Floor Statements

Madam President, if we go back over the past 20 years, it is hard to find an immigration debate that occurred that ended with making law. Immigration issues have been contentious over the years-- unnecessarily so. They have been emotional over the years-- unnecessarily so. It is connected to families, to people, to real lives, and to real stories. I get that. But now we are at a point again where we will be debating immigration on this floor all of this week.

The DREAM Act was proposed 15 years ago. Three different times it has come up before the House or the Senate or both. All three times in 15 years, it has failed--just dealing alone with those Dreamers. Then a very, very large package was tried in 2013. That included not just the Dreamers but their parents and every other person illegally present in the United States--wholesale reform of every part of the immigration system. That was tried in 2013; it also failed. Now it is time to find that middle ground. Where can we find the basic issues here?

In September, the President of the United States challenged the House and the Senate to get a legislative solution for the recipients of DACA and those who are DACA-eligible. At the time, the President was decried as throwing people out of the country, but he was very clear at that point: He did not feel President Obama had the authority to give a wholesale Executive answer for those individuals on what they called deferred action for childhood arrivals. But President Trump said: I want a legislative solution. I want certainty. I don't want these individuals to sign up every 2 years and be at the whim of some future Executive and go through the process. Let's get a permanent answer to all of this, but with that, we have to pick up the issues around it at the same time.

The President actually gave the nation a great gift at that time: a deadline. For two decades, immigration has been well known to be a problem, but there has been no deadline. The President set the deadline of March 5 to have this resolved. We are nearing that now. It is time to move from just debating it in the hallways and in our offices to debating it on the floor of this Chamber and trying to get this resolved.

Here is what I have proposed, along with Chairman Grassley, John Cornyn, David Perdue, Thom Tillis, Tom Cotton, and Joni Ernst: to lay out a commonsense solution, to say, let's stick to four items--four items that the White House has also identified. Those things are all connected.

Those four items begin, obviously, with DACA and those who are DACA- eligible, about 1.8 million individuals who are currently living in the country, who grew up literally speaking English, pledging allegiance to our flag, going to our schools, and engaging in our commerce. In every way, they have lived and functioned as Americans, except they are not. They were brought into the country illegally.

So now what do we do about that? President Obama set a time period. He set a 2007 time period. You had to have been in the country by 2007, be under a certain age, and then you were eligible. We actually advanced that since it has been so long now and said: From the time President Obama announced that--which was June 2012--if you were in the country at that time or before and you are under that time period and that certain age, you are eligible for it. Apply. Go through the process.

We think that is not only entirely fair, it is also entirely compassionate. But it also sends out a warning to those who are going to rush at our border and say: The easiest way to illegally cross into the United States is to bring a child with you. We do not want that to occur. That is a dangerous crossing in many places, many children have died, and individuals have had horrible things happen to them on the way. We want to discourage that. So we set the June 2012 date--that is when President Obama first announced the program--and said that is a reasonable time period. But with that, we said it would take 10 years for those individuals to be able to cross into naturalization. That is in line with other individuals around the world who are currently getting in the line right now. There is no one jumping ahead of anyone else but holding those individuals harmless who are already here and saying: Let's start you through the process, and 10 years from now, you will get naturalization.

At the same time we put them in line, we also put in a process for border security. The reason we currently have 11-plus million individuals in the country with no legal status is because our border security process has been so bad. This is no great shock to anyone. So what we are doing is taking those individuals in DACA and saying: Let's take 10 years to move you into naturalization. During that 10-year time period, we also want to set up the basics of border security. That gives us time to get security first and naturalization second for those individuals but both with great certainty.

It is not just a wall, although there should be sections of wall. In areas where it is highly populated on both sides of the border, we need a wall as a demarkation. But in most areas of the border, it is not highly populated on both sides; it is open desert or mountains. We need cameras. We need technology. We need interaction with our National Guard, who can bring resources to the battle as we try to interdict drugs. We need increased ability in our laws dealing with terrorism, drug smuggling, human smuggling. We need consistency in how we handle immigration. Right now, there is one policy if you come from Cuba, another policy if you come from Honduras, and another policy if you come from Mexico. Why don't we be consistent with our immigration policy?

We need additional Customs and Border Patrol agents. We need additional ICE agents. My colleagues immediately recoil from that and say that is interior enforcement. Actually, it is not. If you have additional Customs and Border Patrol agents and they pick up someone at the border, they are immediately transitioned into ICE custody, where they are detained as they go through the process. But you can't just detain people. You also have to have judges and attorneys. You have to have advocates for those individuals. So we need to increase the number of judges, attorneys, and advocates to be able to help. We need to increase the number of translators to make sure that we get good response from those individuals and that they understand what is going on.

Right now, there are 600,000 people in a backlog waiting for their day in court, for due process--600,000. That is absurd. One of the reasons we have such an open, porous border is that individuals know that if they get across the border, they will only be detained a couple of weeks and then they will be released into the United States with what is called a notice to appear. Some people appear at their court date sometimes 2, 3, 4 years later, and some people do not, but they have been released into the United States in the meantime. We need to accelerate that process.

We have individuals who come across the border and they claim asylum, but they don't get an asylum hearing for a couple of years. We should have that as a rapid process. They should get due process, and they should be able to make that claim. As we have said over and over again, justice delayed is justice denied.

We have some interesting things that we put out in this dealing with the cost to the taxpayers. We put a cap on the amount that we can spend per person, per day in housing individuals, and we set the cap at $500 per day, per person to actually do detaining. We think it is a reasonable amount, and, honestly, it is one of the things I think should be universally accepted, both by the taxpayers and by this body. We put in additional penalties for those who are doing human smuggling and human trafficking and trafficking drugs across our border. We deal with some nation-states that will not accept criminal aliens.

Many people in this body, and certainly across the United States, may be surprised to know that for countries such as Cuba, if there is an individual picked up in the United States who was convicted of armed robbery and is illegally present in the United States, even though they have committed a violent offense, typically in other

countries, they would have to suffer the consequences of being in prison here for their offense, and then they would be deported back to their country, but Cuba does not accept them. Even though they are illegally present in the United States and they commit a violent offense, they do their time period here, and then they are released back into the United States.

Why would we do that? We need to establish a process to resolve this. That is basic with border security and also dealing with naturalization for DACA. We have had individuals who have said: Where does the diversity lottery and the issue of family unification come into this?

Let me tell you how it connects--and they absolutely do connect. Right now we have 4 million people waiting through the process to legally come to the United States. That is a 20-year backlog--20 years. That is irrational. What we would like to be able to do is to fix the process. Before we add another 2 million people into this and take a 20-year process to maybe a 25-year or 30-year process, once we get to that backlog time period, let's fix what is obvious.

Quite frankly, this issue of family reunification is not a new issue. In 1995, Democratic House Member Barbara Jordan led a study on what to do on immigration and made a major proposal on what to do on what they called--at that time, in 1995, in this Democratic-led group--chain migration. It said that adult siblings and adult children should come in under their own merit, not under their family and that we should target skills for individuals who are coming in, not just ``It is my brother-in-law; so he gets a chance to come as well.''

This would allow us to empty out that backlog--the 20-year backlog-- to come into the United States at a faster pace. The diversity lottery is not a challenge with diversity--far from it. We have people from all over the world who come into the United States, and we continue to welcome people from all over the world.

I am fascinated watching the Olympics. I watch people march in from many countries. Everyone looks the same under their flag until you get to the United States. When the United States marches in, you can't pick out which one looks American. We are American. In many countries around the world, they all look the same because you are not welcome if you don't look like them. That is not so with us. We welcome people freely from around the world, but we also want them to bring a set of skills. We believe that we can use those same numbers to encourage people from around the world and bring their skills into the United States, to repurpose the diversity lottery and say: Yes, come. Come from everywhere around the world, but come bringing your skills because we need it as a nation. You are always welcome to come.

It is far from making the Statue of Liberty cry or polishing up her torch. It is saying: We are open to the world. Come and bring your talents and abilities. We will need it in the days ahead.

If we want to prevent a 20-year backlog from getting even worse, we have to fix the family migration issue. If we want to deal with border security and deal with the very real threats that we face, as well as just individuals who want to come to work, we have to deal with the basics of border security, and we should address the issue of DACA recipients. We can do this. We will walk through this journey together. Over the course of this week, I hope we can keep this civil and open and fact-based, rather than charged with emotion and accusations. We all want to help the country. Let's work on helping the country together this week.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, there are a lot of important things the Senate is taking up right now. Obviously, there is the issue of immigration, the budget, and disaster relief. There are a lot of pertinent issues that need to be resolved. One of those things that was in the middle of the conversation came up today. It is part of a conversation that, quite frankly, doesn't come up often in this body, but this seemed like a reasonable piece to be able to come up. It came up to the Senate to open debate on it, and it failed to get the 60 votes to support the beginning of what should be an easy conversation on a hard issue--this issue about children and life.

