Floor Statements

Madam President, last year, our friends across the aisle painted a picture of doom and gloom of what governing with a Republican Senate minority might look like. They forecasted unprecedented obstruction, endless stonewalling, and the inability to get anything done.

Now, there is nothing more popular than the myth that Congress is unable to get anything done. It is pretty popular. The press, uncritically, reports it, even when it is demonstrably false. But it is safe to say the vision painted by our Democratic colleagues of doom and gloom with a Republican Senate minority of unprecedented obstruction, endless stonewalling, and inability to get things done--well, that hadn't come to pass.

Actually, I feel like I am doing a Washington Post fact check. But over the past few months, Republicans and Democrats have actually worked together to make progress on a number of issues.

One, I am sure the Biden administration would confirm that we have been able to confirm a number of nominees for high-ranking positions in the Federal Government with broad bipartisan support.

We extended the popular Paycheck Protection Program that was part of the CARES Act, which was the major COVID-19 relief bill that passed overwhelmingly last year on a bipartisan basis. We did that because we all recognized the importance of small businesses continuing to take advantage of this lifeline until they could safely reopen.

We took action, on a bipartisan basis, to combat the increase in hate crimes against Asian Americans. We provided States with additional resources to upgrade their drinking and wastewater infrastructure.

And this week we passed historic legislation to improve the way we counter the threat from the Chinese Communist Party, the so-called Endless Frontier Act. It included a $52 billion emergency appropriation to make sure that we weren't dependent on imports of semiconductors, which are so essential to our economy and to our national security.

That is not all. The Environment and Public Works Committee advanced a bipartisan surface transportation bill. That is actually the second time--first under Republican leadership, now under Democratic leadership--that the Environment and Public Works Committee has advanced a bipartisan, unanimously supported surface transportation bill.

The Judiciary Committee that I serve on unanimously has approved three bills to support our men and women in blue. And two committees, the Rules Committee and the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, just released a bipartisan report--127 pages long, if I am not mistaken--on the events surrounding January 6.

You would be hard pressed to count the number of bipartisan bills that have actually been introduced in the

last few months, just in 6 months of the Biden administration: legislation to bring down prescription drug prices, enhance cyber security, which is an increasingly scary and frightening issue, especially with the Colonial Pipeline, the JBS hack, and the SolarWinds hack by the Russians.

We also know we need to improve our electric grid infrastructure, which we have bills doing that. And then we also have even a bipartisan bill to address the humanitarian crisis on the southern border-- bipartisan, bicameral.

These are some of the bills that I have introduced, and when you add to it the work being done by other Members of the Senate, you have a long list of opportunities for us to work together on behalf of the American people. I believe this is the type of results and consensus that the American people had hoped for after the last election because, the truth is, neither party got a mandate after the last election.

I know President Biden won the election, but we have a 50-50 Senate, and Speaker Pelosi has a very slim majority in the House. And we have a President who, I think, inspired all of us when he started talking about healing the separations in our Nation and appealing to a promise of unity.

I can tell you one thing, that 2020 wasn't a mandate to pass a radical agenda. It was a call for us to work together. I don't know any other way you can interpret a 50-50 Senate. And I believe there is no better time for us to get work done on behalf of our constituents in the Senate.

There is, perhaps, the apocryphal story of George Washington, who told Thomas Jefferson that the Senate was meant to be the saucer to cool House legislation, like how a saucer apparently was used at the time to cool hot tea. There certainly is a lot of hot tea in the House these days, and the filibuster, I believe, and the 60-vote requirement to cut off debate is core to the Senate's ability to perform its constitutional function--to cool off the debate and to talk about the greater good and to force us to do something that maybe we don't do naturally, which is to force us to work together.

The Founders understood that if you passed legislation on a purely partisan basis, well, the next 2 years after the election, the next 4 years after a new President, the new majority, the new President, could simply undo it. And we have seen a lot of that, unfortunately-- admittedly, on both sides of the aisle.

But when you have to get 60 votes in the Senate to pass legislation that impacts the lives of 330 million Americans, it strikes me that is a pretty commonsense way to force us to do, again, maybe what might seem unnatural to us but we have to do for the benefit of the American people. It forces us to pass bipartisan bills and makes passing partisan bills impossible.

Now, I know both parties. There is a reason why people are Democrats and a reason why people are Republicans. We have different ideas, different priorities, different ways of going about doing things, perhaps to achieve a result that we would all agree on, a different means to an end. But the fact of the matter is, notwithstanding our preference, perhaps, to have our policies succeed over those of our Democratic colleagues, that is not always necessarily in the best interest of the American people. What is in the best interest of the American people is to have us work together.

Just 4 years ago--it is amazing how time flies and how much people's positions change depending on where they sit. Well, 4 years ago, now- Majority Leader Senator Schumer, the Senator from New York, said we should ``build a firewall around the legislative filibuster.''

Believe me, that 60-vote requirement looks a lot better when you are in the minority than it does when you are in the majority. As a matter of fact, when President Trump was in the White House and we had a Republican majority in the Senate, I can't tell you how many times he pressed on Leader McConnell to eliminate the filibuster because it was an impediment to him getting what he wanted done. But he wasn't looking at the long game or the long-term consequences of doing that. Senator McConnell, on the other hand, having been in the Senate a long time, understood that short-term gain was not worth the long-term pain.

But Senator Schumer called it the most important distinction between the House and the Senate, this consensus-building mechanism known as the filibuster. But, today, Senator Schumer perhaps has succumbed to the temptation, once you are in the majority, to say: Anything that gets in my way, any impediment to getting what I want, like the 60-vote requirement, we need to do away with it. So he has done a complete 180. Clearing the way for a radical agenda is priority No. 1.

I understand the political pressures that come within our political parties, and it is pretty clear to me that the pressure on our friends in the Democratic Party is from the progressive left, who want to push the party farther and farther to the left. But that is not a reason for us to give up our previous convictions or principles.

Apparently, our Democratic colleagues--not all, but some of our Democratic colleagues--apparently have abandoned the long-held belief that the filibuster is a vital stabilizing force, and they are on the warpath to eliminate it. You can tell by the language that is being used. Some have called the filibuster a ``weapon of mass destruction,'' ``a death grip of democracy.''

And here is perhaps the most despicable description when, I think it was, President Obama himself, who spoke at John Lewis's funeral, called the filibuster a ``Jim Crow relic,'' essentially suggesting that anybody who supported this vital stabilizing mechanism was a racist. And he gave tacit permission to other people to play the race card when it comes to the filibuster.

Well, it hasn't even been a year since our Democratic colleagues used this ``Jim Crow relic'' to block an anti-lynching bill. This was part of the police reform bill that Senator Tim Scott led that was filibustered by our Democratic friends.

I still remember being on the floor when then-Senator Kamala Harris and Cory Booker, who were the chief advocates for this anti-lynching provision in the police reform bill, were part of the core of Democrats who filibustered that bill. They filibustered their own anti-lynching bill. So when somebody wants to play the race card and say that this is used for improper purposes, their own actions demonstrate the hypocrisy of that argument.

The inconvenient truth for our Democratic colleagues is that they have filibustered bill after bill when they were the minority party over the last 6 years. But I know memories are short around here. The impulse to get something done today may cause people to do things that they later would regret. We certainly have seen that in the George W. Bush administration when then-Leader Reid decided to raise the bar for judicial confirmations to 60 votes for cloture and blocked a number of George W. Bush's judges.

Of course, we know how that story ended. Ultimately, we got back to the status quo ante after we went through years of fights, gangs meeting and coming up with tentative compromises. And then, ultimately, with the use of the same precedent setting or the appeal of the ruling of the Chair, that then was used to bring the number back down to 51, where it had, in essence, been forever, when Neil Gorsuch was confirmed. So it is important for us to remember that what goes around comes around here, and what might seem expedient today may prove to be pretty painful tomorrow.

Well, we know our Democratic colleagues have used this so-called Jim Crow relic--and, again, I think that is completely inaccurate to use it that way. This is how the Senate functions. Our Democrats are within their rights when they employ the filibuster to kill countless pieces of legislation, whether it is pandemic relief, government funding, pro- life legislation, or police reform. The list goes on and on.

Again, I don't particularly like it when the minority filibusters legislation I would like to see passed, but what that means is it is an invitation and, really, a command to us to roll up our sleeves and work harder to try to find common ground. Really, if you think about it, eliminating the filibuster is a lazy way of legislating because it means you don't have to do the hard work. You don't have to build bipartisan consensus. You don't have to worry about stabilizing our laws so

that they don't change dramatically every 2 years or every 4 years depending on who is in charge.

So we don't have to wonder how our Democratic colleagues felt about the filibuster when it was of benefit to them because they made countless statements and even put their feelings in writing. When Republicans held control of the House and the Senate and the White House, our Democratic colleagues were afraid the filibuster would be eliminated. They were afraid we would do what we did not do but that which Leader Schumer and others are advocating now, which is to eliminate the filibuster so we could get--they were worried that we would eliminate the filibuster to get what we wanted rather than have to work together on a bipartisan basis.

So the shoe is truly on the other foot now that Democrats have a nominal majority in a 50-50 Senate but with the tie-breaking vote of the Vice President. That is why Senator Schumer gets to be the floor leader even though he doesn't command a majority of Senators.

Back then, when Democrats were in the minority and they were worried about eliminating the filibuster, 33 of them--33--signed a letter insisting that the filibuster be preserved. Among them was the now Vice President, then Senator Kamala Harris.

Senator McConnell, being an institutionalist at heart, agreed, and he never wavered to pressure from anyone, even President Trump, to eliminate the filibuster. But now the tables have turned, and so have many of our colleagues' views on the filibuster.

Instead of resisting pressure to blow up the rules of the Senate and perhaps change it forever, Leader Schumer has gladly accepted his marching orders from the radical left, and he is trying to dismantle the longstanding rules of the Senate, what makes it exceptional, as he said, different from the House--way back when.

Senator Schumer banked on Republican obstruction to justify going nuclear. He is trying to set up a series of votes in order to justify going nuclear to change the Senate into the House, to eliminate the bipartisan command of that 60-vote requirement.

So he engaged in a lot of doom-and-gloom forecasting to predict that Republicans would willy-nilly filibuster Democrat legislation, but it hasn't come to pass. So now he is trying to orchestrate a series of votes that are designed to fail. And they are just that--designed to fail--because they don't represent the kind of hard work that goes into building bipartisan consensus in the Senate.

