Floor Statements

Madam President, without order, there can be no justice. We all know that. Without order, there can be no justice.

This past year, we have seen felony rioting throughout the United States. It doesn't matter whether that felony rioting happened here at the Capitol. It doesn't matter whether it happened in Portland or Chicago or Atlanta or at any of our other wonderful communities throughout the United States. It is wrong, and we have all condemned it. It should be punished, and it certainly shouldn't be rewarded.

My amendment is very simple. It says that if you were one of those rioters and you have received due process, you have been convicted by a court of law of competent jurisdiction, and you have been adjudged to have committed a felony with respect to a riot or civil disorder in the past 2 years, then you cannot participate in the PPP program. We already have that law at the SBA for disaster loans. This would extend it to the PPP program.

What you allow is what will continue. What you allow is what will continue, and that is why I would respectfully ask consideration for my amendment.

Madam President.

How much time do I have left?

Could I ask unanimous consent for another 30 seconds?

Madam President, this is the third time I have brought this amendment--the third time.

Now, you either approve of the rioting that happened this summer and at the Capitol or you don't. The riots this summer killed 47 people. There was well over $1 billion worth of damage.

No. 2, I can't help it if Speaker Pelosi has decided to go home, which prevents us from offering amendments to make this bill better. We all support extension of the PPP program, but this is not right, and it would be a lot more intellectually honest if my colleague, who opposed my amendment, said: Look, we just don't think that if you rioted you should be punished with respect to the PPP program, because that is what a ``no'' vote is saying.

Madam President.

I would like to ask my colleague for 30 more seconds.

Madam President, I just wanted to read the language to you. It says that you are prohibited from getting a PPP loan if you have been convicted of a felony in relation to a riot or a civil disorder in the past 2 years. You either support violence or you don't.

Madam President, I would like to ask that my amendment, Kennedy amendment No. 1401, be called up.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that we dispense with the reading.

Mr. President, I am sure you have been to Paris. The architect, as you undoubtedly know, who designed the Louvre's iconic glass pyramid was actually an American. He was an Asian American. His name was I.M. Pei. Mr. Pei emigrated from China to the United States in the 1930s.

By the time he passed at the age of 102, he had designed a number of famous buildings. He had done that all across the world, including on U.S. soil, including the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library.

America is proud of Mr. Pei. He is just one of millions of Asian Americans whose talents have helped America continue to be an exceptional nation, a nation made up of exceptional people who take advantage of all of the opportunities that these United States have to offer.

The contributions of individual Asian Americans have helped our country pioneer--and the Presiding Officer knows this--advances in architecture, in medicine, in art, and in technology. But, more than that, Asian Americans are our friends, and they are our neighbors.

The recent murder of Asian-American women in an evil assault in Atlanta was an assault not just on the Atlanta community but on the United States of America. President Biden has correctly denounced these attacks, and he is not alone.

I know the Presiding Officer can join me in this. I condemn these evil murders in the strongest possible terms. No one can justify--no one--the brutal theft of eight lives. Every community--every single one--across our country is grieving for the victims and is grieving for the families.

These victims were all made, they were each made, in God's image, and Americans know that. I also feel the same way about the shooting in Boulder. We all do.

America pioneered government that is based on inalienable rights that God gives each person. God has imbued every man and woman with dignity, and Americans answer that dignity with respect, respect for each individual and their right to make the most of the manifold opportunities our country offers.

Unfortunately, President Biden's rhetoric in defense of the Asian- American community is not altogether matched by respect for the right of Asian Americans to reap the reward of their talent and grit.

The Biden administration, thus far--it has time to correct its course--has shown and did show right out of the gate a determination to stick its head in the sand while some of America's top universities are actively discriminating against Asian Americans.

Last year, as the Presiding Officer knows, the Justice Department sued Yale University. The Justice Department contended that Yale rejected many qualified Asian-American applicants on the basis of race--not on the basis of qualification, on the basis of race.

The decision by the Justice Department came 2 years after several Asian-American organizations filed a complaint with the Department of Justice

and the Department of Education that accused Yale of what I just described: racial discrimination.

Yet only a few weeks--only a few weeks after President Biden set up shop in the Oval Office, the Department of Justice withdrew its own lawsuit based on racial discrimination against Yale University, and that is an actual fact. Watch what we say, not what we do.

Unfortunately, Harvard University also seems determined to discriminate against Asian-American applicants. In 2014, Students for Fair Admissions sued Harvard, claiming that the school was using an application system that intentionally reduces the number of Asian Americans through evaluations that are subjective and potentially racially biased.

You see, Harvard apparently believes it knows how to discriminate in the right way. It believed the same thing a number of years ago when it limited the number of Jewish people who could attend Harvard.

When Harvard considers an applicant, the school doesn't just look at their grades or their test scores or their academic awards. In fact, the admissions team at Harvard often looks past these objective indicators to a student's--this is what Harvard calls it--personal ratings, which is an unfair, ridiculous, and a subjective standard.

These personal ratings, as Harvard calls them, supposedly take into account character traits like humor, sensitivity, helpfulness, and courage. For years, Harvard has consistently granted lower personal ratings scores to Asian Americans than it has to other applicants, and that, too, is a fact.

The judge in the Students for Fair Admissions' lawsuit wrote the following:

The data demonstrates--

These are the judge's words, not mine.

The data demonstrates a statistically significant and

negative relationship between Asian American identity and the

personal rating assigned by Harvard admissions officers,

holding constant any reasonable set of observable

characteristics.

I didn't say that; the judge in the case did.

Now, I want to be fair. It may look smart or wise for Harvard to look for well-rounded applicants--I get that--until you realize and think about that these personal ratings are not just subjective; they are subversive. If you think about it, the scores, these scores--they are not objective like test scores or grades or extracurricular activities; these personal ratings are value judgments that can easily be tainted by racial bias. It is clear that the personal ratings minimize the accomplishments of Asian Americans in particular.

Just look at the numbers. Harvard's admission scores work like this: They use a scale of 1 to 6. One is the strongest possible rating. When it comes to personal ratings--remember, this is the subjective analysis of the personhood of the applicant by Harvard, not the test scores, not the grades, not the extracurricular activities. When it comes to personal ratings, only 17.6 percent of Asian-American applicants receive a score of 1 or 2--17.6 for Asian Americans. For African Americans, that number is 19.01 percent. For Hispanic Americans, it is 18.7 percent. In fact--and these are the numbers--Harvard gives Asian Americans the weakest personal ratings of any ethnic group, bar none.

