Floor Statements

Mr. President, I thank Senator Collins for arranging for us to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the passage of women's suffrage here in the Senate.

I thank my colleague Senator Feinstein for working together so that we all have a chance to reflect on the progress we made and the commitment to make sure we continue to move forward.

It was June 4, 1919--100 years ago today--that the Senate passed the women's suffrage constitutional amendment, but the campaign started with the birth of our Nation. On March 31, 1776, Abigail Adams wrote a letter to her husband, who was serving in the Continental Congress.

She wrote:

I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous

and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such an

unlimited power in the hands of the husbands. . . . If

particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we

are determined to foment a rebellion and will not hold

ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or

representation.

I am sorry that our Founding Fathers did not listen to Abigail Adams.

Over 144 years later, the 19th Amendment was adopted to our Constitution, providing for women's suffrage. It passed first in the House of Representatives on May 21, 1919, and then in the Senate on June 4, 1919.

The right to vote was the first step. Over the last 100 years, we have seen tremendous progress. Legally, financially, and socially, more women have entered the workforce than ever before. Women are filling key leadership posts in increasing numbers, but we still have an unfinished agenda for equality for women.

I think most people in this country would be surprised to learn that there is nothing in the Constitution of the United States that guarantees equal rights for women. As the late Justice Scalia said, there is nothing in the Constitution that requires discrimination against women, but there is nothing that protects women against discrimination.

Senator Murkowski and I introduced S. Res. 6, which extends the date for the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment. In 1972, we passed the Equal Rights Amendment here for ratification for the States and extended it one time, and 10 years later, 35 States had ratified the Equal Rights Amendment--3 short of the required 38. Nevada and Illinois have since ratified the amendment, so it is one State short. However, we need to pass the resolution to extend the time limit.

As Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has said--and this is interesting-- every constitution written since the end of World War II includes a provision that men and women are citizens of equal stature. Ours does not. It is well past time that we passed the Equal Rights Amendment.

The 27th Amendment to the Constitution took over 200 years to ratify. It deals with congressional pay increases.

We can pass and should pass in this Congress a fitting tribute to the celebration of women's suffrage--the Equal Rights Amendment for women.

We need to do more for equal pay for equal work. I acknowledge the extraordinary leadership that we had in Maryland and this Nation in Senator Barbara Mikulski. She was a true champion in so many ways--as a social worker, as a city councilperson, as a Member of the House of Representatives, and as a U.S. Senator--in advancing rights for women, particularly in the workplace. I remember, with pride, seeing her stand next to President Obama as he signed his very first bill, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which enforced rights for women in the workplace. As Senator Mikulski would point out, we still have work to do. We still have not passed equal pay for equal work in this country, and this Congress should deal with that.

We have a wealth gap. There is no question that women do not have the same wealth as men. In working with Senator Rubio on the committee on which I serve as ranking member, the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, we must look at whether the tools of the Small Business Administration's are providing help to women to develop their own businesses. Wealth is usually accumulated through business growth, and we need to do more to help women.

In the State of Maryland, I am proud that 39 percent of our small businesses are owned by women, but women do not have equal access to the tools with which to access capital. We can do better with the 7(a) Program and with the Community Advantage Pilot Program, particularly in making it permanent. So there are still steps we can take to help advance equal rights and equal opportunity for women.

There is women's healthcare. The constitutional right of women to make their own choices about their own health and well-being is again being challenged by some of our States and here on Capitol Hill. Whether it is abortion, preventive screening, or contraception, access to reproductive healthcare provides women with greater economic opportunity. Treating women as less than equal was wrong at the start of our Nation, and it is wrong today.

As we celebrate the 100th anniversary of women's suffrage, let us do several things. First, I urge all of our colleagues to support the resolution that is pending, S. Res. 212, in regard to celebrating the women's suffrage and, second, that we work for full equality for women in our Constitution, in the workplace, in entrepreneurship, and in healthcare.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that floor privileges be granted to Marli Pasternak, a member of my staff, during today's session of the Senate.

Mr. President, media outlets have begun reporting that President Trump is looking into granting pardons to certain military personnel who have been convicted of committing war crimes in both Iraq and Afghanistan. If these reports are true, I find this to be most troubling.

I have an article here that appeared CNN that says:

The idea of pardons of accused servicemembers who have not

yet gone to trial and been convicted that is raising the most

concern from some military law experts.

The United States' global influence is due, in large part, to its reputation for upholding human rights and adhering to international humanitarian law and the law of armed conflict, otherwise known as the law of war. As Stephen Preston, a former general counsel of the Department of Defense, wrote in the Department of Defense's Law of War Manual:

The law of war is part of who we are . . . the laws of war

have shaped the U.S. Armed Forces as much as they have shaped

any other armed force in the world . . . The law of war is a

part of our military heritage, and obeying it is the right

thing to do . . . the self-control needed to refrain from

violations of law of war under the stresses of combat is

the same good order and discipline necessary to operate

cohesively and victoriously in battle.

Five interdependent principles serve as the foundation of the law of war: military necessity, humanity, proportionality, distinction, and honor. These principles are pillars of America's moral standing in the world that allow our military to be the most lethal fighting force against our adversaries but also the most respected and revered by citizens of the world.

The principles of the law of war are aligned with the constitutional values that our Founding Fathers set forth and that all generations of U.S. military servicemembers have sworn an oath to uphold and defend against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

Department of Defense policy states that ``each member of the armed services has a duty to: (1) comply with the law of war in good faith; and (2) refuse to comply with clearly illegal orders to commit violations of the law of war.'' By virtue of their oath and training, members of the U.S. military are accountable for their individual and collective actions through the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

The U.S. Government is also obligated to implement and enforce the law of war as required by our Nation's own domestic laws, policies, regulations, orders, and by the multiple treaty obligations we have with other countries.

U.S. military members who are investigated and convicted of violating the law of war, through the prescribed Department of Defense investigative and judicial procedures, have violated international and domestic laws and have failed to uphold their oath and professional ethics. Whether it was My Lai during Vietnam or Abu Ghraib in Iraq, we have seen how the horrific acts committed by a small group of rogue actors can strategically diminish America's global standing, moral leadership, and strengthen our enemies.

We Americans combat extremism, tyranny, and hate to preserve our way of life. Under no circumstance is adapting to the behaviors of our worst adversaries ever justified--ever. If we willfully allow our institutions or the individuals within them to deviate from the laws and standards of conduct that underpin our great Nation, then we lose our way, and the world loses its champion of righteousness and internationally recognized norms and values.

I do not believe anyone in this Chamber disagrees with the laws and values of this country. The matter at hand is whether we will hold people accountable who violate those laws and fail to act on behalf of America with honor. To me, the right answer is very clear: The United States will not willfully commit or condone war crimes, and we must bring those who do commit them to justice regardless of citizenship, affiliation, or background. That is what we stand for as a nation. Those are our values, and that is America's leadership.

Even in the fog of war--especially in the fog of war--we must endeavor to act with the moral clarity that distinguishes the United States of America as a shining city upon a hill.

With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, on this Memorial Day, I join all Americans in recognizing the brave men and women in uniform who have made the ultimate sacrifice while serving our country. Freedom is not free; it costs the blood shed by America's sons and daughters, who unselfishly served their country and laid down their lives for its protection. The impact of their sacrifice is enduring, forever felt by the parents, spouses, children, friends, and loved ones they left behind.

Army CPT Brian Bunting, known by all his friends as Bubba, grew up in Potomac, MD. He was a distinguished athlete and scholar during his 6 years at the Bullis School, and chose to attend the U.S. Military Academy. Shortly after the September 11 terrorist attacks, Brian graduated in 2002 and was commissioned as an Army officer. Brian was known for his infectious laughter and humor and eventually married Nicole Pascal Bunting in 2006; Nikki had known Brian since the sixth grade. Shortly after Nicole gave birth to their infant son, Connor, Brian would answer the call of duty when activated by the Individual Ready Reserve to deploy to Afghanistan with the 27th Infantry Brigade Combat Team. During his deployment, he returned home for leave and was able to spend a short period with his wife and son, Connor. A few days after his return to Afghanistan, Brian was killed by a roadside bomb in Kandahar on February 24, 2009. At the age of 29, not only did Brian leave behind his wife Nikki and infant son Connor, but he also left behind another son, Cooper, who would be born months after Brian's death.

I remember the sacrifice of Baltimore native SGT Damion G. Campbell. The Forest Park High School faculty described Damion as being ``very mild-tempered and sophisticated,'' as someone who served as a leader and role model for younger students. Damion's mother, Donna Robinson, described him as an ``outgoing, fun-loving and joyful person'' who was passionate about the Army. Sergeant Campbell was a 23-year-old Army medic serving in Afghanistan and was killed in action on August 26, 2005, when a bomb exploded near his vehicle during a patrol in the Khayr Kot district. We remember him today for his ultimate sacrifice and thank him for his service and passion for America.