In 1973, when Roe v. Wade passed, the Supreme Court at that time determined that for children that were viable--and that is the definition they left out there--there is a governmental interest in being able to engage with those children. Well, viability in 1973 was very different than what it is now, decades later. In 1973 viable was a much older child. Now that we know a lot more, a lot more children survive. Children who are born at 22 weeks of gestation have between a 50-percent to 60-percent chance of survival now. That was not true in 1973.

The rest of the world has caught up with this technology, and their governments have acknowledged of this issue that a child who has 10 fingers and 10 toes and a beating heart--they suck their thumb in the womb, they yawn, they stretch, they move--is a child.

I understand there is wide argument about a child that is at 8 weeks of gestation, whom I believe is a child, but others look at it and say: It doesn't look like a child yet. But a child at 20, 22, 24 weeks of gestation even looks like a child when you look at the child in the ultrasound. It is hard to disagree, especially when children are born at that age prematurely and they survive, and many of us know kids that were born at 22 weeks. The bill that came up today on the Senate floor, which had bipartisan support and had a majority of support but not 60 Senators' support to be able to discuss this, was a very simple, straightforward bill. It asked just one question: Will we as Americans continue to allow elective abortions when the child is viable?

The Supreme Court said in 1973 that the government has a right to be able to step in and protect a viable child. There is no question that they are at that age of viability. There is no question, at that age of 20 weeks, that science shows us they experience pain in the womb, and that if surgery happens for a child in utero like that, that child is actually given anesthetic to be

able to calm their pain during that surgery because they have a developed nervous system and because they have a beating heart. This body refused to even take up the issue and debate it.

There is no question that I am very passionate about the issue of life and about children, and that we should as a culture protect children. But this one confuses me--for this body, more than any other issue. There are only seven nations in the world that allow elective abortions after 20 weeks. There are only four nations in the world that allow elective abortions after 24 weeks. We are in that elite club. We are in the elite club with three other nations that allow elective abortions that late--Vietnam, North Korea, and China--the worst human rights violators in the world. There sits the United States in that very elite club.

Why are we there? Because we can't even discuss the possibility that a child is a child, and anyone who has ever seen an ultrasound at 24 weeks cannot deny that is a child, and if that child was delivered prematurely, they would survive and grow and develop into a person. The only difference between that child at 20 weeks and an adult now is time.

This issue will continue to come up, and it should because we as a culture should promote a culture of life and of honoring people--people at their most vulnerable moment. There is no more vulnerable a moment than that for that child. We have to get out of this club of elective abortions and the only group that allows it--North Korea, China, and Vietnam. When will we wake up to the fact that the entire rest of the world--all of Europe, all of Africa, all of Central America, all of South America, every one of those countries--sees that plain? A child is a child, and we need to be able to guard its life.

So I am sad that today in a bipartisan vote with more than 50 votes to be able to get into it and pass it, we didn't have enough people even to want to discuss it and to be able to bring up the bill. We will bring it up again for the sake of those children and their futures. We will bring it up again, and we will keep bringing up the facts of the argument, not the emotion but the facts of the argument, and we will win people over.

With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of the following nomination: Executive Calendar No. 497.

I ask unanimous consent that the Senate vote on the nomination with no intervening action or debate; that if confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table; that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action; that no further motions be in order; and that any statements relating to the nomination be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Presiding Officer of the Senate be authorized to appoint a committee on the part of the Senate to join with a like committee on the part of the House of Representatives to escort the President of the United States into the House Chamber for the joint session to be held at 9 p.m. on Tuesday, January 30, 2018.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding the resolution of the Senate of January 24, 1901, the traditional reading of Washington's Farewell Address take place on Monday, February 26, following the prayer and pledge; further, that Senator Peters be recognized to deliver the address.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10 a.m., Tuesday, January 30; further, that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and morning business be closed; further, that following leader remarks, the Senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of the Stras nomination; finally, that the Senate recess from 12:30 p.m. until 2:15 p.m., and that all time during recess, adjournment, morning business, and leader remarks count postcloture on the Stras nomination.

Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it stand adjourned under the previous order, following the remarks of Senator Casey.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, Senator Tillis and I have come to the floor today because we have just some incredible frustration and wanted to be able to bring some facts to this conversation.

I absolutely grieve for the Federal workers in my State. I mean, there are some phenomenal people who do an amazing job. Most people will never know their names, but, every day, they are getting up to serve the American people.

Every day, there are folks who are in our military who are serving the American people. The civilians who surround them, though they are not listed as Federal employees, are intimately connected to what we are doing for the Federal task--for people. They are trying to figure out this afternoon what is going to happen to them this weekend and next week. They are frantically getting together in offices all over Oklahoma and, quite frankly, all over America and are trying to piece together the ``now whats?'' of a government shutdown, which is distracting them from getting all of the things done that they already need to get done that they are backlogged on now. For what?

The frustration of this whole focus on ``let's do a government shutdown over not having to have real discussions about DACA and immigration'' is not only not accurate, but it is also something that is already in the process that is somehow being short-circuited. All of these Federal workers and all of these civilian employees who are going through all of this turmoil in trying to figure out why DACA is not resolved and why the deadline for DACA is in the first week of March, yet it forces them to be out and have all of this chaos now, at the end of January, has brought utter confusion to everyone, especially when you know the history of this dialogue. Let me walk everyone backward through a span of a few months here.

In September, the Nation was surprised when President Trump announced that he was not going to renew DACA and that he wanted a legislative, long-term fix for DACA. The very day that he made that announcement, I released a statement, saying: In America, we do not hold children accountable for the acts of their parents. We don't do that in American law.

Just a couple of days after that, the President called me late one night. He said: Hey, I saw your statement in a report about that. Can we talk about it? We spent about 20 minutes late that evening just talking about immigration policy and his interest in getting a legislative, long-term resolution for DACA, for these kids who have to renew every 2 or 3 years, and they have no idea what is going to happen. He wanted to have some semblance of permanence for them but, at the same time, also resolve some of the issues around border security that were not controversial a few years ago. He said that we need to deal with some issues with border security, and we need to deal with the issue of DACA and give them some semblance of permanence. Can we put this together?

Actually, at that time, Senator Tillis and I were already working to get something together because, for the last 15 years, the DREAM Act has come up before the House and the Senate, and for 15 years, it has failed every single time. The DREAM Act failed when there was a Democratic President, a Democratic Senate, and a Democratic House of Representatives. That bill was not going to pass. We knew that, so we went to work, asking: What is a better solution that will provide some semblance of permanence on this?

Our conversation was about a lot of the pushback as to why the DREAM Act had not passed in the past. A lot of Americans feel like: I understand this group of individuals has grown up in our country, pledges allegiance to our flag, speaks English, is passionate about where they live, that this feels like home to them, but it is not home. They wanted them to be able to have that opportunity, but they didn't want them to be able to cut in line.

So we put in a process to say that here is a way those individuals can earn the right to be naturalized citizens of the United States, but they have to earn it through a process, just as someone who is international would have to go through that process to be here. The exception would be they are already here, and they wouldn't have what DACA provided. DACA provided 2 years of ``we will not arrest you'' but no legal status. This would provide immediate legal status and an opportunity after 10 years to be able to earn naturalization. That had never been offered like that before.

We worked through all of the details of that and laid out a proposal and said: This is a section of a larger bill. We feel that this is a way to get past what has blocked the DREAM Act year after year after year and what has been the biggest frustration for many of the people in the country with the DREAM Act. Yet our caveat was very consistent. We wanted to be able to resolve this, but it had to be resolved with border security attached to it.

I didn't think that was an unreasonable request. I was surprised to hear that it might have been since, in the previous Gang of 8 versions several years ago that had come out of the Senate, there had been a large section in it about border security. I assumed this would be a nonissue to be able to pair those issues together. It seems irresponsible to deal with the DACA issue and to not address: How did that happen in the first place? To say that we have a secure border and that we don't need to address anything would be to ignore 12 million examples in our country of that rule being violated either through visa overstays or through individuals coming across the border who want to be in our country but who have crossed illegally instead of through a legal process.

We are a very open, receiving country. Every day, a half a million people cross our southern border legally--a half a million every day. A million people a year legally become citizens of the United States. We are not a country that is anti-immigration. We just want it done the right way. We think the law should apply to everyone equally all the time and don't like anyone circumventing the law.

So here is a history lesson.

