Floor Statements

Mr. President, I rise to urge my colleagues to pass this important legislation, and I want to thank Leader Schumer for his tremendous leadership on this entire package. It is amazing. His dedication and support to getting this done. He really, really held steadfast as well as our caucus, as he just described, and so many of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle.

I also want to thank Senator Murray for her continued leadership on appropriations bills.

This supplemental will supply Ukraine with desperately needed equipment, weapons, training, and logistics.

For over 2 years, the Ukrainian people have shown courage and resilience, enabling them to resist Russian aggression. As just described by our leader, it would be disastrous for our national security and democracy and human rights if we had not supported them.

This bill also continues to support American taxpayers by authorizing the President to use an estimated $5 billion in frozen Russian assets. These assets will help pay for Ukraine's reconstruction. And it designates the U.S. economic assistance, which Ukrainians will have to pay back once they have repelled the Russians.

The supplemental also includes support for our Middle East ally Israel, including support to make sure, just like these past few days, of shooting down 99 percent of missiles and drone attacks by Iran.

It also includes $9 billion of humanitarian aid for Gaza, Ukraine, and for people caught in conflicts around the world. These conflicts have taken an immeasurable toll on the Palestinian and Ukrainian people.

The supplemental also contains a range of sanctions that will make it harder for each of Israel's adversaries--Iran and Hamas--to finance their operations.

It contains the SHIP Act, which requires the President to post sanctions against individuals and companies that knowingly help evade oil sanctions. Illegal revenues funnel tens of billions to designated organizations and terrorist groups. And it builds on legislation Senator Murkowski and I enacted over a decade ago that helped expose the middlemen who were enabling Iran to evade these sanctions.

This package also includes over $8 billion to support Taiwan and other Indo-Pacific allies in this critical part of the world where we stand shoulder to shoulder with these democracies.

It also contains legislation, the FEND Off Fentanyl Act, of which I was proud to be a cosponsor--It is critically important legislation that does a couple of things. One, it declares that fentanyl is a national emergency. This enables the President to impose sanctions on fentanyl traffickers, enabling the U.S. Treasury to better fight fentanyl-related money laundering. Those fentanyl traffickers and money launderings have ties to organized crime and to drug cartels.

These issues have been clearly outlined in my State by communities, health providers, law enforcement, and others who want help in stopping the traffickers.

Part of the solution is stemming the flow of fentanyl. This supplemental would allow the proceeds from those seized assets of those narco-traffickers to be used by law enforcement in our local communities to fight this fentanyl scourge.

We must give our communities all the tools they need to stop this product from flooding across our borders, and this legislation will do just that.

I also want to address that technology should be a tool to help solve our greatest challenges, to improve the human condition, and to drive innovation and support economic opportunity. But foreign adversaries use technology for social and political control.

There is no individual right to privacy or freedom of speech in these autocracies. U.S. social media companies are not allowed to operate in China. In fact, China leads the world in using surveillance and censorship to keep tabs on its own population and to repress dissent.

Governments that respect freedom of speech do not build backdoors into hardware or software, into apps on phones, or into laptops. Backdoors allow foreign adversaries to target vulnerable Americans based on their user name or sensitive data. Backdoors allow foreign adversaries to use proxy bots to bombard--bombard--vulnerable populations--Americans--with harmful content or even to blackmail people.

The U.S. Department of Justice has stated: ``Hostile foreign powers are weaponizing bulk data and the power of artificial intelligence to target Americans.''

I do not want technology in the United States used this way. I want the United States to work with our most sophisticated technologically advanced countries, like-minded democracies--places like Japan, South Korea, our European allies--and set the global standards for technology and data protection. I want to see a technology NATO, one in which our allies come together and say there cannot be a government backdoor to any hardware or software if it wants to see global adoption.

We should have a trusted framework for cross-border data flows, as has been discussed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the G7. And criteria for trusted data flow should include commitments to democratic governance, the rule of law, and the protection of property rights and free speech.

I believe in trade, and I want trade. And I believe that business should be about business. But business is not

about business when foreign adversaries weaponize data, weaponize technology, and weaponize business approaches that hurt Americans.

I want to yield to my colleague, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, for his perspective on why this legislation before us is so important.

I thank Senator Warner for his perspective as chairman of the Intelligence Committee and his hard work. He and I both drafted legislation more than a year ago trying to give our government the tools to deal with this issue.

In 2020, India concluded that TikTok and other Chinese-controlled apps were national security threats and prohibited them. As a result, India TikTok users migrated to other platforms, including Google's YouTube, and Indian small businesses found other ways to operate on other platforms.