Like Sergeant Campbell, Army SPL Toccara Green of Rosedale, MD, also excelled at Forest Park High School, where she spent all 4 years in the Junior ROTC program. She graduated from high school in 2000 and attended Norfolk State University in Virginia,

where she studied telecommunications and broadcasting. In 2002, Toccara joined the Army and was assigned to the 10th Mountain Division. While she was deployed to Iraq, part of her job was operating a 50-caliber machine gun on an Army supply truck during convoy operations, a critical role to protect the convoy and thwart enemy attacks. She once told her family ``her ideal situation was to go out fighting for our country.'' Toccara had an opportunity to return home to Baltimore on leave during her deployment. Less than a week after redeploying to Iraq, Specialist Green was killed at the age of 23 by a roadside bomb and became Maryland's first woman soldier killed in combat in Iraq.

Across Maryland and across the country, there are countless others like Captain Bunting, Sergeant Campbell, Specialist Green, and their families who have made the ultimate sacrifice throughout the history of this country. Their sense of duty, honor, and country defined their character and were reflective of their actions. They not only represent the best of who we are as a nation, they are examples of who we all should aspire to be.

Freedom isn't free. The incredible courage and actions of those who have fallen have enabled our freedom and way of life to continue and at such a profound price. This weekend, I will pray for the families in Maryland, and across the United States, who have lost loved ones defending our freedom. I will also pray for the safe return of our brave men and women currently serving abroad. Let us never forget their service, and may we forever honor their sacrifice.

Mr. President, each year during the month of May, Asian Pacific American Heritage Month calls us to celebrate and reflect on the rich history of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. These communities draw from an incredibly diverse range of cultures, languages, and religions that all come together to make the United States a more vibrant nation. Whether as natives or as immigrants, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have long played a pivotal role in the history of the United States since even before its founding.

Congress first recognized the contributions of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders with the introduction of a resolution in 1977 by Representatives Frank Horton of New York and Norman Mineta of California and, later, Senators Daniel Inouye and Spark Matsunaga, both of Hawaii. This resolution proclaimed the first 10 days of May as Asian Pacific American Heritage Week. It took Representative Horton's reintroduction of a modified resolution in 1978 for Congress to pass it and for President Jimmy Carter to sign it. Presidents would then go on to issue annual proclamations for Asian Pacific American Heritage Week until 1990, when Congress expanded Asian Pacific American Heritage Week to the entire month, and President George H. W. Bush designated May 1990 as the first Asian Pacific American Heritage Month. In 1992, congressional passage of a final resolution permanently designated the month of May as Asian Pacific American Heritage Month.

Since the beginning, the choice of the first several days and, later, the month of May served to honor the memory of the arrival of the first Japanese to the United States on May 7, 1843, as well as the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad on May 10, 1869.

The Census Bureau estimates that there are more than 20 million Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders currently residing in the United States, and by many accounts, they represent one of the fastest growing minority groups. Almost 7 percent of Marylanders, more than 400,000 people, identify as Asian American and Pacific Islander. Particularly in the counties surrounding Washington DC, Maryland has increasingly become home to communities of Chinese, Taiwanese, Korean, Filipino, Vietnamese, and Indian Americans. Over the years, they have contributed substantially to making Maryland a thriving State recognized for its leadership in business, education, culture, and many other fields. Asian Pacific Americans have been and always will be an integral part of our community.

Archeological evidence indicates that humans first began to settle in the Pacific Islands, including those of Hawaii, Samoa, and Guam, which would later become part of the United States, thousands of years ago. In what was one of the first crossings of the Pacific Ocean from Asia to the Americas, Filipinos were aboard a Spanish galleon that landed in California in 1587. In the 17th century, the British East India Company brought the first South Asian Indians to the country as indentured servants. In time, the Colonies and, later, the United States would see continued influxes of immigrants from Asia and the Pacific, in addition to the arrival of the first men and women coming from China, Korea, and Japan in the 19th century. Many came as contract labor for plantations, factories, and, famously, the California Gold Rush and the Transcontinental Railroad. In the 20th century, immigration reforms coincided with the Cold War and a new wave of globalization to spur an unprecedented boom in arrivals from these countries and elsewhere in the region. As these populations continue to grow, it is crucial to recognize that Asian Pacific Americans have been in the United States for centuries. Their stories are a testament to how our Nation is one of immigrants that is made stronger, not weaker, through its diversity.

Today, many of the iconic buildings we take for granted originate in the work of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. Here in Washington DC, many might walk beside the majestic East Building of the National Gallery of Art without recognizing it to be the work of the famous architect, I. M. Pei, who passed away on May 16, 2019, at the venerable age of 102. Beginning with the Mesa Laboratory for the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, Pei built a distinguished career over several decades as an eager and ground-breaking artist. In addition to these buildings, Pei would also design the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Massachusetts, the Dallas City Hall, and countless other projects here and abroad, such as the Louvre Pyramid in Paris, France.

Throughout their history, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have been and continue to be leaders. Indeed, one of the best demonstrations of this is the pivotal role Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders played in the Civil Rights era. Contemporaneous with the movements of the 1950s and 1960s, numerous Asian American and Pacific Islander activists and organizations advocated for the equality of all races and social and economic justice. In 1969, it was Yuji Ichioka who first coined the term ``Asian American'' and later taught the first course on Asian American Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, in addition to founding the major advocacy group, the Asian American Political Alliance. Larry Itliong was a major figure in the American labor movement when he helped organize agricultural workers in the western United States to form the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee, which would later merge with Cesar Chavez's organization to create the United Farm Workers.

Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have committed themselves to serving their communities and the United States. For centuries, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have participated in almost every war the United States has fought. Although often serving in segregated units, these men and women enthusiastically fought for what had long been their country, serving as early as the War of 1812. In recent years, Asian American and Pacific Islander soldiers and support personnel have proved essential in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Their sacrifices have been great; we should never forget them. For that reason, the President of the United States has awarded the Medal of Honor to numerous brave Asian American and Pacific Islander warriors.

Many also have gone on to serve as dedicated public servants. Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have held elected offices at the local, State, and national levels for over a century. Leaders such as Senator Hiram Fong and Senator Daniel Akaka made history when they became the first Asian American and Native Hawaiian, respectively, to serve in the U.S. Senate. I was honored to serve alongside Senator

Daniel Inouye, who became the highest ranking Asian-American politician in our Nation's history when he became the President pro tempore of the Senate. Beyond elected office, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders constitute an indispensable portion of the civil service at all levels of government. There, too, they have clearly demonstrated the commitment they have to their community.

In addition to the many contributions made by individuals, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have also imprinted onto our society the marks of distinctive cultures. Though perhaps taken for granted today, many ubiquitous aspects of American life and identity ultimately derive from the men and women who brought pieces of their home countries with them when they came to the United States. From philosophy to religion and entertainment to cuisine, Asian and Pacific Islander cultures have helped influence and form the American way of life as we know it today.

As minorities, many Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have endured persistent forms of systemic racism that still have yet to be eradicated. Historically, countless individuals were denied the same rights as other Americans and were even excluded from citizenship. Laws barred many from working in certain fields and codified school segregation and prohibitions on property and business ownership. Immigration itself became a target of exclusionary policies that prohibited immigrants of certain ethnicities from coming to the United States. Widespread xenophobia, captured best by the ``Yellow Peril,'' dehumanized entire communities and instilled prejudice in the hearts of many Americans. This discrimination reached a peak when President Roosevelt ordered the incarceration of over 100,000 Japanese Americans in internment camps as war began with the Empire of Japan in World War

Mr. President, I rise to express my deep concern over the constant attacks on women's health we are seeing all across America. From this administration's policies, to Donald Trump's judicial nominees, to Governors and legislators in States like Alabama, Georgia, and Missouri under Republican leadership--they are denying women their constitutional right to make their own personal and healthcare decisions.

Women and their healthcare should not be under constant threat. We as a nation have made great efforts to promote equal rights for women and men. In this Congress, we will celebrate the 100th anniversary of women's suffrage. It took a long time for women to get the right to vote, and we continue to make progress on equality. Yet, in the 21st century, the Trump administration continues to push and adopt policies that are setting this country and women in a wrong direction.

The Supreme Court made it clear in Griswold v. Connecticut and Roe v. Wade that there is a constitutional right to privacy that includes making healthcare decisions such as the use of contraception and the right to access abortion.