Harvard admissions officials have reportedly handed out these scores without even interviewing all of the candidates in question--personal ratings without interviewing the applicants. This happens now despite the fact that Asian Americans have the highest grades and test scores. So on the objective criteria--test scores, grades--Asian Americans have the highest scores. What pulls them down? The personal ratings.

Harvard officials admitted in 2013 that if Harvard considered only academic achievement, then proportional Asian-American representation that year would have doubled. Think about that. If Harvard went on the objective criteria--extracurricular activities, grades, test scores-- twice as many Asian Americans would have been admitted to the university. Why weren't they? Because of the personal ratings. They call it ``personal'' even though many of the applicants are never even interviewed.

The Department of Justice has historically supported the Students for Fair Admissions lawsuit. In 2018, the Justice Department filed a statement of interest in the case. Last year, the Justice Department filed an amicus brief in the case. A Federal judge ruled against the plaintiffs in 2019 in the case. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit upheld that decision last November--this despite the fact that the Federal district court judge in the case openly acknowledged that Harvard grants lower personal ratings scores to Asian-American applicants.

The fruits of Harvard's policy are pretty clear. You don't have to be Mensa material to figure this out. The Ivy League school has repeatedly rejected highly qualified Asian-American candidates because of their race.

But there is still hope for justice for our Asian-American students. The Supreme Court may well take up this case, and the White House could defend the cause of merit against Harvard's alleged racial discrimination.

So let me say this as clearly as I can. If President Biden--if the Biden team is committed to fighting racial discrimination against Asian Americans, if President Biden and his team want to lift up Asian Americans, as they say they do, it is not hard to see how countering racist policies within the privileged halls of Harvard--a school that receives Federal dollars--it is not hard to see how supporting that litigation must be part of President Biden's commitment. So today, with all the respect I can muster, I am calling on President Biden and his Justice Department to support the Asian-American students who have brought their case against Harvard.

Harvard is an extraordinary school. Nothing I say is meant to denigrate the quality of that great university. But being a pillar of higher education doesn't mean that Harvard is above the law. I.M. Pei attended Harvard in the 1940s. Who knows if they would accept him today because of his personal rating. You know, that is a shame, and it shouldn't stand.

President Biden should stand up for the rights of Asian Americans to be treated fairly by America's schools. His Justice Department should support this lawsuit.

To be is to act. All we are is the sum of our actions. Everything else is just conversation. Don't just talk about supporting Asian Americans; do it. Do it. Please don't be selective in the reality you choose to accept.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I have a motion to commit at the desk, and I ask that it be reported.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 2 minutes of debate equally divided.

Mr. President, my amendment would prohibit the Small Business Administration from providing any assistance including, but not limited to, Paycheck Protection Program 7(a) loans or other small business assistance to anyone who has been convicted during the past 15 years of a felony during and in connection with a riot, a civil disorder, or another declared disaster. Without order, there can be no justice.

Mr. President, it is a felony for rioting. We shouldn't be giving them money.

Mr. President, I want to talk a few minutes about the good people of China, about Confucius Institutes, and the Chinese Communist Party.

I meant what I said when I referred to ``the good people of China.'' You visited China, Mr. President. The people of China are wonderful people. They are engaging. They are smart. They have a great sense of humor. They have built an extraordinary economy.

I wish I could say the same about their authoritarian government, but I can't. The Communist Party of China is trying to not only swallow China, it is trying to swallow the world.

We helped the Communist Party of China be admitted into the World Trade Organization. We were told that if we did, they would embrace free enterprise. We were told that the Communist Party of China would be a valuable participant in a stable world order. None of that has come to be the case.

We know what the Communist Party of China has done to Hong Kong. We know what the Communist Party of China has done to the Uighurs. We know what the Communist Party of China has done to the wonderful, wonderful people of Tibet. But I did want to make that distinction between the authoritarian government of the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people.

The Communist Party of China, being as aggressive as it is, has for a number of years reached out to our colleges and universities to establish what the Communist Party of China calls ``Confucius Institutes.'' And this was the pitch made by the government of China to our universities: ``We will give you bucket loads of money if you''-- our American universities--``will allow us to establish Confucius Institutes where we can explain our culture to the young people of America, where we can have a free exchange of ideas, and where we can help young Americans learn the Chinese language if they would like.''

That sounds great. You know, I will take a dozen of those. But the Communist Party of China being the Communist Party of China, that is not how our Confucius Institutes have worked out.

These institutes, run by the authoritarian Government of China, will not allow the free exchange of ideas. They will not allow anyone to talk about the Uighurs or the people of Tibet or Hong Kong or what happened at Tiananmen Square. They basically--``they'' meaning the Communist Party of China--have used these Confucius Institutes as propaganda arms of their government.

Many of our universities have done the right thing. They have said: No, we stand for the free exchange of ideas, and if you are going to come on our campus and tell our people that there are things they can't talk about, then, respectfully, you need--you, the Confucius Institutes--to leave our campus.

But some of the universities haven't done the right thing. I am not suggesting that--I am not cynical enough to suggest that it is all about the money, but you can't ignore the fact that I think the Communist Party of China has given our universities, through the years--don't hold me to this figure exactly--but about $150 million to set up these Confucius Institutes. Universities, you know, they build that money into their budget, so they are reluctant to see the Confucius Institutes leave--not all of our universities but some of them. I recognize the economic reality.

I have a bill that would say to--we wouldn't get rid of Confucius Institutes. It will just tell our universities: You have to properly manage them. You can't allow the Confucius Institutes to stay on your campus if the Confucius Institutes will not allow for the free exchange of ideas.

If kids--I shouldn't call them kids. If young people in our universities want to talk about Tibet, they get to talk about Tibet. And the bill would say that the universities have to take back control of these Confucius Institutes from the Communist Party of China; otherwise, they are not going to be eligible for Federal funds.

My bill, once again, doesn't kick anybody off campus. It just says you have to--you, the Communist Party of China, have to do what you originally told us you were going to do.

My bill has--our bill, because the Senate passed it twice. Twice this bill has passed the U.S. Senate, the last time with bipartisan support. We put the bill on the NDAA, and, Mr. President, you know how conference committees work with the NDAA. Sometimes it is a ferret fire drill, and there is a lot of confusion, and somehow the Confucius Institute bill got watered down to do nothing in the conference negotiations on the NDAA. I am not criticizing anybody, but it happened.

