Floor Statements

Mr. President, I rise today in support of Ms. Jasmine Yoon, whom President Biden has nominated to serve as a U.S. district court judge for the Western District of Virginia.

For the last decade and a half, Jasmine has served as an invaluable asset to Virginia's legal community, offering both a unique zeal for public service and an incredible life story.

Jasmine came to this Nation at age 14 from South Korea, speaking virtually no English. All through eighth

grade--and I am trying to think of myself in the eighth grade, and I cannot imagine going through this--but all through eighth grade, literally, at home she read Merriam Webster's dictionary and watched American TV. And by the time she entered high school, she spoke English fluently.

Thanks to this hard work, she developed a stellar academic record, such that she became a two-time graduate at the University of Virginia where she was awarded the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation scholarship, a full 3-year scholarship to the UVA School of Law given for academic and extracurricular achievement.

Shortly before law school, Jasmine became a U.S. citizen. She has spoken movingly to me and to Senator Kaine about her memories of that ceremony and what citizenship means to her.

Following law school, Jasmine began her public service career clerking for The Honorable James C. Cacheris in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, a distinguished jurist and lifelong mentor for Jasmine.

After completing her clerkship, Jasmine went to work as an assistant U.S. attorney in the Eastern District. During her time in that office, she prosecuted countless complex cases. Her work was so notable that she won the FBI Director's Award, given for outstanding prosecutorial skills and service to the FBI.

Upon the conclusion of her time as a prosecutor, she went back to UVA, this time as a lawyer in the university's counsel's office. In taking this job, she and her husband chose to move their entire family to the Western District of Virginia, where they put down deep roots. As counsel to the university, Jasmine impressed everyone she met with her calm and measured approach to nuanced and subtle issues.

Jasmine's community-oriented mindset, her career qualifications, and numerous accolades and awards make her an exceptional nominee for the Western District of Virginia.

Her nomination has received countless letters of support, including from university leadership, local leaders, and the Asian Pacific American Bar Association of Virginia. Jasmine was also voted out of the Senate Judiciary Committee with a strong bipartisan vote.

Once sworn in, Jasmine will be the first Asian-American Federal judge in Virginia. I know she will serve with distinction and make our country and our Commonwealth proud.

I urge my colleagues to support her nomination.

With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise today to celebrate the incredible life of a dear friend and a great American, Hal Malchow, someone whom I think many of my colleagues on the Democratic side have known.

I first met Hal in 1985. I was visiting my dear friend from law school, Rob McDuff, in Oxford, MS. Hal and I were pretty young back in those days, both interested in politics, and the two of us really hit it off at a party that Rob hosted.

Now, Hal has long enjoyed a successful career as one of the country's premier political consultants, but before that, he went to Millsaps College and then the McGeorge School of Law in California. He did practice law for a bit in Jackson, MS. But Hal's real passion was never the law; it was always politics.

In fact, when young, aspiring lawyers would come to his office to get advice about following him into law, Hal was known to reach into his big, impressive wooden desk and pull out his latest rental car contract with Hertz.

``See that contract?'' he would ask the enterprising, would-be attorney, slapping it face down on the table. ``You go to law school, you are going to spend the rest of your career writing those kind of deals.''

So after a few years as a bond attorney in Mississippi, Hal turned his attention to politics. He took on three different candidates as a campaign manager and managed to lose all three races.

Undaunted, in 1984, Hal took on a new challenge. There was an up-and- coming young Congressman from Tennessee with a pretty good resume and a well-known family name who was thinking about running for the Senate. And despite his rather unimpressive track record so far, Hal managed to get an interview.

``So,'' Al Gore said to him, ``I've got one question for you, Hal. If I hire you to be my campaign manager, how am I supposed to explain it to my supporters?''

The way Hal tells it, he looked Gore in the eye and said, ``Everyone in Tennessee thinks you're a lock for this seat. But you can tell them you're taking nothing for granted because you hired the hungriest SOB in the country to run your race.''