We kicked things off earlier this week with a vote on a bill that would exploit the cause of pay fairness to line the pockets of trial lawyers.

We will soon vote on the Democratic Party's attempt to seize authority from the States to run elections. This is a bill so extreme that a number of Democrats have said they will not vote for it.

Who knows what might be next, whether it is packing the Supreme Court, making Puerto Rico or Washington, DC, a State with two Democratic Senators each, or whether they will try to use this to erode the constitutional rights of American citizens, for example, under the Second Amendment. But blocking these bills isn't an example of Republican obstruction; it is a destructive act of political theater.

Well, thank goodness there are enough Democrats who are opposed to eliminating the filibuster, apparently. So it appears that Democrats don't have the votes to make this horribly miscalculated rules change. Two of our colleagues have made clear in their statement that they have the courage to stand up for what they believe is right, despite the pressure they are receiving from the far left.

Senators Manchin and Sinema have repeatedly said they will oppose efforts to eliminate the filibuster. They won't accept the short-term gain for long-term pain. Unlike the rest of their conference, their caucus, they recognize the inherent dangers of making this strictly a 51-vote majority institution. They seem to be following the advice of what then-Senator Barack Obama gave back in 2005 when then-Senator Obama said:

If the majority chooses to end the filibuster . . . then

the fighting and the bitterness and the gridlock will only

get worse.

The American people deserve better than that. Chipping away at the right of the minority may seem expedient now, but Democrats would be sure to regret those changes one day, just as they now regret the day that Harry Reid cleared an easy path for hundreds of conservative Federal judges.

In two years, Republicans could win the majority in either or both of the Chambers. In 4, a Republican could win the White House, as well. How would our Democratic colleagues feel then when their rights as Members of the minority are disparaged and ignored? Would our Democratic colleagues support their rule changes then? Would they then believe the Senate minority should be silenced and made irrelevant, as apparently some believe now?

Well, I find it hard to believe that that would be the case. The thing about power in Washington is it is never permanent. Majorities and Presidents change. And there is a reason why the rules should stay the same. If Democrats had the votes to eliminate the filibuster, our country would face a tidal wave of changes: defunding the police, election law hijacking by the Federal Government over the States and local jurisdictions, tax hikes as high as the mind can conceive, restricted rights under the Constitution. You get the picture.

But when the tide inevitably turns, which it will at some point, then the temptation would be on the part of the Republicans to reverse all of those changes. The economy, the government, the average American family would be in a constant whiplash.

The requirement to get 60 votes to close off debate in the Senate is designed to protect our country from the relatively rapid changes of majorities and Presidents, and eliminating it would do serious, irreparable harm, as many of the quoted comments by distinguished Democrats have stated in the past, if not today, at least in the past. So I agree with what Senator Schumer said 4 years ago: We should build a firewall around it.

But in the meantime, there is still a lot of bipartisan work being done here in the Senate, even under the current rules, without the thermonuclear device of blowing up the 60-vote cloture requirement known as the filibuster. But every day that the Democratic leader wastes on political theater, which he knows is not going to succeed, is a day we have wasted in passing bipartisan legislation that will benefit all of the American people, not just a partisan majority.

This is the world's greatest deliberative body. It may be one of the last ones in existence. I don't know any other place in our country or around the world where Senators can come down to the Senate floor and express their views no matter how unpopular, no matter how politically incorrect, but engage in actual debate and exchange of views, which ultimately give the American people the best opportunity to make up their own minds about what policies they agree with and who they trust to protect their welfare.

This is the world's greatest deliberative body. There are far more important ways to spend our time than on political theater.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, the right to vote is the most fundamental and essential feature of our democracy. As Abraham Lincoln said, a government of the people, by the people, and for the people would not be possible if it weren't for citizens who cast their ballot at every available election.

From city councils, to school boards, to Presidents of the United States, the American people have a right and, I would argue, a duty to make their voices heard. In 2020, a record number of voters did just that. Nearly 160 million Americans cast their ballot, accounting for roughly two-thirds of all eligible voters. If you compare that to 2016, just 4 years earlier, 17 million more people voted in the last election. This included higher turnout across all racial and ethnic groups--African Americans, Caucasians, Hispanics, Asians. Each had a higher turnout this election.

When Congress originally passed the Voting Rights Act in 1965, the goal was to eliminate common discriminatory practices that were in place at that time. It was and it is a landmark piece of legislation. There is no question it has been an overwhelming success, and I think that is something we should celebrate as a nation.

In 2012, for the first time on record, turnout among Black voters was higher than for White voters. In 2020, both Asian and Hispanic voters turned out at the highest rate on record. We certainly have come a long way, as the preamble to the Constitution says, in our effort to form a more perfect Union, but we should not tire, nor falter, nor fail in our progress to make sure that everyone who has the right to vote has an opportunity to cast their ballot.

Before every election--and 2020 was no different--there is a widespread effort to register new voters and encourage more citizens to participate. In Texas, we set new records in registering and turning out voters. We turned out 11.3 million voters, 66 percent of those registered. In the years to come, I hope we will set new records and get more voters to the polls. I think that goal should be shared by every American.

But in addition to this work, we have a responsibility to protect the integrity of the ballot. This became a focus in particular after the 2016 election when we actually saw Russia try to interfere with the Presidential election that year.

In response, Congress provided hundreds of millions of dollars to shore up State election security measures and to help local officials safeguard future elections. Our intelligence community and particularly the National Security Agency and Cyber Command made sure that there were no cyber attacks or minimized the impact of potential cyber attacks on election voting systems, including voter registries and the like. The postmortem reviews were that they were pretty successful in deterring those sorts of attacks that occurred in 2016.

But it is not just up to the Federal Government; across the country, States are also fighting to make sure that those who are legally entitled to vote can do so and ensure the integrity of their own elections. They are looking at ways to make it easier to vote and harder to cheat, which I think should be our goal. But those election security efforts have been mischaracterized, unfortunately, by many of our Democratic colleagues and many in the news media who falsely claim that somehow there are efforts underway at the State level to suppress minority voters.

We saw this play out in the case of the Georgia election law in particular. Our Democratic colleagues tried to frame this legislation as a way to suppress minority voters, but that was completely contrary to the facts, and it was completely contrary to the election laws in their own States.

The Georgia law, for example, set a deadline of 11 days before an election to request a mail-in ballot. In the home State of the Democratic leader, Senator Schumer from New York, voters only get a week--11 days in Georgia; a week in New York. And in New York, you have to give a reason for voting absentee. In Georgia, under the proposed changes to the State election law, you don't even have to give a reason to vote absentee.

Georgia also expanded early in-person voting to 17 days. In Massachusetts, represented by two of our Democratic colleagues, early voting lasts only 11 days.

The President's home State of Delaware won't even offer early voting until 2022. In other words, you can't even do it now, and it won't be available until 2022, and even then, voters will have only 10 days.

Well, I think this demonstrates the hypocrisy of some of the debate we are hearing and seeing.

New Jersey, represented by two Democratic Senators and a Democratic Governor, recently passed a law that expanded in-person voting to 9 days. As a reminder, Georgia just expanded theirs to 17 days. But the New Jersey Governor had the temerity to criticize Georgia for ``restricting the rights of Georgians to vote'' when it is more expansive than the voting laws in his own State.

We have heard similar lines of attack from many across the aisle who falsely try to brand this law as a form of voter suppression. Once you play the race card, it is hard for people to think clearly because it tugs at our emotions. It tugs at our collective, frankly, guilt, emanating from the earliest days of our country that we have come a long way to try to rectify.

But here is the bottom line: Each State has the authority to determine the ``times, places, and manner of holding elections.'' Where does that come from? Well, that is article I of the Constitution of the United States of America. But our Democratic colleagues insist on pushing for a one-size-fits-all mandate that turns federalism, including the Constitution itself, on its head.

Senator Schumer, the Senator from New York, has said that this month, the Senate will vote on a bill called S. 1, which is the Democrats' effort to commandeer control of elections from the States. The bill is so radical that Members of his own party have lined up against it, and it is easy, on superficial inspection, to see why.

In order to vote in person, 36 States require some form of voter identification. That was the recommendation of the Commission that former President Carter participated in, along with James Baker III--a prominent President, a Democrat, and a prominent Republican. They made a recommendation for voter ID, but this proposal, S. 1, would eliminate it.

In my State, Texas, there are several options to present voter identification. You can present a driver's license, a passport, a military ID, a citizenship certificate. If you don't have any of those, you can get another one issued by the State at zero cost. Those all work.

This Democratic proposal would stop States, would actually block the States from requiring voter identification--something you have to do when you buy a six-pack of beer or cigarettes, for those who still smoke, or get on an airplane or even enter a Federal building. You have to produce an identification to do so. But S. 1 would prohibit the States from making that requirement when exercising your most sacred right as a citizen. What would they require? Well, you sign a piece of paper saying you are who you say you are, and nobody can ask you any questions.

The invitation for fraud doesn't stop there because this proposed legislation also legalizes something called ballot harvesting. That means that mail-in ballots could be collected by political partisans, whether it is paid campaign staffers or anyone who has a stake in the outcome of the election--not an impartial third party but a partisan who has a stake in the outcome of the election. They could harvest those ballots.

It goes so far as to specify that the States ``may not put any limit on how many voted and sealed absentee ballots any designated person can return.'' So there are no limits on how many ballots a political operative could harvest and turn in and count in the election. Well, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out how this can go wrong. Maybe the ballots get turned in with thousands of others. Maybe some of the ballots are altered. Maybe some are falsified. Maybe some end up in the trash. It is tough to know exactly what might happen.

S. 1, this Federal commandeering of State-run elections, is rife with opportunities for fraud. It mandates things like automatic voter registration and ballot drop boxes, while making it more difficult for the States to maintain accurate voter lists.

It would even go so far as to make it harder for the States to remove dead voters from their rolls. My State, like many States, has an unfortunate legacy of having candidates and political parties cast a ballot on behalf of voters who are no longer alive--box 13, for example. Arguably, that is the way Lyndon Johnson beat Coke Stevenson, by voting the cemetery vote. And that is not unique.

Why would Senator Schumer and Speaker Pelosi be pushing this takeover of State-run elections? Well, it is pretty obvious. They think that our Democratic colleagues will reap the benefits of hijacking State election laws. That is really their goal here. They want to put a thumb on the scale of future elections. They want to take power away from the voters and the States and give themselves every partisan advantage they can.

