Floor Statements

Madam President, I understand there are two bills at the desk due for a second reading en bloc.

In order to place the bills on the calendar under the provisions of rule XIV, I object to further proceedings en bloc.

Madam President, I wish to first address the vote we held yesterday--one that unfortunately failed but I believe was important nonetheless. It would have set in motion a series of spending reductions--not on bills where we had appropriated money for programs and we knew where it was going to be used, but these were essentially surplus funds which were not being used for the intended purpose and which I believe should have been used to reduce our annual deficits and ultimately our national debt.

I want to express my gratitude to Senator Lee, the Senator from Utah, who spearheaded the effort to take up a bill that the House had already passed.

What we were attempting to do was rescind nearly $15 billion in previously appropriated money that has gone unspent, as I said a moment ago. This was just one small way to show the American people that we are serious--as the majority leader put it yesterday--about tightening our belts financially and taking small steps that hopefully would add up to big steps to live within our collective means.

I voted for the rescissions package because I believe strongly that the government should prioritize keeping its fiscal house in order, one that constantly works to improve and implement fiscal discipline.

I am concerned now that as interest rates are starting to rise, we are going to see more and more Federal spending go to pay debt service or interest payments on bonds that have been issued to secure our national debt.

So I hope we can come back to the table soon with new ideas, and I am disappointed in the outcome of that particular vote.

Keep Families Together and Enforce the Law Act

Madam President, I have also been speaking this week about the ongoing situation at the U.S.-Mexico border. Of course, this is my backyard. I come from Texas, and Texas has a 1,200-mile common border with Mexico. We know, because we have all seen in the news and been moved by these scenes of people illegally crossing the border with children or individuals they claim to be their children and being separated as they have been processed, consistent with current law, including laws Congress had passed, signed by the President--not necessarily this President, in fact--consent decrees, and other court judgments that necessitated that children be treated differently than people who illegally enter the country as adults.

I will be traveling to the Rio Grande Valley tomorrow. Senator Cruz and I both will be in Brownsville and McAllen so we can learn from the people who are working on behalf of all of us to make sure everybody is treated with dignity and compassion. But we also enforce our laws against illegal immigration.

President Trump yesterday issued an Executive order, which I viewed as an emergency measure, that does not substitute for congressional action. In fact, I am confident that the Executive order will be the target of lawsuits. I think the only thing that could really settle the matter once and for all is legislation, which I know the Presiding Officer and I and others have cosponsored, to keep families together and to maintain enforcement of our laws.

Executive orders, of course, as I said, are always subject to legal challenge, and I think we ought to view this as more of a belt-and- suspenders. The President decided he wanted to do what he could on a temporary basis, but it is just a temporary basis, and we need to make sure, as I said, that this is finally settled so that no parent will be separated from their child even if they enter the country illegally. They will be treated both humanely and with compassion while they are presented to a judge who will make a decision on whether they qualify for a legal immigration benefit like asylum, for example.

The legislation I am referring to is led by the junior Senator from North Carolina and is called the Keep Families Together and Enforce the Law Act. As the title of the bill suggests, there are two parts: treating families with compassion while allowing them to remain together and enforcing the laws on the books. They don't have to be mutually exclusive, and our bill would ensure that they are not. It will allow children to stay with their families in a safe facility while they await their court proceedings.

It will also set mandatory standards of care for family residential centers where immigrant families are placed and keep children safe by requiring that they are removed from the care of any individual who poses a danger to them. Just as importantly, it will require more than 200 new immigration judges and require the Department of Homeland Security to expedite the court proceedings for these children and families.

Some have rightfully asked questions about the families who have already been separated: What happens now to the children who have already been separated from their parents?

I can tell you our bill requires the administration to take steps to reunify as many families as possible who remain in the custody of Immigration Customs Enforcement or Health and Human Services.

I have to tell you, this is an old movie in many respects. We have seen this movie before, particularly in 2014, when we saw a flood of unaccompanied children coming across the southwestern border. President Obama, at the time, called it a humanitarian crisis, and I agree. We simply weren't prepared for this flood of children from Central America coming to our border and seeking refuge or asylum. We worked hard to try to make sure they were treated compassionately and humanely, but the law, similar to the law in effect now before the President's Executive order and the law that would be modified by the new bill I mentioned a moment ago--the current law requires those children to be processed by the Border Patrol, to then be handed over to Health and Human Services, and ultimately placed with a sponsor in the United States pending their hearing on their immigration case. Because of the huge backlog of cases, it could be literally months or years before those cases are heard.

It shouldn't surprise anybody that the overwhelming majority of individuals don't show up for their court hearing. That is why it is important for us to move these cases to the head of the line, to maintain a humane detention while they are awaiting their court hearing--hopefully, in a matter of days or weeks, at most.

This is a huge problem that frankly was exposed, in part, by the New York Times. It recently reported that based on the tens of thousands of children who came across the border as unaccompanied minors who had been placed with sponsors, in a check of where those children are now, at least 1,500 of them are unaccounted for.

That should surprise no one because the sponsors were not required to be citizens. They weren't required to be relatives. They weren't even required to have a criminal background check. When the U.S. Government places these children with sponsors in the United States with such inadequate supervision and review, it should not surprise anyone that, unfortunately, some of them will be unaccounted for; hopefully not recruited into gangs, hopefully not trafficked for sex, hopefully still alive. This is a huge humanitarian crisis, and the latest episode having to do with separation of families is just the latest version of that story.

Who benefits from status quo when we fail to correct our laws to make sure that both individuals coming across the border are treated humanely and that we enforce our immigration laws? Who benefits the most? It is the transnational criminal organizations, the cartels, which make money off the status quo. As one person called it the other day, when they were referring to the situation, these organizations are commodity agnostic. As long as they can make money, they will traffic in people, drugs, weapons, and other contraband. They don't really care as long as they make money.

Until Congress acts, as we must, these cartels, these criminal organizations, will continue to exploit these gaps in American law, and the people who will be hurt the most are these children and immigrants who do have a case to make before the immigration courts.

I hope we will act. Frankly, our track record is not good when it comes to fixing our broken immigration system, but I know Mrs. Feinstein, the Senator from California, and Senator Tillis have been talking, and a lot of us have been putting our heads together to figure out how we can come up with a narrow bill that will keep families together and allow us to enforce the laws of the land. I hope we keep trying until we get it done and get it done right.

Other proposals have been made, including one by our friend the senior Senator from California. She and I have worked together on many issues, but on this one, I think her bill has a lot of problems. In fact, there is a huge question about what sort of enforcement, if any, would ever be permitted under her bill. In effect, her bill would make it impossible to enforce the law against an adult illegally crossing the border unless the child is able to go to jail with that adult. I don't want a child to have to go to jail and be exposed to hard and potentially violent criminals. This is a big problem with our friend's bill, Senator Feinstein.

By the way, every single Democrat on that side of the aisle has signed on to that bill. Did they intend this result? No, I don't think they intended it, but it is a big problem with their bill. Children should not go to a jail run by the Bureau of Prisons. No one, I would think, would think that is a good idea. So that is essentially what the bill results in.

Again, I am not saying this was their intention, but the result is to reinstate this catch-and-release program, which has been a failure of our immigration system for a long time. When there is nowhere for the families to be detained and when they can't go to Department of Justice facilities, basically, the authorities simply have to let them go and say: Come on back in a few months, maybe a couple of years, when your case comes up on the immigration court docket.

That is the result. As I said earlier, in the vast majority of cases, people do not reappear because they understand, if they made it that far, they are basically off scot-free. The cartels and the transnational criminal organizations that traffic in people and facilitate this sort of illegal immigration are the ones cashing in on these vulnerabilities and on these gaps in American law. We need to fix it.

Let me correct one other misconception from all of the emotional news we have seen recently. Sometimes the facts get lost. If an immigrant family crosses the border outside of a designated port of entry, they have broken the law, unless they are authorized. If you release these individuals without any consequences, you send a clear message that it is acceptable to cross our borders illegally. Once you have sent the message to the criminal organizations--to people in Central America and elsewhere--that it is OK to break the law and you will be released without any consequence, it should come as no surprise that a huge percentage of illegal immigrants fail to show up at immigration court hearings and that it is a magnet attracting more illegal immigration if there are no consequences associated with it.

With all due respect to my friend, the senior Senator from California, her bill has these unintended effects, and I think simply will not do. I want to be clear, we want to work together to try to address what she wants to accomplish and what we want to accomplish. Let's keep families together, but let's not inadvertently or unintentionally reinstate the broken catch-and-release policies, which simply serve as a magnet for more illegal immigration.