Needless to say, Hal got the job, and Al Gore went on to the Senate that year. Soon, Hal moved to DC. Starting at his kitchen table in a small, one-room apartment, he managed to build the Nation's largest voter contact firm, pioneering the use of advanced data analytics to revolutionize political targeting, launching experiments to measure and improve campaign tactics, and revolutionizing direct mail and fundraising.

He brought the notion of the ``moneyball'' approach to politics a decade before anybody else was doing it. That will be one of Hal's greatest legacies to the Democratic Party and to American politics: the idea that spending decisions should actually be driven by data. He wanted to hold campaign consultants like himself accountable for being wise stewards of donor dollars. He measured success in effectiveness, hard proof that spending motivated voters one way or the other.

Hal worked on every one of my campaigns; and at one point or another, I suspect that Hal has worked with at least half of my colleagues on the Democratic side. But Hal was more than just a consultant; he is also my friend. I know him not only for his brilliant, strategic mind but as someone who is honest, loyal, and extraordinarily creative. My wife Lisa and I have looked forward to receiving his hilarious Christmas cards. He would create a different message and a different approach every holiday season.

In addition to writing a series of political books on moving and motivating voters, Hal is also an accomplished fiction writer. His writing career began when his then-8-year-old son approached him with an idea. Two years later, they completed the first draft of ``The Sword of Darrow,'' a highly acclaimed young-adult fantasy novel. In 2014, writing alone, he published a sequel, ``The Dragon and the Firefly,'' before penning two political thrillers, including ``42 Million to One,'' a finalist for a number of international and national book awards.

As that story illustrates, Hal is also a devoted father to his son, Alex. For many years, he served on the board of trustees at Alex's alma mater, the Lab School. After his son was diagnosed with dyslexia, Hal dove into the challenges facing other children like Alex, eventually becoming the president of the International Dyslexia Association.

Hal is also the biggest Cheesehead I know. Hal was very proud of the fact--

even though he had grown up in Mississippi--that his grandfather was one of the original shareholders in the Green Bay Packers. And Hal has followed in his grandfather's and his father's footsteps as a Packers fan. For the last several decades, Hal has organized annual trips to Green Bay to watch the Packers play, and I was lucky enough to join him in November for what has turned out to be Hal's final football season.

Now struggling with the effects of Alzheimer's, Hal has approached his illness the same way he has approached life: with no bitterness. He said to me, the last time I saw him, ``I'm the luckiest guy in the world, with the life I've lived.'' He tells me he has no regrets, so I can't have any either.

So Lisa and I will continue to keep Hal and his family--including Anne, Alex, and Astrid--in our thoughts and hold them close to our hearts during this difficult season.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise today to recognize and celebrate the career of an exceptional public servant, GEN Paul Nakasone. General Nakasone is retiring from the Army after 37 years of military service, most recently as the Director of the National Security Agency and Commander of United States Cyber Command. He is a decorated combat veteran, and his career has been exceptional. His first operational tour of duty, in 1987, was at Fort Carson, CO, as an assistant intelligence officer. His tours since have brought him everywhere from Korea to Kansas, Georgia to Iraq, and to Fort Belvoir, the Pentagon, and Alexandria, VA.

Over the last 6 years General Nakasone has led the women and men of the National Security Agency, ensuring that its unique, timely and accurate intelligence insights on topics of critical national security are delivered to warfighters, policymakers, and U.S. allies. As chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, I am a firsthand daily consumer of NSA's signals intelligence and analysis, and I cannot stress enough the importance, value, and insight it brings to us as policymakers.

Under his leadership of NSA and concurrently, as Commander of U.S. Cyber Command, General Nakasone oversaw greater integration between U.S. Cyber Command and the NSA. He established several NSA organizations, including a Cybersecurity Directorate, a China Strategy Center, and the Cybersecurity Collaboration Center, to partner with private industry. He spearheaded the development of several successful joint NSA and Cyber Command teams such as the Russia Small Group on election security, which has been vital in securing U.S. elections through the last three election cycles.