This supplemental contains the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act. Congress has a nonpunitive policy purpose in passing this legislation. Congress is not acting to punish ByteDance, TikTok, or any other individual company. Congress is acting to prevent foreign adversaries from conducting espionage, surveillance, and malign operations harming vulnerable Americans, our servicemen and women, and our U.S. Government personnel.

I thank Senator Warner for his comments.

I find it most disturbing that they used TikTok to repeatedly access U.S. user data and track multiple journalists covering the company. Researchers have found that TikTok restricts the information that Americans and others receive on a global basis.

As of December 2023, an analysis by Rutgers University found that TikTok posts mentioning topics that are sensitive to the Chinese Government, including Tiananmen Square, Uighurs, and the Dalai Lama were significantly less prevalent on TikTok than on Instagram, the most comparable social media.

Foreign policy issues disfavored by China and Russian Governments also had fewer hashtags on TikTok, such as pro-Ukraine or pro-Israel hashtags. Here are some of those hashtags on TikTok:

The example of Tiananmen Square, which we all know was an example of students standing up to the military, and yet for Tiananmen Square, there are 8,000 percent more hashtags on Instagram than on TikTok.

The Uighur genocide protecting a Muslim population, there are 1,970 percent more hashtags about that on Instagram than on TikTok.

And my personal favorite, just because I had the privilege of meeting the Dalai Lama here in the Capitol, 5,520 percent more hashtags where the Dalai Lama is mentioned on Instagram than on TikTok.

And pro-Ukraine, 750 percent more hashtags on Instagram than on TikTok about Ukraine and support for Ukraine.

I think that says it all in this debate today. Are we going to continue to allow people to control the information by using an export- controlled algorithm and China-based source code?

My colleagues and I are urging for this deweaponization by saying that TikTok should be sold. Now, I know that the Chinese have an export control on that algorithm. Congress believes that you have to have adequate time to sufficiently address this issue posed by our foreign adversaries. That is why the legislation before us is for ByteDance to sell its stake in TikTok.

We think a year is ample time to allow potential investors to come forward, for due diligence to be completed, and for lawyers to draw up and

finalize contracts. This is not a new concept to require Chinese divestment from U.S. companies.

The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States requires Chinese divestment from hotel management platforms--StayNTouch, from a healthcare app called PatientsLikeMe, from the popular LGBTQI dating app Grindr, among other companies. And even after the Chinese owner divested from Grindr in 2020, Americans had continuity of service on this platform.

So I turn it back to my colleague, but we are giving people a choice here to improve this platform and have the opportunity for Americans to make sure that they are not being manipulated by our foreign adversaries.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that H. Res. 1051, the House resolution originally on this legislation, be printed in the Record.

I turn it back to my colleague Senator Warner and again thank him for his leadership.

Mr. President, I rise today to speak about and thank Carl Imhoff who is retiring after an explementary 44-year career at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.

Carl's insights and contributions have shaped our Nation's approach to grid reliability, resiliency, and security. I can personally attest to how Carl's keen understanding of how our Nation's grid works has helped me draft and enact legislation ranging from measures to respond to the West Coast Electricity Crisis, to the Smart Grid Title of the 2007 Energy Bill, to numerous provisions related to boosting grid R&D, cybersecurity, and expanding transmission lines.

Aided by his forethought and vision, Carl has been a champion for infrastructure modernization. He understands and his work underscores the importance of the electricity grid as the backbone of our economic and national security, as well as the critical role it plays in decarbonization strategies that will power America into the future. His leadership has helped bring forward new approaches and technology advances to energy and grid challenges that will have an impact for years to come.

A native of Arkansas, Carl grew up learning about the intersection of technology, policy, and economic security through the work of his father John, a distinguished professor and long-time chair of the Department of Industrial Engineering at the University of Arkansas, who also served in an advisory capacity on a variety of initiatives for Senators Pryor, Bumpers, and then-Governor Bill Clinton. From his mother Lois, an avid conservationist and community organizer, Carl took lessons on the value of public lands and waters and the necessity of their preservation. In fact, Carl paid his first visit to the hearing room of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee as part of his mother's work with the Ozark Society, which would ultimately lead to the Buffalo River's designation as our first National River, way back in 1972.