Some commentators have pointed out the problem I have identified. It is not just me. They have said Senator Feinstein's bill would present law enforcement with a terrible choice of either keeping children with parents or criminals in the middle of being prosecuted or not prosecuting those violations of the law at all. That is not really a choice. We know what the decision would be. Those cases would not be prosecuted. There would not be enforcement. Then, again, the

transnational criminal organizations, the people who try to take advantage of our laws, will have won.

With these and other shortcomings, I think the much better option would be the bill introduced by Senator Tillis, which I, the Presiding Officer, and others have cosponsored. It would achieve two important goals: continued enforcement of our immigration laws and the unification of families. Some of our friends on the left seem to want one but not the other. They want to unify families, but they don't want to enforce our immigration laws. They say they want to see zero tolerance ended--zero tolerance for violating immigration laws, and, of course, they cast a lot of aspersions on the President and the Attorney General for implementing this policy, along with the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.

Let's think about their criticism for a second. What does that really mean? If you aren't happy with zero tolerance of violating our immigration laws, that means you are happy with tolerating exemptions for lawbreakers. You tolerate not enforcing immigration laws under some, perhaps many, circumstances. We can all see where that leads us. It encourages illegal immigration by sending a message by saying we will not enforce our laws. We should not stand for that and neither should the American people. It would be a big mistake.

Tomorrow Senator Cruz, my colleague from Texas, and I will be traveling to Brownsville and Weslaco, once again, so we can get eyes on the situation there and learn from the people who are charged with making sure our policies are carried out.

As I mentioned, Texas has 1,200 miles of common border with Mexico, and we are ground zero when it comes to the border security challenge. I look forward to talking with our Federal and local officials about the situation, along with faith-based organizations and other groups who are trying to help out. We need their help and welcome their help.

Ultimately, I urge colleagues on both sides of the aisle to continue talking urgently and to support the bill Senator Tillis and others have introduced. We can come together, we can fix this problem swiftly, and ensure these children are kept together with their families.

I yield the floor.

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Tennessee (Mr. Corker) and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Tennessee (Mr. Corker) and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

Mr. President, I have 2 requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority leaders.

Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate:

Committee on Foreign Relations

The Committee on Foreign Relations is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Thursday, June 21, 2018, at 2 p.m., to conduct a hearing on the following nominations: Gordon D. Sondland, of Washington, to be Representative of the United States of America to the European Union, with the rank and status of Ambassador, Ronald Gidwitz, of Illinois, to be Ambassador to the Kingdom of Belgium, Cherith Norman Chalet, of New Jersey, to be Representative of the United States of America to the United Nations for U.N. Management and Reform, with the rank of Ambassador, and to be an Alternate Representative of the United States of America to the Sessions of the General Assembly of the United Nations, during her tenure of service as Representative of the United States of America to the United Nations for U.N. Management and Reform, and Brian A. Nichols, of Rhode Island, to be Ambassador to the Republic of Zimbabwe, all of the Department of State.

Committee on the Judiciary

The Committee on the Judiciary is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Thursday, June 21, 2018, at 10 a.m., to conduct a business meeting and hearing on the following nominations: Britt Cagle Grant, of Georgia, to be United States Circuit Judge for the Eleventh Circuit, David James Porter, of Pennsylvania, to be United States Circuit Judge for the Third Circuit, Holly A. Brady, to be United States District Judge for the Northern District of Indiana, Andrew Lynn Brasher, to be United States District Judge for the Middle District of Alabama, James Patrick Hanlon, to be United States District Judge for the Southern District of Indiana, David Steven Morales, to be United States District Judge for the Southern District of Texas, Lance E. Walker, to be United States District Judge for the District of Maine, Edward W. Felten, of New Jersey, and Jane Nitze, of the District of Columbia, both to be a Member of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, and John D. Jordan, to be United States Marshal for the Eastern District of Missouri, Department of Justice.

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

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

Mr. President, we have been focused on the U.S.-Mexico border, where the prospect of children being separated from their family has shocked and horrified many of us. We have been working to come up with a solution to this problem. That includes President Trump, who yesterday called

on Congress to preserve family unity, while calling for a zero tolerance policy when it comes to violating our immigration laws.

I would like to provide a little bit of context for how we got here and offer a proposed solution. Just like under the Obama administration in 2014, when we saw tens of thousands of unaccompanied children coming across the border into my State of Texas from Central America through Mexico--I remember at the time President Obama called that a humanitarian crisis, and, indeed, it was--trying to find a way to deal with this flood of humanity coming across our border in a safe and humane manner was a huge challenge for the Federal Government, for local communities, like McAllen, TX, and for various faith-based and other organizations. But come they did.

Between August 1 of last year and May 31 of this year, the number of families apprehended at the southwest border rose 58 percent, compared with the same period a year earlier. Of course, just like the humanitarian crisis of 2014, most of these individuals came from Central America. I think it is important to point out that even though these are not unaccompanied minors in the same number that we saw in 2014, we are still seeing so far this year roughly 30,000 children coming across our southwestern border from across dangerous territory in Mexico and from Central America, transported by human traffickers and the cartels, for whom this is their business model. Let me explain for a minute.

Recently, an expert on this topic made the point that these criminal organizations that run children, families, and other adults across the border are ``commodity agnostic.'' That is what he said. In other words, they don't care whether it is drugs, contraband, children, or adults. Whatever it is, they are in it for the money, and they have found an incredibly profitable business model in transporting all of those commodities, if you can call them that, from Central America and across the Mexican border.

For those who are worried about the opioid crisis here in America, which we all are, it is not just about prescription drugs--that is a huge part of the problem--but it is also the heroin that is frequently substituted for the prescription drugs because it is cheap and it is more plentiful. So all of these are good reasons, in my mind, for us to be very focused on what happens at our border.

My State happens to have 1,200 miles of common border with Mexico, and we are at ground zero when it comes to the border security challenges and when it comes to the humanitarian crises and to the law enforcement challenges that go along with it.

This Friday, Senator Cruz, my colleague from Texas, and I will be traveling to Brownsville and McAllen, TX, to once again get an idea of what the facts are on the ground. We have been there many times before, of course, and have worked hand in glove with our local and State officials, with our faith-based organizations and with everybody who is concerned about what is happening at the border, including the Border Patrol, the Texas National Guard, and the like.

I want to make one point when it comes to those who enter our country in order to claim asylum, as many of these people do from Central America. They claim a fear of persecution as the basis for a claim for asylum, but those who present themselves lawfully at ports of entry-- those are the bridges that enter into the United States--can do so and claim asylum without violating any immigration laws. As Secretary Nielsen, the Department of Homeland Security Secretary, said, it is only those who try to enter the country in those vast areas between the ports of entry, which is exceedingly dangerous, by the way, who violate our immigration laws when they enter the United States illegally. When they come with a child, whether it is their biological child or somebody they claim is their child--maybe the cartels have figured out that if they pair these people up, they have found another way to exploit vulnerabilities in the system--it presents the challenges that we have seen here in the last few days.

I want to emphasize that we have seen the arrival of families and children before. So none of this is new, but we do need to put what is happening now in proper context. As the Secretary of Homeland Security, Ms. Nielsen, has said, if the situation in your home country is dangerous and if you have chosen to seek asylum for your family in the United States, there is no reason for you to enter the United States illegally. We saw this during the previous policy that was since eliminated by the Obama administration of Cuban refugees who, because of a unique policy called ``wet foot, dry foot,'' once they crossed over our ports of entry, they were entitled to seek refuge in the United States under the laws at the time. So none of this is new.

As I said, people with a credible fear of persecution in their home countries may present their claims through a normal, well-defined process. There is no reason for somebody to expose themselves, much less their children, to the dangerous, remote regions--areas I call the wild, wild west--down along the border in order to try to sneak through by illicit means.

But people do sometimes falsely claim a credible fear of persecution. In other words, they don't qualify for asylum. So that is why it is so important for us to give them an opportunity and to insist that they present those claims to an immigration judge on a timely basis so those claims can be properly evaluated.

