earned benefits is over.

Let me say it again.

There is no reason not to finish the PACT Act A-S-A-P. Our Nation's veterans have waited long enough for this bill. Since 9/11, nearly 3.5 million veterans have been exposed to toxic burn pits in the line of duty. Scores of Americans went off to serve our country in perfect health only to come back home and get sick from toxic exposure, and when many of these veterans applied to the VA for healthcare benefits, they oftentimes discovered that they didn't qualify.

It is a confounding indignity for our Nation's heroes to sacrifice everything for our country only to come home, get sick, and discover that the VA ain't there for them--they have to fend for themselves.

What kind of message does it send to future veterans when we can't guarantee they will get the healthcare benefits they rightfully deserve and when the VA will not deal with injuries that occurred on the battlefield because of toxic burn pits and other issues? With the PACT Act, we have a chance to answer that question with a resounding yes.

Question: Well, if I enlist, am I going to really be taken care of when my service is complete?

We are going to have a chance to answer that question with a resounding yes. Yes, we will take care of you. Yes, we will make sure you can live healthy and dignified lives. Yes, we will keep our promise to protect our veterans just as they have sacrificed everything for us.

No great nation can dare afford to turn its back on the multitudes who have served our country. No veterans

should ever have to carry the burden of treating complications from toxic exposure all by themselves, and we can change that simply with a vote on this bill.

Let us pass the PACT Act with all due haste. We have a moral obligation in the Chamber to get this done.

Nominations

Now, Mr. President, on the nominations front, we are moving ahead with confirming President Biden's critical and well-qualified nominees.

Later today, we will vote on the confirmation of Alan Leventhal to serve as the U.S. Ambassador to Denmark.

Later this week, once we conclude the PACT Act, we will also move forward on the nomination of Mary Boyle for the Consumer Product Safety Commission, whose confirmation would give that Agency a Democratic majority.

We will also soon vote to confirm another historic judicial nominee, Ana Isabel de Alba, to serve as a district judge for the Eastern District of California. Judge de Alba will be the first ever Latina to serve as a Federal judge in California's Eastern District, joining the more than 65 qualified judicial nominees that this majority has confirmed under President Biden.

I am proud of the historic progress this Senate Democratic majority has made in confirming well-qualified and diverse nominees to the executive branch, to independent boards, and to the Federal bench, and we are going to keep going.

Gun Legislation

Mr. President, on gun safety, Democrats and Republicans continue negotiations over the legislative text for the first major gun safety bill to pass the Senate in 30 years.

Just a few weeks ago, such an effort would have seemed unimaginable. If there were any issue that encapsulates the gridlock of the past few decades, gun safety would be near the very top of the list. For too long, Americans have gotten used to a frustrating pattern--tragedy strikes; families grieve; but gridlock in the Senate ensues.

Perhaps this time--hopefully, this time--it will be different. Many in this Chamber are working, right now, in the hopes that it will be different. We are not over the finish line yet, but there is a real hunger to finally accomplish what has escaped the Senate for far too long: passing meaningful gun safety reform.

Again, not too long ago, this debate would have been hard to have fathomed, but despite the long odds, we gave negotiators space to do their work. I am glad we did because we now have the best chance in decades to act on gun violence. I spoke to both Senators Murphy and Cornyn this morning. They are eager to get the text completed. There will be meetings all day long in the hopes that we can get the text done so we can put it on the floor as soon as possible and get it passed. If we can prevent even one death from gun violence in the future, our efforts at this moment will have been worth it.

Gun safety is near and dear to my heart. As the Acting President pro tempore knows, three decades ago, I was a proud author of the Brady Bill in Congress, which won the support of many Republicans and even law enforcement. Back then, I argued we had to get something done because the American people were sick and tired of the insanity and inaction of gun violence as much as they are today. After years of trying, we succeeded back then, but it wasn't on the first try. Yet we enacted a bill that, very likely, saved tens of thousands of lives. There are many, many people--thousands or tens of thousands in all likelihood--walking the streets today because we passed the Brady Law.

Today, the American people are similarly sick and tired of the insanity of the gun violence happening every day across the country. Just thinking about all of the shootings we have suffered over the years is exhausting and debilitating: Columbine, Virginia, Sandy Hook, Parkland, Las Vegas, Orlando, El Paso, Charleston, Atlanta, Buffalo, Uvalde. The list keeps going on and growing. The American people have had enough. They want us to move forward.

If the Senate can come up with a bill that embraces the bipartisan framework, we are going to save lives. I promise that, once the text is done, I will put it on the floor as soon as possible, so I encourage my colleagues to keep working. As I mentioned, our Senators on both sides of the aisle will be working diligently all day to try and come up with the final text as soon as possible. We don't know the next time we will have a chance to make meaningful progress on gun violence, so we have every reason in the world to get to yes.