With his own degrees in industrial engineering in hand, Carl brought these very sensibilities to Richland, WA, in 1980, when he joined PNNL. Carl began building not only his technical career, but also his reputation in the region as a collaborator and thought leader in charting the path forward for energy system reliability. Meanwhile, he took the opportunity as an avid outdoorsman to experience all the variety and adventures the Pacific Northwest's public lands have to offer and shared them with his growing boys. Carl remains a student of the works of former Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, a Yakima native and confidant of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who is renowned for his work in connection with the preservation of wilderness and wild and scenic rivers.

I have known Carl for the last two decades of his career at PNNL, much of which time he spent as the leader of the lab's grid research and development portfolio. When I first took office in 2001, our region was experiencing the

challenges and economic dislocation associated with the Western energy crisis. As a new member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, I immediately set out to understand how technology--and in particular, the convergence of grid and emerging internet and communications technologies--could bolster system reliability and prevent such a series of events from happening again.

I learned that a group of researchers from PNNL had been working with the Bonneville Power Administration on concepts of wide-area situational awareness, given transmission system reliability events that had recently happened in the West. What is more, they were working on extending those concepts to provide more flexibility and control at the grid edge, integration of variable renewables and working to build cybersecurity into these approaches from the outset.

Over time, Carl and his team's work at PNNL would help inform technical programmatic trajectories included in the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Energy Security Act of 2020, and related provisions in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. Approaches pioneered at PNNL in the cybersecurity arena, with the stewardship of DOE's Office of Electricity--and subsequently, the Office of Cyber Security, Energy Security, and Emergency Response--would underpin the designation of DOE as the energy sector-specific Agency for cybersecurity included in 2017's FAST Act.

Throughout these two decades of dynamic change in the electricity industry--and the added complexity of the environment in which it operates--Carl has shown the unique ability to synthesize the technical findings of PNNL and other laboratory and university researchers, take into account multiple perspectives from industry, and help chart a clear and actionable path forward for next steps in the grid modernization journey. He has built relationships on the basis of a clear-eyed, technically unassailable and unbiased approach, and with the confidence of his colleagues grounded in his integrity and his insistence on always putting the Nation's needs first, ahead of any parochial concerns. Carl has stressed the importance of research, government, and industry working together and built the relationships across industry, long-time DOE civil servants and spanning different administrations, necessary to deliver on the mission.

As a recognized expert and cochair of DOE's Grid Modernization Laboratory Consortium, Carl would find his way back to the very same Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing room he had first visited as part of his mother's conservation work back in Arkansas. He has testified on `` . . . the high return on investment encountered by utilities and national labs across the country when combining new electric infrastructure innovation with public-private validation and deployment.'' He has brought perspectives on growing interdependencies across multiple critical infrastructures, smart grid concepts, changes in generation mix, grid controls, and information technology ``. . . . collectively reshaping utility business models and enabling new innovations and market participants.'' And most recently, Carl brought forward DOE and laboratory perspectives on efforts to mitigate wildfire risk and increase grid resiliency--an emerging issue of great concern for utilities and communities across the West.

Our collective efforts to address the necessity of grid modernization as an energy, economic, and national security imperative are much better for the work of Carl Imhoff and the leadership he has shown across his four decade plus career at PNNL. As he heads off to spend more time with his wife Kristen and his growing grandchildren, I congratulate him on a well-deserved retirement. Still, I hope Carl will keep a phone handy to share occasional wise perspectives on the next phases of our grid modernization journey in the Pacific Northwest, even if he answers the call while hiking Badger Mountain.

So I am pleased to have this opportunity to publicly thank Carl, not only for the contributions he made while at PNNL, but for his approach to collaboration and innovation in the public interest, which will continue to help the Pacific Northwest and our entire Nation realize a more reliable, resilient, affordable, and cleaner energy future.

Mr. President, from January 8, 2024, through January 11, 2024, I was unable to be present for rollcall votes due to illness. However, had I been present, I would have voted as follows.

On the rollcall vote No. 1, on the motion to invoke cloture on the nomination of John A. Kazen to be U.S. District Judge for the Southern District of Texas, I would have voted yea.

On the rollcall vote No. 2, to confirm the nomination of John A. Kazen to be U.S. District Judge for the Southern District of Texas, I would have voted yea.

On the rollcall vote No. 3, on the motion to invoke cloture on the nomination of S. Kato Crews to be U.S. District Judge for the District of Colorado, I would have voted yea.

On the rollcall vote No. 4, to confirm the nomination of S. Kato Crews to be U.S. District Judge for the District of Colorado, I would have voted yea.

On the rollcall vote No. 5, on the question of whether to override the President's veto of S.J. Res. 32, a resolution of disapproval of the rule submitted by the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, I would have voted nay.