On September 5, the President makes that announcement. Within days, we have conversations with the President about it. He agrees we need to be able to have something that is a long-term solution for border security and for DACA. Within about 2 weeks, Senator Tillis and I release the SUCCEED Act and say this has to be part of our border security. Thankfully, in our conference, at the same time, Senator Cornyn is also working through border security to be able to partner it with this. At the same time, Senator Cotton and Senator Perdue are also working on other areas dealing with chain migration, knowing these could all be partnered together to be able to put into a final bill. They were individual titles of a larger proposal. We were bringing those out.

In October, the President of the United States released a long report, saying here is what he would like to have in a bill. He put great detail into it and said that this is what he expects the bill to be like when it is resolved.

So now it is October. He said that we have to get this resolved. We release three different bills, and the President releases something. We want to start negotiations.

In November, we are in negotiations in a bipartisan group, and every day in the bipartisan group, all that our Democratic colleagues want to talk about is DACA--every day. Our staffs meet every day. We are meeting every other day as Members, going through this--sometimes every day going through it. Every day, it is DACA, and, every day, we bring up: Hey, there are other aspects of this that we have agreed to. Yet, every day, they say: Well, let's work on DACA some more.

It finally hits a point in December that I ask: When are we going to get to talking about border security? We have to talk about that. Well, guess what happened. The next meeting I was not invited to attend. Neither was I invited to the next one. Neither was Senator Tillis. Our staffs find out they are still meeting and contact them and say: Hey, we are still interested in getting to a bipartisan agreement. They do not respond to our staffs' emails. They will not even tell us when or where they are meeting.

We didn't walk away from the negotiations. We were kicked out of the negotiations because we believed that this deal needed to have border security in it and DACA. For a group that said, basically, we don't want to deal with border security, they were no longer interested in us, which took us to a stalemate of really getting this resolved, which took us to 2 weeks ago.

On Tuesday, the President invites us over in a bipartisan, bicameral conversation to say: We have to get a plan here. This is stuck. During that meeting with the President, with 26 House Members and Senators together from both parties, we make an agreement that there will be four areas of this final agreement and that these will be the negotiators to be able to pull it together--the Republican and Democratic whips from both the House and the Senate. Those four individuals will be the individuals to pull it together, and they are going to get that done. That was on Tuesday.

By Thursday of that week, a smaller subgroup of the group that I had been kicked out of went back to the President and said: No. We have a better idea. Let's try to do this instead. I know, on Tuesday, we agreed to the other process, but we have another idea to kind of end- run that whole process.

Clearly, it upset a lot of us to say that we are trying to do a bipartisan deal, that we are trying to work this through the process, that we are trying to be of good faith in this. So far, there have not been good faith negotiations on border security at all. We cannot deal with the issue of individuals who are in our country illegally, even if we as Americans see them as neighbors and friends and future citizens of our country, and ignore how it happened in the first place. That would not be responsible of us.

Now, there are some who want to say, ``This is because you are just, simply, a racist,'' which is infuriating and inaccurate and belittles the conversation. To stand up and say that the only reason you think this is because you are a racist is trying to shut down the conversation, not engage in it. These are my friends and neighbors as well, but we are legislators, and we have a responsibility to solve issues, not to belittle each other and not to make false accusations.

There are millions of people who have crossed our border to be able to work or connect with family. I fully understand that. Many of them live around my place, go to church with me. I get that completely. There are also many people who cross our borders because of crime, and we would be foolish to ignore that reality as well. There are people who cross that border to be able to traffic drugs, to be able to traffic in terrorism, to be able to move people--human trafficking, labor trafficking. We should have a secure border set up for that.

Again, this used to not be a partisan issue. In 2006, Senator Schumer and, at that time, Senator Obama voted for the Secure Fence Act, which put in 650 miles of fencing on the southern border. Let me say that again. Senator Schumer and Senator Obama and a lot of other Democratic Senators, who are still here, voted for the Secure Fence Act in 2006 to put in 650 miles of fencing on our southern border. This didn't used to be a partisan issue, and it shouldn't be today. Border security is not partisan. It is national security.

The proposals that have come out at times amaze me. Let's actually get serious about trying to resolve these issues. Basic border security issues should involve not just some fencing in some areas or walls in some areas or technology in some other areas or adding additional manpower in other areas. Those are reasonable things along our border that every country in the world has organized.

It also involves dealing with some of the gaps in our law if someone crosses into the United States. These are things that need to be addressed--for instance, the removal of multiple felony criminal illegal aliens. Why is this controversial? This shouldn't be a controversial issue at all, but for some reason, it is. To end the practice with greater fines and penalties for people who smuggle in people for profit, why would that be controversial? For some reason, it is.

We are dealing with additional judges because we have 600,000 people in a backlog in our immigration courts--600,000 people in our immigration courts in a backlog. Why would that be controversial to have to deal with a backlog? We are behind on family members who have petitioned to be a part of this country but who were--get this--20 years in a backlog. Why would that be controversial to say that we need to divert some of our attention to catching up on the backlog?

There are a lot of issues that we need to deal with, and this is a complicated issue. But for other Members, can I just say that we are very close to negotiating this, that people have actually acted in good faith in negotiations. But saying ``We will shut down the government until you do it our way''--and their way was an end run around the whole stated process that we all agreed on--seems absurd to me, and it certainly seems absurd to the Federal workers in my State who are now going through chaos this afternoon because some people wanted to make an end run around the process that was already in place.

Let's finish the process and not create some artificial cliff and chaos to try to say ``Do it my way, or I will shut down the government.'' Let's finish the process. There are willing partners on both sides, and there are reasonable proposals to finish out what we have already started and worked on for months to get through this process.

I thank Senator Tillis for the engagement he has on this because he and his team have worked exceptionally hard. My team and I, both in my State and here, have worked exceptionally hard on these issues, and we want to get them right. Senator Cornyn and his team have worked exceptionally hard on these issues.

Let's do it, and let's get it right, but let's not shut down the government while in the middle of negotiations because people want to have it their way and not actually finish the negotiations we started.

With that, I yield back.

Mr. President, I want to get a chance to address an ongoing conversation that is happening in Washington, DC, right now and will be over in the next 36 hours. As unusual as this may sound, with all of the drama that is happening here, just outside this building there are tens of thousands of people--most of them students--who are gathered in Washington, DC, preparing for something called the March for Life. This has happened for decades now. Students and adults come from all over the country to Washington, DC, to quietly speak

for those who cannot speak for themselves--children still in the womb-- and to be able to speak out for the protection of life.

It is an interesting conversation that has a tremendous amount of science, a tremendous amount of faith, and a tremendous amount of heat around it, as some individuals don't want to discuss the issue of abortion or would simply say: That is a woman's choice; we need to set that aside and ignore it.

There is a whole group of students who arrive here saying: Wait a minute. That child in the womb has 10 fingers and 10 toes, unique DNA that is different from the mom and different from the dad. The child feels pain in the womb and has a beating heart. That doesn't sound like tissue to me; that sounds like a child.

They are raising great issues that, quite frankly, science reinforces as well.

Last week, I had the opportunity to be able to stop by one of the great research facilities in Oklahoma. They are doing tremendous research on cancer, on MS, on Alzheimer's, and a lot more. I stopped by one of the labs and talked to one of the scientists there. They are actually doing research on zebra fish.

Now, as odd as this may sound, they are actually taking zebra fish eggs and developing those eggs. As they are first beginning to hash out of the eggs, they are injecting them with a gene that they know to be cancerous in humans, allowing that to be able to develop in the zebra fish and seeing the abnormalities there. Then, they try to treat it with different drugs to be able to see if once they get the abnormalities, they can reverse it. They are literally taking the zebra fish, creating problems, and seeing if they can fix them.

They are going into great detail. The microscopes, the work, the millions of dollars that have gone into this research are all for one simple thing--the ability to be able to cure diseases that affect human life.

As a culture, we have determined that life is valuable. Human life, especially, is valuable and precious. The challenge that we have is determining when that life begins. I and millions of others believe that life begins at conception, when that child has a different DNA than the mom or the dad. That tissue is not just the mom's tissue at that point; it is growing independently. There is no difference in that child in the womb and the child that is in the backyard playing, laughing, and going down the slide, other than time. There is no difference.

Last year, Cleveland Cavaliers' guard J.R. Smith and his wife had little Dakota. When I say ``little Dakota,'' I mean little Dakota. She was born at less than 1 pound at 19 weeks of development. She left the hospital 5 months later at 7 pounds, 4 ounces--7 pounds, 5 ounces, actually.

When she left the hospital, it was a remarkable event. It was celebrated all over social media--this guard with the NBA Cleveland Cavaliers and this beautiful child leaving.