In 2018, during General Nakasone's first appearance before the committee as Director of the NSA, he told members that his priority coming into the position was the NSA workforce. He called them the core of the Agency and was adamant about assessing the challenges to retaining ``his talent'' and also recruiting more talent. He knew, as with any successful organization, the NSA relies on its brilliant and skilled workforce of intelligence professionals to accomplish its national security mission. Their well-being and success have been a priority for him throughout his tenure and during his nearly 20 appearances before the committee. He helped to grow the next generation of intelligence analysts and collectors, mathematical scientists, linguists, and cybersecurity experts with programs such as Women in Cyber, cybersecurity and foreign language summer camps, codebreaker challenges, and with partnerships at colleges and universities across the country.

In speaking of the next generation, I would be remiss in not sharing the incredible story of General Nakasone's father, retired Colonel Edwin Nakasone, known as Bud. On the morning of December 7, 1941, then 14-year-old Bud Nakasone, now 96, was eating a bowl of corn flakes in his kitchen when he saw Japanese planes streaking through the skies, part of the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. He saw the planes strafing the nearby barracks and saw a bomb drop on the nearby airfield. He saw U.S. planes, barracks, and hangars going up in flames. As one of the planes flew over their home, he saw on the plane ``the big red meatball''--what the military called the large red circle representing the Japanese Rising Sun--and in the cockpit, the Japanese pilot wearing goggles and a white scarf--and he realized we were at war.

Bud Nakasone enlisted in the Army in 1945, and he served as an interpreter during the occupation of Japan. He later served both on Active Duty and with the Army Reserve, retiring after 41 years of service. He made his career as a high school teacher and college professor in Minnesota. General Nakasone's mother Mary was also an educator--a librarian at the University of Minnesota--when she met Bud. They were married in 1954 are still both living in Minnesota and will celebrate 70 years together this September.

General Nakasone has said that his father's career in the Army Reserve influenced his decision to enroll in the Army's ROTC program and that, when he started learning about the 442nd Infantry Regiment of the U.S. Army--a World War II fighting unit composed almost entirely of second-generation American soldiers of Japanese ancestry--and interviewed several of its veterans, he also became interested in serving.

He has remarked that some of his most satisfying assignments included the privilege to command soldiers, including as a company commander while deployed along the demilitarized zone that separates North and South Korea.

He is a big sports fan, including of the Minnesota Vikings, which means he knows how to keep a stiff upper lip when life brings disappointment or misfortune, whether in the form of a missed Gary Anderson field goal or a lengthy Senate hold. On General Nakasone's bio, it is noted that he and his wife Susan are the proud parents of four children, who form the nucleus of ``Team Nakasone,'' and I know how important their efforts and sacrifices have also been in allowing General Nakasone to take on assignments of increasing responsibility and importance to the security of the United States.

On behalf of a grateful nation, as he transitions to future opportunities, I would like to publicly thank Paul for his long military career, his contributions to the Nation and our national security, and for his leadership of the intelligence professionals at the National Security Agency, and I want to personally thank the Nakasone family for their critical role in supporting him throughout his service to the Nation.

Paul, thank you, and we will miss you.

Madam President, I was unavoidably absent on Tuesday, January 9, 2024, for rollcall vote No. 2. Had I been present, I would have voted yea on confirmation for John A. Kazen, of Texas, to be U.S. District Judge for the Southen District of Texas, rollcall vote No. 2;

Mr. President, this explanation reflects the status of negotiations and disposition of issues reached between the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence for the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2024.

The explanation shall have the same effect with respect to the implementation of this act as if it were a joint explanatory statement of a conference committee.

I ask unanimous consent that the explanatory statement for the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2024 be printed into the Record.

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

Mr. President, I rise today in joining a number of my colleagues to pay tribute to the legacy of Senator Dianne Feinstein.

In the last couple of days since her unfortunate passing, much has been said about my friend Dianne. She was a trailblazer who helped pave the way for generations of women seeking public office. As the first female mayor of San Francisco, she was elected to the Senate in 1992, the so-called Year of the Woman, and she helped triple the number of female Senators from two to six. Think about that. That was just in 1992. Although we still have a long way to go as we march toward true representation in this body, today there are four times that many women sitting in this Chamber, and, as many of them have already noted from the floor, it is in part because of the legacy of Dianne Feinstein.