So I am going to ask my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to pass the Confucius Institute Act for a third time, and I hope, in our new Congress, we can keep teeth in it in working with our colleagues, not only in the Senate but in the House.

Toward that end, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 590, introduced earlier today.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, since we have a few minutes here--I think Senator Sanders is supposed to be next--I just thought I would take a few minutes to talk about President Biden's coronavirus bill.

Let me see if I can explain why so many of my Republican colleagues-- and I am a part of that--are disappointed in the bill. This bill will be our sixth coronavirus bill. I don't think anybody, any fair-minded person, can accuse the U.S. Senate, both Democrats and Republicans, of not trying to respond to this devastating virus and the economic problems it has created.

I have been very proud, within the first five bills, that we did it on a bipartisan basis. We spent a lot of money, about $4 trillion. That is 4-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0 taxpayer dollars. And, of course, we don't even have 5 percent of that. We borrowed every bit of it. It is a staggering sum. But we did it because we had a crisis. We had to deal with it. That is what we were sent up here to do. We did it on a bipartisan basis. But this, the last bill, President Biden's most recent bill--we call it the $1.9 trillion bill--we haven't done it on a bipartisan basis. I am disappointed in that.

I understand politics. The Presiding Officer does too. But I listened very carefully to President Biden throughout the campaign and in his 6 weeks of this administration, and he said very clearly and repeatedly: You know, I want to work with everybody. What I heard him say to the Republicans was: You know, I want to meet you halfway.

I don't mean any disrespect, but if that is the case, either he or the people around him are not very good judges of distance.

It has been made very clear to us that there would be no negotiations on this bill and that President Biden decided to proceed to reconciliation, which only requires a majority. And I think we both expect there to be 50 Democratic votes in favor of this bill and 50 Republican votes against it, and Vice President Harris will break the tie. That is not a bipartisan bill, and I regret that, and I think it could have been different.

You know, we can debate about whether we need $1.9 trillion, and I understand there are good arguments on both sides. I have heard the arguments, and I have listened carefully to my Democratic friends explain why they think we need it. There is another side of the story, and that is that, thank the Lord, we enjoyed 4 percent GDP growth last quarter. Most economists reckon that we will have about 6 percent GDP growth this year. The American people have about $1.6 trillion in excess savings. We have all this liquidity that, as soon as it is allowed to be

released, is going to stimulate our economy substantially, in my judgment.

Everyone involved is doing a wonderful job on the vaccines. President Trump's team did a wonderful job. President Biden's team is doing a good job. The Governors seem to be doing a great job. People are getting vaccinated. We know that we have a lot of people in America who had the virus and didn't even know it. We are rapidly approaching the point where, either through vaccination or people who had the virus and therefore have the antibodies, we are going to have way over the majority of American people protected.

So one point of view is that we don't need to spend $1.9 trillion, but there was a middle ground here, and I am disappointed that the President took the position that, look, we need to spend $2 trillion right now, even though there is $1 trillion at least in previously appropriated funds that we haven't spent yet.

Now, a reasonable approach would have been to say: Do we really need to spend $2 trillion? Maybe we ought to spend the other $1 trillion and see if that will do it. Another reasonable approach would have been to say: Maybe we ought to reprogram some of the $1 trillion that hasn't been spent. For example, we appropriated I think about $70 billion to our elementary and secondary schools. They have only spent $4 billion, so why are we giving them another $160 billion in President Biden's bill? Maybe--I am not saying it is the case, but we ought to explore it--maybe the schools didn't need the full $70 billion we gave them if they have only spent $4 billion or $5 billion. So maybe we can reprogram some of that money.

Now, if we had this money sitting in a checking account, I would still think--because it represents a scarce resource, I would still think that we need to take a look at the money we have already sent and either spend it, if it is well placed, or reprogram it before we go out and spend $2 trillion. But we don't have the money in a checking account. We will borrow every penny of this money, $2 trillion. That is going to bring debt up to 27, 28, 29 trillion dollars, and we know that right behind it is going to come a green infrastructure bill. I am hearing that could be $2 trillion to $3 trillion more. At some point, we are going to run out of digits. I mean, at some point, we are going to have to change the name of the Department of Treasury to the ``Department of Debt'' because there is no treasury left. It is all debt.

The other thing that bothers me about the bill is President Biden-- and, again, I understand politics. He has marketed this bill as an emergency. It is an emergency. We have to do it now. Right now, we need $1.9 trillion to deal with the economic crisis caused by the lockdown. And I understand that argument and that there currently are some Americans who need help, but if what the President is saying is accurate, then why is so much of the money not even going to be spent until a year from now?

I look at the bill, and I say, if all that is true to deal with an immediate crisis, why are we giving money to States and local governments that have actually seen their revenues go up? Why? There is no crisis. And I look at the bill and I ask myself, you know, why are we giving money to bail out pension plans? Can we talk about this? And I look at the bill and I say, why, as I just alluded to, why are we giving $160 billion--I think that is the figure--$160 billion to our elementary and secondary education institutions when we have given them $70 billion in the past and they have only spent $4 billion? Where is the fire? They have $65 billion or so left. This is real money. There is no money fairy.

I look at the bill--I mean, I want to help the American people. Gosh, many of them do need help. But should we really be sending stimulus checks to people who have never missed a paycheck out there? Do they really need the money if they haven't been laid off and if they have been paid the entire time of the lockdown? Why are we doing this?

Couldn't that money--first of all, one option is not to spend it if there is not a need. We can pay down our debt or at least not increase our debt. Another option would be to spend it on something that we really need.

I come to the conclusion--I am not trying to be mean-spirited, but that is why I say calling this a coronavirus bill, you know, it is like calling Harvey Weinstein a feminist. This isn't a coronavirus bill, not the way it has been portrayed.

Now, the American people still have needs. We still have some folks, primarily in the leisure industry and in the travel industry, who need our help. They do need help.

We have a lot of folks who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own. They are on unemployment that is about to run out. They need our help, and we ought to help. But the right way to do this is to sit down as a body--Democrats and Republicans--and go through our needs, not our wants, because that is another problem with this bill; it is more ``wanty'' than needy. Let's go through our needs, and let's discuss how much money we should appropriate to those needs in light of the facts that we have already spent $4 trillion and we have a bunch of money left over. And that is not the way this is being done.

This is just being rammed down our throats. This is just raw gut politics, which I understand. I have been around it. You have, too, Mr. President. We have both been around the block a few times. But that is not how you allocate scarce resources.