The Trump administration has made the very commonsensical decision to have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to illegal immigration. They have made the decision to fully enforce our laws by prosecuting adults in criminal courts when they are apprehended crossing our borders illegally. In my opinion, that is exactly the right decision--enforce the laws as written. The relevant laws--the ones that criminalize illegal crossings--have been on the books for a long time. They are a product of congressional action and Presidential approval, like all legislation. These are not something that President Trump created out of whole cloth, as some people would have you believe. But the truth is that often these laws were not enforced by previous administrations and, particularly, when families were involved. Now that they are being enforced, the adults are, unfortunately, under the status quo, separated from families as part of the legal process as it plays itself out. It is not because of any desire to separate families and children, but rather because of previous Federal court decisions, consent decrees, and statutes that Congress has passed that require children to be placed in a separate, safe setting. In other words, we don't want to place children in a jail cell with hardened, potentially violent criminals because the adult that brought them into the country has violated our criminal laws. So putting the children in a safe, separate setting was really motivated by the best of intentions.

The relevant authorities are important to acknowledge because, as the New York Times has stated this last weekend, contrary to what you may have heard, ``technically, there is no Trump administration policy stating that illegal border crossers must be separated from their children.''

What there are, instead, are many variables that are hard to disentangle from one another, and, I think, unfortunately, those who would like to create a false narrative here have taken advantage of the complexity of these laws and the situation in order to claim some sort of sinister intent to tear children away from their parents unnecessarily. That is not the goal. In fact our goal is just the opposite: How do we keep these children with their families, pending the decision by an immigration judge of whether or not they have a viable claim to asylum or some other benefit.

The so-called Flores agreement is one of those laws that are required to be observed which requires that children can be held no longer than 20 days. A Ninth Circuit opinion applies the Flores bill to family units, protracted timelines for asylum claims, limited detention facilities, and a division of responsibility among ICE, or Immigration and Custom Enforcement, Health and Human Services, and other agencies. All of this adds to the complexity of this situation.

Most of these factors are pretty uncontroversial. I think every Member will agree with the Trump administration that we should never place children in prisons or jails with hardened,

potentially violent criminals when their parents are being lawfully prosecuted for entering the country illegally.

We need to see that this is how we got to where we are now. They are entirely reasonable decisions that seemed to make sense at the time-- that children should not be held for any longer than is strictly necessary, that they should never be detained with adults in a jail cell in potentially dangerous circumstances. A lot of that seemed to make sense at the time. By the same token, I and many others certainly don't want family members to be separated from one another as a consequence of officials doing their duty and enforcing the laws they are sworn to uphold.

I know Customs and Border Protection leaders like Manny Padilla, chief of the Rio Grande Valley sector, and David Higgerson, and all of the other men and women who work under them in the Rio Grande Valley, are trying to do their job. They are trying to enforce the law. That is what we have asked them to do. That is their duty. It is a good thing, and I think we should all appreciate their attempt to do so in a very complex environment.

This is where I have some questions for the minority leader Senator Schumer and others. Senator Feinstein, my friend from California whom I have worked with on a number of pieces of legislation, secured the support of all Members of the Democratic side of the aisle on a piece of legislation which does nothing to ensure that the law will be enforced. Sure, it purports to deal with family separation but basically provides a get-out-of-jail-free card to any adult who illegally crosses the border. In fact, they go from a zero tolerance program by President Trump's administration to a zero enforcement program, thus creating an incentive for people to illegally immigrate across the border and making it almost impossible for law enforcement to enforce our immigration laws. That will continue to be a draw on people from different parts of the world who would love to move to the United States.

We can be sympathetic. We can be concerned. We should do everything within our power to help them so they can live in their own country safely, but we know we simply can't have an open border policy so anybody and everybody who wants to move to the United States can do so. That is why we have exceptions like asylum claims that have to be decided by an immigration judge.

Yesterday, Senator Schumer said President Trump alone could fix this situation by signing a Presidential order, but even though the President has stated his decision to do so, I think that is likely not going to be decided finally by the President but rather by the courts when that Executive order is challenged based on the other legal considerations I mentioned a moment ago: the Ninth Circuit decision, a consent decree in the Flores case, and other statutes.

I don't think our friend, the Democratic leader, actually believes President Trump can do this by a flick of a pen, as he said; otherwise, he wouldn't have cosponsored the bill by the Senator from California to address this situation. Why in the world would he propose legislation if he actually sincerely believes the President alone can fix this problem?

The truth is, we in Congress and the President have a shared responsibility and a role to play in addressing this crisis at the border, but the result of the proposal by the Senator from California, embraced and cosponsored by the Democratic leader, is that it makes it impossible to enforce the laws Congress has written when it comes to adults illegally entering the United States when they are accompanied by a child.

We should not be under any illusion that the criminal organizations that facilitate the movement of people from other countries into the United States--they understand these gaps in our laws. That is why they sent tens of thousands of unaccompanied children into the United States in 2014, creating that humanitarian crisis. They know well that because of the gaps in our law that allow adults with children to be treated differently, they are exploiting that for financial gain.

The result of the proposal by the minority leader and our Democratic colleagues means it is impossible to enforce laws that Congress has written. Ending zero tolerance means ignoring the law, and that amounts to ignoring the will of the people who put Members of Congress in office and ending our respect for the rule of law. Ending zero tolerance, as they would seek to do, means tolerating criminal activity. As I mentioned, these are organized criminal organizations-- they are sometimes called transnational criminal organizations--and they will trade in anything that makes them money: People, guns, drugs, any sort of contraband we can imagine. Not applying the law to illegal entry does nothing but fuel them and feed their money machine, which is why they continue to do what they do.

The other concern I have with the legislation proposed by our Democratic colleagues, even though they have said only the President can fix it, is that while legislation from the Senator from California does seek to keep families together--a goal we share--it doesn't specify where those families should be held. That is a big problem because when it comes to the safety of these children, we don't want to leave that open to interpretation or misunderstanding. We want to be sure and clear that these families are kept in separate residential housing facilities, away from hardened and potentially violent criminals, but our Democratic colleagues' bill that every single one of the Democrats in the Senate has signed on to doesn't even address that. As I said, in fact, their bill would likely result in many adults entering the United States illegally getting off scot-free because of the no enforcement zone, basically extending within up to 120 miles from the border. Basically, Federal law enforcement authorities, not just the Border Patrol but the FBI, the U.S. attorneys, and others, would be essentially prohibited from prosecuting anybody for violation of our laws.

Now, all of us sat up and paid close attention when former First Lady Laura Bush and the current First Lady Melania Trump expressed their concerns about family separation and called on us to find a better way to answer the current crisis, and I agree with them. In fact, we have gotten off to a pretty good start.

Led by our colleague from North Carolina, some of our colleagues and I, just a few minutes ago, introduced a bill called the Keep Families Together and Enforce the Law Act. The goals of this legislation are pretty straightforward: keep families together in safe, secure facilities while their cases are waiting to be decided by a court.

We set mandatory standards of care for family residential centers to make sure they are hygienic and safe and the sort of place where we can treat people compassionately.

We also authorize 225 new immigration judges because of the huge backlog that makes it hard to handle all the cases that come across the border. We give these families a chance to move to the head of the line to get their cases decided on an expedited basis so that while they are being detained in these safe, secure, family facilities, their cases can be decided quickly. Also, if they are entitled to an immigration benefit like asylum, they could be afforded that on a reasonable timetable and not left in limbo for any longer than absolutely necessary.

Now, I believe, talking to my friend the senior Senator from California, Mrs. Feinstein, that these are elements of a bill we might be able to agree to, Democrats and Republicans, in order to address the common concerns we have about family separation. Throughout the course of our discussions, though, it has become clear this is something we all believe; that families crossing the border should be kept together. Where we may differ is whether that should also go along with a joint commitment to enforce our immigration laws, but, as I said earlier, this is not an either-or situation. We can keep parents and children together while, at the same time, remaining resolute in enforcing our immigration laws--something I believe we should do.

The Trump administration has said it will not tolerate any violation of those laws and that all offenders will remain on the table for prosecution, but there is no reason for our Democratic colleagues to oppose what I have

laid out. Either we are or we are not a nation of laws, with a government that enforces those laws, or we are a nation with no law and open borders; simply waving through anybody who wants to come into the country at their discretion.

So I would urge all of our colleagues to work together to continue talking about and supporting a bill that represents these shared values. If we come together, we can resolve the situation swiftly and ensure that these children are kept together with their families and, as I said, that they can be expeditiously presented before an immigration judge so they can present any legitimate claim they may have to any immigration benefit. I think that is a commonsense solution to this problem, and I look forward to our colleagues working together to try to solve it.

I yield the floor.