Dianne was propelled into office because she believed in the power of public service to improve people's lives. It is why, having witnessed the devastating effect of gun violence firsthand--literally coming up on the murder of then-Supervisor Harvey Milk--she was such a champion of gun safety.

Believing that weapons of war had no place on our streets, she authored and shepherded into law the assault weapons ban. Although I acknowledge that

my own record on this issue has been somewhat complicated, I am convinced that this country would be far better and would be far safer if that assault weapons ban was restored today.

In this and so many other ways, Senator Feinstein was long ahead of the curve. She was a lifelong champion of equality, civil rights, immigrants, and the gay community. She was proud to call herself an environmentalist long before that term was even used.

Much has been said about her legacy on these issues, but as the current chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, I want to call particular attention to her leadership on national security.

Let me cite right now that I have been in pretty regular contact with my dear friend, the former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, the former Senator from North Carolina, Richard Burr, who also wanted, through me, to express his condolences as well.

Among her many firsts, Senator Feinstein was the first woman to chair the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. She served as chairman from 2009 to 2015 and vice chairman from 2015 to 2017.

During her time as chair of the committee, the Senator led the drafting and subsequent enactment of six consecutive authorization bills following a 6-year span where we didn't do the IAA. These bills are crucial tools to exercise oversight of the U.S. intelligence community. They authorize funding for intelligence activities and add or amend legislation affecting the IC.

But perhaps one of her greatest legacies was her unflinching investigation into the brutal detention and interrogation methods used by the CIA in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

As part of that report, which, I can tell you as a member of the committee at that point, without her persistence, her diligence, would not have gone through, as a part of that effort, the report that came out of her investigation into CIA methods was a report that--committee staff examined more than 6.3 million pages of records. They wrote a 6,700-page report, backed up by 38,000 footnotes, and eventually released a public, 500-page, declassified, executive summary detailing a host of brutal practices used against detainees, without--and this was hard for those of us who supported the IC--without yielding actionable intelligence to prevent terrorist attacks.

In doing so--again, I was a witness to this--Chairman Feinstein went toe-to-toe with the CIA, went toe-to-toe with Presidents of two different parties and others who were determined to bury that part of the CIA's history. She made sure that we had a full reckoning.

I joined the committee in 2011, 2 years into Dianne's tenure as chair. From her, I learned about both the intel, the necessity that this committee be independent, that it needs to be bipartisan, and that our role in oversight was critically important.

In so many ways, I am proud of the fact that under Senator Burr and now under my tenure as leadership, we call ourselves the Senate Intelligence Committee--the most bipartisan, fully functioning committee not only in the Senate but in the whole Congress.

On a personal note, I remember--and I have such greater appreciation for this now--when I was the new guy on the committee, I sat at the far end of the dais. My particular interests were in satellites and overhead. Whenever we had a hearing on the essential role that NGA, NRO, and other Agencies play, in terms of overseeing the oversight of our satellite imagery, and the fact that I felt we were sometimes investing way too much in legacy systems, Dianne would always let me go the extra minute, 2 minutes, 3 minutes in terms of my questioning. That is a type of courtesy and understanding that I have tried to emulate in my role as chairman.

Sometimes, at the end of a long hearing, if you are the guy or the gal at the end of the dais in your chair, you like things to be wrapped up fairly quickly. She was always courteous. She was always understanding. She allowed me the lane where I slowly developed some level of expertise. And I stand here today proud of my work on that committee.

But I learned so much from her about how to operate--how to operate with integrity, how to operate in a bipartisan fashion, and with always the eye on the ball that the work that the men and the women of the intelligence community does is absolutely critical. But it is also equally critical for those of us in Congress who are entrusted with the oversight responsibility of that community that we do our job as well.

Like so many of my colleagues, we have lost a mentor. I lost a friend, and the Senate has lost a giant.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, thank you for the courtesy of allowing me to speak again. I just spoke about Dianne Feinstein.