Those are just some of the features of S. 1. There are others. It would make changes to the Federal Election Commission, which currently has six members, three from each political party. This is intentionally designed to protect the Commission from partisan politics. Regardless of which party controls the Senate or the White House, the FEC will always be fair and balanced. Well, that doesn't serve the interests of our Democratic friends, so they want to change it. The election takeover bill would remove one of the seats held by a Republican and turn the Federal Election Commission into a partisan body--no more equal representation, no more consensus building. Why bother with that when you can steamroll an agenda with no opposition?

Then there is the taxpayer funding of elections. Instead of political candidates going out and making the case to prospective voters, instead of supporters voluntarily backing their preferred candidates with their hard-earned dollars, this bill would force taxpayers to bear the financial burden, even to the point of channeling dollars, your tax dollars, to candidates whom you disagree with who support policies that you do not support. And it is not even a dollar-for-dollar match. I don't know who came up with the idea of $6 from the taxpayer for every dollar that is raised from voluntary donations, but that is the proposal. What a deal. That means if somebody gives a candidate 200 bucks, the Federal Government could match it up to $1,200.

Our Democratic colleagues even managed to get on the wrong side of the American Civil Liberties Union. This bill would implement a new disclosure policy that the ACLU says ``could directly interfere with the ability of many to engage in political speech about causes that they care about.''

But as bad as this proposal is, S. 1, if that doesn't work--and it is looking like, from reading the news recently, it is not likely to work because of defections, even among Democrats--our Democratic colleagues have a plan B.

I want to remind you of what I said at the outset, that the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was one of the most important laws passed in modern American history. It has been reauthorized a number of times over the years, most recently in 2006. I proudly cast my vote in support of reauthorizing the Voting Rights Act. But a new bill introduced by our friend the Senator from Vermont, the senior Senator, sometimes invoking the name of that civil rights icon, John Lewis, his proposal would radically change the law as well, this time putting the Federal Government, not the State, in charge of new voting laws again.

Just a reminder: Back in 1965, part of the Voting Rights Act required States and jurisdictions with a history of discrimination to receive Federal preclearance before they could put new laws into effect.

In 2013, the Supreme Court of the United States struck down the portion of the law that set the formula for which States were included in that requirement. The Court ruled that it was unconstitutional because the coverage formula was outdated. The Court said history did not end in 1965.

Indeed, what happened when the Voting Rights Act was reauthorized in 2006, the proponents of that bill made no accounting for the tremendous progress in minority voting turnout that we have seen since that time. In other words, the Voting Rights Act worked. It worked miraculously, and thank goodness it did.

But the Supreme Court, in striking down the 1965 formula as opposed to the current-day rate of minority voting, the Court said the Congress based the law on 40-year-old facts having no logical relation to the present day.

Here is an example: The formula in 1965 required States to receive preclearance before they could put their own voting laws into effect if they had any test or device, as it was called, that restricts voting. That included things like literacy tests or subjective determinations of moral character. But thanks to the Voting Rights Act, those practices are nowhere to be found today.

The bill introduced by Senator Leahy, the senior Senator from Vermont, would change the formula with language so broad that virtually every State in the Union and every local jurisdiction would have to get their election laws precleared by the Biden Justice Department before they could put them into effect. The trigger for that is a vague number of voting rights violations that wouldn't even require a finding of intentional discrimination. Nevertheless, these State and local governments would be required to get the sign-off of partisan bureaucrats at the Department of Justice to exercise their own constitutional authority.

I think it is important to keep in mind that the Framers of the Constitution wanted the States to chart their own course in elections, not Washington bureaucrats. To quote the Supreme Court of the United States, ``The Framers of the Constitution intended the States to keep for themselves, as provided [under] the Tenth Amendment [to the Constitution], the power to regulate elections.'' Yet, in any instance where your local election official wanted to make a commonsense change in the way your elections were actually carried out, you would have to ask ``Mother May I'' to the Department of Justice.

Based on this proposal, you would think there have been countless unenforced instances of voter discrimination that cry out for this sort of remedy, but you would be wrong.

The Department of Justice already has authority under section 2 of the Voting Rights Act to prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, or membership in a language minority group. During the entire 8 years of the Obama--the Obama--Justice Department, they filed only four enforcement cases in the whole United States under section 2--four.

So the narrative of widespread voter suppression is nothing but a propaganda tactic designed to support a political outcome. The push for a Federal takeover of elections is not about voter suppression at all. It is about unconstitutionally seizing power and never letting go.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, as we all know, in recent years, China has emerged as one of the greatest competitors to the world order. Unfortunately, they don't play by the same rules that the rest of the international community plays by. The Chinese Communist Party is increasingly aggressive and well-resourced and has made no secret of its intent to gain more influence and power.

For everything from national security to economic policy, there is a clear and urgent need to reorient the way our country views and responds to the challenge from China. I am glad the Senate is taking up an important step today through the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act. The cornerstone of this legislation, of course, is funding to bolster domestic semiconductor manufacturing so the United States can compete with China and secure some of our most critical supply chains.

Nearly 90 percent of the semiconductors made in the world are made by countries in Asia, with Taiwan dominating the market with about 63 percent of that total of 90 percent. In fact, one company, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, accounted for more than half of the total foundry revenues last year. As I said, companies in Taiwan control 63 percent of the advanced semiconductor markets.

If for any reason that supply chain was cut off, it would lead to very serious consequences across our entire economy. To address this, Senator Warner, the senior Senator from Virginia, and I introduced the CHIPS for America Act last year to shore up domestic semiconductor manufacturing and reduce our alliance on other countries for one of our most critical products. Semiconductors go into everything with an off and on switch.

The United States is not the only country that spotted this blinking red light, this danger signal. Other countries have recognized the immense risks that exist, and they are also pouring billions of dollars into new foundries. The European Union, for example, is investing up to $35 billion, South Korea is investing $65 billion, and China is investing a whopping $150 billion in semiconductor manufacturing. Our competitors are pouring tens of billions of dollars into boosting their own supplies of these essential semiconductors, and the United States needs to keep up and compete.

The vast majority of our colleagues agree that this was an important and critical task. It was carefully crafted in monthslong, bipartisan, bicameral negotiations, and, in fact, this legislation was adopted as an amendment to last year's Defense Authorization Act by a vote of 96 to 4. Now, though, it falls to us to fund what we authorized in the Defense authorization bill, and there is just one issue standing in the way.

During committee consideration of the Endless Frontier Act, an amendment was adopted that would apply controversial and unnecessary prevailing wage language to the CHIPS for America Act. The prevailing wage provision creates an obstacle to our funding the CHIPS for America Act, and it confers zero benefit on anybody because the manufacturing of semiconductors is a very sophisticated, well-paying business.

Considering the current wages of U.S. semiconductor manufacturing companies, there is zero impact on workers' wages by requiring companies to pay an elevated, so-called prevailing wage. So it is really a nonissue. However, these Davis-Bacon provisions also represent an unprecedented expansion of a partisan labor policy, and applying them to private construction projects, as I said, sets a troublesome precedent.

Leaving this language in the bill has the potential to dramatically weaken support for this essential broader legislation, and I hope we can all agree that the stakes are simply too high to let that happen. I have introduced an amendment to strike this unnecessary and divisive provision and to maintain the strong bipartisan support that the

CHIPS for America Act has earned so far. This partisan provision has no impact on workers' wages, and it should hardly be a reason to forfeit the strong bipartisan support the CHIPS Program has previously received.

It is important that we send a clear and distinct and unequivocal message to our competitors and rivals in China. Republicans and Democrats have worked together to bolster domestic semiconductor manufacturing and to confront one of our biggest looming threats from China. Now is not the time to sacrifice the progress we made.

I encourage our colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support this amendment so we can maintain the strong bipartisan support for this essential program

I yield the floor.

Madam President.

Madam President, during the committee markup on this bill in the Commerce Committee, there was an amendment offered that was accepted that added Davis-Bacon prevailing wage protection to the underlying bill, which is now in the bill before us.

This is purely a gratuitous addition to this bill because the fact is, in constructing these major semiconductor fabs, they pay far greater than the prevailing wage. But perhaps the most dangerous part of this is the fact that this now is being applied to private construction.

Davis-Bacon historically and statutorily has been applied only to public workers. But this is an unnecessary expansion and, frankly, jeopardizes some of the support we are getting for the underlying bill, which we cannot afford to lose any of that support in our competition against China, particularly when it comes to manufacturing semiconductors here onshore and shoring up the vulnerable supply chain.

I would ask colleagues to vote for the amendment.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Madam President, during the first 4 months of 2021, more than half a million migrants have crossed our southern border--a half a million--including more than 50,000 unaccompanied children. Now, nobody really believes that those children got there all by themselves. The truth is, they have been smuggled to the border and crossed the border only to be picked up by Border Patrol, taken care of, as we would all hope they would be, and ultimately be placed with U.S. sponsors. I will have more to say about that in a moment.

In the same period of time last year, there were fewer than 125 migrants who crossed our border, including just over 10,000 children-- half a million so far this year, 125,000 last year, 50,000 children so far this year, 10,000 last year during the same period of time. Put simply, this is not normal, nor should it be the standard operating procedure for the U.S. Government. The truth is, our country lacks the facilities, the personnel, the resources, and the policies to handle this sort of influx of humanity in a humane way.

Back in March, the President tapped Vice President Harris to handle the border crisis, but we have seen no progress to date. In fact, the Vice President, I believe, is in Guatemala today, and she hasn't even been to our southern border. She hasn't visited the facilities where tens of thousands of migrant children have been cared for. And she hasn't listened to the migrants' horrifying stories of how they were treated by the human smugglers that brought them to the border.

We do know the Vice President is finally hitting the trail this week to talk about the border crisis. But that seems to be all it is, is talk. The only problem is, she is not visiting the border. She is not even in her home State of California, which has a border with Mexico. She is in Guatemala.

As law enforcement, nongovernmental organizations, and border communities are being overwhelmed by the surge of migration, the Vice President is meeting with foreign leaders. Now, there is nothing inherently wrong about meeting with foreign leaders, but, surely, she can't think that a conversation with the President of Guatemala is going to solve the human crisis at our border.