Dakota is now 1 year old, and it has been interesting the stir that happened around her birth as a lot of people stopped and thought about a child that small and that young. It was interesting. The CNN articles that came out at the same time as little Dakota's birth noted that a child at 23 weeks of development has a 50 to 60 percent chance of survival now. Science has changed a lot over the last several decades. A lot has happened. It is remarkable to hear the stories of surgeries that are happening in utero.

In 1995, Roberto Rodriguez actually went through surgery still in the womb. He had major problems in his left lung, and at 20 weeks, they went in and did surgery in utero, fixing his left lung. It allowed him to finish out his term, and 13 weeks later he was delivered healthy. Little Roberto Rodriguez is now 22 years old.

This technology is not new anymore. In many ways, the science has far surpassed what were our conversations here in America dealing with policy around children.

Back in 1970, when the Supreme Court passed Roe v. Wade, they had this whole conversation about viability and that government has a right to be able to step in and protect children at the moment that they are viable. Well, in the 1970s, that was very different than what it is now. Now we see children at 21, 20, 22 weeks of development being born and being natural, healthy, great children. We need to be able to catch up in law.

We may disagree on a lot of things on life. As I have already stated, I believe life begins at conception. In this body, I know there are a lot of conversations, saying: How do we actually get to a sense of commonality and common ground on these issues.

Well, let me just lay down three different areas where I would say that maybe we could find some common ground on these three areas. Though we may disagree on when life begins, can we at least agree that Americans have the freedom of conscience? Can we at least agree on the late-term abortions, when a child is clearly viable? And can we at least agree that when a child is born alive, they should be protected? Let me just hit those three very quickly.

The first one is just basic freedom of conscience, allowing an individual to be able to live out their conscience. I spoke to several nurses just a few months ago. When those nurses were hired at the hospitals they worked in, they told the individuals in HR and the physicians they worked with that they believed life begins at conception and they had a moral and conscience belief that they wanted to protect children. They were told at that moment: You will not have to participate in abortions. We understand your conscience belief, and we will protect your conscience belief. For years, they did not. Then, suddenly, they ran short in nurses at one moment, and they pulled each of them in at different times and in different hospitals and in different States. They told the stories that they had been pulled into a procedure, being told on the way in: We need you in this procedure-- arriving only to find out it was an abortion they were being forced to assist with. They were appalled to be part of the death of a child rather than protecting the life of a child. Each of them was told: You will lose your job if you don't participate in the taking of this child's life. That is an unfair place to put them in.

Individuals should be able to have the freedom of conscience and should be able to live out their moral and spiritual beliefs. I would never go to an abortion doctor and force him to peacefully protest against his own abortion clinic. That would be absurd. But for some reason, pro-abortion hospitals see no issue in at times compelling a staff member to participate in something they find objectionable, even when they made their stance clear.

We should never force a person to administer a lethal injection in a prison if they have a moral objection to the death penalty. That seems only reasonable. We are rightfully furious when a man threatens a woman with firing if she doesn't respond to his advances. No one would say that if she doesn't like his advances, she could just go find another job. But for some in our culture, they want to look away when that same man threatens a woman with firing if she doesn't violate her conscience and help perform an abortion. They are willing to tell her: Just quit and go find another job. What is the difference?

We wouldn't compel a vegan to eat meat at the company barbecue, would we? Why would we compel a person to assist in the taking of a life when they are personally offended by the practice?

The right of conscience should be protected for every person. Religious intolerance is a personal choice, not a legal requirement in America.

Late-term abortions are another area where I think we should be able to find common ground, and we should be able to protect these children. We should agree that elective late-term abortions should be ended in America. This is an elective abortion after 5 months of pregnancy. When the child's nervous system is fully developed, they can feel pain at that point.

We in America, because of the pro-abortion lobby and the activists who are around them, have lost track of this simple fact: We are one of seven nations in the world that allow elective abortions after 22 weeks of gestation. In fact, of these seven nations that allow abortions after 22 weeks of gestation, three of them--Canada, Singapore, and the Netherlands--allow elective abortions only until 24 weeks, just 2 weeks later. But there are only four countries in the world that allow elective abortions at any moment. Are you

ready for this club? There are four nations that are like us: the United States, Vietnam, North Korea, and China. That is it. Those four nations allow elective abortions at any stage. That is a horrible club for the United States of America to be in. Those countries are some of the worst human rights violators in the world, and that is the elite club in which we find ourselves.

The pro-abortion lobby is so powerful and so wealthy, and they are so engaged, they are not willing to relent that even one child's life could be protected, even when they are clearly viable, leaving the United States in this horrible collection with Vietnam, North Korea, and China on abortion policy. At 5 months old, a child in the womb can kick, stretch, yawn, smile, suck its thumb, and feel pain. It is a viable child.

Late-term abortions represent only 1.3 percent of all abortions in America. I would contend we should stop this practice altogether. There are 191 nations that don't allow this--191 nations. There is no reason we should not as well.

This is interesting. The Washington Post heard several people quote that statistic about seven nations are the only nations that actually allow any abortions at this late stage. Those three that I mentioned-- the Netherlands, Canada, and Singapore--allow them up to 24 weeks but not after that. So they ran their famous Fact Checker on this issue. The Washington Post ran through all of it and looked at it and said: This sounds like this is not correct. They ran through the whole study, looked at it, fact-checked the whole thing, and at the end of it came back and said: No, it actually is correct. What seemed a dubious statement in the beginning they fact-checked and gave what the Washington Post calls their elite Gepetto qualification--that means no Pinocchios; true statement.

We should be able to resolve this. I have made no secret that I believe that life begins at conception, but I would say to this group that not everyone agrees with me on this, but we should at least be able to protect life when it is viable.

Let me add one more detail to this that is painful to even discuss. Of those late-term abortions that occur--those 1.3 percent of abortions that occur during this late time period--the child is too large and too well developed to actually have a traditional abortion procedure, so the abortions are done by the abortion doctor reaching in with a tool into the womb and literally pulling the child's arms and legs off, allowing the child to bleed to death in the womb and then pulling its parts out a piece at a time. Why do we allow that in America? As I said, 191 other nations do not. All of Europe does not. When is the last time you heard me say our social policy needs to catch up with Europe? We are better than this.

One last statement, because I have some colleagues who want to join me in this conversation. We should be able to agree on a simple principle: that if an abortion is conducted and it is botched and instead of destroying the child in the womb, the abortion doctor actually induces the delivery--in those rare cases, the current practice is, when the child is delivered, everyone in the operating room backs away and allows the child to die of exposure on the table, because they can't actually take the life anymore; it has been fully delivered.

Kermit Gosnell sits in prison right now because, as an abortionist in Philadelphia, he was in the practice of delivering children and then killing them after they were delivered. It is already a crime to physically take the life of that individual, so the current practice is, if they mess up the abortion and deliver instead of destroy, they just allow the child to die on its own, crying on the table. Can we as Congress and as Americans at least agree that it is barbaric to watch a crying child on the table slowly die; that at least at that moment of delivery, we would agree a child is a child when we can see all 10 of their fingers, see all 10 of their toes, and hear their voice crying on the table? This is an issue that shouldn't be controversial. This is an issue for which we should find great compassion.

I would challenge this body, when we deal with conscience and when we deal with late-term abortions and when we deal with children who are born alive, that we find resolution in those areas.

I am aware this is a difficult topic. I understand that for many people, this conversation is painful to even consider and that for the millions of American women who have experienced abortion in their personal lives, this is painful to even consider. But I am also aware that until we talk about these hard issues and resolve them, they will continue to advance.

We are better than this as a nation. Let's prove it in the way we treat our most vulnerable.

With that, I ask unanimous consent for colloquy time with some of my colleagues, and I would like to be able to recognize Senator Blunt from Missouri.

Mr. President, the House passed both the pain-capable and the infant protection born-alive bills in prior months. The Senate has yet to take that up, and it is our hope in the Senate to be able to bring that up for real dialogue in conversations in the days ahead.

Mr. President, I would like to ask Senator Sasse to join us for this colloquy as well.

Mr. President, this is a difficult issue for so many people because it is intensely personal for so many people. We understand full well the grief some families have when this

topic comes up because there are millions of men and women who they know their child has been aborted. We get that. We want to have incredible compassion for them as they struggle through some of the most difficult decisions of their life. We understand that when they go to the mall and they watch a small child laugh in the food court of the mall, they wonder in the back of their head, ``Would that have sounded like my child when they laughed?''