Elections

Mr. President, on the elections of last night and election deniers, a year and a half after the 2020 election, Donald Trump's Big Lie is alive and well, unfortunately.

Last night, hard-right candidates who believe the last Presidential election was stolen--it is so incorrect, with no factual basis. But these people with these beliefs were elevated into the general election. Many of these candidates are running in critical swing States and running for offices that will have outsized influence in managing future elections.

The example of Nevada's secretary of state race is especially bone chilling. Jim Marchant--a far-right radical, who openly believes that the 2020 election results were illegitimate, who believes the Big Lie-- is now running to be the top elections official in Nevada. Mr. Marchant is someone who openly thinks Donald Trump should be the President right now, and if he wins in November, he will be Nevada's most important election official and would pose a direct threat--a direct threat--to the democratic process in that State.

He must be rejected by the people of every political persuasion. It doesn't matter if you are a Democrat or a Republican or an Independent, a liberal or a conservative or a moderate. Democracy is at risk if we elevate individuals who don't believe in the sanctity of elections. That is the road to authoritarianism, to dictatorship. This isn't a partisan argument. Undermining democracy endangers all of us-- Democrats, Republicans, Independents. If the proponents of the Big Lie are elected to office, they pose a direct threat to our democratic way of life.

The January 6 hearings have made it abundantly clear that even Donald Trump's inner circle knew the Big Lie was utter garbage, so it is nothing short of horrifying to see that radicals who profess the Big Lie are gaining strength across the country.

I urge the American people to reject the credo of lies pushed by Donald Trump and his cronies and, whatever your party, to vote this November for men and women who will safeguard our democracy and preserve the sanctity of our elections. Without it, our country could be on the road to ruin.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, at 5:15 this afternoon, we will be voting on a budget resolution written by my colleague Senator Rand Paul from Kentucky. As chairman of the Budget Committee, I urge a very strong ``no'' vote.

At a time of a massive incline in wealth inequality, at a time when two people in our country own more wealth than the bottom 42 percent of our population, at a time when the top 1 percent owns more wealth than the bottom 92 percent, at a time when we are looking at more income and wealth inequality than at any time in American history, this budget resolution offered by Senator Paul would move us in exactly the wrong direction and make a bad situation worse.

Senator Paul's resolution would make the very wealthiest people in this country even wealthier, while at the same time, it would make tens of millions of middle-class Americans--people in the middle class, people in the working class, lower income Americans--even poorer.

We remain, sadly, the only major country on Earth not to guarantee healthcare to all people as a human right. We pay the highest prices by far in the world for prescription drugs. Half of our people are living paycheck to paycheck, and millions are working at 8, 9, 10 bucks an hour because we still have a disastrous, starvation minimum wage of $7.25 an hour. Many millions of Americans today, as housing prices soar, are spending half or more of their limited incomes on housing. Forty-five million people in our country are struggling with student debt. At a time when half of older Americans have no savings--people have worked their entire lives, and they have no savings to prepare themselves for retirement. The Social Security benefits that they will receive are inadequate to allow them to live out their remaining years in dignity.

What this budget resolution brought forth by Senator Paul does is exactly the opposite of what we should be doing. Instead of expanding Medicare to make sure that every man, woman, and child in this country has healthcare as a human right, this is a budget that would lead to devastating cuts to Medicare, cuts to Medicaid, and cuts to other public health programs.

Senator Paul's budget resolution would cut nutrition assistance at a time when there are children in America today who are going hungry. It would cut Federal aid to education at a time when schools are looking for funding to pay the teachers they need adequate wages. But in the midst of this budget that cuts healthcare, that cuts education, that cuts Social Security, that cuts every benefit needed by ordinary Americans, this is a budget that would give massive tax breaks to the wealthiest people in this country.

So you have a situation where, right now, we have a tax system which is broken, which is corrupt, which allows some billionaires in a given year to pay zero in Federal income taxes--zero. Some of the richest people in this country in a given year do not pay a nickel in Federal income tax. We have a tax system which allows dozens of major, profitable corporations making billions of dollars a year in profit to pay in a given year zero in Federal income tax. We have an effective tax rate today in which billionaires pay a lower effective rate than nurses and firefighters. That is what we have today. Senator Paul's budget--well, you guessed it. You are right. It would give even more tax breaks to the 1 percent and to the billionaire class.