On the rollcall vote No. 6, on the motion to invoke cloture on the nomination of Erika L. McEntarfer to be Commissioner of Labor Statistics, I would have voted yea.

On the rollcall vote No. 7, to confirm the nomination of Erika L. McEntarfer to be Commissioner of Labor Statistics, I would have voted yea.

Mr. President, for the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation I report favorably the following nomination lists which were printed in the RECORDS on the dates indicated, and ask unanimous consent, to save the expense of reprinting on the Executive Calendar that these nominations lie at the Secretary's desk for the information of Senators.

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

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the vote occur immediately.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, I rise today in support of the nomination of Michael Whitaker to be the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration. Last week, the Commerce Committee unanimously advanced Mr. Whitaker to the Senate floor, and this resounding bipartisan approval is in addition to the broad support that Mr. Whitaker has received from the private sector. He has the support of the aviation workforce, pilots, flight attendants, machinists, air traffic controllers, and safety specialists at the FAA.

Aviation safety advocates like the 737 MAX crash families have called Mr. Whitaker a ``strong leader'' for the FAA with the ``ability [to] restore public trust and confidence in its oversight and safety standards.''

The conclusion is clear, Mr. Whitaker is the right person to lead the FAA. And America's chief aviation regulator has a critical mission: protect the safety of the flying public.

Each day, 44,000 FAA employees oversee the safety of 25,000 daily commercial flights, 2.5 million travelers, and over 5,500 airports.

These Agencies set the safety standards for aerospace manufacturing, and safety starts at the top with the Administrator. America's safety system is under stress, given the changes to FAA and the innovation that we are seeing in new technology. We have challenges in the post- pandemic rebound of air travel and making sure that we have a workforce.

And the FAA's workforce, I know that Mr. Whitaker, in his confirmation hearing, committed to making this a No. 1 priority: build a strong safety culture, attract new talent, and keep pace with technology transformation.

Mr. Whitaker must build an organization that meets the challenges of incorporating new users and technologies like drones and advanced air mobility, electric propulsion, commercial space, and just the continued growth of the busy aviation aerospace around the globe.

Among the most pressing problems is addressing air traffic controller hiring and training, and Mr. Whitaker has stated this will also be a top priority.

Finally, the FAA must be among the global leaders in aviation safety. Mr. Whitaker must work internationally at the International Civil Aviation Organization, ICAO, and through bilateral partnerships to lift the baseline for aviation safety regulation throughout the world.

This work of rebuilding leadership starts here at the FAA, and he is committed to implementing the critical safety reforms that were part of the Aircraft Certification, Safety, and Accountability Act. These are strong challenges, but no doubt this Administrator can meet those challenges and live up to these commitments.

I am confident that Mr. Whitaker's abilities will make sure that this legislation is fully implemented.

In addition, yesterday, the President of the United States and the Secretary of Commerce announced a series of tech hubs in response to the legislation that we passed, the CHIPS and Science Act. I know the Presiding Officer, I think, is pretty happy about that because I think one of those tech hubs was in his State. And certainly there was one in Washington that is really about the next generation of advanced materials in aviation.

The designation made possible by CHIPS and Science is to think about lab-to-market testbeds on thermoplastic composite fabrication equipment and help the United States stay in a leadership position in the next generation of aerospace workforce.

The United States leads in ideas, but we don't always lead in the implementation of the innovation, particularly at a time where now everyone, in an internet age, is reading about our innovations and trying to implement the same things.

The tech hub idea can leverage a lot of ideas across the United States and help translate the science faster into real application and real competitiveness for our Nation and grow jobs and help grow actually rising incomes in various parts of our country as well.

The tech hub, in this instance, in the aerospace ecosystem where we have millions of people employed nationally and we have leading institutions that are doing aviation research--we need to show that innovation can move beyond just where we are today on composites but on next-generation research that then gets translated to the workforce and the skilling of the workforce.

This means creating more patents, translating discoveries, and keeping U.S. manufacturing competitive. I know that many of my colleagues here in the Senate were very pleased to hear this announcement by the President and the Secretary of Commerce.

With over 30 years of diverse experience in these issues, like aviation, Mr. Whitaker will be able to help, I think, in this next- generation aviation technology: thermoplastics.

This is also important for our space companies that want to get into a more rapid production of thermoplastic piece part production, and I think this kind of R&D alliance will help for the future.

So I thank our colleagues for the time today. I hope they will support Mr. Whitaker. I hope that we will move quickly on this nomination, and I hope that it will give us a chance to have an FAA Administrator who will also help us move quickly to resolve the FAA authorization issues and get that authorization before both bodies before the end of the year.