We get the grief they live with for the rest of their life as they process through what some physician told them was tissue, but in their heart they know was a child. This is a nation that can set some basic principles to help those individuals, to promote adoption, to be able to encourage those families and help walk alongside them. We are good at grace and compassion as a nation. We can continue to be better at it. One of the ways we have to be able to express that is for the most vulnerable, for those children who have yet to be born.

I would like to invite the Senator from Montana to also join in this colloquy.

Mr. President, there has just been a dialogue--a colloquy--here on the floor. I thank Senator Daines from Montana, Senator Blunt from Missouri, Senator Ernst from Iowa, and Senator Sasse from Nebraska for joining in a dialogue of this basic issue of life.

In 1973 this week, Roe v. Wade was passed by the Supreme Court in a split decision. We are still having this dialogue, and there is still an ongoing argument about looking into the womb. We know a lot more now--about times now--than they knew in 1973, and we know a lot more about the development of a child now than they knew in 1973. We are still having this ongoing debate that, I think, is a righteous debate, quite frankly. I think it is entirely appropriate for us to be able to talk about these kinds of difficult issues and try to find some resolution. The American people have these dialogues, and we should have them here and be able to bring the debate to the forefront.

This is not about people whom we hate. It is always interesting to be able to get the dialogue and pushback from people who say: You just hate people because of whatever reason. It is not true. It is, actually, that we love children. That is really the issue. There is a vulnerable child in the middle of this conversation, and sometimes they don't seem to come up in the conversation about protecting rights or about giving people privacy. All of those things are wonderful euphemisms, but in the middle of that, there is a very small child who is being discussed. We are trying to elevate their voice--to literally speak for those who cannot speak for themselves. We think that is an appropriate role for government--to speak out for the most vulnerable and see if we can find justice for those individuals.

This week is not only the week that we have the anniversary of Roe v. Wade; it is also the week that we celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. I would say that he is a terrific role model in this conversation. His basic teaching is that hate doesn't win over a friend, that only love can do that. Only love can transform an enemy into a friend. That is what we are trying to do.

To the people who oppose this idea, we get it. We can have that dialogue. They are not our enemies, though. Quite frankly, we want to respond to their comments in love and say, ``Let's sit down and have a reasonable dialogue. Let's express our affection for children,'' and be able to talk about how valuable they really are in our society. Let's talk about adoption. Let's talk about ways to be able to continue to take care of them. In the middle of it, let's talk about a child as a child, not just as tissue that is random, because tissue that is just random doesn't suck its thumb and smile back at you. It doesn't stretch and yawn. It is a child who does that. We want to be able to have that conversation.

I would urge this body to stop ignoring what millions of the American people see as the issue. Let's talk about the child, and let's see where we are going to go. I think a good first step for us to be able to talk about this is with the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act, what we call the pain-capable bill, which deals with late-term abortions-- very late, 5 months and later--and the issue of conscience.

Are we really going to compel people to perform procedures they find morally reprehensible in the destruction of a child rather than in the protection of a child? We should be able to find common ground on those.

Let's then keep the conversation going because it is a reasonable thing

for us to be able to discuss. If we cannot talk about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in this place, where can we talk about it?

Again, I thank my colleagues for participating and for their tenacity and their compassion and their affection for all Americans whether they agree or disagree on this issue. I appreciate very much their engagement.

I appreciate very much the volunteers who are scattered around the country right now who are serving women in some of the most difficult moments of their lives at crisis pregnancy centers, at women's resource centers, and other locations. They are volunteering; they are providing clothes; they are providing help; they are providing sonograms and pregnancy tests; and they are walking those families through those tough days. Thanks to those volunteers as well today, wherever they may be, and bless them for the ongoing work that they do.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule XXII, all postcloture time on the House message to accompany S. 139 expire at 12:15 p.m. on Thursday, January 18.

Mr. President, a few days ago, our Nation stopped and remembered Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. It is entirely appropriate for us to do so. It is a holiday set aside to be able not only to remember but to reflect and try to figure out: Where are we now?

This year is especially significant. Fifty years ago this year, Dr. King was assassinated in April 1968. A lot of things have changed in that time period. Quite frankly, as a nation, we have learned a lot about race. We no longer as a nation talk about three-fifths of a man anymore--rightfully so, and we are appalled by our history in that. We no longer have separate water fountains set up in restaurants or tell certain people because of their background, their family, or their skin color that they can take food to go but they can't come in and sit down.

We have come a long way in hiring. We have come a long way in just our communities and our schools. The work is not done. We still have a long way to go, quite frankly.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was bold enough to be able to challenge the church first, then the Nation, and then the world that we have an issue around the issue of race. He was going to challenge us to confront it--rightfully so. He challenged us on the issue of racial justice, on poverty, on education, but he also challenged us on the way that we speak out on issues, and I think we lose track of that as a culture.

Quite frankly, as a Senate and as a Nation, we are losing track of one of the things Dr. Martin Luther King challenged us on: There is a right way to confront issues and a wrong way to confront issues. Dr. King did something revolutionary. He pushed a community to confront injustice the right way, and he won.

He made radical statements like this:

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.

Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Dr. King said:

I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a

burden to bear. Love is the only force capable of

transforming an enemy into a friend.

For whatever reason, we lose track of Dr. King's statements about ``love is a powerful thing.'' We start as a culture responding with hate to respond to hate. When someone says something hateful, we respond back with something more hateful back at them. It doesn't actually solve anything, and we lose the great model that he really set for us in that.

If we want to make enemies friends, only love can do that, only relationships can do that, only pressing a friend to do the right thing can do that. Now, is that happening in our culture? No. It is in spots, but it is not hard to go on any of our social media sites at any moment and be able to see the challenge in our social media sites, where it is not love driving out hate. It is hate attacking hate.

It is remarkable to me. I just glanced at some of the things just of late as I was preparing for this conversation. I look backward at a few of the posts that are on my own social media sites--controversial statements that I made, like, on the 1st when I did a post that just said ``Happy New Year.'' It was a stinging controversial post that was responded to by someone saying: Loser. Liar. Traitor. How much money did you take from Russia, comrade?

That was to my statement of ``Happy New Year.''

I made a statement about how kids who came in under DACA should be treated differently. These are kids who didn't break the law. These are kids who are like the 4-year old riding in the backseat of the car when their parent was speeding. When the parent is pulled over, they don't give the kid a ticket. I made just a quick post about that, and the response to that, among many, was this: What is with his hair color? Dude, get it done professionally. You look terrible.

I just have to say to you: Dude, this is done by a professional. God gave me this hair color, and so there is no bottle involved in this one. It is His work, and I would call Him a pro.

There is all of this talk back and forth about where we are going to go as a culture, and we are losing Dr. King's legacy that hate doesn't drive out hate, that only love does that.

Now, there is a lot of conversation in this body, as well, saying things have never been worse in the Senate and in Congress. I would disagree. Just after Vice President Burr left office, he challenged the Secretary of the Treasury to a duel where he shot the Secretary of the Treasury dead in a duel. In 1850, in the Chamber just right down the hallway here, in what is called the Old Senate Chamber, they were working on a compromise and Senator Foote and Senator Benton were in an argument, and so Senator Foote reached into his desk in the middle of the argument and pulled out his pistol while screaming at Senator Benton, to which Senator Benton jumped on one of the desks that is in this room still today. He jumped on the desk and pulled open his coat, revealing: I don't have a weapon. Shoot me. Shoot me. That was on the Senate floor, and they wrestled Senator Foote to the floor and took his gun away from him.

People can say it has never been worse. I can assure you it has been worse. But what we do have responsibility for is in our time and setting the tone for difficult debate in this moment.

The arguments that happen on the Senate floor and the violence on this

Senator floor, including Senator Sumner being almost beaten to death with a cane just before the Civil War, set a path into the Civil War for the Nation. What is the path we are taking the Nation on right now in our debate?

As a nation, I have a simple reminder that is not mine. It is from a powerful American leader named Dr. King, who said: ``Hate does not drive out hate.'' For anyone who is looking at what is happening in our culture and in politics right now saying ``if only I say something more hateful than the last guy, this will get better,'' you have missed his point.

Dr. King was deeply moved by Scripture, and there are multiple examples of it in his writings and in his speeches. He quoted passages over and over again, like from 1 John, Chapter 4: ``Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another''; Psalm 34: ``Taste and see that the Lord is good.'' Over and over again, he came back to Scripture as just a simple reminder that things can be different for us.

He challenged the church at moments, like in his letter from Birmingham jail, and he challenged culture. In fact, we lose track of the fact that during the civil rights movement, Dr. King was working with both parties to establish platforms for both parties that would respect the dignity of all Americans. It is a good path that has been set for us. In the middle of our conversation about Dr. King, I would hope that we would remember it.