Unfortunately, the vision of America that Senator Paul's budget puts forward--balancing the budget on the backs of working families, the elderly, the children, the sick, and the poor in order to make the richest people in America even richer--is not just the vision of Senator Paul. I wish it was just his vision, and I have to applaud his honesty for coming forward and putting his vision on paper. Unfortunately, it is the vision of many, many people in the Republican Party, and this is what they want.

Senator Paul and many in the Republican Party do not believe that it was good enough to provide over $1 trillion in tax breaks to the top 1 percent and large corporations, as they did when Trump was President-- not good enough. The budget that we are debating today, Senator Paul's proposal, would make those tax breaks for the wealthy and the powerful permanent--permanent--at a cost of more than $2 trillion over the next decade, cutting nutrition programs for hungry children, throwing millions of people off of Medicare and Medicaid, but providing $2 trillion in tax breaks for the very wealthy.

Under Trump, Republicans came within 1 vote of passing a bill that would have thrown up to 32 million Americans off of health insurance and eliminated vital protections for people with preexisting conditions like cancer or diabetes and substantially increased premiums for older workers. That was the bill that the Trump administration tried to get passed. It failed by one vote--the late Senator McCain.

Senator Paul and many Republicans who support this budget resolution believe that what they tried to do a few years ago in decimating the Affordable Care Act--hey, that didn't go far enough.

So the budget that we are talking about right now, Senator Paul's proposal, would throw up to 35 million Americans off of Medicaid.

So what do you do in the middle of a pandemic when you have no health insurance? Well, right now, as a nation today, there are estimates that about 60,000 people a year die because they don't get to a doctor on time. Throw 35 million people off Medicaid, that number will escalate. We are talking about tens and tens of thousands of people who would die because they wouldn't have Medicaid, wouldn't be able to go to a doctor when they are sick.

When Donald Trump was in office, he proposed a budget that would have cut Medicare by nearly $845 billion. Senator Paul and the Republicans who

will support this budget do not believe that those cuts went far enough--only $845 billion in cuts to Medicare. The budget we are debating today would cut Medicare by up to $3.9 trillion over the next decade and throw some 29 million senior citizens and persons with disabilities off of Medicare.

At a time when tens of millions of Americans struggle with hunger, Senator Paul and the Republicans who support this budget want to cut the SNAP program by $300 billion, throwing some 13 million people off of that program.

I don't know what a nation stands for if we cannot feed the hungry and if we cannot provide healthcare to people who need it, but that is what this budget does. Overall, Senator Paul's budget would make $15 trillion in cuts over the next 10 years, slashing the Federal budget by nearly 40 percent by the end of this decade.

So that is where we are today, Mr. President. And, again, I would reiterate that this is not just Senator Paul's budget. And I applaud him for his honesty. He is an honest guy; he is a straightforward guy; and he comes forward and he says: This is what I believe.

It would be bad enough if this were just the views of one U.S. Senator. Unfortunately, it is not. These are the views of many in the Republican Party.

So, Mr. President, it is absolutely imperative that this budget proposal of Senator Paul be defeated and that we move this country forward in a very different direction. It is a direction which says that the U.S. Government should be representing the needs of all of the people, not just the wealthy and the powerful and Big Money campaign contributors. It is a vision in opposition to Senator Paul that says that healthcare is a human right, that we have to stand up to the pharmaceutical industry and cut prescription drug costs in this country in half. It is a vision which says that, no, we should not be cutting Social Security; we should be lifting the cap on taxable income, which today is at $147,000, meaning that somebody making $10 million pays the same amount into Social Security as somebody making $147,000. We should be lifting that cap so that we can increase Social Security benefits for all seniors.

So, Mr. President, this is not just a budget resolution on the part of the Senator from Kentucky, Senator Paul; this really is a contrasting vision of where we want this country to go. Do we want to move into an oligarchic form of society where a handful of people on top have enormous wealth and enormous political power while, at the same time, the middle class continues to become small and we have more and more people living in poverty?

So these are contrasting visions of the future of America, and I hope very much that Senator Paul's resolution will be soundly defeated.

With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, former Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt, in writing with Jared Cohen, once said:

Modern technology platforms [are] even more powerful than

most people realize [and that] our future world will be

profoundly altered by their adoption and successfulness in

societies everywhere.

There is no question that Big Tech plays an ever increasing role in our lives. I imagine most of us wouldn't even be able to count the number of times a day we interact with technology platforms, from checking our email to spending time on social media to searching on Google, and the pandemic only accelerated that trend as our reliance on technology for everything from social connection to food delivery increased.

I don't need to tell anyone that technology platforms offer lots of benefits. They are sources of entertainment and information. They make it easier to stay close to distant loved ones. They allow us to shop, to conduct business, and to connect with friends, and to advocate for causes that we believe in.