Through advancements in women's health and access to contraception and education, the number of unintended pregnancies has significantly been reduced, with a corresponding reduction in abortion. Yet we see Republican leaders trying to reverse the advancements our Nation has made in women's health, access to contraception, and education.

For nearly 50 years, the Supreme Court has upheld the legal precedent of Roe v. Wade, including its affirmation in Planned Parenthood v. Casey in 1992. In that case, the Supreme Court held that ``our law affords constitutional protection to personal decisions relating to marriage . . . contraception, family relationships, child rearing, and education. . . . These matters, involving the most intimate and personal choices a person may make in a lifetime, choices central to personal dignity and autonomy, are central to the liberty protected by the Fourteenth Amendment.''

The Court prohibited States from passing statutes that placed undue burdens on a woman's right to make her own healthcare decisions. Yet Republican leaders continue to introduce and pass laws that interfere with a women's autonomy over her health and well-being.

Last week, for instance, the Republican Governor of Alabama signed a bill into law banning almost all abortions in that State, with no exceptions for the cases of rape or incest. The law not only prosecutes women, but it also includes unprecedented criminal penalties against doctors, threatening them with life in prison for treating women. The Alabama law exposes doctors to felony charges punishable by up to 99 years in prison for providing or attempting to provide an abortion, making this the most extreme ban of its kind to pass in nearly 30 years.

Since the beginning of 2019, bills attempting to restrict abortion have been filed in 45 States, including Alabama, Missouri, and Georgia.

Earlier this year, Georgia's Republican Governor signed a 6-week ban into law that would make it illegal for women to terminate a pregnancy and a doctor to perform the termination after a fetal heartbeat is detected. I must tell you, many women don't even realize they are pregnant at 6 weeks.

The Alabama and Georgia bills impose burdensome and medically unnecessary limitations on women and their doctors, particularly those in low-income, medically underserved areas. The bills harm women who are victims of sexual assault and minors who are victims of incest. These provisions appear to be designed to perpetrate a culture of not believing women and trying to discredit the victims of assault.

It is hard to understand how many Republicans are talking about getting Big Government out of people's lives but not when it comes to one of the hardest and most intimate decisions a woman can make--a decision that she wishes to make between herself and her doctor. In those circumstances, these same colleagues believe that Big Government, and not the woman herself, knows better. They believe that government, and not the woman, should dictate whether she can or cannot have control of her own body. They believe that government should have the power to force a woman to forgo a medically necessary procedure. They believe that women should be stripped of that power and stripped of the choice to decide what is best for herself. Many believe that even in cases of incest and rape, where the woman is a victim of a crime, that the woman should be compelled to bear the child against her will and bring the pregnancy to term. Talk about being intrusive.

Basically, the rights of women are being trampled to death. I thought we had gotten beyond that, and now we see that we are moving in the wrong direction.

Empowering women is one of the most important things we can do for the future of our country. Core to women's constitutional liberties is autonomy over their own health and well-being. If we truly want to support women, we need to safeguard and improve, not limit, access to comprehensive healthcare.

I hope we can all agree that on this 100th anniversary of women's suffrage, we should be looking at ways to remove discrimination based upon sex and not moving in the wrong direction by taking away from women their right to make their own healthcare decisions.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I am going to take this time to speak about Russia. But if I might, following up on the point by the Senator from Alaska, first, I want to applaud the police officer you are honoring this week.

This is National Police Week. I think it is very appropriate that we recognize those who are serving our country and our community as first responders.

I want to mention two police officers specifically, both of whom gave their lives in defense of our community. These law enforcement officers were young, and they went into danger rather than running away from danger. We lost two of our officers last year.

Amy Sorrells Caprio from Baltimore County, my home jurisdiction, a member of the Baltimore County Police Department, died before reaching the age of 30, pursuing a burglary suspect who struck and killed her with the vehicle being operated by the suspect. She leaves behind a husband, parents, and sister. Our prayers are with her.

The second police officer I would like to honor is Mujahid Abdul Mumin Ramzziddin, a 51-year-old police officer from Prince George's County, MD, close to where we are right here. He was off duty, and he observed the need to help a person who was a victim of domestic violence. He went to help that person and was ultimately killed by the perpetrator.

He leaves behind a wife and four children, and our prayers are also with him.

Mr. President, I would ask unanimous consent that Senator Portman and I be recognized for up to 25 minutes.

Mr. President, shortly, I am going to be joined by Senator Portman. The two of us have been working for well over a decade on retirement savings issues. When both of us were Members of the House of Representatives, we worked on pension legislation together. It was unusual at that time to have a Democrat and a Republican working together.

There was a great deal of discussion about tax reform at that time, and it seemed like neither the Democratic nor Republican leadership was interested in dealing with retirement savings at that point. Yet Congressman Portman and I joined forces, recognizing the need to strengthen retirement savings in this country. We authored a bill known as the Portman-Cardin bill. It was more of a process than it was legislation. We brought all stakeholders together, and we sat around, listened to each other, and came to a consensus bill that was enacted into law and made permanent. It provides greater portability among the different pension plans in this country, recognizing that employees were shifting jobs, and therefore it was necessary for them to be able to protect their retirement savings.

We looked at increasing the amount of money that individuals could put away for retirement. One of the provisions provided for catchup for people over 50 years of age because we recognized that people-- particularly women--who entered the workforce at a later time didn't have as many years to put money away for retirement savings.

We simplified the retirement plans so that small companies could establish a pension plan and have safe harbor, so it was not as complicated to set up pension plans.

We established a saver's credit. We did that because we recognized that the Tax Code itself wasn't necessarily a great enough incentive to get younger and lower wage workers interested in participating in a retirement plan. We found that if an employer put money on the table, most employees would opt to join that pension plan. Witness the Thrift Savings we have here as Federal employees.

We recognized that a lot of the smaller companies didn't offer those types of plans. So we developed the saver's credit, which allowed lower wage workers to be able to get government help with putting money away for their retirement.

Quite frankly, the law that was passed back then did dramatically help the number of people who participated in retirement savings. We also included an automatic enrollment feature, and that also helped dramatically increase the number of people participating in retirement savings.

I give that as background because Senator Portman and I have joined up again in the Senate in an effort to build on the success we had over a decade ago.

We had a hearing this past week, and in that hearing, we brought up the fact that several provisions that Senator Portman and I had been working on are included in the recent legislation, which is legislation that had passed the House of Representatives and passed the Senate Finance Committee in the last Congress and the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee have filed in this Congress. That includes many important provisions to improve retirement savings.

We hope that bill will be considered on the floor very shortly. We want to get that done. Yet we recognize that we need to go further than that. For that reason, Senator Portman and I have introduced the Retirement Security and Savings Act this year, and it includes many important provisions. It deals with the fact that we have yet to fully accomplish what we need to for retirement savings.

According to a 2019 GAO estimate, 48 percent of those who are near retirement age--those over 55 years of age--have no retirement nest egg, and 29 percent have no savings or pensions.

Since the great recession, personal savings rates in this country have been flat.

Access to employer-sponsored plans and participation are still at way too low of a rate. For private sector workers, 68 percent have access to plans, but barely over 50 percent actually participate in plans. For part-time workers, the numbers are much lower--only 39 percent have an opportunity and only 22 percent actually participate in plans. For small businesses, only about 50 percent provide retirement access to their employees, and 34 percent participate. In the lowest quintile-- those at the lowest incomes--44 percent have access to retirement savings through their employment; yet only half that number actually participate.

The urgency of this is really underscored by the fact that we have now gone from a landscape that included mostly defined-benefit plans where the employer had a plan for you, that employer took the risks, and you had a guaranteed benefit when you retired--you didn't have to think about how much money you put away because your company was protecting you on retirement with a defined benefit. We have gone from a defined-benefit world to a defined-contribution world.

I am going to yield at this point to Senator Portman to go over the provisions we are including in the Portman-Cardin bill. I believe we will have time, and I will come back and comment on some of the particular provisions.

I want to compliment Senator Portman for his longstanding commitment to dealing with this national need. America's economy is strong, but it is not strong on personal savings and retirement savings, and we need to do better. It has been a pleasure to work with Senator Portman in regard to these issues.

Mr. President, let me again thank my colleague Senator Portman.

He has explained what is included in the Retirement Security and Savings Act that we filed this week. It builds on what has worked, and it takes on new opportunities to increase savings and retirement security.

He mentioned the automatic enrollment, which is the safe harbor here, because Americans make decisions by inaction. Now, with automatic enrollment, they will be in retirement plans and will have the opportunity to opt out.

It increases the saver's credit's eligibility, but, importantly, it makes it refundable, and it deposits it directly into a savings account so that low-wage workers will, indeed, have savings opportunities.

It increases the tax credits for small business so that the burden of setting up a plan for your employees will be matched with this credit so that more workers will have opportunities for savings retirement.