Thank you.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, for the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation I report favorably the following nomination list which was printed in the RECORD on the date indicated, and ask unanimous consent, to save the expense of reprinting on the Executive Calendar that this nomination lie at the Secretary's desk for the information of Senators.

Mr. President, I follow my colleague from California, and I believe he said it correctly--the legacy of Dianne Feinstein.

Our colleagues are in shock today, even though we knew Dianne was ill, even though we knew she was 90 years old, even though we knew she was the longest-serving woman Senator. The fortitude that she showed and demonstrated was constant. Sitting here just a few months ago in all-night vote-arama sessions, when the youngest of us wanted to crawl into our hideaways and sip coffee at 2 a.m., Dianne was at her desk voting.

At 90, she had the fortitude, as Senator Murray said, to vote just yesterday. I don't know if it was the steel that was cemented into her at that moment of the mayor's assassination or the tragedy and cost of serving and knowing that you still had to move forward. No matter how disastrous the situation was, Dianne moved forward.

I am so blessed to have served with her. But I want people to know the Nation has lost a legislative giant, women have lost a hero, and the Senate has lost a true colleague. Those of us who are out here today know when we say the word ``true colleague,'' we mean like a true collegial colleague. Sometimes we say the word with a little more disdain, like our ``frustrating colleague,'' or as Senator McConnell said, our ``good friend,'' when maybe in reality, it is hard to get those words out.

But Dianne was the epitome of what the Senate is losing. Let's just face it. Dianne, one of her most famous phrases was ``I have to go home and read tonight.'' I bet you her family or her staff heard her say that because she meant it. She meant: I don't know enough about this subject to go just spur off. I am literally going to study and analyze and find out what it actually is all about.

How many times did Dianne stand up in caucus and say: I have been reading a lot about this subject, but I think we need to know a lot more? And she would communicate what she knew and, as many of my colleagues know, she was always asking questions.

For me, as a young Member coming here more than 20 years ago, I was amazed and astounded at what I might call the polite pushiness of Dianne Feinstein. I don't know how she did it, but serving on the Judiciary Committee with her--and Dianne will observe--when Dianne's time ran out and somebody tried to cut in and debate her, Dianne had this way of saying: Mr. Chairman, this is a really important point and I just need to make this point. And the chairman would let Dianne go on for another 5 minutes. And I thought, How does she pull this off? Well, I will tell you how she pulled it off: because people knew she was serious about legislating. She was serious about working across the aisle.

And probably in my early days here, she forged the greatest impression of what working across the aisle was really all about. There were times, probably, when I didn't even agree with her, but she had the cache of a Senator who could put a deal together with both sides.

I saw her great work on the California Desert Protection Act, landmark legislation protecting California. I saw it on the 2007 energy bill where we raised CAFE standards for the first time in 25 years. Dianne had a provision called Ten-in-Ten. She just evangelized every minute of the day about why we needed higher fuel efficiency standards. She thought we could improve it 10 miles in 10 years and she was right, and it became the basis of what that bill was. She never let anybody off the hook during those negotiations. She made sure that we got that done.

I saw her work tirelessly as my colleague Senator Murkowski--she may not have been here yet--but she worked with Jon Kyl on water legislation until the cows came home, because Arizona and California had real water issues and Dianne was forever adamant about trying to address this issue for the western part of the United States.

So for me, I want to thank her family for your sacrifices, for sharing Dianne with us, letting us have her as long as she was willing to serve and for making it the dedication of her life.

Yes, that personal side of her was also so sweet. Most of us doodle, but Dianne doodled in masterpieces. And she was always inviting people to dinner, always doing those kind little things for us, which means that you really made the Senate a more human place. That is what she really did. She just made this a more human place by just giving a little time and attention to some of the needs of your colleagues. But what sweet blessings; what sweet stories.

I want to honor Dianne by remembering her great legacy and thanking all of those who were part of her life because, for women, we didn't really know how to get all of this done here--how hard you push, how loud you can be, how much you can just get in here and grind away sometimes. Dianne showed us that, yes, we can be trailblazers and do it and that the results really, really, really, really matter for people.

I hope that people will remember that legacy of her and the kindness that went along with it and realize that this institution really does need to return to the ways of Dianne Feinstein.

And if you are from California, you should be damn proud that your Senator is going to go in the history books as a forerunner for so many other women and for policies and behavior that we should be amplifying.