But I also don't need to tell anyone that technology platforms have a more problematic side as well. One big problem arises from the increased ability Big Tech has to shape the information we see through the use of opaque algorithms. Gone are the days when you logged into Facebook and just consumed content that had been posted chronologically since your previous login. Now, Facebook and other social media platforms use algorithms to shape your news feed and provide suggestions for additional content, emphasizing posts that the platforms think you will be interested in and deemphasizing other posts.

Now, obviously, algorithms are not all bad. Most of us like it when YouTube automatically plays another video by our favorite band instead of switching to something completely unrelated. But if a 15-year-old kid watches a video and then YouTube's algorithms lead him or her down a path of inappropriate videos--well, I think you could see that is a problem.

A 2021 Wall Street Journal investigation into TikTok revealed how easy it is for young users to be bombarded with inappropriate and disturbing content. And thanks to limited or opaque disclosures, people are often not aware of just how much their experience on technology platforms is being shaped by opaque algorithms.

When we search for something on Google, most of us don't spend a lot of time thinking about the fact that Google is tailoring our search results to what it thinks we want to see or what it wants us to see. But the fact of the matter is that almost all of the information being presented to us by Big Tech platforms like social media and Google is being filtered and tailored to us. And while, again, this can have a positive side, it can also have negative consequences, ranging from political polarization to addictive behavior.

As technology platforms play an ever more dominant role in our lives, I believe platforms should be required to make users aware of the fact that an algorithm is controlling the content they see. To that end, I have offered multiple pieces of legislation to increase Big Tech's transparency and to give consumers more control over their experience.

My bipartisan Filter Bubble Transparency Act would require large- scale internet platforms to notify users that the content they are seeing has been selected for them by secret algorithms, creating a unique universe of information for each user--a phenomenon that is often referred to as the ``filter bubble.'' Platforms would also be required to give users the choice to switch to a version of the platform that is filter bubble-free.

I have also introduced the bipartisan Platform Accountability and Transparency Act--or the PACT Act--to shed greater light on the secretive content moderation processes internet platforms use.

The PACT Act would require internet platforms to prepare biannual transparency reports outlining material that they have removed from their sites or chosen to deemphasize. These reports would have to be made available to the public and not in intentionally complicated legalese. Platforms would have to provide clearly understandable versions of these reports to consumers.

The PACT Act would require technology platforms to provide consumers with greater due process when it comes to content these platforms remove or otherwise moderate. So if Facebook, for example, removed one of your posts, it would have to tell you why and would have to provide a way for you to appeal that decision.

Today, I am introducing a third piece of legislation to increase transparency and accountability at Big Tech. This bill is called the Political Bias in Algorithm Sorting Emails Act, otherwise known as the Political BIAS Emails Act. The Political BIAS Emails Act is intended to address the problem political campaigns on both sides of the aisle have faced in getting their campaign emails to Americans.

A recent study from North Carolina State University found that during the 2020 election, Google's Gmail--the largest email provider in the United States--sent greater numbers of Republican campaign emails to spam folders, while Yahoo! and Outlook sent greater numbers of Democratic campaign emails to spam, albeit by lesser margins than Google did for Republican campaign emails. Well, that is a problem.

Americans should have access to political communications from both parties so that they can make their own informed decisions on what candidates they wish to support. Disproportionately filtering out information from candidates of one party--or from a certain candidate within a particular political party, as happened during the Democratic Presidential primary--skews the information available to Americans.

I do not believe that Big Tech should be deciding what information individuals receive. Americans are free to opt out of whatever email communications they wish, including political communications, but Big Tech should not be making that decision for them. My Political BIAS Emails Act would prohibit email services from using filtering algorithms on emails sent from political campaigns where the candidate is running from Federal office.

Gmail and other email services' inboxing practices are a black box to consumers, and they operate with very little accountability. To address this, my legislation would require email services to submit transparency reports noting the number of emails from both Republican and Democratic campaigns flagged as spam, as well as provide information to political campaigns on request to help ensure that voters are receiving relevant information on every candidate's policy positions.

This legislation would help ensure that Americans and not Big Tech--I emphasize not Big Tech--are making the decisions on what campaign communications they want to receive.

Internet platforms have enhanced Americans' lives in a number of ways, as I have already mentioned. But as these platforms play an ever- greater role in shaping the information we receive, it is vital that we insist on adequate transparency and ensure that Americans are given the opportunity to opt out of the filter bubble. American people ought to be in charge of what they see, not Big Tech companies.

I will continue to work to advance the various bills that I have introduced to promote greater transparency in Big Tech. And as ranking member of the Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Communications, Media, and Broadband, I will continue to focus on ways to ensure that Big Tech is accountable to consumers.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.