The final point I will make is, I know when we did the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act--``we,'' meaning the Republicans--we went through reconciliation. We did. And so a fairminded person might be thinking, well, Kennedy, you know, how can you criticize your Democratic colleagues for using reconciliation if you did it? And that is fair, except when we did the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, we asked our Democratic friends in leadership: Can we sit down and see what we can put together? And we were told: No, we don't want to reduce taxes.

That is not what happened this time. Ten of my colleagues--I wasn't invited, and that is OK. But 10 of my colleagues went to the White House and visited with President Biden for 2 hours and came back and said: You know, I think he may want to put a bill together. And we were excited. We were going: Yay, that is great. Wonderful.

Then, the next thing we knew, the White House issued a statement and said: Our idea of unity is to do what we say and don't ask questions.

Both of us know that is not unity.

So all of this could have been avoided. It all could have been avoided. And I think we are going to end up spending money that doesn't need to be spent right now. I think we are going to end up spending money where we don't need to spend it.

I am so glad that Senator Schumer withdrew his bridge project and that Speaker Pelosi withdrew her Silicon Valley subway. That is just spending porn as far as I am concerned.

But, in any event, I wanted to get that off my chest. We are going to go through a vote-arama, where we all offer amendments. Maybe together we can make this bill better and get rid of some of the spending porn, as I call it, and do the job that the American people sent us here to do.

Thank you.

I don't see Senator Sanders. I'm sorry.

With that, I yield to my good friend Senator Peters.

Mr. President, I am going to talk for just a few minutes about the need to open our schools. I think you would agree with me because I followed your career--with admiration, by the way--that our country is only as good as its dreams and we are only as valuable as our children. And, in my judgment, we are doing immeasurable damage in this country to our children.

We all know that we had to close down our public schools and our parochial schools and our private schools, pre-K to 12, because of the coronavirus, but I think most fairminded Americans understand that we need to open them.

The future of this country is education. It is not the level of the stock market. It is not the unemployment rate. It is not who the President is. It is education, and we know that. So why aren't we opening our public schools when we know it is safe to do so?

I am very proud of our efforts in Louisiana. Seventy percent of our public school students are back learning in person--70 percent. And I want to thank every teacher, every parent, every school board member, every maintenance worker in our schools, and anyone who directly or indirectly influenced this result. They are heroes in my opinion. Seventy percent--I am so proud of that.

I especially want to thank our teachers. I have been a volunteer public school teacher in Louisiana for--I don't know--20-plus years. I do it three times a year, and I am a real substitute--none of this go for an hour and talk about how a bill becomes a law. I am a real substitute: quarter to 7 to 3, teach five classes, do your bus duty, your lunchroom duty, and get worn out. So I have some appreciation for what it takes to teach, particularly in this difficult environment, and I especially want to thank our teachers.

But that 70 percent figure that I am talking about, the number of our public school children in Louisiana who are back to in-person learning, is only 40 percent nationwide, and that is an embarrassment. That is a disgrace. We are doing immeasurable damage--immeasurable damage--to a generation of children.

Now, I don't need to tell you we have been struggling with elementary and secondary education for the last 40 or 50 years, and it is very frustrating because Americans can do extraordinary things. We can unravel the human genome. Americans can take a diseased human heart and replace it with a new

one and make it beat. Americans can send a person to the moon and bring him back or her back. But we struggle to teach our kids how to read and write and understand the meaning of their diplomas when we have 18 years to do it.

Now, there are a lot of reasons for that, and I am sure not blaming anybody, and I don't want to digress. But my point is, we were struggling before the coronavirus. That should tell us that now more than ever, given our circumstances before the coronavirus, we need to take meaningful steps to get these schools back open.

We know that it is safe. The CDC Director under President Trump has said it was safe. The CDC Director under President Biden has said it is safe.

Vaccination across America is--we started out a little rocky, a lot like our testing program, but it is getting much better.

I read an article the other day in the Wall Street Journal, written by a Johns Hopkins researcher, physician, who said, in his opinion, about six or seven times more Americans have had the coronavirus than we know of; therefore, they do have immunity. And he said, coupled with the number of people who have had and survived coronavirus and our vaccine program, which is getting more aggressive every day, we could have a substantial reduction in the number of coronavirus cases by March and April. Indeed, we have seen the decline in the number of our cases now, today, starting from early January. They have declined dramatically. And people smarter than me have suggested it is our vaccines, it is the approach to herd immunity, and, of course, it is the habits that we have developed in terms of social distancing and masking and good hygiene.

But my point is that the experts, the science, all tell us that it is safe. And I have to tell you, I don't mean to be unfair because I know it is complicated, or it can be, and I don't mean disrespect, but I have been very, very disappointed with President Biden. He has flipped and flopped on this issue like a banked catfish. He has said we need to follow science, but he refuses to follow the science in terms of opening our schools.

We know it can be done because we have been doing it in Louisiana. We have done it. If you look nationwide at the number of private schools that are open, back with in-person education, the number of parochial schools, the number of Catholic schools--they are doing it. Why can't we do it in our public schools?

It is not money. For our first five coronavirus bills--I am not counting President Biden's proposed bill. Through our first five coronavirus bills, we have appropriated between $70 billion and $80 billion to our public schools to get them back open. Our public schools have spent $5 billion out of 70 to 80--I think it is $70 billion. So it is not a matter of money. I think it is just--I am not sure what it is. I don't want to be a cynic and say that it is a matter of will. But here is what I am asking President Biden to do; here is what I would do if I were King for a day. I am not; I don't aspire to be. But here is what I am hoping that President Biden will do this afternoon: Call a press conference, and look the American people in the eyes, and look our school board members in the eyes and our teachers and our parents and our maintenance workers and say that we need to open up.

If we really believe we are only as good as our dreams, we are only as valuable as our children, then we need to act like it. And I think President Biden needs to call that press conference. He doesn't need to talk about the science, though that is important, or the politics or nibble around the edges. He needs to look the American people in the eye and say: By God, open the schools. Open the schools. Our kids deserve no less.

There is not much I agree with former Congressman and Mayor Rahm Emanuel on, even though I think he is a bright guy, but politically we approach the world differently. But he said when he was mayor that kids drop out--not in the 12th grade. They drop out in pre-K and kindergarten and the first, second, third, and the fourth grades. We are going to lose a whole generation of kids here.