I thank the President.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise today in support of President Biden's nomination of Anna Gomez to be a commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission.

Americans need an FCC fully equipped to deliver affordable high-speed connectivity, strengthen local broadcasting, foster spectrum innovation, and promote emerging technologies. Ms. Gomez will deliver on these priorities.

While she has dedicated much of her career to public service, working in various roles at the FCC, serving as Deputy Assistant Secretary at NTIA, and at the National Economic Council during the Clinton administration, she has also worked in the private sector.

For 3 years, she served as the vice president of State and Federal regulatory, government affairs for Sprint Nextel, and for 9 years, she worked at Wiley Rein, as part of the law firm's telecommunications practice.

Ms. Gomez will focus on ensuring affordable, reliable broadband across America's cities, suburbs, and rural communities. In recent years, it has become increasingly clear that for healthcare, education, labor, and so much more, broadband is a necessity.

For this purpose, Congress allocated $65 billion for broadband in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, including $42.5 billion allocated based on the FCC's broadband maps. Ms. Gomez has pledged to work to improve the accuracy of these maps and deliver broadband to all.

We also need to lower the cost of broadband deployment. By leveraging our existing electrical grid infrastructure, we can build out more middle mile capacity. This will spur competition and help lower the cost of broadband.

While Congress invested $1 billion to create a middle mile grant program at the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, the demand for this funding was more than seven times the amount available. We must do more.

Given her experience working at NTIA, Ms. Gomez has unique expertise in middle mile broadband deployment issues.

The FCC also plays an important role in sustaining local news. Local stations provide trusted on-the-ground reporting that informs the public and strengthens our democracy.

Ms. Gomez understands that we must protect local broadcast news and has pledged to delve into what the FCC can do to protect it.

She will also fight to ensure that the United States remains a leader in global spectrum policy. As countries like China compete for spectrum leadership, we must develop smart spectrum policies that promote national security and innovation.

We know the FCC has a crucial role in making sufficient spectrum available for wireless innovation and our federal agencies' critical missions.

Over the past year, Ms. Gomez has worked hard to prepare the United States for the 2023 World Radiocommunication Conference and develop a comprehensive U.S. global spectrum strategy. She has also built a strong team that is well-informed and

well-equipped to represent U.S. interests in spectrum policy.

Some of my Republican colleagues have complained that they did not have an opportunity to meet with the nominee or that we should not confirm her until the World Radiocommunication Conference is over.

It has been 100 days since Ms. Gomez's nomination and 57 days since the committee's vote. Ms. Gomez has been available, willing, and eager to meet with all Senators to discuss her qualifications for the role.

The State Department also has extremely qualified experts who can step in for Ms. Gomez, just as she has planned for.

Anna Gomez has the knowledge, skills, and qualities to be an FCC Commissioner. I am proud to support Ms. Gomez's nomination, and I urge my colleagues to do the same.

Mr. President, I rise tonight to speak about important legislation that was included in the National Defense Authorization Act tonight and something that will help us fight the scourge of illicit fentanyl in the United States of America.

An urgent public health crisis is gripping our State and many other parts of the United States. I want to thank my colleagues Senator Scott from South Carolina and Senator Brown from Ohio for their leadership on the bipartisan legislation known as the FEND Act that was included in tonight's legislation.

The fentanyl crisis is having a direct and dire impact on families in the State of Washington and all throughout the United States. In the past 12 months, more than 65,000 Americans have died by overdosing on synthetic opioids like fentanyl. That is why it is so important that, tonight, included in this legislation is the FEND Act, and that is part of a response that we need to have to take this national crisis seriously.

This legislation declares the international trafficking of fentanyl, and its precursors needed to make it, a national emergency. This gives the President and us the focus that we need to fight, as it says in the legislation, ``an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States.''

Mr. President, a crisis of this magnitude demands a robust Federal response, and that is why this legislation provides the President with new tools to stop the illicit fentanyl flooding our borders and those who are trying to transport it into our country.

First, the new tools in this legislation are sanctions targeting transnational criminal organizations and foreigners engaged in international fentanyl trafficking. The bill specifically calls out eight known cartels in Mexico, which means that Treasury can investigate suspicious activities involved here and declare sanctions. It recognizes that these traffickers, once identified, can have sanctions imposed and can have forfeiture of their property.

Recognizing that fentanyl production is not simply these entities but also diverse networks of players, this legislation helps us go after those. Sanctions will enable the U.S. Government to try to disrupt the flow of this product: the distributors, the brokers, the wholesalers, the retailers, the sellers of precursors--anyone who is involved in trafficking these deadly pills can now be targeted.