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator Tennessee (Mr. Corker) and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senator are necessarily absent: the Senator from Tennessee (Mr. Corker). and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

Mr. President, yesterday I spoke briefly about the ongoing situation at the U.S.-Mexican border. It continues to be on my mind and on the minds of many others, including the Presiding Officer, who has offered some very constructive suggestions for how to address this situation.

Just as under the Obama administration in 2014, we have seen a surge of unaccompanied children and families coming across our southern border during the spring and summer months. At the time, President Obama called it a humanitarian crisis, and it truly was and is.

Between October 1 of last year and May 31 of this year, the number of families apprehended at the southwest border rose by 58 percent, compared to the same period a year earlier. Many of these individuals hail from Central America. Some have presented themselves lawfully at ports of entry, but others have tried to enter illegally in more remote, unpopulated areas.

Let me explain. I think Secretary Nielsen tried to make this distinction, but I am not sure it quite penetrated. If someone shows up at a port of entry and asks for asylum, they have not violated our immigration laws, and their claim for asylum needs to be considered by the Border Patrol and by the immigration judge to whom their case is assigned.

If someone tries to enter the country between the ports of entry, they have violated a Federal law. Secretary Nielsen made the point that there is no reason for people legitimately claiming asylum to enter the country illegally when they can come through the ports of entry, much as Cubans have in times past during the existence of the so-called wet foot, dry foot policy that was later abrogated by President Obama.

People with a credible fear of persecution in their home countries may present their claims through normal, well-defined processes. There is no reason for somebody to go to the far reaches of the frontier, the border region--the Wild Wild West, as I like to call it--and try to come in by illicit means. There is simply no reason to do that if you have a legitimate claim for asylum.

Nonetheless, many people opt to go that route anyway. For them, the Trump administration has made a decision to enforce our laws on the books by prosecuting adults in criminal court when they are apprehended crossing our borders illegally. Those are laws passed by Congress, signed by the President of the United States, and the Trump administration has made the logical decision that it is their responsibility to enforce laws that are on the books.

The relevant laws--the ones that make it illegal to cross the border in the first place, a misdemeanor, and it often makes subsequent crossings much more serious--have been on the books for many decades, but they were not always enforced by previous administrations when families were involved. Now, because of a number of Federal court decisions, consent decrees, and statutes, an adult must be separated from a child as the legal process plays its way out.

The reason I say that is we don't want children going to jail with an adult who is being processed for illegally entering the United States. Children are, under current practice, placed in a separate, safe setting. They are not left unattended and fending for themselves against violent criminals who are being detained by regular ICE or Bureau of Prisons facilities.

The relevant legal decisions, settlements, and statutes are important to acknowledge because, as the New York Times stated this past weekend, ``Technically, there is no Trump administration policy stating that illegal border crossers must be separated from their children.''

Instead, there are many variables that are hard to disentangle from one another: the current administration's stepped-up enforcement directives, the so-called Flores agreement, which requires that children be held for no longer than 20 days, a Ninth Circuit opinion that applies Flores to family units, protracted timelines for asylum claims, limited detention facilities, and a division of responsibility among ICE, Health and Human Services, and other agencies.

You can see how this quickly becomes enormously complex because of the overlay of Federal law, consent decrees, court judgments, and other divided responsibilities among Federal agencies.

Underlying this complex array of factors is something pretty uncontroversial, though. I think every Member of this Chamber will agree with the Trump administration that we should never be placing children in

prisons or jails with hardened criminals when their parents are being prosecuted.

By the same token, I and many others certainly don't want family members to be separated from one another as a consequence of Department of Homeland Security and administration officials enforcing the laws they are sworn to uphold.

What we are literally being told is that there is a false choice here. You can either enforce the law or unify family members. We are hearing from many of our Democratic colleagues that the administration ought to simply quit enforcing the law, but we all have taken an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States. Whether you are a legislator, the President of the United States, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, we have all taken that same oath.

I know U.S. Customs and Border Protection folks, like Manny Padilla and David Higgerson and all the men and women who work under them in the Rio Grande Valley, are trying to do what is required of them by their job; that is, to enforce the law. That is a good thing. We appreciate all they do.

The answer to this current situation is a solution that allows us to both enforce the law and keep families together. They don't have to be mutually exclusive. We have to keep family members together and prevent unnecessary hardship, stress, and outrage. It is not our purpose to cause these children, in particular, the children who have been brought across our border illegally by their parents--we are not trying take it out on them or punish them. We have heard about the consequences when family members are separated. Mental health problems may, for example, follow children all the way to adulthood. We need to be mindful of that risk and work to ensure the children's well-being.

None other than former First Lady Laura Bush wrote this last weekend that she believes we can find a better answer to this current crisis, and I agree with her. In fact, we are off to a pretty good start. Some of my colleagues and I, including the Presiding Officer's staff, are working together to try to come up with a way to keep families unified when they are detained at the border.

I think our goals should be pretty clear and simple: Ensure that families stay together at ICE facilities while their criminal or civil proceedings are ongoing; clarify that the so-called Flores settlement does not apply to children who have crossed the border illegally with their parents; and promote the expedited consideration of detained families by immigration judges so that they are not left in limbo for any longer than is absolutely necessary.

I believe these are the building blocks for a consensus approach, one that every Member--Republican and Democrat alike--could rally behind. Throughout the course of our discussions, though, one point has become increasingly clear. All of us believe that families crossing the border should be kept together. Where we differ is whether we believe we should also enforce our immigration laws.

As I said, it need not be an either-or proposition. We can keep families unified and at the same time remain resolute in enforcing our immigration laws. In fact, Congress wrote them, and it is within our prerogative to change them if we wish, but as long as they are on the books, I believe everyone from the President of the United States on down has a responsibility to enforce laws on the books.

The Trump administration has said that it will not tolerate any violations of those laws or any others and that all offenders will remain on the table for prosecution. There is no reason for anybody to oppose what I have laid out. Either we are a nation of laws, with a government that enforces them, or we are a nation with no laws and open borders.

I urge all of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle to keep talking and keep an open mind. I believe that on a very contentious subject, like immigration, we could literally come together and resolve this situation swiftly and ensure that these children are kept with their families and the law is enforced, according to what the laws are on the books.

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

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

Madam President, in a few minutes--maybe in about an hour and a half--we will be voting on the National Defense Authorization Act, which Congress has passed faithfully for 57 consecutive years. That indicates the sense of importance we all have toward funding and providing the authorities and equipment and training that are necessary for our military to do the job we have asked it to do.

I particularly commend Senators Inhofe and Reed for their leadership in guiding us through the passage of this bill.

There are 1.8 million people in the world who are on Active Duty in the U.S. military--1.8 million people. The United States has 737 military installations, and the Department of Defense is

the world's largest employer. Supporting all of these people in these facilities is no easy task, and the Defense authorization bill is one very significant way in which we do exactly that. It is how we make sure that all of the men and women in uniform are paid, that our alliances are strengthened, and that military facilities are properly modernized and maintained.

The bill we are voting on will support an appropriation of up to $716 billion for those tasks. I might add that that is a huge number, but this is the Federal Government's No. 1 responsibility. In my opinion, everything else the Federal Government does comes after providing for the common defense because nobody else--no local government, no State government, no private sector--could possibly provide for the common defense.

America's leadership role in the world remains essential because we know that while there are other countries that will work with us--for example, our NATO allies--they require and the world really demands American leadership, and that is what provides for the safety and security and the peace all across the planet.

In Texas, there are roughly 200,000 men and women who wear the uniform of the U.S. military in places like Fort Hood, Joint Base San Antonio, Naval Air Station Corpus Christi, and Dyess Air Force Base in Abilene. Those are the people I think of each year as we take up the Defense authorization bill. We rely on them to provide our security, and they rely on us to deliver what they need in order to be successful.

One thing this year's bill will do is to give our troops a 2.6- percent pay raise, which will be the largest in 10 years. It doesn't sound like a lot, but I am sure they will appreciate it nonetheless.

Given the state of today's world, maintaining our military readiness has never been more important or more difficult. The array of security threats that face the United States is more complex and diverse than it has been at any time since World War II. Our military leaders say that the strategic environment has not been this competitive since the Cold War. Our adversaries are investing in their capabilities and, in some areas, are surpassing us. Simply put, America no longer enjoys the comparative advantage it once had over our competitors and adversaries.

As I said earlier, the Defense authorization bill is important for reasons that hit much closer to home. I am thinking about Texas military families and military facilities. This year's Defense authorization bill will authorize $158 million for military construction projects in Texas, including a new basic military training dormitory at Joint Base San Antonio and a new warehouse at the Red River Army Depot in East Texas.