It expands part-time workers--a group that, today, is underrepresented in retirement savings.

It deals with the student debt issue. I really thank Senator Portman and also Senator Wyden for their help in recognizing that a lot of young workers would love to put money into retirement, but they have to pay off their student loan debt. So that, at least, can be used as a match by an employer for a savings account.

It also deals with lifetime income. How many people have we run into, as Senator Portman has pointed out, who have outlived their retirements? They didn't expect to live to be 95 and still have active lifestyles. So we significantly increase the opportunities for lifetime income options, as well as what Senator Portman said in dealing with required minimum distributions.

There are a lot of other issues. I think there are 50 issues in the bill. There are a lot of other issues that are important. There are issues that we want to work on, including relating to the recoupment of benefit payments.

The bottom line is that we want to improve the retirement security for Americans. As Senator Portman pointed out, Social Security is very important. It is a three-legged stool. Let's work together to increase private savings in retirement, which is exactly what this bill does.

I think we have 1 minute left, so I yield to Senator Portman.

Madam President, I rise to express my objections in opposition to the Trump administration's constant attacks on women's healthcare, such as taking action to undermine the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and finalizing administrative rules that allow discriminatory practices to family planning providers and women seeking reproductive healthcare.

Women and their healthcare should not be under constant threat. As a country, the United States has made great efforts to promote equal rights for both women and men. Yet in the 21st century, the Trump administration and congressional Republicans continue to push the policies that set this country back.

The Trump administration's attacks on women's healthcare are unconscionable. Trump has taken several administrative actions that allow employers, insurance companies, and hospitals to refuse healthcare coverage and services based on their personal beliefs. For example, the recently finalized refusal rule allows virtually any individual or entity involved in a patient's care--from a hospital's board of directors to a receptionist who schedules procedures--to put their personal beliefs ahead of a patient's healthcare needs.

Letting hospitals, pharmacies, and a range of people involved in healthcare deny services means that women will lose critical care. Rape survivors could be denied emergency birth control. Same-sex couples could be denied fertility treatment. Women with an unintended pregnancy could be denied information and counseling on their options. The rule represents a radical departure from HHS's mission and long history of combating discrimination, protecting patients' access to care, and eliminating health disparities. It is outrageous that President Trump continually implements policies that discriminate against women in healthcare. We cannot allow women to be treated this way.

One of the most egregious acts of this administration is gutting title X, the Nation's only federal grant program dedicated solely to providing individuals with comprehensive family planning and related preventive health services. The Trump administration finalized a rule that would bar providers from giving their patients complete medical information and block care at popular family planning providers like Planned Parenthood, even though Planned Parenthood serves approximately 40 percent of title X patients.

Last year, title X funding allowed nearly 4,000 health centers to provide over 4 million low-income women and men basic primary and preventive healthcare services such as pap tests, cervical cancer screenings, contraception, breast exams, and HIV testing. In Maryland there are 55 title X-funded health centers spanning my State. These include federally qualified health centers, local health departments, Planned Parenthood clinics, and school-based health centers. In fiscal year 2015, Maryland received over $3.8 million in title X funding and provided health services to over 64,000 patients. These are low-income, underinsured, and uninsured individuals who would otherwise lack access to healthcare.

In addition to attacks on women's healthcare, the Trump administration has proposed a title IX rule that weakens the existing protections for victims of campus sexual assault and allows universities to roll back their responsibilities to ensure students receive an education free of discrimination. Recently I was on the campus of the University of Maryland, College Park, speaking to students from College Park and Bowie State University regarding issues related to higher education. At College Park students are guaranteed housing on campus only for their first 2 years of education. Under Secretary DeVos's title IX rule, the university would no longer be responsible for investigating any claims of sexual assault for incidents that take place off campus, even though it may involve two students. In fact, 9 out of 10 sexual assaults do take place off college campuses.

This rule and the administration's failure even to listen to the concerns of sexual assault survivors on campus show a callous disregard for victims. We should be working to ensure protection for victims, not minimizing their experiences. In order to do just that, I have fought for funding for the Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights to have adequate staffing to investigate these claims and other

claims of violations of a student's civil rights. I have also cosponsored bipartisan legislation, such as the Campus Accountability and Safety Act, which seeks to find a commonsense solution to this difficult issue that holds colleges accountable without traumatizing victims when reporting an assault.

We should also take up and pass the reauthorization for the Violence Against Women's Act. Last month, the House passed this critical legislation, which would reauthorize funding of these programs and authorize new programs; amend and add definitions used in the VAWA programs; amend Federal criminal law relating to firearms, custodial rape, and stalking; and expand Tribal jurisdiction over certain crimes committed on Tribal lands.

The American people deserve better from their elected officials. I am committed to opposing President Trump's reckless and outrageous actions that would harm women and their families in Maryland and across our Nation.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, today I wish to honor Jacqueline ``Jackie'' Louise Falk. Jackie was an incredible force in Democratic politics for decades. She left behind a tightknit family of relatives and a political family that stretches around the world.

Jackie is best known for holding a key role in nearly every Democratic National Convention from 1972 through 2004. She also was on staff at the Democratic National Committee (DNC), as an aide to then- treasurer Robert Strauss, during the time of the Watergate break-in; she served as assistant to the counselor to the President during the Carter Administration; and served as administrative assistant and chief of staff to U.S. Representative Leo Zeferetti in the early 1980s.

Jackie suffered a stroke last week and passed away on Wednesday, May 8, surrounded by her loving, extended family. Jackie never sought the spotlight. but left her mark on our party and our country by bringing a semblance of order to the sometimes-chaotic world of nominating the President of the United States.

Today, I would like to honor Jackie's memory by sharing some of her remarkable story. To tell the story of Jackie Falk is more than politics, although it is weaved throughout her life. As one friend, Yolanda Caraway, described her: ``Jackie was one of the sweetest, kindest and funniest people I've ever known and I'm really going to miss her, especially her wonderful laugh.''

Jackie was born in Trenton, NJ, to Minnie and Arlo Falk. She grew up with her brother Albert and sister Lisa. Jackie got hooked on politics and public service at a young age thanks to her Aunt Violet (Williams Biglane), who, after service in the Navy WAVES, went on to work as the personal secretary to former Senator and former Vice President Hubert Humphrey.

Jackie would tell stories of interacting with Hubert Humphrey and passing out flyers for his campaign. In 1964, Jackie accompanied Aunt Violet to the Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, NJ, to see Humphrey nominated as Vice President. Aunt Violet helped Jackie make her way to the Democratic National Committee, where she started working in 1972 for then-DNC Treasurer Robert Strauss. Jackie went on to work closely with every Democratic Party chairman from Strauss through Terry McAuliffe.

When Terry McAuliffe, former Governor of Virginia and former chairman of the DNC, heard of Jackie's death, he had this to say: ``We lost a legend. The Democratic Party and Democratic National Conventions will never be the same. Jackie's convention credentialing was a labor of love and truly a work of art. She conducted her credential operation like Mozart conducted his symphonies. She never ceased to amaze. I and so many others will forever be in her debt and will miss her deeply.''

In 1975, Jackie moved to Atlanta to work on the Presidential campaign of Jimmy Carter. She returned to Washington to work on his White House staff in the Office of the Counselor to the President. The Washington region would remain her home, even as she would take up temporary residence every 4 years in whatever city was the latest to host the Democratic nominating convention. Oftentimes, she was one of the first people working on a convention and one of the last to wrap things up.

After President Carter lost relection, Jackie worked on Capitol Hill, where she served as chief of staff, administrative assistant, to Congressman Leo Zeferetti from January 1981 to January 1983. She then was hired early for the Democratic Convention in San Francisco, which was the start of her run overseeing credentials and a larger swath of the conventions.

From 1984 on, she was responsible for credentials--who gets the precious access passes and where they could go--

either as credentials director or as deputy convention manager. This made her one of the most sought after and powerful women in Democratic politics.

In the 1990s, between conventions and DNC work, Jackie started an interior decorating business. Clients came from among her political contacts, including Mary Matalin and James Carville.

Jackie loved her family; she cheered on their milestones and loved celebrating holidays together. She is survived by her brother and sister-in-law Albert and Debbie Enourato; sister Lisa Enourato; nieces Whitney and Hannah McNees; nephews Will, Luke, and Eli McNees and Wyatt and Gunnar Enourato. Her great love also was for her Great Pyrenees; the latest was Bree, who we know misses her dearly.

Jackie also built an immensely loyal political family that came together every 4 years for conventions and as often as possible for happy hour or dinner at Jackie's house. She was an incredible mentor and role model. She demonstrated how a woman in politics could be both strong and gentle, funny and serious.