The Border Patrol will tell you, as they have told me, mass migration like this is a product of two different actions. One is the so-called push factors, which means people who lack economic opportunity; maybe they are fleeing violence; maybe they just want to come to America to be reunited with some other relatives; and certainly the human smugglers are more than happy at $5,000, and more, a head to help them. But these smugglers, as I intimated a moment ago, are a part of transnational criminal organizations that care nothing for these migrants. They just care about the money. And what they do is they flood the border with unaccompanied children, for example, taking as many as 40 percent of the Border Patrol off the frontlines in the war against illegal drugs coming across the border. And when the Border Patrol is not there--surprise, surprise--the very drugs that contributed to the loss of about 80,000 lives last year in America alone come flowing across, whether it is heroin or cocaine or artificial opioids. You name it, it is coming across the border by the same people who are moving the migrants across the border. Again, they are commodity agnostic. They will do anything for a buck, and they care nothing about the migrants at all.

Well, imagine calling 9-1-1 when your home is on fire and watching as they hose down your neighbor's house instead. That is what it feels like watching the Vice President down in Central America.

For years, the United States has tried to address the crime and corruption in Central America with very limited success. Do they have some modest role in the crisis? Well, yes, but that is hardly where the Vice President's attention should be focused right now. Particularly, she should be focused--and the President focused--on working with us on policies that Congress would pass that would mitigate this humanitarian crisis.

Former Senator Harris's list of legislative accomplishments and her experience solving complex policy problems is not particularly deep. But rather than be critical, I would like to offer a suggestion.

In April, Senator Sinema--the Senator from Arizona--and I introduced the Bipartisan Border Solutions Act to address this unfettered flow of migration. She is concerned about Arizona; I am concerned about Texas. But the truth is, I am concerned about America writ large.

We have been proud to work in a bicameral way, too, with two of our friends on the other side of the Capitol: Congressman Henry Cuellar, a Democrat from Laredo, TX; and Tony Gonzales, from the 23rd congressional district. The four of us live in and represent border States and districts. We have spent time--a lot of time--listening and learning from the men and women who are committed to safeguarding our border and those who care for the migrants and those who live in these border communities.

There are a lot of people out there who will talk about what is happening at the border who have never actually been there, so how in the world would they possibly know? They inaccurately characterize border communities as unsafe, lawless places. That is not true.

They villainize the Border Patrol and other law enforcement Agencies like ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Remember the ``Abolish ICE'' slogan? They are criticizing these public servants for actually enforcing the laws that Congress has passed. Congress passed those laws. These brave men and women are simply executing the laws that Congress itself has passed.

Well, unfortunately, there is a lot of talk here in Washington by people who offer blanket solutions that have nothing to do, or very little, with solving the complex problems that exist. The fact of the matter is, my State of 29 million people has a beautiful, safe, and vibrant border region. I was there last Wednesday, last. The men and women who lead and protect these communities are doing everything they can to fairly and humanely respond to the crisis. But they are being overwhelmed, and they are not getting much help from the Federal Government.

The same is true across our entire southern border. At her invitation, I visited Tucson last Tuesday, a very different border region than we visited on Wednesday, where Senator Sinema came to McAllen, at my request, in the Rio Grande Valley.

I appreciate her and her staff taking the time to learn more about the differences in the border in my State from her State. And I certainly learned a lot by traveling to Tucson and meeting with her constituents.

In Arizona, we visited a soft-sided Customs and Border Protection facility where migrants are processed, and the Tucson sector chief talked about the broad responsibilities his agents have in these facilities.

As I suggested a moment ago, normally, the Border Patrol is responsible for patrolling the border. That is why they call them the Border Patrol. But now they are encountering unaccompanied children and have to leave those frontlines--about 40 percent of them--just to take care of them at these CBP, Customs and Border Protection, facilities.

Well, we need the Border Patrol on the border, patrolling the border so they can deal with everything from encountering a child abandoned by human smugglers to a tractor full of human trafficking victims. They might, and will and do, interdict drugs, weapons, money, or any of a number of contraband being smuggled across the border. Again, as some wise person coined the phrase ``commodity agnostic,'' these transnational criminal organizations that really bring people into the United States from worldwide locations but principally from Mexico and Central America--all they care about is the money.

In the Tucson sector alone, 103 agents were pulled from the field because somebody needed to take care of the migrants. Now they are doing everything from changing diapers to serving meals, to supervising playtime for the children--103 law enforcement officers in the Tucson sector alone who should be stopping dangerous people and dangerous substances from entering our country instead of acting as caretakers and not creating serious gaps in our border security.

Of course, the cartels--these criminal organizations--are pretty smart. This is actually part of their business model. They know that if they flood the border with unaccompanied children, for example, the Border Patrol is going to leave huge gaps that are then going to be exploited by the drug smugglers.

They know about the vulnerabilities that exist on our border. They know about our laws and policies, and they are actively exploiting them. And we are basically letting them. Shame on us.

In the Rio Grande Valley last week, we spoke with a number of law enforcement and community leaders, including the National Border Patrol Council president, Brandon Judd. Brandon told us that, this year, individuals from 151 different countries were processed at the Donna Processing Facility. This is one processing facility in Donna, TX, in the Rio Grande Valley. Last year, they processed people from 151 different countries.

A couple of weeks ago, Customs and Border Protection at the Laredo Port of Entry made a seizure of hard narcotics worth more than $3.5 million of street value. This wasn't from an entire week's worth of drug interdictions; this came from two vehicles that they stopped. One had 20 pounds of cocaine in it; the other had more than 167 pounds of methamphetamine.

This strain on law enforcement poses serious risks to our entire country. The criminals, the drugs, the weapons, and other illegal goods that cross our border are heading to every corner of the United States. And if you think they are stopping at the border, think again. They are traveling to all 50 of the United States.

And while unaccompanied children have become the face of this crisis, there is a ripple effect that extends far and wide. Border Patrol, ultimately, doesn't have the capacity to provide safe and thorough care for these children and patrol our borders and interdict dangerous substances and enforce our laws. Agents are spread a mile wide and an inch deep, and something has got to change.

This is where the Bipartisan Border Solutions Act comes in. We provide for two major changes in the way that migrants are processed to alleviate the strain on law enforcement and improve the way we process and care for migrants when they are in our custody. One, the bill establishes at least four regional processing centers in high-traffic areas. It is, in effect, a ``one stop shop'' for the various government Agencies involved in processing migrants. CBP, Customs and Border Protection; ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement; FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency; the USCIS, U.S. Customs and Immigration Service; and the Office of Refugee Resettlement will all be housed under a single roof.

Migrants can receive medical screenings, have their identities verified, and go through a criminal history check all in one place. And then they will begin the legal process of seeking asylum if, in fact, that is what they are doing. They will complete their asylum interviews, go through legal orientation so they know their rights, and receive the documents and information they need to appear for their future court date in front of an immigration judge.

Our bill also addresses the staffing shortages that have made this situation much more challenging. It requires the hiring of hundreds of CBP officers and Border Patrol processing coordinators so agents can get back on the frontlines. In other words, these processing coordinators aren't going to be Border Patrol agents who are highly trained law enforcement officers. We want them back on the frontlines. But if it comes to processing the migrants and preparing the paperwork, we believe these processing coordinators can help.

Our legislation also calls for 150 new immigration judge teams, 300 asylum officers, ICE litigation teams, and other personnel to help adjudicate these asylum claims.

Right now, the system is completely overwhelmed, and that is exactly what the human smugglers--what we call the coyotes--are planning on. Everybody in Texas along the border, everybody in Arizona, and everybody who lives or works along the border understands what is happening. Again, that is why it would be so instructive for Vice President Harris to actually go to the border.

In order to gain a handle on the mass movement of migrants, we need to make these commonsense changes. When it comes to children, it is not enough to ensure they are safely processed by Border Patrol and then transferred to Health and Human Services' custody. We also need to make sure these children are safe after they have been placed with sponsors in the United States and told to appear for a future court hearing. In most cases, children are released to parents or other relatives, but not always.

HHS reports that in 2021, more than 1,000 children have been released to unrelated individuals or distant relatives they don't even know. While these may be legitimate caretakers, it can also open the door for these children to be exploited or trafficked.

In 2014, the Office of Refugee Resettlement placed eight children with members of a human trafficking ring who posed as family or friends. These children were forced to work on an egg farm in Ohio for no pay for 12 hours a

day, 6 or 7 days a week. They lived in deplorable conditions, and they were threatened with violence if they didn't comply. These distant relatives, unbeknownst to these children, and these unrelated individuals are a big cause for concern, but not the only one.

Before a child is released into the custody of anyone--a parent, grandparent, aunt, or uncle--this person must be thoroughly vetted by the Federal Government because we simply can't hand a child over to somebody who is going to be a danger to them. There is no vetting requirement, though, for other people who live in the same home. And those of us who have dealt with the scourge of child abuse know that about anybody living in the same home with a minor child--particularly, an unaccompanied child who has undergone the trauma of moving from Central America to the United States is going to be a potential victim.

You can have a trustworthy individual identified as taking care of the child, but abuse could be happening under the roof by another person who lives there. Why do we say that? Because, sadly, it happens all the time. Or, heaven forbid, the parent or the relative is the one who decides to exploit the child themselves.

What is being done to prevent this abuse? As it turns out, not a lot by the Federal Government. The Health and Human Services Department requires safety and well-being check-in calls to be made to sponsors within 30 days after a child has been released. But in 2021 alone, the data shows that 18 percent, nearly one in five children, could not be reached after 30 days. Phone calls were not answered. Door knocks were not responded to. And that means that hundreds of children released to the care of these adults in the United States on our watch are lost to the system. We don't know if they are in a safe home or if they are a victim of trafficking or abuse, or whether they simply disappeared, whether they have been recruited into a gang. The U.S. Government simply does not know where they are and what is happening to them. This is a national scandal.

Senator Sinema and I are committed to passing this legislation that provides these critical protections for these children who already have endured a lot of pain and suffering--a lot more than any child should.

Our bill would require criminal background checks, not only for the child's sponsor but for any other adult living in the household. It will bar children from being placed in the custody of anyone who has been convicted of sex offenses, domestic violence, human trafficking, child abuse, or other serious crimes. The U.S. Government simply can't check a box once they have placed a child with a sponsor in the United States. After the initial 30-day checkup, we require another 60-day checkup--as a matter of fact, every 60 days.

Protections for children, streamlined processes, more personnel-- these are commonsense reforms that will address the most urgent issues currently on our southern border.

Bipartisanship, as we know, is in short supply these days, especially when it comes to the debate surrounding immigration and border security. We have folks in both parties and in both Chambers of Congress lined up behind this particular bill. I hope we can add more bipartisan cosponsors.