It will prioritize access to high-quality education for military children, establish a Federal grant program for infrastructure near military communities, as well as to protect our airports and airfields from radar interference, which builds on previous efforts at Sheppard Air Force Base and Naval Air Station Corpus Christi.

One additional part of the Defense authorization bill I will highlight promotes justice for victims of sexual assault on military bases. This stems from a piece of legislation that I cosponsored with the Senator from Maine, Mr. King, which has been included in the final bill that we are voting on, called the Children of Military Protection Act. It is based on actual case studies at Fort Hood and Fort Bliss that were brought to my attention by military lawyers.

Finally, the Defense authorization bill will invest in a medical program at Fort Bliss, cyber institutes at places like Texas A&M, and our workhorse legacy fighter aircraft, like the F-16s at Joint Base Fort Worth.

Texas priorities are far from the only ones addressed in the NDAA, but they are important, and I am glad we are taking care of servicemembers in my State and keeping our commitment to them. So let's get the NDAA across the finish line this evening.

Family Separation Policy

Madam President, the other issue I want to talk about is the ongoing situation at the U.S.-Mexico border. This is the border from my State to Mexico--1,200 miles of common border.

Just like under the Obama administration in 2014, we have seen a surge of unaccompanied children and families coming across our southern border during the spring and summer months. Overwhelmingly, these families and these children are coming from Central America--in other words, from countries that are not adjacent to or contiguous to the United States. Some have presented themselves lawfully at ports of entry, but others have tried to enter illegally.

For example, if you are attempting to claim asylum, you can show up at one of our bridges or ports of entry and claim asylum without breaking the law. Yet, if you enter the country between the ports of entry--through the wild, wild west, I will call it, of the Texas frontier and border region--you will be entering the country illegally. You can then claim asylum, but you will still have entered the country illegally, so your asylum claim will have to be considered in that context.

The Trump administration has made the decision to enforce all of our laws by prosecuting adults in criminal court when they are apprehended after having crossed our borders illegally. I support that approach--a zero tolerance approach--for adults who violate our immigration laws. This law has been on the books for many decades but has not always been adequately enforced.

Because of numerous Federal court decisions, settlements, and statutes, an adult can be separated from a child as part of the legal process as it plays out. That way, children are placed in separate, safer settings. I doubt many of us would want a child to go to a jail cell in which somebody is being held for having illegally entered the country. That is why children are put in separate, safer settings. They aren't left unattended to fend for themselves amongst potentially violent criminals who are being detained in regular ICE or Bureau of Prison facilities.

Those legal decisions, settlements, and statutes are important to acknowledge because, as the New York Times stated this week, ``There is no [express] Trump administration policy stating that illegal border crossers must be separated from their children.'' So the New York Times--hardly a big Trump cheerleader--has said, ``There is no [express] Trump administration policy stating that illegal border crossers must be separated from their children.'' In other words, this is as a result of other consent decrees and laws which are within the power of Congress to change. In fact, I think every Member of this Chamber will agree that we should never be placing children in prison cells or jails with hardened criminals when their parents are being prosecuted. By the same token, I don't want family members to be separated from one another as a result of DHS and administration officials enforcing the laws they are sworn to uphold. We have to keep family members together and prevent unnecessary hardship, stress, and outrage.

The good news is, we have it within our power to find a better way because parents who are awaiting court proceedings shouldn't have to do so separated from their children and children shouldn't be taken from their parents and left frightened and confused about where they are and what is transpiring around them.

In 2014, I introduced a bipartisan bill called the HUMANE Act with my colleague Representative Henry Cuellar of Laredo, TX. I plan to soon reintroduce an updated version of that legislation. It will include provisions that mitigate the problem of family separation while improving the immigration court process for unaccompanied children and families apprehended at the border.

To the greatest extent possible, families presenting at ports of entry or apprehended crossing the border illegally will be kept together while waiting for their court hearings, which will be expedited. Additionally, this legislation will help eliminate the incentive for unaccompanied minors and family units with children to come to the U.S. illegally by expediting their court hearings. We found that catch and release is merely an inducement for further illegal immigration. By detaining these families together to make sure they appear before an immigration judge and receive any immigration benefits they are entitled to under Federal law, this will serve as a further deterrent for others who do not qualify

for those immigration benefits. These minors should be afforded all required due process and have access to representation in court when making their claims. Through this expedited immigration court process, we would help ensure that children and family units with claims for immigration relief in the United States are able to receive their day in court rather than waiting in a multiyear backlog.

This legislation is not a solution for all of our problems at the border--far be it--but it would make real improvements to deter illegal immigration while ensuring the humane treatment of children and family members who entered the country in violation of our laws. I ask colleagues on both sides of the aisle to take a hard look at this bill and work together to find a reasonable solution for this component of the crisis at our border.

I yield the floor.

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Cassidy), and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman) would have voted ``yea.''

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Cassidy), and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman) would have voted ``yea.''

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Cassidy), and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

Further, if present and voting the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. President, I have a request for one committee to meet during today's session of the Senate. It has the approval of the Majority and Minority leaders.

Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committee is authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate:

Committee on the Judiciary

The Committee on the Judiciary is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Monday, June 18, 2018, at 2 p.m. to hold a hearing entitled ``Examining the Inspector General's First Report on Justice Department and FBI actions in Advance of the 2016 Presidential Election.''

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

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 1 minute.

Madam President, I appreciate this broad support we have seen for plugging the holes in our ability to evaluate foreign investment with regard to national security risks in the United States. We know China, for example, has been quite explicit about what it is trying to do to surpass the United States economically and militarily, and it has been very aggressive and very strategic in the way it has tried to acquire intellectual property and know-how through foreign investment in the United States. That is why this legislation is so important.

I admire the Senator from Pennsylvania as one of the most principled conservatives in this body and in Congress, but he and I differ over whether the REINS Act, which would require up-or-down votes on implementing regulations, should be a part of the implementation of this national security legislation. I never dreamed we would do that in a national security context as opposed to doing it in economic and environmental legislation. Reluctantly, I oppose the amendment of the Senator from Pennsylvania and encourage all of our colleagues to do the same.

I conclude by saying, I share his concerns when it comes to using national security as a pretext on economic legislation and trade issues, and I look forward to continuing to work with him and all of my other colleagues outside of the national security context to make sure we support free and fair trade--trade that protects U.S. interests. With the overstepping of the regulatory bounds by the executive branch on occasion, I am all for rolling that back when we can but not in a national security context like this.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain) and the Senator from Ohio (Mr. Portman).

Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Ohio (Mr. Portman) would have voted ``yea.''

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Idaho (Mr. Crapo) and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Idaho (Mr. Crapo) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. President, I am glad we are making such great progress on the Defense authorization bill. I know some additional work needs to be done. I wanted to come to the floor and comment briefly on the historic meeting that occurred this last week with North Korean officials in Singapore.

President Trump, Secretary of State Pompeo, National Security Advisor Bolton, and the rest of the American delegation are to be congratulated for having this meeting. It was a historic first step, and I applaud President Trump for taking it. But I reiterate: It was a first step.

To me, it reminds me of boxers entering the ring and touching gloves before the fight begins. It is a warmup for something longer and much more difficult. We need to remain clear-eyed about who we are dealing with and not assume that there isn't hard work to be done.

As one commentator recently put it, North Korean duplicity is normal. We need to remind ourselves of our own history of negotiating with North Korea and our counterpart's record of saying one thing and simply doing another.

The joint agreement signed by President Trump and Kim Jong Un set broad goals whereby the United States made unspecified ``security guarantees'' and Kim Jong Un recommitted to work toward the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. This agreement set the stage for future engagements between our Secretary of State and his North Korean counterpart.

By saying it is a first step--or, like two boxers, touching gloves before the fight begins--I don't want to suggest in any way that this was unimportant. I think it is dramatically important because I can't think of any other place in the world where a misstep or a miscalculation could lead to so much bloodshed, heartache, and conflict. While we know that the military option must always be the last option, diplomacy is always welcome and is facilitated by a strong military and preparedness. But now the followup negotiations will be led by Secretary Pompeo, and I have every confidence that he will ably lead those.

He has said that the United States hopes to achieve ``major disarmament'' of North Korea's nuclear arsenal during the next 2\1/2\ years but added emphatically that we will resume joint military exercises with South Korea if the talks stall.

I think this represents the right approach. Aim for the best, while remaining vigilant and preparing for all possible obstacles and outcomes.