Let me close by saying that May is National Stroke Awareness Month. Everyone is encouraged to know the signs and understand how important it is to get help quickly. The minutes and hours right after stroke occurs are crucial. According to the Centers for Disease Control--CDC-- stroke, while preventable, is the fifth leading cause of death in the United States and a leading cause of severe disability. Jackie Falk died of a stroke, and the CDC says that approximately 60 percent of individuals who die from strokes are women. I urge the women and the men out there not to ignore the signs, such as sudden numbness, confusion, trouble seeing, trouble walking, and severe headache.

The political world will never again see someone the likes of Jackie Falk. Her memory will be a blessing to her family, all those who knew her, and all those who benefited from her hard work, dedication, and love of the Democratic Party and the good it can accomplish.

Mr. President, today I rise to speak about National Small Business Week. As ranking member of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, I want to thank the 30 million small businesses in America for their contributions to our economy during this National Small Business Week.

I look forward to National Small Business Week every year because it is a chance for us to honor the small businesses and communities in Maryland and across the country that may not make headlines, but they steadily move our economy forward by improving industries, developing new products, and creating employment opportunities for more than 47 percent of all American workers.

One tradition of National Small Business Week is that the Small Business Administration selects a Small Business Person of the Year from each State, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Guam.

This year's Maryland Small Business Person of the Year is Zhensen Huang,

the chief executive officer of Precise Software Solutions--an innovative information technology company that is based in Rockville, MD. Dr. Huang is also a professor of information systems at the University of Maryland Baltimore County, where he is training future leaders in Maryland's technology sector.

Small business owners like Dr. Huang are the cornerstone of Maryland's economy, and their deep roots in the community help to shape the culture and character of our State. I thank Dr. Huang for bringing dynamism and ingenuity to Maryland's economy, and I wish him and his colleagues continued success.

I have met with countless small business owners like Dr. Huang as I have traveled across my home State of Maryland, which we proudly call ``America in Miniature'' due to our diversity. From bustling metropolitan areas like Baltimore City and the DC suburbs to rural communities on the Eastern Shore and in Mountain Maryland, small businesses are not just where we buy products and services; they are the building blocks that make up our communities.

That is why I requested a seat on the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee when I began serving in the Senate in 2007. I wanted to make sure small businesses in Maryland and across the country were receiving the support they needed from Washington. Nationwide, small businesses account for 99.9 percent of all businesses, with there being a total of nearly 31 million small businesses that employ 60 million Americans.

According to the Small Business Administration Office of Advocacy, small businesses created 1.8 million net jobs in 2016, the most recent year for which data is available. Of those jobs created, more than 1.2 million were created by small businesses with fewer than 20 employees. It is clear that small businesses are the growth engine that power our economy, so it is on us in Congress to ensure that they receive the support they need to overcome the unique challenges they face.

When I meet with small businesses across Maryland, one of their top concerns is often their access to capital. Capital is the lifeblood of small businesses. So, for many small businesses, an SBA-backed loan is a lifeline that is the difference between success and failure in the early, fragile stages of a small business's life.

I see the benefits of SBA-backed loans every time I drive past Under Armour's headquarters in Baltimore. Without an SBA-backed loan, Under Armour may not have been able to grow from a small business being run out of a basement to the global brand, with thousands of employees in Baltimore, that it is today. Last year alone, SBA-backed financing helped nearly 75,000 small businesses access more than $36 billion in capital, and it supported more than 725,000 jobs.

The SBA's finance programs are models of public-private partnerships and do a lot of good in this country, but some of the programs are not adequately reaching underserved communities, especially those of minorities, women, and veterans. I do note that the SBA's Microloan Program and the 7(a) Community Advantage Pilot Program do punch above their weight in reaching underserved borrowers. We can learn from how those programs are being operated to help underserved communities in order to help modify loan programs such as the 7(a) and 504 so they may be able to reach more of the underserved communities.

The chronic shortfall of SBA loans reaching the minority communities is especially important in Maryland, which I am proud to say has the highest average number of minority-owned businesses in the country. Minority-owned firms are two to three times more likely to be denied credit, more likely to avoid applying for loans based on the belief that they will be turned down, and more likely to receive smaller loans and pay higher interest rates on the loans they do receive.

Last September, I held a field hearing in Baltimore at Morgan State University--a revered HBCU--to learn more about the struggles minority entrepreneurs face in their accessing of capital.

One of the key takeaways from the hearing was that minority small business owners need SBA to fill the gaps when private lenders often fall short. Additionally, access to capital must go hand in hand with entrepreneurial development training. The entrepreneurial development programs at the SBA provided mentorship, business advice, and training to more than 1.2 million entrepreneurs during fiscal year 2018.

These programs are invaluable. Data show that small businesses created by entrepreneurs who receive at least 3 hours of SBA counseling have higher success rates than small businesses created by entrepreneurs who have not received that amount of counseling.

Knowing that small businesses, especially minority-owned small businesses, need more support from the SBA, not less, is why I remain deeply troubled by the administration's efforts to make vital business counseling and SBA-backed loans more difficult to access.

The administration's fiscal year 2020 budget proposed more than a quarter of a billion dollars in new fees for SBA-backed loans. Simply put, this is a $255 million tax on American small business owners. Additionally, instead of investing in entrepreneurial development programs, the administration's recent budget proposed $67 million in cuts to these programs.

The administration's efforts to undermine the SBA are even more concerning considering the current lack of leadership at the Agency. Since the resignation of Administrator Linda McMahon, the President has not sent Congress a nomination for a new Administrator. I also remain concerned about the administration's failure to nominate a Deputy Administrator--a position that has been vacant for more than 12 months.

We hear from the administration that we haven't acted on their nominees. We don't have the nominees to act on. As I speak, there are thousands of small business owners from across the country who are visiting Washington, DC, in order to participate in the National Small Business Week events that have been scheduled, and many more are participating in events across the country.

Let us honor them and their contributions by giving the SBA the tools and leadership it needs to help entrepreneurs build successful small businesses. I look forward to continuing to work with Chairman Marco Rubio and our colleagues in the House, in a bipartisan fashion, to support American small businesses so they can continue developing innovative products and services and creating jobs.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, today I wish to discuss S. 1309, the Combating Global Corruption Act of 2019. There is heightened awareness in the United States, the Western Hemisphere region, and around the world that corruption is a serious threat to democracy, stability, global security.

Corruption erodes trust and confidence in democratic institutions, the rule of law, and human rights protections. It damages America's global competitiveness and creates barriers to economic growth in international markets. It threatens our national and international security by fostering the conditions for violent extremism and weakening institutions associated with governance and accountability. As Transparency International noted in its 2018 Corruption Perceptions Index published this January, failure to curb corruption is contributing to a worldwide crisis of democracy. According to Freedom House, in 2017, democracy faced its most serious crisis in decades and marked the 12th consecutive year of decline in global freedom.

We have all seen the headlines, from scandals in Liberia, Hungary, and Guatemala, to the doping by Russian athletes and their subsequent ban from the 2016 Summer Olympics, to the Panama Papers. It is clear that where there are high levels of corruption we find fragile states, authoritarian states, or states suffering from internal or external conflict, in places such as Afghanistan and Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Somalia, Nigeria, and Sudan.

The problem of corruption and the dysfunction that follows it can be difficult to address because it is like a hydra, with many corrupt actors that can include government officials, businessmen, law enforcement, military personnel, and organized criminal groups. Corruption is a system that operates via extensive, entrenched networks in both the public and private sectors. It is ubiquitous and pervasive.

We must address it. We can't throw up our hands and accept corruption as the status quo because the costs of not addressing and rooting it out are too great. Corruption fuels violent extremism, pushing young people toward violence, because they lose faith in the institutions that are supposed to protect and serve them. Corruption feeds the destructive fire of criminal networks and transnational crime. Citizens lose faith in the social compact between governments and the people. Terrorist groups use corruption to recruit followers to their hateful cause. It is a vicious cycle.

The human cost of corruption is substantial. Across the globe, millions of men, women, and children are victims of modern day slavery. Corruption enables their trafficking within and among countries. Corruption is a constant companion to modern day slavery and the suffering that it brings. We also have seen this play out in the refugee and migrant crisis, with thousands drowning in the Mediterranean, victims of trafficking networks and corrupt government officials who facilitate this illicit business. Make no mistake, corruption is big business. UNICEF estimates that human traffickers generate $32 billion in profits by smuggling 21 million men, women, and children through corrupt networks every year.