Let me make one quick side note, as well. It is kind of a fun note for those of us from Oklahoma. The story of Dr. King, as many people may know, almost didn't happen the way that it did. In 1953, just finishing up seminary and in the middle of his doctoral work, when he was just Martin Luther King, not Dr. Martin Luther King yet--he was still doing his doctoral work at Boston University. He came to a small church in Oklahoma City that was well respected in the civil rights movement--Calvary Baptist Church. In fact, in 1952, Calvary Baptist Church hosted the national conference of the NAACP and had Thurgood Marshall there as a speaker. In 1953, Dr. King was interviewed there to be one of the pastors at Calvary Baptist Church. The elders in the church heard him, read about him, met him, and then turned him down. This is my favorite quote from one of the elders of the church. They said they didn't think he had enough gravy on him yet. He was too young, not experienced enough. That was in 1953. Ten years later, he was standing on the Mall right down the street saying ``I have a dream,'' leading the entire country.

I say that to say that sometimes we have this assumption that we are in control. We are not. God is in control. He has a path and a plan. Sometimes when we hear no and when we hear hard things, we find out He has a path and plan that may look different from ours.

I would only challenge us as a body to do the right thing the right way and to see where that takes us. As it says in Psalm 34, ``Taste and see that the Lord is good.'' Do it the right way, and let's see how this works out together.

It is a simple reminder and a simple admonition to a body that could use some words from Dr. King and see if we can put them into practice together.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, once more I am coming to the floor to talk about the basic rules of the Senate and how we actually get on legislation.

We have spent all of this week on four district court judicial nominations--the entire week, no legislation--because we can't get on legislation.

In 2013, we were in a situation similar to this. The minority party, at that point being the Republicans, were slowing down the process in the Senate on nominations by the Democratic Party, at that point the majority. So Republicans and Democrats sat down together and said: This is a problem. We cannot get to legislation.

The Republicans and Democrats together, with 70-plus votes, made a 2- year rule change in the Senate in the 113th Congress. It was a simple rule change: 2 hours of debate for a district court judge, 8 hours of debate for just about everyone else, and 30 hours of debate for circuit court, Supreme Court, and Cabinet nominations. It was a bipartisan agreement that worked very well for that 2-year time period.

Then, at the end of that 2-year time period, it had a sunset on it, and it expired. The hope was that we would relearn how to be able to do this. I wasn't in the Senate at that time, but I have spoken to multiple people about that process.

What happened instead was, during the first year of that, there continued to be ongoing frustration, so my Democratic colleagues used what is affectionately called the nuclear option to be able to change the rules of the Senate to say that they could bring individuals with only 51 votes--not 60--and

then they used the rule, on top of what they changed, to bring people forward at greater speed, which they did. For the rest of the next year, they used it that way.

We now come to this time period. Let me give an example of what I am talking about and the frustration it creates. Let me confirm my number and make sure I get it right for all of the Senate history. From 1967 until 2012, there were 46 cloture votes invoked. That means they requested a cloture vote, and it went all the way to be a vote--46 of those on judges and the executive branch from 1967 to 2012.

Last year, there were 46 cloture votes in this body, just in 1 year. What was from 1967 until 2012 the total number, Democrats did to Republicans in 1 year--last year.

The statement keeps coming up over and over again: Why can't we get on legislation? Because each day is full of dead time, debating nominations--nominations like what passed today unanimously in the Senate. But we had to have cloture time set aside for it.

This has to be fixed. The rules of the Senate are set by the Senators. In 2013, the Senators stood up and said ``This has to stop,'' and they fixed it. I am recommending again that the Senate, once again, implement the same rule that Democrats led Republicans to do in 2013 now, in this year, and instead of doing it for one Congress, make it the rule. If it was a good idea for Democrats in 2013 and 2014, why is it not a good idea for Republicans and Democrats now?

That simple rule is, when we can't agree on a candidate, we would have only 2 hours of debate on a district judge--remembering that for the entirety of this week, it took the whole week to do four of them. We could do 2 hours of debate for each one if it is a district court judge, 8 hours for just about everybody else, or 30 hours of debate for Supreme Court, circuit court, and Cabinet-level nominations.

People would think that would be a slam dunk. So far it has not been. For some reason, my Democratic colleagues say: That rule was good for us, but it is not good for you, and it is not good for the future of the Senate. I believe it is. I believe it was a fair rule then, and it is a fair rule now. Enough debating about the rules of the Senate; let's get on to the business of the Senate and actually do what the American people sent us here to do.

Interestingly enough, there is also a very obscure rule in the Senate called rule XXXI. If, at the end of the year, there are still nominations that are pending out there, those nominations have to be returned to the White House, and they have to start all over again. The Senate can agree by unanimous consent to say that we all understand these are all in process and, by unanimous consent, just agree to those things to be able to hold them on the calendar.

Let me give an example. Under President Bill Clinton, at the end of his first year, only 13 of his nominations were sent back to the White House. After the end of George W. Bush's first term, only two nominations were returned back to the White House. After President Obama's first term, only eight were sent back to the White House. After President Trump's first term, 90 were sent back--Bill Clinton, 13; George Bush, 2; President Obama, 8; President Trump, 90.

I don't think my Democratic colleagues understand that they are continuing to amp up the volume of obstruction, saying: Someone has obstructed us in the past, so we are going to do it 10 times to you. All that leads to is that the next time the Republicans are in the minority, we do it 10 times again, and it makes it worse.

There is a way to fix this. We should come to that mutual agreement. We should resolve the rules of the Senate.

We have to get on to the budget. We have to get on to the Children's Health Insurance Program. We have to get on to intelligence issues. We have to get on to immigration. We have to get on to infrastructure. We have to get on to a lot of other things, but we are stuck debating about people, and that should be an easy one for us.

I am recommending to this body what my folks used to say to me: What is good for the goose should be good for the gander. If it was a great rule when Democrats were in the majority, it should be a great rule when Republicans are in the majority.

Let's take clean, fair rules and apply them to everyone. Let's move on with the nomination process. Let's get back to the business of doing legislation so we can get this resolved.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, it is an interesting conversation we can finally have about immigration. This has been that topic which has been discussed for a while but not settled.

For 20 years, this body has talked about solving some of our immigration issues. National security immigration hasn't been a partisan issue until of late. Suddenly, when President Trump brings it up, we have a bunch of folks who used to be for border security but are now against border security because President Trump wants border security--with some of the exact same ideas that have been in the Gang of 8 bill or were in previous versions or were even talked about with a secure wall or fence before. Almost every Democrat in this body voted for the Secure Fence Act of 2006.

It is interesting to me the number of people who contact us saying: We do not want to build a wall. I have said: What about the 650 miles of wall that already exists and was put in place after 2006, which, by the way, President Obama, when he was Senator Obama, wholeheartedly supported and voted for?

This is suddenly a partisan issue. I am trying to help our entire body take a step back and say: Immigration should be a humanity issue and a legal issue, not a political issue.

I had a conversation with a friend of mine this weekend. We have known each other for years. He is a pastor. We started talking about the immigration issue. In that dialogue, he said to me: In the church, we look at every individual as an individual created in the image of God, and the church has a ministry to be able to reach out, regardless of legal status.

Then he said, right behind it: But, in government, we understand there is a different responsibility. The church engages with every person equally, but the government has the responsibility of looking at laws--what is legal and what is not legal--and helping abide by those laws and enforcing those laws.

He is correct. There is an issue of humanity in this. These are people caught in a system, and oftentimes those children in the DACA Program are caught in a gap in which literally they have no home country. They were brought as infants or as young children with a parent who violated the law but did so with a child who came in and has now lived in the country, in some cases 20 years, and they know only this country. They are literally caught in the middle. While we have great compassion, we are walking this interesting balance between compassion for people, which we as a nation have, and also consistency with the law. The law applies to every person. Whether you are the President of the United States or an undocumented individual who has come in, the law applies to everyone.

What do we do with this? The first thing I think we need to do is take a deep breath and pull the politics out of this and to say border security--in fact, security as a whole is not a controversial issue. I will tell you, as a U.S. Senator, I have the privilege occasionally of going to do interviews. Let me give you an example. CNN has a great studio in Washington, DC. When you go to the studio in Washington, DC, you go through the front door of a big building. There is a security person there, and they will check your ID before you go any farther. Not only will they check your ID, they make sure you are already preregistered to be there to visit with CNN because you can't just walk in. You have to notify them ahead of time you are coming, even if you are the person being interviewed. Then, there is a physical barrier between you and the elevators. Once the security guard clears you, you go through the physical barriers, but you can't go up the elevator because the security guard has to clear you to actually go up that elevator and punch in a certain code to go up to the floor. When you arrive at that floor, you are literally in nowhere land because everywhere around you are locked doors until someone comes in and clears you. You go to another security guard, and you sign in with that security guard, again check ID, and then you have an escort who takes you into the studio. That escort stays with you because as soon as your interview is done, they will smile at you and say: Your time is up. We are going to escort you out.