I see I have some additional time while we are waiting on Senator Schumer. I think I am going to take my additional time--and I will cut it short if Senator Schumer is here--to talk about another issue

Mr. President, I want to talk about the European Union's approach to Russia. We know that in February, the Russian Government sentenced Alexei Navalny, a very prominent opposition leader to Mr. Putin, to almost 3 years in prison. And shortly afterward, Mr. Putin directed that thousands of Mr. Navalny's supporters who were protesting be arrested.

What was he--what were his supporters--arrested for? Criticizing Mr. Putin. Navalny's imprisonment comes in the wake of his near-fatal poisoning, about which we have all read. And what happened to Mr. Navalny should be a wake-up call to our friends in Europe. It is certainly a wake-up call to the American people.

This isn't the first time that Mr. Putin has tried to get rid of a dissident. Unfortunately, it probably won't be the last. For years, Russia has been making trouble, both at home and abroad. Mr. Putin has made trouble here in America, about which we all know. Domestically, opponents of Mr. Putin have been arrested. They have died in prison. In some cases, they have been murdered. We all know that.

Now, if this is how Mr. Putin is going to treat his own people, imagine how he would and has treated foreign countries, particularly our friends in Europe. Russia has launched an unjustified invasion of Georgia. It still controls large parts of Georgian territory. In 2014, Mr. Putin invaded Ukraine. He illegally annexed the Crimea. He started a war in Eastern Ukraine. It cost about 14,000 lives.

But Russia's aggression--Mr. Putin's aggression--and let me say, I am not impugning the people of Russia. They are wonderful people. I admire them deeply. But their leadership, their political leadership, is lacking. And Mr. Putin's aggression begs the question: If NATO troops did not stand in the way, what else would Russia do? Who knows what would happen to Poland and the Baltic States and other countries that were once part of the Soviet sphere.

The Economist puts it this way--I am going to quote:

Russia's gangsterism has become impossible to ignore.

Russia's gangsterism has become impossible to ignore.

But our friends in Europe seem to be doing a pretty good job of it.

The Navalny case shows that criticizing the Kremlin comes with a cost, but it is a cost that we and the European Union can and must bear because the price of appeasement is too high. And our European friends can do it, taken as a group. Senator Schumer knows this. The EU's power surpasses Russia's by far. The EU is a bloc of 450 million people. Its GDP is nine times larger than Russia's.

Russia's economy is only slightly bigger than Spain's, and it is smaller than the economy of Italy. A lot of people don't realize this, but Russia--look, I will concede them this: They have nuclear weapons and good spies. But the economy of Russia is smaller than the economy of New York State. So why is Europe so content to be bullied?

I am going to give you a quick case in point. Josep Borrell visited Russia following Navalny's imprisonment. Mr. Borrell is the EU's top foreign affairs official. He allowed--stood there and allowed--Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov--I know Mr. Lavrov. Perhaps you have met him, Mr. President. I understand his personality. He doesn't exhaust himself trying to win friends. But Mr. Borrell, representing the EU, its top foreign official in foreign affairs, stood there and allowed Foreign Minister Lavrov to push him around shamelessly. The Russian Foreign Minister insulted the EU. He called it an unreliable partner while Borrell stood there and said nothing--nothing.

Another example, Germany. Germany is still supporting construction of the Nord Stream 2 Pipeline, a project that is going to leave Europe even more reliant on Russian oil and gas. We are going backward here. This is going to make the EU even more vulnerable to Russian influence because we know that a more independent Europe becomes--the more Europe becomes dependent on Russian energy, the more reluctant it will be to defend itself against its neighbor's bullying.

I don't want to beat this point to death. America is ready to do its part. We have imposed sanctions on Mr. Putin. I support President Biden's attempt to engage our friends in Europe and our effort to try to convince China to become a stable part of world order, but we shouldn't forget to do the same thing with respect to Mr. Putin. Mr. Putin's aggression should teach us something: What you allow is what will continue

I yield the floor to the distinguished Senator from New York.

Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 782 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, we guarantee freedom of speech in America. Unlike other countries, we also guarantee freedom after speech. One form of freedom of speech is the right to peacefully protest. That doesn't mean that violence as a part of protest is or should be legal in our country. In fact, it is not. Without order, there can be no justice.

We have had, unfortunately, riots throughout this year. In fact, if you look at the numbers, we have had over 50 deaths in our country this year from riots, including here at our own Capitol, and this is the most expensive period of riots in our history.

My amendment would prohibit the SBA from providing assistance, such as the Paycheck Protection Program, the Economic Injury Disaster Loans, 7(a) loans, and other small business assistance, to anyone who has been convicted during the past year of a felony or a misdemeanor during and in connection with a riot.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for an additional 30 seconds to respond.

Mr. President, do I have any additional time from my original time?

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

Mr. President, I want to talk about two topics today. The first topic I want to address is the issue of immigration. My good friend Senator Durbin is very articulate--he is almost an expert on this issue--and I appreciate his comments. I want to just give you my perspective on immigration because it is so important. Yet this is not why I came down here today.

I love legal immigration. I think most Americans do. Louisianans love legal immigration, and I say that with great confidence because, every year, the American people invite over a million of our world's neighbors to become American citizens in a legal manner. We are very welcoming in this country. We invite more people to become citizens in America than any other country in the world, and I am flattered that people want to come here. I mean, other than someone living in North Korea, when is the last time you heard of somebody trying to sneak into China? People want to come to America, and I am so proud of that fact.

I don't believe in illegal immigration. Some of my colleagues--not the Chair and Senator Durbin--think that vetting people at the border is racist. I don't. I think it is prudent. Every country does it. We respect the rule of law in this country, and illegal immigration is illegal. Duh. I mean, if you don't like the immigration laws, one should change them. In the meantime, we have to follow the law. I am not real crazy about traffic cameras. I think, in many cases, they are designed to just raise money, but I obey them, and when I get fined, I pay the fine. It doesn't happen often now, but I do it.

Look, this country needs an immigration system that looks like somebody designed it on purpose. It does. I think the American people deserve that. I would love to work with Senator Durbin. I am not real interested in nibbling around the edges. I am not real interested in piecemealing. I am not real interested in some sort of widespread amnesty. I think we ought to sit down. We all ought to take our meds and sit down as adults and Senators in good faith, as all Senators are, and try to tackle this problem in a global way.