Our bill has already been endorsed by a broad range of law enforcement, immigration, and business groups--for example, the National Border Patrol Council, National Immigration Forum, and U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. I could go on and on.

As I have said before, and I will say again in closing, if anybody has a better idea, I am all ears. But, right now, all we hear is crickets. No one is offering any bipartisan, bicameral solutions-- anything close to what we have described here. This isn't meant to be comprehensive immigration reform. It is a targeted solution to the most urgent problems at hand.

I would be happy to offer this legislation to Vice President Harris or President Biden as a solution to the crisis on our southern border. I am happy to meet with them. Senator Sinema, I am sure, feels the same, and Congressman Cuellar and Congressman Gonzalez.

We are interested in fixing the problem, not scoring political points, and we can't afford to wait years or maybe even decades to see the circumstances in Central America change. After all, then-Vice President Biden was tapped to solve this identical problem by President Obama. Let me say that again: Vice President Biden was tapped to solve this identical problem by President Obama. Not only was he unsuccessful, but, as we know, it has gotten worse since that time.

We need urgent action to address the crisis we are experiencing today at our Nation's border and the Bipartisan Border Solutions Act is an important first step.

Mr. President, I would like to thank our friend Senator Cramer for telling us this story about this great American patriot. Many of us are of that age where we are the children of members of the ``greatest generation'' who have their own stories to tell. Just listening to Senator Cramer talk about this great patriot who fought at the Battle of the Bulge, one of the most horrific battles in World War II and most consequential battles--that is really where they really stopped Hitler, finally, toward the end of the war--it reminds me of people like my dad who flew B-17s out of England during the last part of the war. Their job was to knock out the Hitler war machine. But there are so many great stories from that generation. These great World War II patriots are getting older, and they are leaving us, but certainly we will always remember them and their contributions. So I appreciate the Senator from North Dakota sharing that with us.

Mr. President, I call up my amendment 1858 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, last year Senator Warner, the senior Senator from Virginia, and I introduced the CHIPS for America Act to help shore up vulnerable supply chains for semiconductors and to reduce our reliance on other countries for the most critical components of everything from the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter to the cell phones in our pockets and everything in between.

The vast majority of our colleagues have agreed that this is a critical task. It was carefully crafted after monthslong bipartisan, bicameral negotiations. In fact, this legislation was adopted as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act by a vote of 96 to 4 at the end of last year. But now we need to fund the program we created, and there is just one issue standing in the way.

During committee consideration of the Endless Frontier Act, an amendment was adopted that would apply controversial and unprecedented prevailing wage language to the CHIPS for America Act signed into law last year. This provision creates a needless hurdle to funding for the CHIPS provision.

Considering the current wages of U.S. semiconductor manufacturing companies, there is zero benefit--zero benefit--to workers' wages. So this is really a nonissue in terms of the compensation that workers in semiconductor manufacturing facilities will make. What is more, these Davis-Bacon provisions represent an expansion of special interest labor policy to private construction projects and set a disturbing precedent.

Leaving this language in the bill is a gratuitous act and could dramatically weaken support for the broader legislation, and I would hope we could all agree that the stakes are simply too high to let that happen. So I have introduced an amendment to strike this unnecessary and divisive language and maintain strong bipartisan support for this program. A partisan provision with zero benefit to workers' wages is hardly a reason to gamble with strong support for the CHIPS Act.

Republicans and Democrats have worked hard together to bolster our domestic semiconductor manufacturing and to confront one of the most dangerous, looming threats from China. Now is not the time to sacrifice the progress we have made. So I would encourage my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support this amendment so we can maintain the strong bipartisan support for this critical legislation and send a message to our adversaries that the United States intends to stay the world's preeminent economic and military power.

Madam President, Texas has always been a proud supporter of an ``all of the above'' energy strategy. We are often recognized as an oil and gas powerhouse, which we are, but most folks don't know that we are the No. 1 producer of energy from wind, the No. 1 renewable resource. In fact, we now produce one-quarter of all wind energy in the United States. So if Texas were a country--and my friend from Vermont may be interested in this--we would be the fifth largest wind energy producer in the world.

And we don't have any plans of stopping there. We are also making serious strides in energy innovation.

A couple of years ago, I visited the NET Power plant in La Porte, TX, right outside of Houston. NET Power is significant because it has developed a first-of-its-kind power system that generates affordable zero-emissions electricity. Using their unique carbon capture technology, they have taken natural gas, one of the most prevalent and affordable energy sources, and made it emission-free. That is what innovation can produce: emission-free electricity from natural gas.

As impressive as this project is, though, it is made even better by the fact that it is not unique. Private companies are harnessing the power of human ingenuity to make our most used energy sources emission- free. Earlier this year, for example, ExxonMobil announced a $100 billion carbon capture and storage project in the Houston area, otherwise known as the energy capital of the world. This would create a carbon capture innovation zone to significantly reduce carbon emissions.

ExxonMobil estimates this project has the potential to store up to 100 million metric tons of carbon per year by the year 2040. A decade later, Houston could be carbon-neutral.

These kind of developments, I think, are incredibly exciting, and they showcase, once again, the power of innovation not by the government but by the private sector.

If we are able to reduce emissions without harming our energy security, raising taxes, killing high-paying jobs, or driving up costs to consumers on a fixed income, why wouldn't we? Breakneck changes in technology have fueled our economy, propelled the communications sector, and completely transformed our daily lives.

It is time to harness American ingenuity to revolutionize the energy sector. Smart policies can't prioritize only conservation, productivity, or economic power. We need to strike a balance of all three. You are simply not going to achieve the balance by imposing heavy-handed regulations or making it more expensive. Unfortunately, that seems to be exactly the path our Democratic colleagues in the Finance Committee want to take.

Over the last couple of years, we have seen no shortage of unrealistic and downright harmful policies that are advocated for in the name of reducing carbon emissions. Some of our colleagues have proposed everything from the socialist paradise that is the Green New Deal to a more targeted but no more realistic net zero emissions bill.

Tomorrow, as I suggested, the Finance Committee will mark up the latest proposal, legislation introduced by Chairman Wyden known by the innocuous name of the Clean Energy for America Act. But the bill is anything but innocuous. The bill proposes a complete overhaul of the energy tax code to finance the full gamut of clean energy policies. At its core, though, it is an anti-fossil fuel bill.

Given the fact that more than 60 percent of our electricity is generated by fossil fuels, that strikes me as a pretty radical position to take. This proposal uses a variety of tax increases to place a squeeze on fossil fuel producers and to push America toward renewables, which accounted for no less than 20 percent of our energy production last year. In other words, they want to push us into the renewable space that only accounted for 20 percent of our energy production-- completely unrealistic

This proposal would drive up costs for American energy producers and consumers, who would be the ones ultimately footing the bill. Namely, senior citizens and those on fixed incomes would be the ones hurt the most.

I also have serious concerns about how this dramatic shift would impact our energy security. The higher cost of domestic oil would, once again, make the United States rely on countries like Russia, Iran, and Venezuela for our energy needs, and obviously we can all see the dangers that would produce.

Our friend John McCain aptly described Russia at one time as ``a gas station masquerading as a country.'' Well, that was pretty funny, but it is also pretty accurate. Having the United States and our other allies over a barrel because of lack of energy diversification and domestic production gives them a lot of power--and too much power.

We know what it has been like for recent decades before we became more self-sufficient when it came to energy production. I remember, back in 1980, Jimmy Carter famously issued the Carter doctrine after the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. He suggested that if anyone, any country, any adversary of the United States were to blockade the Strait of Hormuz, it would be an act of war because the oil that flowed through the Strait of Hormuz was essential for our national security and our economy.

So why in the world would we want to return to those bad old days when we were dependent on imported energy? Well, this issue was further underscored in 2009, when Russia effectively turned off the gas in Ukraine for almost 3 weeks. This affected at least 10 countries in Europe whose natural gas flowed through that pipeline in Ukraine.

If these tax hikes slowly strangle U.S. energy companies, we could end up in the same position: dependent on others for our basic energy needs. After years of building our energy independence and strengthening our energy security, now is not the time to turn back the clock. We simply should not put ourselves in a position where we are reliant on any other country, let alone our adversaries, to keep our lights on and to keep our economy humming.

And the consequences don't stop there. Beyond harming our energy security, the legislation that the Finance Committee will consider tomorrow would kill countless high-paying jobs. It would weaken our global competitiveness and reverse the economic gains we have made because of a thriving oil and gas industry. And that is just scratching the surface of this misguided bill.

One of the most outrageous provisions, though, is the electric vehicle tax credit proposal. We all know that out of the 280 million cars on the road in America, the vast majority of Americans drive cars that run on gas or diesel. When they fill up their tank at the gas station, they pay a user fee, or a tax, on every gallon they buy. Some of that money goes into the highway trust fund, the pot of money that pays to build and repair the roads and bridges we drive on every day. As we all know, though, the highway trust fund is in dire straits. Unless something changes, the shortfall over the next decade is expected to be nearly $200 billion.

Those who drive electric cars don't buy gasoline, obviously. They don't contribute to the highway trust fund. They don't pay anything to drive on the roads and bridges every other American has to pay for and ultimately subsidizes.

The proposal by the chairman of the Finance Committee doubles down on this problem and makes Americans do even more to subsidize the pricey electric vehicles owned by wealthy consumers. This legislation extends electric vehicle incentives, which will come at the cost of other taxpayers, without addressing the fact that electric vehicles are already driving on taxpayer-funded roads virtually free of charge. This is incredibly expensive and benefits only a limited group of wealthy Americans.

Let's compare the cost of this program to the carbon capture projects I mentioned. Current electric vehicle subsidies equate to spending about $455 for every ton of CO2 that is reduced. As a reminder, this applies only to emission reduction for cars. Electric vehicle subsidies have zero bearing on the carbon emission of the manufacturing sector, power generation, or other emission-intensive industries.

Carbon capture and storage, like the ExxonMobil project I mentioned earlier, can apply to virtually every source of emissions and at a much

lower cost. CO2 can be abated for $100 to $200 per ton. That is less than half the price of an electric vehicle subsidy.

I support efforts to reduce carbon emissions to preserve our air, land, and water for future generations, but those efforts don't have to come at this sort of exorbitant price. You can support all energy sectors and innovation and conservation. These are not mutually exclusive.

One great example is a bill I introduced called the LEADING Act, which was signed into law last year. This legislation incentivizes the research and development of carbon capture technology for natural gas and innovation in the energy industry at large. That is how we can keep costs down for taxpayers and maintain this revolution in the energy sector.