Second, the Senate-passed legislation goes after financial institutions that participate in fentanyl-related money laundering. Once caught, property forfeited by international fentanyl traffickers can be used by the Department of Justice and State and local law enforcements to help participate in additional investigations, and this legislation also empowers Treasury to use special measures to pursue fentanyl-related and other types of drug laundering activity. For example, a foreign financial institution engaged in fentanyl-related money laundering, it can impose restrictions on those banks and U.S. banks doing business with those foreign entities.

So the bottom line is there are new tools. Once this legislation makes it to the President's desk and through the finish of our colleagues working together on a final House and Senate NDAA package, it will give the U.S. Government Agencies more tools to disrupt the illicit fentanyl trafficking and the supply chains that exist internationally.

Severely penalizing those engaged in fentanyl trafficking is just one step. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, my State, Washington, experienced the single highest increase among U.S. States in reported drug overdoses last year--an increase of more than 21 percent.

Hundreds of traumatized families that will never be the same, thousands of first responders struggling to cope with this daily tragedy that they respond to--the statistics are stunning, but they are also just very tragic. Sometimes it is hard to even listen to the stories, but I have been going around my State listening to people affected by this crisis and talking to those in my State about the opportunities to do something--the heart-wrenching stories of individuals who have been impacted by this: a mother whose son went off to college and just simply didn't come home; a beloved brother who fought addiction for years and who got help to kick heroin, got sober, and got his life back but then, sadly, succumbed to fentanyl; a woman struggling with addiction who realized she needed help but then couldn't find a bed available for detox, only to hear, time and time again, that such a bed did not exist; a young man who took a single pill he thought was Percocet who died from an illicit counterfeit pill laced with fentanyl.

That is why we need legislation. In addition to the FEND Off Fentanyl Act, we need to do more with just the supply. In the Tri-Cities, a police officer told me that their local task force has already seized over 200,000 fentanyl pills this year. Statewide, we have already surpassed the number of fentanyl seizures in all of last year. Law enforcement in Washington has already seized more than 1.6 million fentanyl pills this year compared to a total of 1.3 million in all of last year.

So the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency has seized over 379 million deadly doses of fentanyl. That was last year. That is more than enough supply in the United States. We need to do something now to also aid in the stopping and obstruction to make sure that we are preventing this from happening in the rest of the United States and to stop it in my State of Washington.

I plan to work with TSA and DEA to make sure that we strengthen the laws that allow for the investigation of fentanyl distribution at our airports, to make sure that we are tracking the supply and investigating and giving our law enforcement any tool that they can use to help stop the movement of this product.

I am also grateful that our colleagues tonight acted in a bipartisan way, and I hope they will act in a bipartisan way in the future. There are other things that we need to do to stop the cycle of addiction.

As one doctor told me: We could have access to recovery be as easy as access to the drug, but it is not.

We have heard from people all over the State--from our firefighters, from our police officers, from our courts, to our healthcare treatment centers--and we have seen unbelievable pilot programs that are being used to try to tackle this problem. We have seen fire stations use new equipment and first responders so they can quickly get to the scene and have the tools in place.

We have heard from our State and from our healthcare officials like Dr. Banta-Green from the University of Washington, who has helped to understand and pioneer a program so that people can just walk into a facility that is community-based and get access to care and treatment immediately. So no more trying to respond every day of where to go or having a first responder having to go back to the same place, but giving people a place that they can go.

I hope our colleagues will look at some of these innovative prevention

measures that my State is trying to undertake. I hope that we can work in a bipartisan effort to give more tools to DEA, but I hope tonight we will be happy that we are now declaring this a national emergency, that we have given the President and Treasury and our officials new tools to stop the trafficking of this product and to pursue those who are involved in it in an aggressive way around the world.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, for the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation I report favorably the following nomination list which was printed in the Record on the date indicated, and ask unanimous consent, to save the expense of reprinting on the Executive Calendar that this nomination lie at the Secretary's desk for the information of Senators.

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

Mr. President, I am pretty sure I am joining my colleague from Washington, who probably just spoke on the same subject, but I come to the floor to support the nominations of two very exceptional nominees to serve as judges for the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington.

Kimberly Evanson, born and raised in our State, grew up in Grays Harbor County before attending Tacoma High School in Tacoma. She attended Seattle University and went on to graduate from Georgetown University Law Center.