Let's be clear-eyed: Any fight against corruption will be long-term and difficult. It is a fight against powerful people, powerful companies, and powerful interests. It is about changing a mindset and a culture as much as it is about establishing and enforcing laws. As my colleagues and constituents know, my attention has long been focused on fighting corruption. I was proud to sponsor the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act with our late colleague Senator John McCain, an unwavering enemy of corruption throughout the globe. That bipartisan bill was enacted into law in late 2016, and I applaud the Trump administration for aggressively using the act to target human rights abusers and corrupt individuals around the globe who threaten the rule of law and deny fundamental freedoms, but the problem of corruption is enormous; we simply must do more.

I want to briefly discuss something that is hard to capture in legislation. It is something that I grappled with when drafting this bill. It is something that perhaps, more than anything, will dictate if we win this struggle against corruption. That is bipartisan political will, which as so critical in advancing the Global Magnitsky Act. Global Magnitsky took several years to enact because some in Congress, as well as some Obama administration officials, were concerned about the political and practical ramifications of the bill.

Another example of the impact of a lack of political will on fighting corruption is particularly salient this week, as we mourn the passing of our dear colleague, former Senator Richard Lugar. In 2010, Senator Lugar and I were able to get one of the most powerful anti-corruption and antipoverty laws enacted.

Senator Lugar and I worked on the bill that would become section 1504 of the Dodd-Frank Act, known as the ``Cardin-Lugar provision,'' for several years. Over the course of our tenures on Foreign Relations Committee, we had seen clear evidence that secrecy breeds corruption and that corruption can breed instability and perpetuate poverty in resource-rich countries. The Cardin-Lugar provision requires that all foreign and domestic companies listed on U.S. stock exchanges and involved in oil, gas, and mineral resource extraction must publish the project-level payments they make to the foreign countries in which they operate. The enactment of this provision was a watershed moment in which the United States reclaimed its position as a leader in the effort to increase global accountability and transparency. It took 6 years for the Securities and Exchange Commission to finally issue a rule to implement the law--6 years. That is the length of a term of a U.S. Senator. It is college and a master's degree. It took 6 years for the United States to act on this bill. It took that long because some people believed that less transparency is a good thing. Some groups believed that accountability should take a back seat to profitability. Unfortunately, the rule was repealed by Congress in February 2017.

Congress has a responsibility to reaffirm our bipartisan commitment to combatting corruption not only to honor the legacies of our late colleagues Senator Lugar and Senator

McCain. We also must act to show solidarity with the millions of brave human rights defenders, anti-poverty advocates, journalists, and investigators who put their lives at risk every day--and sometimes pay the ultimate price--to fight the scourge of corruption and impunity.

I am proud that last week Senator Young and I, along with Senators Leahy, Rubio, Blumenthal, and Merkley, reaffirm bipartisan political will to combat global corruption by reintroducing the Combating Global Corruption Act, S. 1309. Our bill makes clear that the United States must meet the scale of the problem of corruption with greater resolve and commitment. To do that, our bill focuses on four things.

First, we must institutionalize the fight against corruption as a national security priority. Our bill requires the State Department to produce an annual report, similar to the Trafficking in Persons Report, which takes a close look at each country's efforts to combat corruption. That model, which has effectively advanced the effort to combat modern day slavery, will similarly embed the issue of corruption in our collective work, so that we hold governments to account. This bill establishes minimum standards for combating corruption, standards that should be part and parcel of every government's commitment to its citizens. These include whether a country has laws that recognize corrupt acts for the crimes they are--violations of the people's trust--along with appropriate penalties for breaking that trust, whether a country has an independent judiciary for deciding corruption cases, free from influence and abuse, whether there is support for civil society organizations that are the watchdogs of integrity against would-be thieves of the state. This bill, hopefully, will build anticorruption DNA into the foundations of government action.

Second, in the United States, our whole-of-government effort must be better coordinated. Right now, we work across multiple agencies and in multiple offices to combat corruption. There is much information and many best practices that can be shared; we have got to do better at that and take advantage of those areas where we have been successful. The State Department and the United States Agency for International Development have done great work, but the vast nature of the problem requires that we improve our ability to tackle it. In this bill, agencies and bureaus and our missions overseas will have to prioritize corruption into their strategic planning as an essential part of our foreign policy work, a step that I believe will foster greater cooperation.

Third, we must improve oversight of our own foreign assistance and promote transparency. The U.S. taxpayer has a right to know how our foreign assistance is being spent and also should feel confident that we are doing the kind of risk assessments, analysis, and oversight that ensure our assistance to other countries is having the effect we want it to have. Our bill consolidates information and puts it online, where citizens can see the numbers and the programs. That kind of transparency is in and of itself good, but in my experience it has the effect of making us better at self-policing our work. We can use the data to capture redundancies and analyze trends, which I believe will make our decision-making better. The bill embeds oversight into our foreign assistance programs overseas, maintaining the flexibility we need to meet our goals rapidly while also holding government to account.

In fact, it is a natural complement to the Foreign Assistance Transparency and Accountability Act, a bipartisan law Senator Rubio and I cosponsored that looks at our foreign aid and seeks to ensure that our foreign assistance programs are tracked and evaluated adequately and appropriately.

I am a believer in the power of example. This ``one-two'' punch of the Combating Global Corruption Act and the Foreign Assistance Transparency Act strengthens our foreign assistance policy, demonstrates that we hold ourselves to the highest standards, and shows other countries that we are committed to this fight.

Finally, we have to find ways to resource anti-corruption work. Corruption is big business and big money. We should look for ways to use seized assets and ill-gotten proceeds to build civil society capacity to fight corruption and make it easier to transfer these assets to the appropriate effort. We have also witnessed the damaging impact of corruption on our foreign assistance efforts. The Combating Global Corruption Act understands that corruption risk assessment before, during, and after the provision of foreign aid and security assistance is integral to reducing and eliminating corruption. It holds U.S. foreign assistance and security assistance programs accountable to U.S. taxpayers by specifying transparency and accountability measures for the Department of State, the Department of Defense, and the U.S. Agency for International Development to advance anti-corruption efforts in those countries where the U.S. administers foreign and security assistance.

As we project the American values of good governance and anticorruption abroad, we must also redouble our efforts to strengthen these core values here in the United States. Unfortunately, these values have been put into question under our current administration. Our concerns run deeper than noticing the lack of priority given to anti-corruption and good governance policies. U.S. credibility has been weakening on this issue. In turn, our U.S. foreign policy is threatened.

For the 3rd straight year, the Trump administration, through its budget request, sent a message to the world of its priorities for the United States. For the 3rd straight year, the Trump administration proposed drastic cuts to the State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs--SFOPS--budget, which would cut foreign assistance funding by more than 30 percent. This also came amidst the recent decision to cut off foreign assistance to the Northern Triangle of Central America, a region of the world where U.S. assistance in combating corruption has a direct impact on our national security. This decision threatens to undermine the critical anti-corruption programming that helps us combat narcotics trafficking groups and violent gangs, as well as to address the root causes of migration. For this very reason, the bipartisan U.S.--Central America strategy names good governance as one of its central pillars.

This is why for Fiscal Year 2020, I asked the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs to include at least $500,000 for the Department of State and $500,000 for the U.S. Agency for International Development to achieve meaningful and robust implementation of the activities outlined in the Combating Global Corruption Act. This includes the bill's reporting requirements, staffing, and staff training to support anticorruption as a foreign policy and development priority. This bipartisan bill recognizes the importance of combating corruption as a hurdle to achieving peace, prosperity, and human rights around the world. Passage of S. 1309 would signal to the international community that the U.S. Congress has not forgotten U.S. values and that we will continue to fight to ensure such values and U.S. credibility remain intact.

There is only one United States of America. There is only one country that can do what we can do, and this bill sends the message that we will continue to fight to ensure that stature does not change.

I am under no illusion that this global fight against corruption will be easy. It will make the work of our government agencies more challenging. It will make our diplomacy more challenging. It will require political will, but political will finds its source and its strength in our values. Political will is created when we embrace those values. Political will endures in good governance, accountability, and transparency and those values that are at the core of the compact between the government and the governed.

As this bill moves forward, I urge my colleagues to find the political will to combat global corruption, ensure accountability, and keep our commitment to the best of American values.

Madam President, I really want to thank Senator Murphy for his longstanding commitment to this humanitarian need. We are now just a Senate vote away from making a major difference in regard to the humanitarian crisis in Yemen, and every Member of the Senate will now be on record.

I want Senator Murphy to know that his work has been extremely important and is well understood. What he is saying I just really want to underscore; that is, the U.S. military engagement with Saudi Arabia and its partners is counterproductive, not just to the humanitarian crisis that exists today in Yemen but to America's national security interests.

The conflict in Yemen has become a humanitarian nightmare. At this point our involvement does not advance the interests of the United States, our partners, or regional stability.