So I will continue to push back on efforts to weaken our energy independence and harm our economy in pursuit of arbitrary goals. There is simply no reason to stick taxpayers with the bill for these unnecessary policies when there are better commonsense ways to promote both innovation and conservation.

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

Madam President, a few hours ago, I had the pleasure of joining Secretary Raimondo and Senator Warner of Virginia for a tour of the Micron Technologies manufacturing plant just outside Washington, DC, in Manassas, VA. This is one of the great companies with facilities that produce semiconductors on U.S. soil.

Secretary Raimondo, Senator Warner, and I were given a behind-the- scenes tour of how these advanced chips, or semiconductors, are made, and we discussed some of the reasons why it is more expensive to build these facilities in the United States.

The average American uses countless products every day that could not function without semiconductors. For everything from cell phones, to televisions, to cars and dishwashers, chips underpin our most-used technology. As we become more technology dependent, it is going to get nothing but more important. But it is not just consumer products; cell towers, water treatment plants, agricultural equipment, our energy grid--semiconductors make all of that possible.

These tiny technologies also play a huge role in our national defense. When we send our troops on a mission by land, sea, air, or even in cyber space, they need the best equipment available. Now more than ever, the equipment can't function without these chips.

Just look at Israel's Iron Dome missile defense system. This highly sophisticated system of rocket interceptors is a great example of the role that chips play in national security--not only ours but of our allies' as well. We know that the number of civilian casualties that would be caused if not for the protection of the Iron Dome for the Israeli people would be significantly higher. I asked my staff to find out how many semiconductors are actually in one of those interceptors that knock out one of those rockets coming from Hamas. What I found out is that every single one of these interceptors contains more than 750 different semiconductors.

So it is not hyperbole to say that there are life-and-death consequences to a reliable semiconductor supply chain, but right now, we are in a seriously vulnerable situation. Over the last two decades, the United States has gone from producing roughly a quarter of the world's semiconductors to about 12 percent. At the same time, China, our rival, our competitor that we are talking about a lot this week and last, has gone from manufacturing zero chips to now 16 percent of the world's supply, and it plans to invest another $1.4 trillion in semiconductor technologies.

Right now, China is building 17 fabs, or manufacturing facilities, in China. We are maybe thinking about building one, through Taiwan Semiconductor in Arizona, but it depends on our willingness and ability to support that domestic manufacturing whether or not they actually complete that currently planned manufacturing facility. But when we are looking to our adversaries to supply the technology to power our most critical devices and systems, it is a huge problem.

The global shortage we are seeing right now is a glimpse of what things could look like and worse. The lack of supply has forced companies across the

full range of impacted industries to scale back production or hit pause altogether. We have seen that particularly in the car manufacture business.

This shortage has led to some serious consequences. If companies have to shut down production, which is happening right now, due to lack of supply of semiconductors, there are hard-working Americans who aren't able to earn a paycheck. This impact, as I have suggested, is now being felt by autoworkers across the country.

But we have every expectation that in a few months things will get back to normal. Those production lines will start back up, workers will be back on the job, and life will carry on hopefully as normal.

But the bigger question we need to ask is how would we fare if our supply chain to advance semiconductors was cut off entirely. Let's say it is another pandemic or a natural disaster or, heaven forbid, a military conflict in the South China Sea.

Nearly 90 percent of the world's chips are made in Southeast Asia. If that supply was cut off for any reason, what would we do? The consequences wouldn't be limited to a few bells and whistles on new cars. It would impact our missile defense systems, the F-35--the fifth generation Joint Strike Fighter--advanced weapons systems, quantum computing, and the full range of equipment and technologies our national defense depends on. If we don't have the ability to provide our troops with the technology they need to be successful, what would we do?

Well, the risks of carrying on business as usual are far too high for us to even contemplate that scenario. There is a clear need to invest in domestic semiconductor manufacturing and secure perhaps our most vulnerable supply chain. As we continue to debate the most effective ways to confront threats from China and bolster our national and economic security, there is no question that funding to shore up domestic semiconductor manufacturing is a must-do.

Last year, Senator Warner, the senior Senator from Virginia, and I introduced the CHIPS for America Act, and it was adopted by an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act with broad bipartisan support on a vote of 96 to 4--a rare thing these days. That bill became law earlier this year, and now we have the important job of providing the funding for it, something I hope we can achieve through the legislation that is before the Senate today.

During the committee consideration of the bill, an amendment was added that would apply the controversial prevailing wage language to this portion of the bill. Considering the current wages of U.S. semiconductor manufacturing companies, it really is a nonissue. But what is an issue is expansion of Davis-Bacon prevailing wage provisions, not for public works but to private companies. And I believe the inclusion of this provision includes some roadblocks on the way to passage of this final legislation.

So last week I introduced the amendment to strike this unnecessary and divisive provision and to protect the broad bipartisan support this legislation has already received. A controversial provision that doesn't even enact any real change is hardly a reason to let the funding go down the drain, and it really is just an unnecessary distraction. We don't need any other speed bumps in our ability to pass this important bipartisan legislation.

I hope our colleagues will continue to work with us in good faith to reach a compromise that will earn broad bipartisan support.

Last year the CHIPS for America Act, as I said, passed with a vote of 96 to 4, and there is no reason why this critical funding that we will be voting on this week should be politicized now.

Nomination of Chiquita Brooks-LaSure

Finally, Madam President, on another matter, this evening the Senate will take up a procedural vote on the President's nominee for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

CMS, as we all know, plays a vital role in providing healthcare to our most vulnerable populations. More than 4 million Texans, including half of our children, depend on the stability of our State's Medicaid Program to provide healthcare for them and their families. And in States across the country, Medicare funding is vital to the health of our most vulnerable friends and neighbors for everything from an emergency room visit to mental healthcare. But that could soon change.

The Biden administration has taken the unprecedented step of rescinding an agreement with my State and the previous administration to maintain the stability of our State's Medicaid Program. Under this agreement, Texas was set to receive approximately $11 billion a year over the next decade to provide healthcare for our underserved population. Low-income individuals and those in rural areas are especially reliant on this funding, as are those who need mental healthcare. Mental and behavioral health providers alone receive about $300 million a year.

When asked for the reasoning behind this dangerous and frankly shocking move, rescinding a prior agreement extending our 1115 waiver, CMS said it was to correct their administrative error--their error. But two anonymous Federal healthcare officials, I believe, did something that is all too rare here in Washington: They actually said the truth. They explained the real reasoning to the Washington Post. They said it was done ``to push state officials toward accepting the Affordable Care Act's Medicaid expansion.''

So, in effect, the administration is doing something that the Supreme Court of the United States said it cannot do, which is to hold a gun to the head of the States and force them to accept Medicaid expansion. So now what they couldn't do under the Supreme Court's decision, they are trying to do now by holding our healthcare hostage in order to force the expansion of Medicaid into our State. That is a choice left up to the Governor and our elected legislature, not one to be made by bureaucrats with the Department of Health and Human Services or CMS.

While patients in Texas may be the first ones caught in this political game, I have no expectation that they will be the last. As a matter of fact, there are only four States that don't have approved or pending 1115 waivers, which is what we are talking about--four. There are only four that don't have those. So every other State beyond those four could be in the same situation my State is in, in the coming months. Whether it is Florida, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Missouri, Idaho--the list of States that could be impacted by this life-and-death game of political chicken is a long one.

Of course, this all comes at a time when our healthcare system is already in fragile condition after more than a year of battling COVID- 19. And the patients whose healthcare relies on the stability of the Medicaid system are those who have faced the biggest challenges during the pandemic.

I have asked the Biden administration to work with the State to ensure that millions of impacted individuals won't lose access to healthcare, but so far there has been little or no progress. The administration has been unable to provide me any assurance that an agreement could be reached before the end of this fiscal year-- something that would have dire consequences on our providers and especially those in behavioral and mental health.

To state the obvious, the nominee to lead CMS, Ms. Brooks-LaSure, did not personally rescind the Texas Medicaid waiver. As a matter of fact, she hasn't been confirmed yet; so she couldn't. But before her nomination could advance, Members of the Senate deserve a commitment from the administration that it won't try to force the hand of other States, including Texas, by putting the healthcare of millions of vulnerable citizens on the line.

If we don't stand up now and push back on this reckless move, who will be next? Which State will be next? How far will the administration go to force States into enacting laws that they do not want to enact?

CMS funding is vital to the healthcare of millions of my constituents and to the stability of our entire healthcare system. CMS cannot be used as the administration's strong arm to coerce States into accepting its political demands, which is all this is.

I appreciate Ms. Brooks-LaSure's experience in working with States to develop these types of waivers and her willingness to meet with me on this issue, but frankly this is a decision being made above her in the food chain. But my State has not so far received

an assurance that this action will be rectified, and it looks like the administration is intent on pulling the rug out from under our poorest and most needy patients.

For that reason, I cannot support this nominee, and I urge my colleagues to stand with me and, in doing so, stand up for the healthcare of their most vulnerable constituents, too, and pushing the administration to find an alternate and satisfactory path forward. If the administration will take aim at the healthcare of 4 million vulnerable Texans, they will do it to anyone.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, in my lifetime, China has gone from a poor and isolated country to now accounting for nearly 20 percent of global gross domestic product. There is no doubt that the ingenuity of the Chinese people has contributed to this success, but we know the driving force behind this dramatic rise is the aggressiveness of the Chinese Communist Party. Its aims can be summed up with four R's: resist, reduce, replace, and reorder.

China resists American economic influence by manipulating American businesses and industries and stealing intellectual property. It reduces internal dissent and free expression of ideas through mass surveillance and censorship of its own people, and it seeks to exert its power and influence in the United States. The Chinese Communist Party intends to replace America as the world's technology leader through the Made in China 2025 initiative, which seeks to achieve Chinese dominance in high-tech manufacturing. Finally, it hopes to reorder international norms and institutions around itself. That is their vision. That is their strategy. That is their plan.

Now, the Chinese Communist Party's ruling strategy can best be described as ``win at all costs.'' In other words, they do not play by the same rules we do. And make no mistake, these ambitions paint an alarming picture for the United States and our allies.

Former Attorney General Bill Barr said last year: ``It is clear that the PRC,'' or People's Republic of China, ``seeks not merely to join the ranks of other advanced industrial economies, but to replace them altogether.''