It is a shame CNN has to do that, but they do because not everybody who walks through their doors means to do them no harm. There are some people who mean to do them harm, and it is right for them to keep that level of security.

For that level of security that we talked about for CNN, all of us see that as rational--unfortunate but rational. I would say to us as a nation, why is that rational at CNN headquarters, and it is irrational for us to be able to do the same thing with our own borders? Not everyone who crosses our border is there to help us. We can all admit, there are some individuals--a few thankfully--who do mean to cross our borders and do us harm. We should be aware of that. We have half a million people a day who legally cross our border, our southern border, alone--half a million people a day who cross back and forth, who legally go through the system. They are doing commerce. They are visiting family. There are all

kinds of individuals who move back and forth through our gates legally every single day. We should ask the question: Why are half a million people moving through legally but yet there are thousands and thousands who are moving through illegally? What is the difference, and should we ask questions of some of those people? Should there be a physical barrier in some spots?

We have seen some places like in Yuma, AZ, when there wasn't a physical barrier and there is a large city right on the border and someone would cross the border quickly, commit a crime, and move right back across the border. When a physical barrier was put in place a decade ago in Yuma, AZ, the crime rate dropped dramatically in that area. The physical barrier helped and did reduce crime.

I have had people say, if you build a 30-foot wall, there will be a 31-foot ladder leaning against it. That is true, but it slows them down and gives enough time in remote areas or in heavily urbanized areas for people to be able to respond and be able to interdict those individuals. Walls don't stop people. They slow people down so you can actually do interdiction and ask: Why are you going over the wall rather than through the gates like half a million other people are doing today?

Why is that happening? That is not unreasonable, but it has become heavily politicized. We need to step back and remove this from a conversation about Presidents and about political parties and move it back to some basic, commonsense things--things this Congress used to do with wide, bipartisan support--things like a physical barrier. There should be a wall in certain areas of the southern border that don't have a wall right now. There should be areas of technology in other areas. There should be an area to have watch towers with cameras that are there. We should add some additional personnel. We are talking about 3,000-plus miles on our northern border, 2,000 miles on our southern border. That is a lot of territory to be able to cover. Some of those areas don't even have broadband access to it, so just getting information to the agents who work there takes a very long time or is unreliable. We do need to have some technology improvements in some of those areas. Should every part of our border have a wall? No, I don't think so. It shouldn't all have a wall, but in heavily populated areas, it probably should because that provides greater security, quite frankly, on both sides of the border.

Some of it is even more simple than that. There are areas where there are large amounts of cane that is growing up in the Rio Grande River, and the Border Patrol agents can't see on both sides of the river who is moving through because people can hide in the cane. Just eradicating the cane that is all through that area on the border, in the river area, would provide tremendous visibility. That would allow people to be able to see farther and, quite frankly, stop some of the drug movement and allow for more interdiction in those areas. It shouldn't be that controversial. That should be common sense--adding technology, adding sensors, adding greater visibility, adding a wall in areas where a wall is needed, and in other areas that don't need a wall, we don't.

That is not just the issue. Some of the issue is fixing loopholes in the law that get exploited. There are some individuals who cross the border, and they know the rules. The coyotes in Central America who are actually humans smuggling them all the way through Mexico and getting them to the border have told them exactly what to say. When they encounter a Border Patrol agent, they say: Say these words, and you will get access to asylum, whether they are true or not.

The way it typically starts is, they say those words the coyotes have told them to say, and they actually get a quick hearing and what is called a notice to appear for another hearing, which is usually 2 or 2\1/2\ years later. They disappear somewhere into the American system, and we have no idea where they are. They are somewhere among 300-plus million Americans in some town, and we don't know where they are. The vast majority of them never show up for the court hearings, but they have a piece of paper that says ``notice to appear,'' which also means they are given legal protections until that court date, and they can move around the country.

That is a loophole in our system. It should be fixed. Nowhere else would they do that. Why do we do that? We allow ourselves to be exploited. There are some words and phrases that we need to be able to clean up in the law and some things that need to be done. Again, that shouldn't be controversial. It should be security related. There should be some basic questions about how we are going to handle immigration.

We allow 1 million people a year to become citizens of the United States legally--1 million people a year. Yet the American system is also ignoring hundreds of thousands of others who are coming into the system illegally and pretending it is not happening. It is. For 20 years, this Congress has not paid attention to it.

Say what you would like to about President Trump, but he is pushing this Congress to do something it has not done in two decades--deal with the issue of border security. This body will have to come to agreement on that. The House of Representatives will have to come to agreement on that, and the President will have to be able to sign it or it will be just another Executive action that will not last very long. If we are going to have lasting, real change in border security, it has to go through the legislative process.

The President is pushing us to get that done before the first week of March. We had 6 months of time. Four months of that has already run out. It is time to get that document finished, to deal with the basic things the President has asked for--border security, a legal status for those individuals who are in the DACA Program whom the previous President just put into deferred action status--that we will not arrest them, but they are in some sort of legal limbo in between. President Trump wants to have a permanent answer for all of those families. Dealing with things on border security, not just the wall but the other exceptions to it. The President wants to deal with the visa lottery, which is a system where the names of 50,000 people somewhere in the world are just randomly drawn out of a hat to be able to become American citizens.

Many of us said for a long time, that is a foolish way to do your immigration system. Our immigration system should be based on what we need in America--what jobs, what locations--rather than randomly pulling names of people around the world out of a hat. I understand there are millions and millions of people around the world who would love to be Americans, but in America, we want to be able to target those individuals who want to not just be Americans but want to be a part of us, not just culturally but economically, to be part of the fabric of whom we are, to make decisions for ourselves as a nation, and to do it not just in our own policy but also our own immigration policy. It is not too much to ask.

There are basic things that should be done. Dealing with the DACA students who are literally caught in a place where they have no home is a compassionate thing to do, but along with our compassion, we also need to uphold the law. Those kids should not be held to account for what their parents did, but their parents should not have the same access to the American system of being naturalized as the kids do--only because the parents did intentionally violate the law. They chose to break the law and bring their child with them when they did it. The child didn't make that decision. Now they are growing up in a place where they have no country. They should have a shot at being in our Nation. I do not believe the parents of those kids--who broke the law-- should have that same access to our system. That may seem heartless, but I will tell you, that is the balance we have to have between compassion for people and upholding the law; that the law does apply to all people. Maybe there is a way to do some other work permits or some other things that could be there, but access to citizenship should be reserved for those individuals who are upholding the law, not violating it.

There are some DACA kids who have done some remarkable stuff, some DACA kids who are pretty amazing individuals. I ask folks in Oklahoma when I am home, if I could identify for you 700,000 people somewhere around the world who speak English, who are excellent students, who have stood up

every day in their school and pledged allegiance to the United States of America, who are in our military already, who are already working in our economy right now, are those the individuals you want to reach out to and be part of that 1 million people a year who become citizens? I have yet to have someone tell me: No, that is not whom we are looking for. Everyone says: That is exactly whom we are looking for.

I get to smile at them and say: They are already here. They just happen to have grown up in this country already, but they have no home and would love to call this one their home.

I would like to give them the opportunity to earn the ability to be naturalized--not automatic, to earn it--and go through the process, to get in line like every other person around the world, to get in line but not have to return to their home country because they don't know a home country, but get in line here to do it.

There is a way to be able to do this. The President has been the first advocate for that. There is a way to be able to actually answer the problems we have dealt with for 20 years on border security so we don't continue to have another DACA Program in 5 years, in 10 years, and over and over again as we are right now. Let's solve it.

Interestingly enough, in 2012, when President Obama announced the DACA Program, he made some pretty blunt, clear statements during that time period. One of them was, for individuals--this was in June of 2012--who are already here, he set a date. He said: For those individuals, our Nation wants to provide an opportunity to not be arrested, and we will work on your status, but for any future individuals who cross our border, you will not have access to this program.

That is President Obama who made that statement in 2012. While I have heard individuals say we should abide by the words of our Presidents, when President Obama made those statements to those kids in 2012, I would remind us as a nation, we should honor all of those statements, if we do any of those statements, including President Obama's statements saying that this will end, and people who are crossing our border will be returned to their home country.

As he announced publicly, there is a right way to be able to do immigration. Let's do it the right way. We already receive 1 million a year. Let's do it the right way, and you will find a very welcoming United States of America.