I recognize that we have a strategic partnership with Saudi Arabia and that we have a mutual desire to prevent the expansion of Iranian influence and terrorist groups that seek to do us harm. However, our current military support to Saudi Arabia in the Yemen conflict has become detrimental to these shared goals and our broader partnership.

The suffering this conflict has caused is beyond measure. More than 22 million people, nearly 75 percent of the population, are at grave risk. The country has now seen the world's largest cholera outbreak, which has killed thousands. Hunger and malnutrition are threatening 2 million innocent children under the age of 5. A recent Save the Children report concluded that some 85,000 children have already died from starvation since the war began. Morally continuing our military involvement in this disaster simply should not be an option.

I would also like my colleagues to look beyond our direct support to the role U.S. arms sales play in worsening the conflict. These sales cannot come at the expense of human rights, mass atrocities, and regional destabilization. Saudi Arabia has shown a disregard for international law by inflicting devastating losses on civilians, including young children.

It is now well known that the Saudi-led coalition targets civilian infrastructure vital to Yemen's recovery and reconstruction. In fact, a recent U.N. report concluded that the coalition's air campaign is the leading cause of civilian casualties in Yemen, with 61 percent due to coalition air strikes. Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and Bellingcat have found that U.S. weapons have been used in these unlawful air strikes. There is evidence that the coalition has used banned and inherently indiscriminate weapons like white phosphorus and cluster bombs.

The military conflict has produced staggering human rights abuses. The AP, international organizations, and a special expert group established by the U.N. Human Rights Council have found that all parties in the conflict have committed grave violations of human rights and the laws of war. Houthi war crimes and abuses are staggering; however, reports indicate our supposed partners have also engaged in horrific abuses, including widespread torture and sexual abuse at coalition-run secret prisons.

For all of these reasons, it is imperative that there is a speedy and peaceful conclusion to the conflict in Yemen. It is apparent that this will not come from our military involvement. We must, instead, focus our efforts on supporting U.N.-led efforts to foster dialogue, a ceasefire, and humanitarian access.

It is critical to prevent expansion of the Iranian influence and extremist groups in the region, but our military involvement is not helping us in that regard. Experts from across the ideological spectrum agree that the escalation of the conflict has increased Iran's and extremist groups' influence in Yemen. Our military campaign is counterproductive to our objective to minimize the influence--and hopefully eliminate the influence--of Iran and extremist groups.

With all of these considerations in mind, Republicans and Democrats in the Senate and House of Representatives came together to pass S.J. Res. 7. For reasons that are still incomprehensible to me, the President chose to veto this resolution. Oxfam recently responded to this by stating that ``the people of Yemen and the parties to the conflict are watching closely and the messages US leaders send have the power to save lives.''

With a veto, they lose faith in the United States and see the end to their suffering a little further out of reach. It is not, however, too late for Congress to do the right thing. By overriding this veto we assert this body's authority to support peace and human rights while making America safer and more secure.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Thank you, Mr. President. I rise today to discuss Special Counsel Robert Mueller's recent report, which is titled ``The Report on the Investigation into Russia's Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election.''

The Mueller investigation was authorized to ensure a full and thorough investigation of the Russian Government's efforts to interfere in the 2016 Presidential election, as well as any links and/or coordination between the Russian Government and individuals associated with the campaign of Donald Trump.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein said, when appointing the special counsel:

[T]he public interest requires me to place this

investigation under the authority of a person who exercises a

degree of independence from the normal chain of command. . .

. I am confident that [Special Counsel Mueller] will follow

the facts, apply the law, and reach a just result.

I encourage all Americans to read the redacted version of the Mueller report and draw their own conclusions. The report lays out in stark detail Russia's attack on our country before and during our 2016 elections.

The special counsel rightly concluded that the Russian Government interfered in the 2016 Presidential election in a sweeping and systematic fashion.

In January 2018, I issued a report on behalf of the Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee titled ``Putin's Asymmetric Assault on Democracy in Russia, and Europe: Its Implications on U.S. National Security.'' That report outlines some of the same tactics used by Russia and Europe that the Mueller report identifies were used in our 2016 elections. Mr. Putin has waged war against democracy.

The Mueller report concluded that Russia interfered in the 2016 Presidential election principally through two operations. First, a Russian entity carried out a social media campaign that favored Presidential candidate Donald J. Trump and disparaged Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton; second, a Russian intelligence service conducted computer intrusion operations against entities, employees, and volunteers working on the Clinton campaign and then released stolen documents.

The investigation also identified numerous links between the Russian Government and the Trump campaign. When discussing the Mueller report, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein recently said: ``There was overwhelming evidence that Russian operatives hacked American computers and defrauded American citizens, and that is only the tip of the iceberg of a comprehensive Russian strategy to influence elections, promote social discord, and undermine America, just like they do in many other countries.''

The Director of National Intelligence testified before the Senate in January that ``even as Russia faces a weakening economy, the Kremlin is stepping up its campaign to divide Western political and security institutions and undermine the post-WWII international order. We expect Russia will continue to wage its information war against democracies and to use social media to attempt to divide our societies.'' We expect that Russia will continue to wage its information war against democracies and to use social media to attempt to divide our societies.

The special counsel fulfilled his mandate to fully investigate both criminal acts surrounding the 2016 elections, as well as efforts to obstruct this critical investigation. Let me be clear that President Trump has consistently taken steps to deny Russia's involvement in tampering in our elections, resisted efforts to hold Russia accountable, besmirched the reputation of the special counsel while trying to dismiss him or willfully impeding his investigation, and repeatedly attacked the integrity of our intelligence and law enforcement Agencies. Despite the President's egregious behavior, the special counsel's work has resulted in dozens of indictments and numerous convictions and guilty pleas.

Several legal cases and investigations are still ongoing. Let me remind my colleagues that while the special counsel has delivered its final report, there are several ongoing Federal investigations and criminal trials, including those publicly known in the Southern District of New York and in Washington, DC.

Congress must now fulfill its oversight obligations under the Constitution. In order to prevent future attacks on our country and stem abuses of power, we must review a complete copy of the report as soon as possible and hear direct testimony from Special Counsel Mueller.

The Mueller report laid out numerous disturbing episodes where behavior by President Trump may have constituted obstruction of justice. The report stated:

``If we had confidence after a thorough investigation of

the facts that the President clearly did not commit

obstruction of justice, we would so state. Based on the facts

and the applicable legal standards, however, we are unable to

reach that judgment. The evidence we obtained about the

President's actions and intent presents difficult issues that

prevent us from conclusively determining that no criminal

conduct occurred.''

Indeed, the report stated that ``the President's efforts to influence the investigation were mostly unsuccessful, but that is largely because the persons who surrounded the President declined to carry out orders or accede to his requests.''

Congress should therefore closely examine the President's behavior, keeping in mind the President's obligations to fully execute the laws and preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution. Members of Congress took an oath as well to support the Constitution before taking office. The American public now deserves to hear directly from Special Counsel Robert Mueller through the relevant House and Senate committees.

Congress still has the ability to make a judgment on the obstruction of justice. Congress must now fulfill its oversight function under the Constitution and do all we can to prevent future attacks on our country and to stem abuses of power and corruption.

Congress has an obligation to understand the report fully and respond in such a way to prevent such attacks from happening in the future. This should involve prompt and thorough hearings in both the House and Senate.

Here are some areas where the Senate should consider legislative action.

First, if an American is approached by a foreign entity about involvement in an American election, that American should have certain responsibilities to immediately notify appropriate law enforcement agencies. I think many of us thought that was probably already the law.

Second, legislation should be considered to protect our elections from foreign interference by imposing appropriate responsibility on social media platforms and amending our election

laws in regard to attribution on advertisements, including through social media.

Third, the Senate should consider additional sanctions on Russia for its documented attacks against our 2016 elections.

Congress must continue to take the lead in defending U.S. national security against continuing Russian aggression against democratic institutions at home and abroad.

Earlier this year, I joined other Senators in introducing the Defending American Security from Kremlin Aggression Act of 2019. This comprehensive legislation seeks to increase economic, political, and diplomatic pressure on the Russian Federation in response to Russia's interference in democratic processes abroad, malign influence in Syria, and aggression against Ukraine.

I am pleased to work with my colleagues on a comprehensive, bipartisan effort to counter Russia's pervasive attacks on our electoral systems and cyber infrastructure. I introduced the Election Systems Integrity Act to better America's election systems so that we are aware when a foreign national or interest seeks to obtain ownership or control of election service providers or related infrastructure.

The American people have every reason to be disappointed and alarmed at the lack of preparedness to defend this Nation. News reports just last week suggested that former Homeland Security Secretary Nielsen unsuccessfully tried to elevate the U.S. Government response to the cyber security threat to the 2020 elections, apparently because President Trump was not interested in the issue and did not want to call into further question the legitimacy of his 2016 election victory, with Russian assistance.