President Trump has said that sanctions against North Korea will remain in effect until we are sure that nuclear weapons are no longer a factor. I applaud this stance of maximum pressure. We shouldn't take our foot off the gas at this point because that is what brought us to this historic meeting in the first place.

I believe the United States should remain committed to the permanent, verifiable, and irreversible dismantling of North Korea's weapons of mass destruction, and I wish Secretary Pompeo luck as he continues followup discussions in South Korea to help accomplish the goal that we seek.

As Speaker Ryan said last week, President Trump has now ``disrupted the status quo.'' I like the way he expressed that. President Trump--if nothing--is good at disrupting the status quo, but here, when it comes to North Korea, it is enormously positive when the status quo includes a brutal dictatorship that commits flagrant human rights violations, has a state-controlled economy, is starving its own people in order to build nuclear weapons, and has shown contempt for international norms and global diplomacy. I would say that the careful and cautious kind of ``disruption'' is exactly the right thing to do.

Our colleagues across the aisle seem to agree, and I am grateful for that. Not everything needs to be a partisan issue here in Washington, DC. In a statement, the junior Senator from Vermont called the summit earlier this week ``a positive step in de-escalating tensions.'' I saw that former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper made similar positive remarks. We will have to wait and see how this story unfolds, but the President is to be commended, first for ensuring that the summit took place at all and, then, for providing us with hope for a path forward.

Farm Bill

Mr. President, another item of business today is the farm bill, which I hope we will take up promptly here in the Senate. Fortunately, it passed the Senate Agriculture Committee yesterday by a vote of 20-to-1. Thanks to Chairman Roberts and Ranking Member Stabenow, this bipartisan compromise is a fair and equitable bill that does not favor one region of the country over another. I have found in my time in the Senate that agricultural issues and the farm bill don't pit Democrats against Republicans so much as it pits one region of the country against another, which makes it even more challenging--kind of like a Rubik's Cube to figure out. But the near unanimous vote is a testament to the collaboration and bipartisanship of the leaders of the committee. They deserve the respect and appreciation of us all, especially those of us who hail from States where agriculture has such a dominant presence, like my State

and like the State of the Presiding Officer.

The farm bill is always a significant piece of legislation because it helps to ensure that Americans, and many other people who depend upon our food supply, enjoy access to the safest, most affordable, and most reliable food supply in the world. We have to remember that in many non-Western countries, you can't just walk up to a store and know that what you want will be there on the shelf or that it will be affordable or that it will be safe to even eat. The farm bill helps to ensure that we continue to enjoy each of those things, knowing that we can walk into a store, that we will find what we want, that it will be affordable, and that it will be safe to eat.

This year's farm bill will be hugely impactful for farmers and ranchers in my State of Texas. Among its most noteworthy provisions are protecting seed cotton eligibility for the farm bill safety net. In the supplemental funding bill we passed last February, we worked hard to include this language, returning cotton to the safety net. This helped cotton growers compete on a level playing field after years of depressed prices.

So I want to thank Chairman Roberts and Ranking Member Stabenow, as well as the rest of the committee, for ensuring that this policy continues and that cotton farmers have the long-term predictability they deserve under the farm bill.

This year's bill also retains and strengthens the Price Loss Coverage Program to help provide Texas producers with predictability throughout unstable weather and natural disasters. That comes as great news this year, especially, when we are all well aware that much of the Texas Panhandle, as well as much of the rest of my State, remains under severe, or even exceptional, drought conditions.

Additionally, the bill promotes animal health and reauthorizes disease research programs, including a crucial one that will help the U.S. Department of Agriculture research and contain the spread of cattle fever tick. This is a parasite-carrying insect with the potential to wipe out cattle herds and cause devastating financial losses.

The research programs that we are promoting will help farmers and ranchers all across the country. I know the senior Senator from Minnesota, for example, has been concerned about avian influenza in her State, and I am glad that we were able to work together to ensure that these important research programs, with all of their implications, are authorized in the bill.

On top of that, the farm bill will strengthen crop insurance and other crop management tools and enhance incentive programs that help the agriculture community conserve soil and water.

Finally, the bill encourages the U.S. Department of Agriculture research partnerships, including those at Texas A&M, Texas Tech, and Prairie View A&M, to promote more productive and profitable farming, and it will assist Texas farmers and ranchers in placing and selling their products in foreign markets.

I know Senator McConnell intends to take the farm bill up on the floor as soon as possible, and I look forward to supporting its swift passage.

I yield the floor.

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain) and the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran).

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain) and the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran).

Mr. President, we will be voting on the National Defense Authorization Act soon, which enjoys a storied history in the Congress. Fifty-seven consecutive years we passed the National Defense Authorization Act in order to support and equip our military. Earlier this month, the Senate Armed Services Committee voted overwhelmingly-- 25 to 2--to advance this important legislation to the floor.

There are 1.8 million Americans around the world on Active Duty, according to the Department of Defense. The United States has 737 military installations worldwide, and the Department of Defense is the world's largest employer. Supporting all of these people and facilities is a Herculean task, and the Defense authorization bill is one very important way we do that. It is how we make sure the men and women in uniform are paid, our alliances are strengthened, and that military facilities are properly modernized and maintained.

This bill we will be voting on will support a total of--it is an authorization--$716 billion for these tasks. Occasionally, people ask: Isn't that too high a price to pay? Well, $716 billion is unquestionably a lot of money, but the simple fact is, there is no one who shares our values who can step in and fill the void left by an absence of American leadership. It is American leadership that keeps the world stable--or at least as stable as it is--that helps keeps the peace and helps fight the scourge of things like terrorism. There is no substitute for the United States of America.

There are countries I will talk about in a moment--such as China-- that want to surpass us both economically and militarily, but it is important for our very way of life and for peace in the world that the United States continues to live up to its responsibilities to lead when it comes to national security.

In my home State, there are roughly 200,000 men and women stationed at places like Fort Hood, Joint Base San Antonio, the Red River Army Depot and Ellington Field. These are the people I think of each year as we take up and pass the Defense authorization bill. They rely on us to supply them what they need in order to do the tasks they have volunteered to do.

One thing this bill will do--and it sounds very modest--is provide a 2.6-percent pay increase, the largest in nearly 10 years for our uniformed military.

Given the state of today's world, maintaining our military readiness has never been more important or more difficult. The array of national security threats facing the world is more complex and diverse than at any time since World War II. Our leaders say, the strategic environment has not been this competitive since the end of the Cold War. Simply put, America no longer enjoys a comparative advantage that it once had over its competitors and its adversaries.

Secretary of Defense Mattis and the Department of Defense have admirably crafted the national defense strategy that was delivered to Congress earlier this year. This is a critical first step for the administration to lay out its strategy, but now that strategy must be implemented, and the Defense authorization bill will align our policies and resources in a way that will accomplish that.

This legislation will modernize the military's rigid, outdated personnel management system to increase the adaptability of the force, increase its lethality, where necessary, invest in emerging technologies to ensure that our troops have what they need in order to be successful, and reform the Department of Defense to empower strong civilian leadership.

I am glad there are two pieces of this bill that are included and that I want to highlight in particular.

The first is called the Children of the Military Protection Act. I believe the Senator from Maine is my chief cosponsor, and I thank him for that. This will close a jurisdictional loophole affecting military installations where minors commit criminal offenses on base. This issue was brought to my attention by an Army JAG officer--a judge advocate general, a lawyer--who was concerned that juvenile sexual assault cases were falling through the cracks when the Federal Government chose not to prosecute because, naturally, this would end up in the jurisdiction of U.S. attorneys and the Federal courts, and certainly their plate is full. This was a particular problem, though, at Fort Hood in Central Texas.

This legislation will allow Federal prosecutors to retrocede jurisdiction to the State; that is, allow the State to step up and prosecute these cases, allowing State-level authorities to take up the case when the Federal Government's other responsibilities and finite resources prevent it from being able to do so.

This is, as I said, a bipartisan priority that Members of both sides of the aisle should rally behind.

Our children who live on military bases must be protected at all costs, and when they are sexually assaulted, their juvenile assailant should not escape justice because of the constraints of the status quo.

The second piece of legislation I have introduced and that I am pleased has been included in the NDAA--the Defense authorization bill-- involves how we address future threats to our national security. I have spoken quite a bit about China recently. My friend from Maine, who serves on the Intelligence Committee, as do I--we hear

quite often about the challenges confronting us from our rival China. But that country bears mention again right now because of its connection to the Defense authorization bill.

The chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Chairman Thornberry, has recently said that it is in ``the Indo-Pacific region [where] the United States faces a near-term, belligerent threat armed with nuclear weapons and also a longer-term strategic competitor.'' He has described that as being a threat to the United States in the Indo- Pacific region where we face a near-term belligerent threat armed with nuclear weapons--that would be North Korea--along with a long-term strategic competitor, and that would be China, that Chairman Thornberry is referring to.

That is why this year's Defense authorization bill, among other goals, prioritizes military readiness in that region and strengthens key partnerships. It promotes stability and security in the Indo- Pacific region through exercises with our allies, and it maintains our policy of maximum pressure on North Korea as we seek to negotiate the denuclearization of the North Korean peninsula.

But another main provision in this legislation that has to do with the Indo-Pacific region in particular, which I have cosponsored, along with Senator Feinstein, the senior Senator from California, is known as the Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act, or FIRRMA. This legislation will allow us to better intercept threats to our national security posed by China when its companies masquerade as normal corporate actors. But it has been well documented that China is intent upon not only stealing our intellectual property, but also acquiring the know-how to build dual-use technology in China and thus undermine our industrial base here in the United States. They do so by evading current law, by mergers, acquisitions, and joint ventures. This legislation will modernize the review process led by the Secretary of Treasury to make sure that foreign investments in the United States protect our national security.

This is not intended to discourage foreign investment. Foreign investment is a good thing. But when countries have an explicit strategy to try to acquire cutting-edge technology that has military applications, it obviously is a concern to our national security.

As I said earlier, the Defense authorization bill is important for many reasons that hit closer to home. For example, in Texas, this bill has traditionally authorized needed improvements at Texas military facilities. We have an all-volunteer military. That means we have to not discourage people from entering the military or being retained in the military. One of the ways we do that is by making sure that we maintain improvements at our facilities, as well as provide updated aircraft, ships, and ground vehicles. All of these have Texas implications too.

So when I vote yes on the Defense authorization bill soon, I will be thinking of these servicemembers--my constituents back home who proudly wear the uniform of the U.S. military--as well as all of those troops stationed overseas. I encourage all of our colleagues, let's make sure we get this NDAA, the Defense authorization bill, across the finish line as soon as possible.

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

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

Mr. President, I rise today to mark an important milestone for our friend Senator Mitch McConnell, who has now become the longest serving Republican leader, surpassing Senator Bob Dole of Kansas, who served from 1985 to 1996.

I told somebody in the press yesterday that Senator McConnell has done it the old-fashioned way: He earned it. He earned this role as our leader and the respect, certainly, that goes along with it.

He served as minority leader beginning in 2007, and I had the honor of presenting him with a copy of his maiden speech as Republican leader back then. That was at the beginning of the 110th Congress, and he has served as either majority leader or minority leader ever since. What a historic tenure his has been, and what a privilege it has been for me to serve alongside him since I came to the Senate in 2003, but especially in my role as whip, I have had the opportunity to work with the leader on a daily basis, and it has been one of the highlights of my Senate career.

Senator McConnell is trusted. We all know he is whip smart. He is an impressive strategist. He understands the Senate better than anybody else here, and time and again, he has demonstrated what leaders always need to demonstrate, and that is a remarkable degree of humility, sometimes preferring to work for the betterment of the conference and the country behind the scenes rather than enjoy the spotlight on the frontlines. That takes a remarkable sense of self-confidence and team spirit that not everybody has. It is true that sometimes he is soft- spoken, but I can assure you that he is never afraid to take a hard line when absolutely necessary. But more than that, he is a rare example of what a Senator ought to be, what a true public servant ought to be.

As majority leader, Senator McConnell is a member of a storied group that includes the likes of Senator Charles Curtis, the first official majority leader of the Senate, who was famous for his Native American ancestry and racing horses, I am told. The` group includes Robert Taft of Ohio, who would work late into the night studying the rules of the Senate in order to outmaneuver his opponents. It includes Lyndon Baines Johnson from my State, who would go on to become President, as well as Mike Mansfield from Montana, Johnson's whip, who went on to serve as majority leader for 16 years. In more recent times, there have been great statesmen, such as Bob Dole, Trent Lott, and Bill Frist.

We all know that Senator McConnell is an avid student of history, and he has learned a lot from all of these leaders--their example, their ups and downs, their successes, and their challenges--and in a sense, he stands on their shoulders. The experience, the example, and the great leadership each of them demonstrated have benefited all of us but nobody more than our leader Senator McConnell.

In today's world, the qualities embodied by all of these men is not very widely understood, but we have to look no further than Senator McConnell to see what that leadership looks like. One thing it requires is recognizing your role but also respecting the role of other Members in the conference.

As I said, Senator McConnell deeply understands the nature of the Senate and his position, and he illustrated this when he spoke at the beginning of the 114th Congress.

In his first speech, he recognized that the American people were anxious about the direction of our country. He mentioned the decline of civic trust in our national institutions. He expressed concern about his fellow Americans feeling as though government was somehow uninterested or incapable of addressing their concerns--a government that seemed to be working for itself instead of for them. Those were some of the sentiments and concerns he expressed at the time.

Sensing this unease, articulating the problem was just the beginning of Senator McConnell's setting out to fix it. What Americans wanted then is what they want now: They want a government that works. They want, as Senator McConnell called it, a government of the 21st century, one that functions with efficiency and accountability, competence and purpose. That is the kind of government our leader has worked tirelessly to promote. As he has told us time and again, what he is interested in is results, not show votes. Many of us from time to time have said: Why can't we have a vote on this or that? He reminds us that what we need to produce is results, not theatrics.

He has taken steps to return the Senate to regular order, which simply means getting the Senate back to work according to its own rules and traditions. He has gotten the committees to work again. The Senate simply does not work unless our committee structure works, because then power is diffused among all Senators, and they each get to contribute their piece of a solution to a problem. He has committed himself and the Senate to a more rational, functioning appropriations process-- something we all can applaud.

In my opinion, it has been his never-ending quest for this body he loves to function not just ably but at a consistently high level. That has been his greatest contribution to the people he serves.

Leader McConnell is concerned about the policy priorities of our party, of course, and he works doggedly to advance a conservative, right-of-center agenda, but he also cares deeply about this institution that he has committed so much of his life to serving and the pivotal role the Senate has always played in American history. He cares about upholding the rules and traditions of this body, not for their own sake but because they have simply withstood the test of time.

We have made great strides this Congress under Leader McConnell's leadership. We passed the first overhaul of the Tax Code in more than three decades and allowed Americans to keep more of their hard-earned paychecks. We reformed Dodd-Frank legislation, freeing up banks and credit unions to better serve their communities by giving small businesses access to the credit they need in order to start that business and grow. We rolled back overly burdensome regulations and confirmed 39 judicial nominees, including a Supreme Court Justice and 21 circuit court judges. As Senator McConnell likes to remind us, these judges will serve long after this President's term of office and perhaps even our time in the Senate.

This spring, we kept a solemn commitment we made to our veterans by making sure they have access to the healthcare choices which they need and which we have solemnly committed to provide. None of this would have been possible without Leader McConnell's deftly navigating around the stop signs and roadblocks that naturally occur in a place like the Senate and refusing to yield along the way to unprecedented levels of partisan obstruction.

But we must not forget that Senator McConnell is a leader not only of our conference, but he also serves primarily on behalf of the people of Kentucky. He doesn't leave his full-time job behind when he puts on his leadership hat. He somehow has to balance the needs of both his constituents in Kentucky and the larger needs of the Senate and of the country as a whole. It goes without saying that balancing those competing demands is extraordinarily difficult. It is not for the faint of heart. But somehow Senator McConnell makes it look easy. He doesn't even seem to break a sweat, amazingly so. That is because people like Senator McConnell are versatile and energetic.

On behalf of his fellow Kentuckians, he has recently championed the cause of international adoptions, ensured a healthcare fix for more than 3,000 retired coal miners, and supported military installations, such as Fort Campbell and Fort Knox. He has gotten more resources to strengthen Kentucky universities. He has helped his State combat the scourge of opioid addiction. He even helped a mother get her child back after she was abducted and taken to West Africa. These are just some of the recent ways he has served his State.

As we know, Senator McConnell joined the Senate in 1984, so one could literally write volumes about his many other contributions over the past 3\1/2\ decades. He once said of the Senate what is no less true of all of us: We are all imperfect at moments, but we were permanently endowed with high purpose.