I just wanted to make it clear--this is speaking for me, personally, and I have learned a lot from listening to Senator Durbin as I always do--I am a steadfast believer in legal immigration, but I adamantly oppose illegal immigration. I think it is dangerous. I think it is unfair, especially to those people across the world who have waited in line patiently and followed the immigration laws of our country.

Mr. President, he had been reporting and trying to predict--and had predicted with great accuracy--the weather in the Baton Rouge metropolitan community for 45 years, but Pat's experience covers a whole lot more than being a meteorologist, though he was one of the best I have ever seen in that regard.

During his nearly half century of reporting the weather, Pat not only covered more than 500 storms and hurricanes but he also hosted ``We Play Baton Rouge,'' a local game show; ``The 5th Quarter,'' a sports show; and ``Hotline After Dark,'' a local talk show, where his guests-- and I am going to quote here--``ran the gamut from champion bodybuilders, to beer brewers, to duck callers.'' We are a very diverse people in Louisiana.

Pat has a warm heart, and he cares for the State and the Baton Rouge

community, and that has been on display for a lot of years. I am not telling my people back home anything they don't already know.

Pat is especially well known for being chairman of WBRZ--WBRZ, channel 2 in Baton Rouge, our prominent local station, where Pat has worked for so long.

Pat has worked hard as chairman of that station's Pat's Coats for Kids--Pat's Coats for Kids. This program has--unfortunately, we have children in America and in Louisiana who are hungry and cold. You can't learn when you are hungry; you can't learn when you are cold.

Pat has delivered hundreds of thousands--could be in the millions for all I know--of coats to kids whose parents can't afford to keep them warm in the winter.

He has also created the Fill a Prescription for the Needy project, and he started Baton Rouge's St. Patrick's Day parade--the Wearin' of the Green, it is called--which he continues to coordinate every single year.

Pat's final broadcast took place on Friday night, as I mentioned, January 29. That does not--I can assure you, knowing Pat Shingleton, that does not mark the end of his service to the people in Baton Rouge. I can say that with great confidence.

I predict that Pat will continue to contribute as a community advocate and as a spokesperson at WBRZ. I predict he will continue to champion all of the charity projects that he spearheaded for so many years.

Now, when asked about his retirement, Pat said, and I am going to quote, ``I think we're all given a whole bunch of heartbeats.''

``We're all given a whole bunch of heartbeats,'' Pat said, ``and God gives us these heartbeats to do something good.''

What an eloquent way of putting it. Pat has used his heartbeats pretty well, in my judgment. He has a lot more to go, but he has done it for the good of our State, for the good of the Baton Rouge metropolitan community, and he has done it in the newsroom, and he has done it outside the newsroom.

Pat says he is going to spend the extra time with his family--good for him; he has earned it--especially his 1-year-old grandchild.

Look, we are going to miss his guiding hand through Louisiana's irreverent weather patterns. We may have to draft him back on a few occasions, but I want to wish him a joyful retirement to soak in all the perks of being a grandfather.

Pat, thank you. Thank you for your hard work for the people of Baton Rouge. Thank you for giving so much to the people of Louisiana for all these 45 years.

You are a good person, and you are a fine American. God bless you and your family.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, yesterday I stood on the floor of our esteemed Senate, and I said: The Senate needs to do more. The Senate needs to do more.

I was very careful--and I want to reaffirm today--I was very careful not to say we are not doing anything. I talked about our important work on confirming judges. I think we are putting some very fine men and women on the Federal bench, who are going to make our country safer and better. I was also very careful to talk about the fact that after a logjam had been created on the appointments for the President's administration, we were finally able to break that logjam. We have started confirming some new advisers for the President.

I am very proud of the good work this body has done, but I did make the point that we need to do more. I talked about the fact that, in my judgment, there are many issues--if we think about them--on which my Democratic friends and my Republican colleagues have more in common than we don't, but we can't determine whether that is accurate unless we vote, unless we bring bills to the floor, unless we get bills in front of the committee and mark them up. That is our word, as you know, for amending a bill.

One of the bills I talked about yesterday was the need for bipartisan support for trying to do something about the spam, fraudulent robocalls the American people are getting, about which Senator Collins just spoke so eloquently. I said there would be bipartisan support. I believed it. I believe it even more today. I am very proud of the Senate because we just passed a bill. Do you know how many people voted against it? One. One ``no'' vote. See what happens when Senators are allowed to be Senators?

There are other efforts that we can work on together. The cost of prescription drugs--I spoke about that yesterday. I don't want to go into it more today.

I will give you another one, and I know this is controversial, but I think it is less controversial than people realize--net neutrality, the importance of people being able to access the Internet freely without being blocked or without their speeds being throttled or without their being censored.

That is a very controversial issue around here, but I still believe we share more in common than we don't on that issue. I talk with my colleagues all the time. I say: We need to pass a bill. Do you know why? Because the businessmen and the businesswomen and the consumers need some predictability in this area. What happens now is, if we have a Democratic President who gets control of the FCC, they pass one set of net neutrality rules, and then if we have a Republican President who gets control of the FCC, they pass a different set of net neutrality rules. The business community and the consumers are like ping pong balls. There is no predictability. There is no certainty. You can't plan. So everybody says: We need to pass a bill. Well, I am going to say it too. We need to pass a bill, but the only way to pass a bill is to pass a bill. And I think that is an area where we can work.

Another area--I understand how hard it is to fix our healthcare delivery system, but we ought to at least try. Our efforts in the last Congress to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act did not work. We could not pass the bill. I do not know a single person, honestly, a fairminded person who thinks the Affordable Care Act is working. But there are things we can do in the meantime while we are trying to reach an agreement on health insurance and the healthcare delivery system that looks like somebody designed the two things on purpose. There are things we can do together in the meantime.

I think there is bipartisan support for the idea that if you have health insurance and you go to the emergency room--and you picked an emergency room at a hospital that is under your policy--and you go and you pay your $500 deductible, a month later, you

should not get a bill for $1,000. You call them up and you say: What do you mean? The hospital is listed on my policy. I did what I was supposed to do. I went there. It was an emergency, but I did not go to the closest hospital. I went to the hospital in my policy, and I get a bill for $4,000.

They say: Oh, that doctor, that radiologist--not to pick on radiologists--that radiologist wasn't covered by your plan.

Well, how am I supposed to know?

We can address that. I guarantee you that there is bipartisan support to do something about that. We might not agree on the details, but that is why, you know, God created the Senate floor. You come down here, you debate, you discuss, and you offer amendments.