In everything from electric cars to advanced robotics, to artificial intelligence, China aspires to lead global

production and to dominate global production, and they are throwing serious money into the effort to get China there. China is expected to spend $1.4 trillion by 2025 covering investments in everything from 5G to artificial intelligence.

This is not the time for the United States to be complacent, to sit back and watch the Chinese Communist Party pursue tech domination. By the time it has made significant progress, we would be too late. We need to take action now to ensure that our economy and our military can continue to outcompete China, and that is precisely what we can achieve through the Endless Frontier Act.

As Leader McConnell said, a robust amendment process will be critical to this piece of legislation. As I was discussing with Senator Schumer this morning, for most Members, this 1,500-page substitute bill landed on their desks just a little bit earlier this week, so it is going to take a little time for us to understand and to digest the complexity and the ambitions, really, I should say, of this bill.

In the coming days, I hope the Senate will vote on amendments from Members on both sides that will strengthen this legislation and ensure that it addresses the broad range of strategic threats we are facing.

One of the most urgent priorities is to secure the supply chains of our most important products. We really learned that from the pandemic. When the COVID-19 virus hit, starting in China and then spreading around the world, we learned that China made most of the personal protective equipment in the world, and thus we were competing with China and other parts of the world to get access to the personal protective equipment that our first responders, our frontline healthcare workers, and others needed in order to be safe. That was one of the first signs that our supply chains may be vulnerable.

But before any piece of technology becomes usable for its audience, it includes parts and pieces and materials that literally come from around the world. This was the theory of globalization: Go wherever this product can be produced the least expensively. But we didn't count on pandemics. We didn't count on natural disasters. We didn't count on the potential for military conflict to jeopardize the availability of these essential products. Regardless of where a product is finally assembled and packaged, each of those individual pieces is key to protecting the supply chains of our most valuable assets.

Right now, supply chains for everything from cars and cell phones to missile defense, to communication systems are at risk because of one tiny piece of technology called a semiconductor or a microelectric chip. It goes by numerous names.

I have shown a floor chart previously, and I will probably bring it out again sometime here before we are through, but the fact is, the United States relies heavily on other countries for these essential advanced semiconductors.

Nearly 90 percent of those chips are made by companies in Southeast Asia, including Taiwan. As a matter of fact, Taiwan alone produces 63 percent of the world's advanced semiconductors, and we depend on that sole source for these most advanced microchips. One company, Taiwan Semiconductor, accounted for more than half of the total foundry revenues last year, and, as I said, companies in Taiwan control 63 percent of the market.

If for any reason that supply chain was cut off, it would lead to very, very serious economic and security consequences across our entire economy. In recent months, we have gotten a glimpse of what this might look like, particularly when it comes to our car manufacturing capacity.

At the beginning of the pandemic, automaker suppliers predicted a drop in car sales, and so they canceled their orders for semiconductor chips. Semiconductor manufacturers replaced the auto chip capacity with other in-demand products, like chips for personal computers that kept kids learning while they were at home or chips that went into ventilators to keep COVID-19 patients alive. But American consumers kept buying cars at prepandemic rates, and the carmakers needed to make up for the chip to meet that demand. Unfortunately, restoring the production of auto chips is not a quick or easy process. There is a long lead time, in fact, to manufacturing a single chip, which can take up to 6 months.

Although chipmakers are filling auto chip orders, we are still likely to face a shortage that may last throughout the summer. In response, some automakers have removed certain technology and extra features, like GPS, from vehicles in order to reduce the number of chips they need. Others have cut production across the board and laid off some of their workforce. But as bad as that may sound, it could be much, much worse.

The squeeze we are feeling now is more or less the result of a backlog, and we have every expectation that in a few months, things will return to normal. But what if, instead of a decrease in supply due to increased demand, the supply was cut off entirely? This is not some fictional doomsday scenario; it is a real possibility. Our dependence on other countries for these chips could leave us in a very vulnerable position if access were suddenly cut off or restricted.

Unlike the supply chain shortages we experienced at the start of the pandemic for things like PPE, hand sanitizer, and the like, there is no quick fix here. In order to build a single chip, you need very expensive and highly advanced equipment. You need the skilled workforce. And, as I said before, you need quite a bit of time because it can take months to build a single chip, and that is assuming you have the facility and all the equipment ready to go.

A couple of weeks ago, I met with executives in Dallas who represent a full range of businesses and industries impacted by the current chip shortage. An executive at Qorvo talked about how the process of building a new chip fabrication facility isn't just expensive; it is time-consuming. It can take years to receive all of the high- functioning equipment necessary to build advanced microchips. Building a foundry is a huge undertaking that requires a massive investment. A single foundry where these advanced semiconductors are built can cost upwards of $10 to $20 billion--$10 to $20 billion. Indeed, that is the reason why we are so reliant on Taiwan, because it is a low-cost provider. Again, we made the mistake of thinking that cost was the only thing that mattered, as opposed to dependability of our supply chain. So there is a clear need to bolster our domestic semiconductor manufacturing.

The United States is not the only country that sees the handwriting on the wall. Other parts of the world, from South Korea to China itself, to the European Union, are investing billions of dollars in new manufacturing capacity. Right now, as I speak, there is one semiconductor foundry being planned for Arizona by Taiwan Semiconductor. China is building 17 while we are just getting started to build 1.

As I said, the European Union is investing huge amounts of money, about $35 billion; South Korea is investing $65 billion; and China is investing a whopping $150 billion in semiconductor manufacturing. Other countries around the world recognize the risks to their economy and their national security given the current semiconductor manufacturing landscape.

Our competitors are pouring tens of billions of dollars into boosting their supplies, and the United States needs to do likewise, which is why Senator Warner, the Senator from Virginia, and I introduced CHIPS for America Act last year. The premise of this legislation is straightforward: to create a Federal incentive program to encourage chip manufacturing here in the U.S. of A. Rather than rely on manufacturers in Taiwan or China or compete against other countries for the limited supply of chips worldwide, let's bolster the supply of American-made semiconductors. This way, we can secure our most critical supply chains, create thousands of well-paying American jobs, and boost our global competitiveness by supplying made-in-America chips to our friends and allies around the world.

We weren't alone in thinking this is a good idea. In fact, when we considered the authorization for this CHIPS for America Act in the Defense authorization bill last December, it passed with a vote of 96 to 4. So it is clear that the entire Senate understands the

gravity of this issue and its importance. That authorization became law in January, and now we have the job of fully funding these programs so they can actually get to work turning over dirt and getting these foundries off the ground.

The strong support for this legislation on a bipartisan basis shows that this is a priority for a majority of the Members of this body. There is no reason these funding programs shouldn't be bipartisan too.

We are already seeing divisions about provisions related to the payment of a prevailing wage, so-called Davis-Bacon provisions, which is, frankly, dividing us, which is a moot issue given the current wages of U.S. semiconductor manufacturing companies. It is a nonissue for them. Yet some of our Democratic colleagues decided to insert this divisive issue in this underlying Endless Frontier bill.

We should not allow unnecessary or purely political provisions to weaken our strong support to our consensus commitment to deal with these vulnerable supply chains. I am committed to securing funding to bolster our domestic semiconductor manufacturing, and there have been a lot of conversations about the most effective way to do so. But let me be clear. The Davis-Bacon provisions inserted into the committee markup in the Endless Frontier bill is jeopardizing this funding.

I hope our friends on the other side of the aisle will work with us in good faith to come up with a compromise that allows this funding to pass with broad bipartisan support, just like the CHIPS for America Act. There is a clear and present need and, I might say, a clear and present danger to the United States.

We need to bolster our domestic semiconductor manufacturing and secure one of our most vulnerable supply chains. As I said, this is a matter of both our economic and national security and something far too important to fall prey to partisan jockeying.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, the situation in the Middle East is a stark contrast from that of just 9 months ago.

Last summer, the United States helped broker the Abraham Accords--a historic step in the relationship between Israel and the United Arab Emirates. The UAE became the third Arab country--the first Gulf State-- to recognize and normalize relations with Israel. Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan would follow suit shortly thereafter. These agreements mark historic progress toward peace in decades and appear to open a new era of diplomacy in the Middle East.

Today, though, the optimism we felt just a little less than a year ago has been replaced with more violence--more violence--and more destruction than we have seen in years and civilian casualties that continue to climb every day.

Hamas has fired thousands of rockets into civilian populations in Israel. If not for the Iron Dome anti-rocket defense system and the U.S. support and funding that made it possible, the death toll would be significantly higher than it is.

Just as any sovereign state under attack by terrorist forces would do, Israel has defended its citizens. Given the way Hamas uses Palestinian civilians as human shields--a war crime, by the way, for which Hamas alone is responsible--the counterstrikes have carried a human cost.

As the conflict has intensified, some of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle have called into question Israel's right to defend itself. They have acted as though there is some moral equivalency between the terrorist acts of Hamas and Israel's right to defend itself. They have called on the President to speak out against the conduct of Israel but not Hamas. It is as though they think that Israel is somehow a terrorist group, not the other way around.

As I said, Hamas has launched thousands of rockets specifically headed toward civilian targets in Israel. The moral equivalency argument between Hamas's attack and Israel's response is clearly divorced from any reality.

Let's be clear, though. This conflict is not a welcome development for anyone. The Israeli and the Palestinian people are bearing the cost of a conflict that they had no hand in creating.

It is important to remember that two things can be true. First, Israel has a right to defend itself. If Hamas or any other terrorist group or state launches an attack on Israel, its government has both the right and the responsibility to respond and protect its citizens. Secondly, the number of civilian casualties on both sides, particularly the number of children, is heartbreaking. Both of those things are true.

The violence and destruction we are seeing is devastating, made even more upsetting by the progress we appeared to have made just last year. But this is not a conflict between two governments; this is a sovereign state defending itself against a terrorist attack.

I am afraid that message has been lost on President Biden. When asked about the conflict earlier this week, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said the administration is using ``quiet and intensive diplomacy''--``quiet and intensive diplomacy'' while the rockets are raining down on civilian populations in Israel.

The only democracy in the Middle East is being attacked by a terrorist

organization, and the diplomatic strategy of the leader of the free world includes remaining quiet. I am reminded of President Obama's statement--bizarre now, in retrospect--talking about ``leading from behind,'' an oxymoronic doctrine which gave way to disastrous, albeit predictable, consequences in Libya. We continued to see the dire cost of poor American leadership in other foreign countries. In Yemen, in Iraq, Syria, and Ukraine, leading from behind has done nothing but harm the cause of peace.