That is where I think we can go, and I hope in the days ahead we can finish out a negotiation and be able to resolve some basic things--not everything in immigration but at least the core issues of immigration and border security so we can resolve the issue not only for the kids in DACA but continue to be able to work on how we are securing our Nation for the future.

With that, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, maybe my colleagues have heard through public and private conversations over the past year that I believe the Senate is moving gridlock from here on Capitol Hill to all across the city and across the Nation. The reason for that is how we do nominations and the length of time on nominations. It is time for the Senate to fix the Senate's rules.

Here is how it works. As this body knows extremely well, we have over 1,000 nominees who come from the President. In the first year of a new Presidency, a vast amount of time is spent in getting those 1,000 people through the nomination process. Each one of those is selected by the White House. They do their own vetting, and then they send them over to the Senate.

The Senate has the constitutional responsibility for advice and consent. When they come through the Senate, they will go through background checks, evaluations, and conversations with staff on both sides of the aisle.

They then come to the committee, go through a committee process and a hearing, they are voted on in that time period, and then they move to the floor.

When they move to the floor for debate, typically, for most of the years of the Senate, they have already gone through the committee process. Every Member of the Senate has the opportunity to be able to take a look at their information. And then they move through with a simple-majority vote. That is the way nominations have moved for most of the history of the Senate.

A few years ago--20 or so--some individual Senators started asking for cloture votes. Those cloture votes started to slow down the process on about 3 or 4 nominations a year; then it became 9 or so nominations a year; then it moved to as crazy of a number as 13 or so a year, of the 1,000 or so moving through.

That became such a nuisance that in 2013, my Democratic colleagues called for something they called the nuclear option, to say we will just take nominations not from 60 required to be able to get to cloture but just to 51. There was debate and internal conversation about that because Republicans, quite frankly, were holding up 15 or so nominations a year with the cloture process. So there was a big debate about that.

In the beginning of President Obama's second term, Republicans and Democrats came together and they changed the rules of the Senate for 2 years and said: OK, truce. The simple rule of the Senate was for any cloture vote, if there was one called for--again, typically, you would never call for one, but if there was one called for, there would be 2 hours of debate for a district court judge, 8 hours of debate for most nominees, and 30 hours of debate for Supreme Court, circuit court, or a Cabinet-level appointment. But even Harry Reid, when he stood on the floor, said this would be only--his words--``extraordinary circumstances'' if you should ask for a cloture vote at all. But if they were asked for, it would be 2 hours, 8 hours, or 30 hours. Prior to that, all nominations were 30 hours of debate, literally taking up an entire day to move one person, knowing that you have to move 1,000.

A few months after that, still in 2013, Democrats still frustrated that Republicans were calling for some cloture votes still, moved to have the nuclear option entirely and just transition all nominations, except for the Supreme Court, to just 51 votes. So now they had the rule of expediting 2 hours, 8 hours, and 30 hours, and the new ability to move them all with just 51 votes.

Quite frankly, if you are going to change the rule to 51 votes, you probably need to change the cloture rule as well. They just did it in reverse. They changed the rule for how many hours it would take and then later changed the rule for how many people it takes to go through the process.

Now what has happened? Remember I argued that we had 13, 14, 15 people held up in cloture in a year? This year, so far, there have been 64 nominations held up in cloture votes. That is 64 days in the Senate we could do nothing else but sit here waiting. Now, it wasn't for debate. It may sound as if it is being held for 30 hours of debate for that time period. Debate normally didn't happen. Most of the time, this Chamber was empty. It was just that 30 hours was demanded to shut down the body as a whole, 64 of those in this year.

What has it brought us? It has brought us more animosity, more division, and more frustration. My Democratic colleagues a few years ago were screaming that we should have the nuclear option because Republicans were so irrational with 15 cloture votes. Yet we have watched 64 occur this year.

Earlier this week, I sat down with the Rules Committee and brought a very simple option to everyone, Democrats and Republicans alike, and we had a great turnout to be able to just talk through the process. My simple presentation was, let's take the rule that was agreed to in 2013, that Harry Reid and the Democrats brought at the beginning of the second term of President Obama, and let's have the rule for each nomination be 2 hours, 8 hours, and 30 hours. Let's move back to the tradition that Harry Reid had, which is to say let's make cloture votes only extraordinary on a nomination, if needed at all, but if they are, 2 hours, 8 hours, or 30 hours. To do the exact same thing now is what was agreed on in 2013 and 2014.

By the way, Republicans joined with Democrats during that time period and passed that new rule, which would put us at disadvantage with 78 votes.

I don't think it is too much to ask to say that if we are going to get the Senate back to work again, then let's actually get back to work again. Let's put us in a process that actually gets there.

What happens in the meantime when that does not occur? I will tell you what happens. In the meantime, we have agencies all over this town that can't answer a question because the bureaucrats are waiting on a Senate-confirmed individual to be able to lead that agency--to be the Secretary, Under Secretary, Deputy Secretary, whatever the task may be, the counsel for that particular agency--so they sit and wait. So our constituents who are trying to get a permit in certain places or trying to get an answer or trying to get disaster relief--all they can say in the office is, we can't do that until we get a Senate-confirmed position in place. But we can't get Senate-confirmed positions in place until my Democratic colleagues will actually allow individuals to actually come up and be debated.

What else happens? The other thing that happens is, we can't do legislation in this body; we can only do nominations. With 1,000 different positions that are open, typically they move through rather quickly and they move through the process. But when 64 days are held up just for that, during that time period, you can't do anything else but sit and go through what is called the cloture 30 hours. You can't bring up other legislation.

Then what happens? Well, then my Democratic colleagues come to the floor and say: We haven't had a single debate in this body on CHIP. We haven't had a debate on infrastructure. We haven't had debate on any of these things. Why won't we move a bill on all of these things?

At the same time, they know it is because they blocked the floor from being able to move legislation because of continual cloture votes over and over and over. It is a bizarre game that doesn't lead to solutions; it leads to greater animosity. It is the same frustration that has existed for a while; it is just getting louder.

At some point, we have to put in a process and say: How do we get out of this? How do we fix this? I think the best way to fix this is to take a bipartisan solution that was agreed to before when Democrats were in the lead, to agree to it now and say that is going to be the permanent rule, just to be able to move a set of ideas.

For what is historically called the greatest deliberative body in the world, wouldn't it be nice to actually get back to deliberating again, spending more time on legislation rather than more time arguing about why aren't debating it when everyone secretly knows the reason, which is because we can't get it to the floor?

I do grow tired. I grow tired of hearing all the political statements and accusations.

Republicans hate children.

They want to throw them out.

They don't want them to have health care.

They hate people of color.

They are trying to exclude people from voting.

They are trying to keep people from having tax reform.

They only care about the wealthy.

Just over and over, when at the same time, the undercurrent is out there to keep anything from being discussed on the floor. It is an interesting strategy to paint your ``enemy,'' but it doesn't help the country--intentionally divisive without a solution.

In 2001, the first year of a new President, there were 51 nominations pending that first year.

There is an interesting thing in the Senate rules. It is the wonderful rule XXXI that no one has heard of. It states that at the end of a year, any nominations that are still out there can be automatically thrown back to the White House and they have to start all over again. They have to renominate them. They have to go through the whole process. They have to go through committees.

At the end of the first year of President Bush, there were 51 nominations still sitting there at the end of that year. On 49 of them, this body, by unanimous consent, said: No, we will just hold them over. We are fine. We don't have to send them all back to the President.

In 2009, in President Obama's first term, there were 72 folks. For 64 of those, this body--every Republican and Democrat--agreed to just leave them here and not make them go through the whole process again, which would have been absurd.

As of now, we have 122 pending at the end of President Trump's first year. I am interested to know, when Republicans gave Democrats unanimous consent to be able to maintain their nominations in the past, what happens now. Will this be yet another sign of pure politics rather than actually helping the country get stuff done?

I look forward to the day when we can work toward solutions, not just argue and banter back and forth with political statements. If we are going to get stuff solved, let's not pretend and play games and put each other down; let's actually sit down in a room and get stuff solved. Let's fix the rules of the Senate, whether they be the budget rules that keep us from actually having real budget debates or the rules of the Senate that keep us from actually working rather than allowing us to actually do work.

The rules of the Senate and the process in the Senate are determined by the Senators, so we alone are to blame when the Senate is not working. There is no finger-pointing. There is no ``it is that party.'' There is no ``it is that person.'' It is all of us.

So my recommendation is simple. Let's fix it. Let's resolve the issue. Let's do the right thing in the right way.

With that, I yield the floor.