There are other examples. Let me say I am cutting this short because we are about to have another vote on a disaster bill. Thank you. Thank you, United States Senate. Thank you, President Trump, for meeting us in the middle.

I am not clairvoyant, but I feel really good about its passing--not good for the Senate as an institution, although I am proud of us today, but good for our farmers and our people in so many States who have been hurt by natural disasters--wildfires and hurricanes. Puerto Rico was hit with two hurricanes right in a row. We are going to do something about that today. I am happy for the Senate, but I am even happier for the American people.

I am going to say it again. We have more in common--our Democratic colleagues and our Republican colleagues--than we don't on certain issues, and I think we would surprise ourselves in what we could achieve if we just try.

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

Mr. President, I don't have a speech prepared. I just want to share a few thoughts with my colleagues. What I am about to say I intend to say gently and constructively, and that is this: We need to do more. We need to do more. By ``we,'' I mean the U.S. Congress.

We have completed almost 25 percent of the time allotted to this current Congress. And what have we done? Other than nominations, which are important--and I will come back to that--we have done nothing-- zero, zilch, nada.

Let me talk about my friends in the House of Representatives first. I have great respect for them. I wish I had served in the House. I would have loved to have had that experience. So far, our friends in the House--at least the leadership--have done two things. No. 1, they have passed bills they know have not a hope in Hades of passing the U.S. Senate. We call those bills messaging bills, as you know. They are not designed for the next generation. They are designed for the next election. They don't do anything to make the American people any more secure or improve the quality of their lives, and we all know that.

The second thing that my friends in the House leadership have done-- and I say this with all the respect I can muster--is to harass the President.

Again, I say this gently, and I say this, hopefully, constructively to my friends in the House leadership: The House leadership needs to urinate or get off the pot. The House leadership needs to indict the President of the United States, impeach him, and let us hold a trial-- he will not be convicted--or they need to go ahead and hold in contempt every single member of the Trump administration so we can move those issues into our court system and get back to doing the people's business.

Now, if they decide to go the court route, I would caution my friends to be very, very careful because once it enters the court system, it becomes a zero-sum game. One or two things are going to happen. Either the administration will win, in which case the oversight authority of the U.S. Congress will be undermined, or the House leadership will win, in which case no American with a brain above a single-cell organism is going to want to run for President of the United States, because Congress will be able to find out everything about your life, even the most intimate details, whether it is relevant to your job or not and whether it happened when you were President or not.

What I hope happens is that my friends in the House leadership and the administration sit down and talk--not talk like 8-year-olds in the back of a minivan fighting but talk constructively about how their behavior could impact important institutions in this country--and work it out.

I thank the Attorney General for making overtures to the House leadership to try to find common ground.

Now, let me talk about the Senate. We need to do more. I am not saying we haven't done anything. We have confirmed some very important nominees to the Trump administration. It is long overdue. They are fine men and women. We have confirmed some very fine men and women to the Federal Judiciary, and I believe they will make this country safer and will make this country better. I am very proud of that effort. So let me say it again. I am not saying we have done nothing. I am saying we need to do more.

There are issues where our Democratic friends and my Republican friends have more in common than we don't. We need to bring the bills to the floor of the Senate. Everyone has their own list, and everyone in the Senate knows what I am talking about, whether they will say it or not.

What is one of the things that moms and dads worry about when they lie down at night and can't sleep? The cost of prescription drugs. There is bipartisan support for prescription drug reform.

I just read a study in the Journal of the American Medical Association. They studied the U.S. healthcare delivery system and the healthcare delivery systems of all other wealthy countries. So it is apples to apples. In America, we pay about $1,500 for every man, woman, or child every year for pharmaceutical drugs. In the average rich country, other countries pay $750.

I am not criticizing our pharmaceutical drug companies. What they do is marvelous. We live longer. They save money. They keep us out of hospitals. But why is everybody else paying $750 and our people are paying $1,500? There are things we can do that will help make the pharmaceutical industry better but also help consumers. Do you know what we are doing about it? Nothing. We need to bring a bill to the floor.

I could give you another example. We all know there needs to be reform of our National Emergency Act. We know that. It is not about President Trump. It is about institutions, checks and balances, and Madisonian separation of powers.

We could do something together to get rid of spam robocalls. I get about 12 a day.

Rob Portman has a great bill that would end government shutdowns. We have more in common on that than we don't.

We need a supplemental disaster bill. We have Americans who are hurting. In my State, after Katrina, we were flat on our backs. If it hadn't been for the American taxpayer, we would have never risen to our knees, much less to our feet. We have other Americans and friends in Puerto Rico who need help. We ought to be able to work it out.

I could keep going. Everybody has their own list.

I don't care whether we move a bill through committee or whether we bring a bill directly to the floor of the Senate--I am in labor, not management; that is above my pay grade--but we need to try. We need to try.

I understand it is an election cycle. I get that. I say to the Presiding Officer, I am a politician. You know that. But we are always in an election cycle. When are we not in an election cycle? And I understand some of my colleagues with a lot more experience than I have--and I listen carefully to them, and I try to listen carefully to them--are thinking right now: Kennedy, that is just not the way it is done here.

Well, by God, maybe it is not, but maybe it should be.

I know some of my friends are thinking: Kennedy, if we do that, we are taking too big of a political risk.

Maybe we are. Maybe we will win.

I just think that there are bills that will make the American people able to live better lives, and we ought to spend a little more time thinking about the next generation than the next election.

With that, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I rise as a Member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship to highlight a veteran-owned Louisiana business that is a true success story. With me today is my colleague from my office, Ms. Cassie Leonard.

We all know small businesses are how many Americans live the American dream. They start small; they start with a passion; they create jobs; and then they help us compete globally in America and spark innovation. These American small business owners are often our friends. They are often our neighbors.

They succeed through the hard work of entrepreneurs like Mr. Mike Hackley of Baton Rouge. I am talking about Mike and his business BBQGuys because it is National Small Business Week and because BBQGuys was named Senate Small Business of the Week just last week.

Mike has served our country in many ways. He has served our country in the Air Force for more than 10 years. Once his military career ended, he worked in a number of different sectors. Like a lot of Louisianans, Mike loves the outdoors. In Louisiana, we will barbecue no matter how hot it gets outside.

Mike turned his passion into a profession, and he did it by starting an outdoor business called The Grill Store & More.