For those familiar with the story of his own life, this sense of high purpose was seen early on. After overcoming polio at a young age, Leader McConnell went on to attend the University of Louisville, where he served as student body president and where he urged his classmates to march with Martin Luther King, Jr., on behalf of civil rights. He then became president of the student bar association in law school. This man was clearly born to lead.

What was clear early in his life remains clear today: Leader McConnell is simply relentless. He never stops working, and in his view, we--both as a conference and a country--still have miles to go before we sleep.

In addition to confirming the President's nominees, we have a packed to-do list this year that includes finishing the Defense bill this week, passing water infrastructure reform, as well as a farm bill, combating the opioid crisis, and reauthorizing the Federal Aviation Administration and the Coast Guard. None of this is easy, but one thing is certain: With Leader McConnell at the helm and with the hard work of those of us here in the Senate--on a bipartisan basis, hopefully--we will continue to make steady progress on behalf of the American people we serve.

Thank you, Senator McConnell, for your example. Thank you for your mentorship and for your friendship, and congratulations once again on reaching this historic milestone today.

I yield the floor.

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Missouri (Mr. Blunt) and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

Madam President, I thank my friend from Kansas.

I want to talk a little bit about a hearing I chaired yesterday, a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration hearing that was called ``Student Visa Integrity: Protecting Educational Opportunity and National Security.'' The point of the hearing was to raise awareness about a very serious issue and to hear from the Federal agencies responsible for our national security, visa policy, and the vetting of foreign nationals studying in the United States.

We hoped to shed light on policies and procedures that are in place, what should be in place but is not, and to address what has become a growing source of concern; that is, foreign countries taking advantage of their international students studying in the United States and turning them into intelligence assets or otherwise using them to gain information that will help other countries grow their economy and their military in a way that undermines U.S. leadership in both of those areas.

That issue relates primarily to China's aggressive plan to surpass the United States on all fronts--militarily, economically, and technologically--and to do so by whatever means necessary. We already know that China is perhaps the No. 1 abuser of cyber space to steal intellectual property and to use that to advance its economy or its military. They have been very public about their ultimate goal; that is, to use whatever means they need in order to advance their economy or their military.

It is important to remember that China is not a democracy like ours. China is a Communist country guided by a doctrine that does not recognize the human rights or individual rights that we take for granted here in the United States and in other democracies.

They made it very clear what they intend to do. For example, in its ``Made in China 2025'' strategy, which is something that has been published--you can read it yourself--China is accelerating its efforts to acquire U.S. intellectual property and sensitive research. That is where our universities in particular come in.

Billions of Federal tax dollars--I think it is $178 billion in the Omnibus appropriations bill alone--are given to universities to conduct research to benefit the American people and hopefully all of humankind. Some of that research is sensitive because it is classified research. We had, for example, the head of security at the Texas A&M University System talk about the steps they have taken to protect that from prying eyes because of the sensitivity of some of that research.

Universities are ground zero in this threat. This past February, Director Christopher Wray testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee in an open hearing about the security risk posed by certain Chinese students, visiting scientists, and scholars at American colleges and universities. His remarks were brief, and because of the sensitive and classified aspects of some part of what he said, he couldn't provide the full context and breadth in that open setting, but what he did say publicly was alarming. He said that the FBI is ``watching warily'' and that ``naivete'' was exacerbating the problem. What I think he meant by that is that people were simply unaware and thus unprepared for what was happening. He also made very clear that the Chinese Government was intent on doing whatever it needed to do-- whether it is placing intelligence officers or other agents of the Chinese Government on campuses--to get the information they want.

We are fortunate to have the world's top universities and colleges, and they are known for their open research, which fosters collaboration and innovation across a broad array of industry sectors and academic disciplines. One of the crown jewels of our country is our colleges and universities and the research they do, but our openness is also a vulnerability when being exploited by other countries for their own purposes.

What is happening now, Director Wray says, is that foreign actors have taken advantage of that open environment and are using it to study, learn, and acquire sensitive information to the detriment of U.S. national security--and that is what we are primarily talking about here.

It is not an isolated problem. Director Wray said that the Federal Bureau of Investigation is actively monitoring universities in all of its 56 field offices across the country, not just in major cities. Nearly all students and visiting scholars come for legitimate reasons. I take that as a given. We are not talking about everybody; we are talking about the isolated few. But the danger still remains. Most are here to learn and share our culture and to contribute their talents to America.

I tend to think that our colleges and universities are the best elements of our soft power as a nation. When people come here and learn more about us and where we share values, perhaps even take those values back to their home country and serve as someone we can talk to and work with in the future, it promotes world peace, promotes mutual understanding, and, as I said, I think it is one of the most important elements of our soft power as a country.

I am not here suggesting that we ought to conflate Chinese Communist Party influence on all students and academics--far from it. Students from across the world are certainly welcome; we welcome them with open arms to come to study at our colleges and universities, and I encourage them to explore opportunities to do so.

What yesterday's hearing was actually about was not them but a small subset of people we should be concerned about--security risks, those who are here to steal and exploit our intellectual property and our national security and economic advantages, people who don't respect the rule of law as we do when it comes to intellectual property rights.

As the FBI Director said, we can't be naive. This theft is occurring. It has been well documented, and we have to take the necessary preventive measures to ensure that it doesn't continue.

By the way, I have mentioned one country, China, but certainly these concerns are not limited to China. There are more than 5,000 Russian students studying in the United States. There are other countries, including state sponsors of terrorism, like Iran, that have foreign students here, actively working to steal U.S. technology and bypass expensive research and development and exploit the student visa program to gain information that will benefit their countries.

I will just pause for a moment to say that we spend untold amounts of money in this country--taxpayers' hard-earned money--to research and develop the newest, most innovative products. That is true in the military sector and in the nonmilitary sector.

But when the American taxpayer pays to produce the necessary weapons and necessary infrastructure to protect us and our security, and other countries are actively trying to steal it and don't have to pay that research and development cost, we can see the obvious problem.

Yesterday's hearing exposed a bigger problem, and that is the issue of competing global visions. Communist China makes no secret of the fact that Karl Marx is, in effect, their national hero. There was a week-long celebration in China just last month, which included a mandatory study session, led by President Xi, of Marx's famous work, ``The Communist Manifesto.'' Events like this show that China, while a rival, in some ways could be a wolf in sheep's clothing when it comes to its most aggressive tactics, which I mentioned just a moment ago. When it tries to present itself as a westernizing economy and a friend of the global community of nations, China conveniently ignores facts about its alternative development model and its state-controlled economy, the fact that it respects no law in pursuit of those policies. It also disguises and downplays its geopolitical aims--to rewrite the rules of our world order and recreate them in China's own image.

Whether it is China's increasing belligerence in places like the South China Sea, its crushing of internal political dissent, its flagrant human rights violations, or its population controls--like the one-child policy, which I understand has now been relaxed, but parents are not free to have all the children they want. It is controlled by the government; you have to ask the government's permission--China has repeatedly shown itself as a power-hungry authoritarian country, willing and able to violate the rights of its own people and dismissive and contemptuous of international norms and international law.

I don't intend to sound hyperbolic about this, but this is the truth. So let's not deceive ourselves into believing otherwise. That is what Director Christopher Wray of the FBI calls naivete. Let's not be naive. Let's be wary when China tries to just blend in internationally. Its rosy rhetoric and misleading narrative of cooperation are often camouflaged for its true and more troubling aims.

We know that there are high-level negotiations between the United States and the Chinese Government on the issue of trade, and that is a good thing.

Madam President, how much time do I have remaining?

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent for one minute to wrap up.

Madam President, I joined a number of other Senators, 27 Senators, to talk about ongoing trade negotiations with China. The main point of the letter was to emphasize that there is no question that China is actively seeking to surpass the United States economically and militarily. It is imperative that neither the Federal Government nor private U.S. companies abet that effort either deliberately or inadvertently.

When it comes to China, national security isn't just a pretext for economic protectionism. It should not be. I, like many of my colleagues, believe strongly in free trade, and we shouldn't use national security as a pretext for economic protection. But the national security concerns are indeed real, for example, in the ZTE matter, which is a subject of some debate--as it should be--and discussion here in the Congress following the negotiation by Secretary Ross of a deal that he is proposing.

For those of us who serve on the Intelligence Committee and on the Armed Services Committee, I assure you, the threat China poses is real, and the dangers we worry about are already taking effect. Our inaction could have only negative consequences, and we need to aim to prevent any future negative consequences for our country.

I yield the floor.

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).