Recently, Jared Kushner inconceivably tried to argue that Russia's interference amounted to ``a couple of Facebook ads'' and that congressional and special counsel investigations were ``more harmful'' to the United States than the actual Russian interference.

Congress needs to look very carefully and independently at the 10 episodes that could constitute obstruction of justice by Trump, where Attorney General Barr ``disagreed with some of the Special Counsel's legal theories, and felt some of the episodes examined did not amount to obstruction as a matter of law.''

Remember that President Trump tried to label Special Counsel Muller's probe as a witch hunt, but Special Counsel Mueller, a well-respected former FBI Director under both Presidents Bush and Obama, who was unanimously confirmed by the Senate for the position on two separate occasions, kept his head down and did his work without fear or favor.

The special counsel's investigation has resulted in, so far, 199 criminal counts, 37 people and entities that have been indicted/charged as a result of the investigation, 7 guilty pleas, 1 trial conviction, and 5 people sentenced to prison.

The report is clear that the Trump campaign knew it would benefit from Russia's illegal activities. ``Several individuals affiliated with the Trump Campaign lied to the Office, and to Congress, about their interactions with Russian-affiliated individuals.'' Mueller's report states that some corroborating electronic communications were deleted.

One editorial in the Washington Post asked the question: How could there be obstruction of justice even if there was little evidence to support the underlying suspicion of Trump campaign coordination with Russia?

First, Mr. Mueller argued:

``Obstruction of justice can be motivated by a desire to

protect non-criminal personal interests, to protect against

investigations where underlying criminal liability falls into

a gray area, or to avoid personal embarrassment. The injury

to the integrity of the justice system is the same regardless

of whether a person committed an underlying wrong.''

More specifically, ``the President had a motive to put the FBI's Russia investigation behind him,'' Mr. Mueller wrote. ``A thorough FBI investigation would uncover facts about the campaign and the President personally that the President could have understood to be crimes or that would give rise to personal and political concerns.''

I am quoting directly from the Mueller report.

For the record, the President did not fully cooperate with Special Counsel Mueller's investigation. The President refused to sit for an interview. He has taken every opportunity to say that this whole process was a witch hunt. He has done all he can to undermine the authority of the special counsel, its investigators, its purpose and, therefore, its results.

As Special Counsel Mueller noted in his final report:

Beginning in December 2017, the [Special Counsel] sought

for more than a year to interview the President on topics

relevant to both Russian-election interference and

obstruction-of-justice . . . we received the President's

written responses . . . we informed counsel of the

insufficiency of those responses in several respects . . .

Recognizing that the President would not be interviewed

voluntarily, we considered whether to issue a subpoena for

his testimony. We viewed the written answers to be

inadequate. But at that point, our investigation had made

significant progress and had produced substantial evidence

for our report. We thus weighed the costs of potentially

lengthy constitutional litigation, with resulting delay in

finishing our investigation. . . .

So there is no question that the President did not cooperate as Mr. Mueller had requested.

Special Counsel Mueller noted that he declined to ``make a traditional prosecutorial judgment'' due to its acceptance of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, or OLC, opinion prohibiting the indictment of a sitting President. The special counsel stated that while the OLC opinion holds that a sitting President may not be prosecuted, the OLC opinion ``recognizes that a criminal investigation during the President's term is permissible. The OLC opinion also recognizes that a President does not have immunity after he leaves office. . . . Given those considerations, the facts known to us, and the strong public interest in safeguarding the integrity of the criminal justice system, we conducted a thorough factual investigation in order to preserve the evidence when memories were fresh and documents materials were made available.''

That is ending a quote by the special counsel. Mr. Mueller's report is a clear directive to Congress to move forward with its own proceedings.

The criminal process at issue here for a sitting President is completely separate and independent of both the congressional oversight power and the congressional impeachment power for high crimes and misdemeanors. Even if the House decides to begin impeachment proceedings against the President--and it has the sole power to do so-- and even if the Senate were to convict the President--it has the sole power to do so--the Constitution provides that ``the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment, and Punishment, according to Law.''

The report emphasizes the President's constitutional obligation to faithfully execute the laws under article II, section 3 of the Constitution, and notes that ``the proper supervision of criminal law does not demand freedom for the President to act with a corrupt intention of shielding himself from criminal punishment, avoiding financial liability, or preventing personal embarrassment.''

Congress should take action and convene oversight hearings on the Mueller report and the underlying evidence. The report states:

Our investigation found multiple acts by the President that

were capable of exerting undue influence over law enforcement

investigations, including the Russian-interference and

obstruction investigations. The incidents were often carried

out through one-on-one meetings in which the President sought

to use his official power outside of usual channels.

These actions ranged from efforts to remove the Special

Counsel and to reverse the effect of the Attorney General's

recusal; to the attempted use of official power to limit the

scope of the investigation; to direct and indirect contacts

with witnesses with the potential to influence their

testimony. Viewing the acts collectively can help illuminate

their significance.

That is again quoting from the Mueller report.

These are disturbing and troubling actions by the President. Congress needs to get to the bottom of what happened and lay bare the facts for all Americans to see.

The report continues:

The President's efforts to influence the investigation were

mostly unsuccessful, but

that is largely because the persons who surrounded the

President declined to carry out orders or accede to his

requests. Comey did not end the investigation of Flynn, which

ultimately resulted in Flynn's prosecution and conviction for

lying to the FBI. McGahn did not tell Acting Attorney General

Rod Rosenstein that the Special Counsel must be removed, but

was instead prepared to resign over the President's order.

Lewandowski and Dearborn did not deliver the President's

message to Attorney General Sessions that he should confine

the Russia investigation to future election meddling only.

And McGahn refused to recede from his recollection about

events surrounding the President's direction to have the

Special Counsel removed, despite the President's multiple

demands that he do so.

That is again quoting from the Mueller report.

The American people can take little comfort in the fact that the episodes of potential obstruction of justice would have been much worse had the President's staff actually followed through on his orders. The misconduct here emanates from the President himself.

The report notes the marked change in the President's behavior--after the firing of FBI Director Comey--once the President realized that ``investigators were conducting an obstruction-of-justice inquiry into his own conduct . . . The President launched public attacks on the investigation and individuals involved in it who could possess evidence adverse to the President, while in private, the President engaged in a series of targeted efforts to control the investigation.

For instance, the President attempted to remove the special counsel. He sought to have Attorney General Sessions unrecuse himself and limit the investigation. He sought to prevent public disclosure of information about the June 9, 2016, meeting between Russians and campaign officials. And he used public forms to attack potential witnesses who might offer adverse information and to praise witnesses who declined to cooperate with the government.

The report continues:

The conclusion that Congress may apply the obstruction laws

to the President's corrupt exercise of the powers of office

accords with our constitutional system of checks and balances

and the principle that no person is above the law. . . . In

sum, contrary to the position taken by the President's

counsel, we concluded that, in light of the Supreme Court

precedent governing separation-of-power issues, we have a

valid basis for investigating the conduct at issue in this

report. In our view, the application of the obstruction

statutes would not impermissibly burden the President's

Article II function to supervise prosecutorial conduct or to

remove inferior law enforcement officers.

The report concludes:

The protection of the criminal justice system from corrupt

acts by any person--including the President--accords with the

fundamental principle of our government that ``no person in

this country is so high that he is above the law.''

They cited U.S. v. Lee, Clinton v. Jones, and U.S. v. Nixon.

Congress, through its oversight powers and constitutional responsibilities, should closely examine, investigate, and take testimony on the following episodes and events relating to potential obstruction of justice by President Trump.

The special counsel examined these episodes in great detail and found supportive documentary and testimonial evidence that raised significant concerns about potential wrongdoing in a number of cases, including the Trump campaign's response to reports about Russia's support for Trump; conduct involving FBI Director Comey and National Security Advisor Michael Flynn; the President's reaction to the continuing Russia investigation; the President's termination of Comey and efforts to have Rosenstein take responsibility; the appointment of special counsel and efforts to remove him; efforts to curtail the special counsel's investigation; efforts to prevent public disclosure of evidence or affect witness cooperation or testimony; further efforts to have Attorney General Sessions take control of the investigation, after recusal; efforts to have White House Counsel Don McGahn deny that the President had ordered him to have the special counsel removed; conduct towards Flynn and Manafort; and conduct involving Michael Cohen. That is quite a long list.

Congress should now rise to its constitutional responsibility and conduct vigorous oversight based on the roadmap provided by the Mueller report, both as to Russia's interference in the 2016 Presidential election and efforts to obstruct justice during the Mueller investigation.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.