Nearly her entire legal career has been spent in the Western District of Washington and the district in which she will serve, if confirmed. She has nearly 15 years of experience with constitutional and Federal law procedure, making her--as the American Bar Association said-- ``well-qualified'' for the Federal bench.

Ms. Evanson has dedicated her free time to supporting her community through volunteer work, and since 2013, she has been a regular volunteer with the Western District of Washington's Federal Civil Rights Legal Clinic. There, she provides legal advice to King and Pierce County residents who face employment discrimination, disability, housing, prison misconduct, and excessive force claims.

Ms. Evanson's commitment to ensuring legal services and counsel is available to all, regardless of income, shows her dedication to a fair and inclusive justice system.

I urge my colleagues to confirm Ms. Evanson to the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington without delay.

I also want to urge my colleagues to vote to confirm Tiffany Cartwright for the Western District of Washington. This is a historic nomination. If confirmed, Ms. Cartwright would be the first woman to serve as Federal district judge from the Tacoma courthouse.

Ms. Cartwright is a proud Washingtonian who grew up in Kitsap County and attended Central Kitsap High School. She went on to earn a bachelor of arts from Stanford University in 2007 and a juris doctorate from Stanford Law School.

Ms. Cartwright is extremely experienced in our court system. She has served as a law clerk in the Alaska State Supreme Court and has served as a Federal law clerk for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Ms. Cartwright currently serves as a civil rights attorney in Seattle, where her practice focuses on police misconduct and gender discrimination. In addition to her work as a civil rights attorney, Ms. Cartwright serves on the Local Rules Committee for the Federal Bar Association.

Ms. Cartwright has made it a priority to improve the accessibility of the courts. In her free time, she has served as pro bono counsel for cases involving women's and LGBTQ+ rights. And at the Seattle law firm where she works, she has developed a successful fellowship program to draw a diverse range of applicants to the firm and help reduce bias in the workforce.

A real champion for her community and civil rights, she would make an outstanding addition to the district court in the Western District of Washington. And again, I urge my colleagues to vote to confirm Tiffany Cartwright for the Western District of Washington.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, today is a very good day for one of Washington's most famous products; that is, Washington apples. And that is because retaliatory tariffs that had been put on Washington apples in India really impacted our growers across Washington State.

I want to thank Ambassador Tai, and I want to thank the Biden administration--Secretary Raimondo especially--and I also want to thank Ambassador Garcetti for making sure that, in the negotiations leading up to today's visit by Prime Minister Modi and discussions between the United States and India, removing these retaliatory tariffs on apples was included on the list.

So, today, our growers know that they can go back to marketing a great worldwide product, our Washington apples, that had access to what at one point was a $120 million market. This retaliatory tariff being removed will help boost sales to India. It will help

the bottom line of farmers in Washington State, and it will be essential for the 1,400 growers that I have just recently visited along with my colleague Senator Stabenow, in discussion of this year's farm bill, to say these are important markets for Washington products.

We heard from people like Jorge Sanchez from Northern Fruit in East Wenatchee that ``India was a critical market for the Washington apple industry, and the tariffs have hit the producers of Red Delicious apples especially hard.''

These growers are looking forward to an opportunity to rebuild this market access. This deal also includes removing some of the tariffs on chickpeas and lentils, also a great Washington product that suffered under these retaliatory tariffs. India was a top export market for U.S. chickpeas and lentils prior to the tariffs, and these important pulse crops are a very great product to see into the Indian market.

At its peak, the pulse crop value was over $180 million. And they, in the last year, with the retaliatory tariffs over the last 6 years, had dwindled down to next to nothing. That is why it was so important to speak directly to Prime Minister Modi, to ask him to consider more trade with the United States, to open up these opportunities for us, Washington and India, to work together and for the United States and India to work together.

Trade and investments are an essential part of our relationship with India. They are essential for all our allies and partners. And they should be in tandem with growing our partnership on critical, leading- edge technologies. I know the discussions that will happen today at the White House and in the future will be about marrying our technology economies as well--very important work to be done in the post-CHIPS and Science legislation that was passed--and working together on important national security issues.

But today is also very good news because it shows that the partnership between the United States and India can get us off of these retaliatory tariffs, help our farmers grow new market opportunities, and produce and sell our product in India, a very growing market for our apples and lentils.

So I want to thank everybody involved again--President Biden, Commerce Secretary Raimondo, Ambassador Tai, and Ambassador Garcetti-- for making this happen.

I look forward to hearing Prime Minister Modi's comments--and Foreign Minister Jaishankar--for continuing to see the work that our two countries are going to do together.

I yield the floor.