I hope this serves as a wake-up call for President Biden of the dangers of a similar quest. ``Quiet and intensive diplomacy'' is not the appropriate course when one of our closest allies in the world is being attacked by an internationally recognized terrorist organization.

But we can't lose sight of the country behind the curtain, the silent financier of this conflict, which is Iran, the No. 1 state sponsor of international terrorism, because this is, in fact, a proxy war waged against the Jewish State.

Iran is a prolific state sponsor of terrorism and has felt growing pressure from the United States and its allies in recent years. The Trump administration withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal and placed sanctions on hundreds of businesses and individuals who have helped finance Iran's illicit activities. And there is no question that Iran stood to lose the most from the peace agreements brokered last year. The threat of Iran was largely responsible for these countries to come together and to lay down their arms and to work together.

The Biden administration has made clear it intends to recklessly revive the Iran deal, while loosening the sanctions that would provide the United States leverage to negotiate better terms. These important sanctions target Iran's support for terrorist groups like Hamas, as well as its ballistic missile development and human rights violations.

Removing them now, essentially unilaterally, is a grave mistake. Simply by signaling this intent, President Biden has already emboldened and encouraged Iran's malign activities through its proxies--Hamas, Hezbollah, and others.

This current loss of life and destruction demonstrate that Iran is capable of wielding deadly force, even with lean resources. Fewer sanctions, though, have meant less cash flowing to their terrorist proxies.

This week, we are reminded of the saying that has been around for years: ``If Hamas laid down its weapons today, there would be no more violence. If Israel laid down its weapons, there would be no more Israel.''

America must remain steadfast in our commitment to support Israel, as well as our responsibility to counter threats posed by terrorist organizations like Hamas and malign nation state actors like Iran.

I hope for a day in the future when the Middle East can be a place of peace, stability, and democracy, but we simply will not reach that point without a strong and secure Israel.

I stand in full support of Israel and will continue to fight for a strong U.S.-Israel relationship. The United States does not bow down to terrorist organizations, and we will not allow our allies to be bullied and beaten by Hamas or any other terrorist group.

(Mr. OSSOFF assumed the Chair.

Mr. President, one of the topics of discussion right now here in Washington, DC--actually, there are many different topics of discussion, but one of those is infrastructure. Depending on who you ask, you are likely to get different answers on what exactly people mean when they say the word ``infrastructure.''

When I and my constituents in Texas think about infrastructure, we think about our highways and bridges. Now, those are two of the big things that come to mind. We are home to the largest network of highways in the Nation, as well as the largest number of bridges, and these structures are supporting more and more Texans by the day. It is no secret that, in the last decade, Texas has grown by nearly 4 million people--roughly the population of our neighbor to the north, Oklahoma. If we want to get all 29 million Texans and our visitors and our crucial commercial cargo around the State safely and efficiently, we need a reliable network of transportation infrastructure, and there is a lot of room for improvement over the status quo.

Every year, the American Society of Civil Engineers evaluates America's infrastructure and issues a report card that lets us know how we are doing. Well, America is barely passing with a C-minus. Texas is faring only slightly better than the rest of the class with a C. There is no doubt about it--it is time for an investment in our infrastructure. Now more than ever, that investment must be made responsibly.

We just spent trillions of dollars to help the American people and our economy get through a pandemic, and our national debt is at its highest level since World War II. I have told my friends back home that this is the domestic equivalent to a world war. We didn't ask in World War II: How much money can we spend? We needed to defeat our enemies, and we did. Then we needed to come together responsibly and figure out how to pay for it.

We don't need to quit spending altogether, but we surely must take a closer look at what is necessary and what is desirable and what is something we would like to have but that could be put off for another day. Think of the Goldilocks principle: not too hot, not too cold. In this case: not too small, not too big. We need to find the right size, and we need to agree on what that means.

The most recent highway and transit funding bill that became law was the FAST Act of 2015. That bill came in right around $300 billion. Last Congress, before the pandemic hit, it looked like we were poised to pass a similar bill at roughly the same pricetag. I think we can all agree that, now, something of that size is probably too small. We need to invest in our infrastructure--repair our roads, our bridges, our airports, our levees, and other transportation infrastructure that is long overdue.

The pandemic has highlighted the need to expand that definition, though; for example, to strengthen broadband and internet access. For many Americans, the daily commutes to work or to school have been replaced by virtual classrooms and telework. Our 21st-century economy and society depend on internet connections, and we need to do more to improve access, especially in rural areas, where the big internet companies don't find it commercially advantageous to offer service.

Republicans and Democrats agree that, this time around, we need a larger investment in our Nation's infrastructure, but, frankly, the proposal from President Biden is far too big. The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates it would cost an additional $2.65 trillion--roughly nine times the recent highway bill that became law--and that is on top of the $1.9 trillion that the Senate majority and the House and the President just passed into law purportedly for additional COVID-19 relief, although only about 10 percent of it actually addressed COVID-19. The point is, we have been spending a lot of money, and we can't keep spending money that we are borrowing from future generations.

Not surprisingly, only a fraction of the President's infrastructure bill is dedicated to roads and bridges--5 percent, in fact. The vast majority of the funding goes toward a long list of programs and policies that are unrelated to infrastructure--for example, caregiving for the elderly and disabled; community colleges; programs to improve diversity in STEM careers. All of those are important topics, but they are not infrastructure, and we shouldn't be paying for them by borrowing money from future generations. We ought to figure out appropriate offsets and pay-fors like we used to do here before the pandemic hit. Our job is to find the right-sized bill that suits our needs without going overboard with unnecessary and unrelated spending.

Fortunately, Mrs. Capito, the Senator from West Virginia, is leading the way to find that Goldilocks just-right fit. She and a number of our colleagues have outlined to President Biden and our Democratic colleagues a framework to improve our Nation's infrastructure. The plan they have proposed comes in at $568 billion--more than we have spent in the past but far less than the President's proposal.

When we talk about the need for bipartisan compromise, this is a great place to start. The Republican plan includes nearly $300 billion for roads and bridges--2\1/2\ times the President's plan for roads and bridges. It also invests in airports, drinking and waste water, ports and waterways, broadband, and some of the most urgent infrastructure priorities in our country.

Last week, Senator Capito and five of our Republican colleagues met with Vice President Harris and President Biden to discuss a path forward. They, apparently, had a productive meeting, and the President seemed to be receptive to many of the ideas that were shared. I hope this is the starting point for a consensus package that addresses our infrastructure needs

There is a question that almost nobody wants to talk about, but thanks to Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon and Senator Mike Crapo of Idaho, we actually had a virtual hearing on this this morning in the Senate Finance Committee to answer the taboo question that nobody really wants to talk about, which is, How do we pay for it? As I said, this was the subject of the Senate Finance Committee hearing this morning, and I am sure some of the ideas that were put forward will begin to start to take traction and, hopefully, lead us to a way to responsibly pay for this infrastructure bill.

In the past, funding for infrastructure bills has come from the highway trust fund, but for years, it has faced severe shortfalls. To a serious degree, my constituents in Texas have footed the bill for those shortfalls. We are one of the few States, for example, that receives less than it contributes to the highway trust fund. In other words, we are a donor State. For every dollar we put into the highway trust fund, we get 95 cents back. Well, that is not the same treatment every State is getting. In fact, we have a lower rate of return than every other State. If we want to have any long-term success in maintaining our roads and bridges, we have to bring this formula up to date, and it has to be equitable.

The smart spending, though, can't stop there. We need to repurpose the mountain of unused Federal funds from

the so-called COVID-19 relief bill. States are awash with cash that they, frankly, don't know how to spend. The massive $1.9 trillion bill became law without the support of a single Republican because it was so extravagant and poorly targeted. Case in point: the blue State bailout. This legislation sent 350 billion additional dollars to State and local governments, many of which were not facing any budgetary shortfalls.

We have started to see a flurry of news stories in the past few weeks that have demonstrated exactly why we were opposed to this reckless spending. For example, California has reported a $75 billion budget surplus--a massive amount of money. Governor Newsom says this will be used to pay down past State debts, send direct checks to Californians, and add to its rainy day fund. In addition to California, you have New York, Colorado, Michigan, Minnesota. Each of these States is expected to have more than a $1 billion surplus--again, because of the massive shuffling of cash out of Washington, DC, into the States that was not targeted to COVID-19 relief.

This is exactly why we advocated against this tidal wave of funding for States that were not even operating in the red. Taxpayer dollars shouldn't be spent to erase the debts of mismanaged States or to add to their rainy day funds. They have the ability to raise revenue themselves, so it shouldn't be the responsibility of the Federal taxpayers to bail them out or to provide them with this huge cash cushion with their looking to try to find responsible ways to spend it.

Tens of billions of unused dollars from this legislation should be repurposed to help cover the costs of these investments without driving our national debt even higher. It is common sense, and I actually believe that there is a way to incentivize the States to use that additional cash for infrastructure purposes, whether it is through modifications and cost sharing between State and local governments. Many of those States are struggling to find a way, within the guidelines and guardrails that we have provided for COVID-19 relief, to spend it anyway, so why not spend it for infrastructure? Maybe there is a win-win there.

There are a number of ideas now on the table about how to pay for this infrastructure bill, but I hope we can all agree that the massive tax hike that President Biden is proposing is not the answer. This would constitute the largest set of tax hikes in more than half a century, and these increases would do serious damage to our economy just as we are coming out of a pandemic-induced recession.

At a time when our economy is already on fragile footing, the tax burden on Americans would be greater than that of our biggest trading partners and competitors, and this would have far-reaching consequences for our competitiveness and our economy as a whole. After all, we know these tax hikes won't be reflected in lower earnings for CEOs. The brunt will be borne by consumers, who will pay higher prices, and by workers, who will earn lower wages, and let's not forget those whose jobs have disappeared entirely. We are already seeing some price hikes on some of our most used consumer products, covering everything from cereal, to diapers, to lumber, and to cars.

This is not the time to increase taxes and drive inflation across our economy, which is, actually, a tax increase on low- and middle-income people. We need to find responsible ways to fund an investment in our infrastructure without hurting our economy and the people we represent. Right now, it appears that bipartisan progress is being made toward that just-right-sized policy and for it to be paid for in a responsible way or, at least, that is my optimistic hope.

So I want to thank Senator Capito for her leadership on this effort and all those who have been working with our Democratic colleagues and the administration and encourage them to continue to work with folks on our side of the aisle so we can get this done on a timely basis.

I yield the floor.