Early on, being the perceptive business person he is, Mike saw an opening with e-commerce, something we take for granted today. He launched a website called www.bbqguys.com, and he did this in 2001, 18 years ago, when Americans who did have the internet were on dial-up connections.

Today, 18 years later, BBQGuys is a giant in outdoor living online retailers. Mike now employs nearly 300 workers. He started with less than 10. That is the American dream. That is American success, and BBQGuys continues to evolve and to grow.

They started designing and manufacturing premium barbecue grills, with manufacturing operations here in the United States, and they are looking to export into Europe and Australia.

Mike also remains committed to a culture of teamwork at BBQGuys. Every day he makes a point of going around the office to say good morning to his employees, and I am not talking about just to the executives. It is no wonder Mike has a high employee retention rate, a reputation for outstanding customer service, and an A-plus rating from the Better Business Bureau. BBQGuys has also been named one of the 5,000 fastest growing businesses in the United States by Inc. Magazine for 11 years in a row.

I am proud to stand today before the U.S. Senate to say I am proud of Mike Hackley. I am proud of what he has built. He is realizing the American dream, and he is creating good jobs for my State.

Mike, if you are listening, thank you for making Louisiana proud.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. President, I would like to take a few moments to speak on an issue that, as you know, is important to American families all across the country.

Hardworking Americans long for cheap and efficient sources of energy for their homes, for their businesses, and for their schools, and one of the answers--not the only answer, but one of the answers--to this dilemma is clean-burning natural gas.

Natural gas is an abundant energy source that, unfortunately, in some cases is being squandered. We can do a better job of getting the fuel to consumers. In fact, we waste too much of this useable fuel source through a process known as natural gas flaring. Natural gas flaring is a practice where the natural gas is intentionally burned off at a drill site.

What I can happily report, however, is that President Trump and his administration have begun to take the necessary steps to address the underlying causes for this inexcusable waste.

Just last month, President Trump signed a pair of executive orders to expedite the construction of pipelines that will allow oil and natural gas to be safely and economically transported from drill sites to end users.

The President took the courageous first step in addressing a problem that has been present for far, far too long, and I am talking, of course, about the lack of infrastructure. The lack of infrastructure not only chips away at the great economic benefits our country receives thanks to our drilling boom, but without pipelines and other means of transport, processing, and storage, the cheaper and cleaner burning natural gas is too often wasted--natural gas, mind you, that could be powering businesses, schools, and even tens of millions of homes across the United States.

I would also like to note that I would be remiss if I didn't mention the environmental benefits of natural gas. Simply put, natural gas is an environmentally friendly fuel source. This abundant fuel is not only incredibly efficient, with a 92-percent energy efficiency, but the use of natural gas reduces carbon emissions as well. When compared to other fossil fuel sources, burning natural gas results in far fewer pollutants such as carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxide, nonmethane organic gas, and carbon dioxide. In fact, depending on the pollutant, using natural gas can mean a reduction in carbon emissions of up to 90 percent--90 percent--in some cases.

As our drilling boom continues in America, by implementing greater direct use of natural gas, we can cut thousands and thousands of tons of carbon emissions from our atmosphere every year, and these are numbers that we should all be able to get behind.

Ever since the advent of hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, we have been able to extract crude oil from deposits that we not only didn't think we could ever reach but from deposits we didn't even know existed until a few years ago.

American ingenuity is truly an amazing thing, and that American inventiveness and perseverance have led the United States in becoming the world's leader in oil production. Did you ever think America would lead the entire world in oil production?

Unfortunately, the infrastructure to support this boom has lagged. When drilling for oil, it is not an a la carte menu. Once the drill reaches the desired deposit and begins pumping the targeted crude oil to the surface, what is also brought to the surface alongside the crude oil is natural gas. You simply cannot drill for shale oil and not extract natural gas.

The problem, however, is while we should be looking at this phenomenon as a net positive--one drill extracting two sources of energy--far too often this natural gas byproduct is wasted because the infrastructure is simply not there to move the large quantity of natural gas to consumers. In one of our Nation's busiest oil fields-- perhaps the busiest, at least operating in America today--the Permian Basin in the great State of Texas and the great State of New Mexico, our shale drillers have long complained that they have no way to move natural gas to the market because there simply aren't enough natural gas pipelines. Adding to the dilemma is the fact that not only is there a severe lack of pipelines, there is a severe lack of alternative transportation options as well. When it comes to transporting oil and natural gas, we have four alternatives: pipeline, train, truck, and boat--pipeline, train, truck, and boat. Until President Trump signed his Executive orders last month--one requiring the Transportation Department to allow liquefied natural gas to be shipped via specialized rail and tanker trucks--too much of the natural gas extracted had no way of getting to open markets. In the Permian Basin alone--remember in Texas and New Mexico--about 3 percent of the natural gas that comes to the surface with the oil is flared. That means it is just burned off. It is wasted.

Now, 3 percent may not initially sound like a lot, but when you run the numbers, it becomes clear that we are wasting a vast amount of money and a huge source of energy. There is so much oil being extracted in the Permian Basin alone that over $1 million worth of natural gas is burned away, flared, wasted every day; $1 million worth of natural gas--a relatively clean source of energy, better for our environment-- is burned away every single day. To put that in perspective, the entire daily energy needs of Montana or New Hampshire could be met with just the gas that is flared in 1 day in the Permian Basin. A further look at the numbers suggests that by the end of 2018 alone, so much natural gas was burned off in the Permian Basin that the entire residential energy needs of Texas for the year could have been met--the entire State of Texas.

The problem is likely only going to get worse. The Permian Basin is far from the only area in which flaring occurs today in our country. Just accounting for the month of October this past year in North Dakota, it was reported that the amount of gas flared or burned off or wasted was enough to heat 4.25 million homes. The amount of natural gas flared, burned, wasted for the month of October, just in North Dakota, would have heated 4.25 million homes. This has to change. We simply cannot continue to sit by as millions of dollars are literally burned off every day into the atmosphere.

I thank President Trump. He took some great initial steps in trying to solve the wastefulness inherent in flaring from speeding up the construction of much needed pipelines to ordering increased use of specifically designed trains and tanker trucks. The American people will have far more access to this abundant and ever-present fuel source for their homes, for their businesses, and for their schools. There is

still a long way to go--a long way to go. Additional miles of pipeline and specialized train cars are just the beginning. I believe we can do better--much better, in fact--than simply sitting idly by as we watch good fuel being burned off into the night sky.

(Ms. McSALLY assumed the Chair.)