Later today, the House is potentially acting on legislation. One of the things Dianne was always clear-eyed about was our national security threats and the challenges posed by autocratic nation-states like Russia. I implore my friends in the House--a House that just this week, by a vote of 330-plus, said they did not want to walk away from Ukraine, our commitment at this moment, our military support, our diplomatic support, our State Department support at this critical junction in this world.

Well, in a crass, crass move, Republican House leadership is not only trying to remove all assistance for Ukraine but literally trying to prevent our Defense Department, our State Department, and other Agencies from transferring already-existing funds to those necessary areas that are going to be most in jeopardy if we walk away from Ukraine at this moment in time. I implore those who have said time and again that we need to stand up for Ukraine not to walk away at this moment in time.

The truth is, what happens today, as European elections over the next few weeks with forces that are not in support of democracy's continued fight against the autocracy that Putin represents, the brutal dictatorship that Putin represents--they will be watching.

I hope that we stand firm, as so many of us in this body alone, north of 85 Senators, have come to the floor at one point or another or in voting have said they want to stand with the people of Ukraine in their strong fight. We are going to have to address that question later today as we sort through these final hours before the imminent and totally avoidable shutdown happens at midnight tonight.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I want to thank my good friend the Senator from Oklahoma, who is also a member of the Intelligence Committee, a subject of which I am going to speak to, and I appreciate the courtesy of allowing me to go first.

Today, Mr. President, I rise to say a few words about someone who has been an essential part of the Senate community for many, many years.

I am proud to note that earlier this week--as a matter of fact, on Tuesday evening--with the support from the Senator from Oklahoma, the Senate unanimously confirmed the nomination of Mike Casey to serve as Director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center. We know, at a time when the United States is facing tremendous foreign intelligence and security threats, it is important to have a Senate- confirmed leader as the head of the NCSC, which is charged with protecting against insider threats, supply chain risks, and other counterintelligence issues.

The truth is, the position has been vacant since the end of the last administration. So, as chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, I am glad that we will finally now have a Senate-confirmed leader in place to lead the efforts to protect against foreign threats, to protect U.S. critical infrastructure, to advance the counterintelligence and security mission, and--maybe most importantly--to be on constant call of the Senate Intelligence staff to make sure that efforts to reform security clearances is at the top of the agenda.

But while I recognize that this is a great step for our country and our national security, it is a real loss to me personally, to members on both sides of the aisle on the Intelligence Committee, and to our staff, because we are losing Mike Casey, who has been the staff director for the last 8 years. And while he doesn't look Medicare- eligible, the truth is, he has been working up here for 28 years, starting in the House of Representatives and, eventually, joining the staff of the House Armed Services Committee before Senator Feinstein brought him over to the upper Chamber as staff director for the Senate Intel Committee in 2016.

I have worked extraordinarily closely with Mike over my years as a member of the committee but particularly when I bumped up to the position of vice chair. I think a lot about our kind of bonding and, in many ways, I think of the committee's bonding when, under the able leadership of then-chairman Richard Burr, the committee took on the responsibility of the investigation into the outside interference of the 2016 national elections. Our staff and, at that point, the majority committee's staff worked so seamlessly together.

While we got a lot of grief from folks all across the political spectrum--and a lot of this was due to Mike Casey--one of the things that I was most proud of was, as a variety of people came before the committee to testify on what could have been, otherwise, a totally partisan matter as it was in the House of Representatives, witness after witness said they didn't know, as they were being questioned, whether they were being questioned by majority or minority staff. A lot of that was due to Mike Casey's leadership.

The truth, as well, is that Mike--I had to push him at times. You know, he used to think that the job of the Intelligence Committee was basically just to do oversight on the 17, 18, 19--depending on the week--number of IC Agencies that we oversee. He didn't realize that, actually, the IC's responsibility--and I know sometimes the Presiding Officer and I have had clashes--was literally everything that touched technology in our country.

Again, Mike, while sometimes reluctant, has stepped up to that task. And I am proud of the fact that it was our committee that initially worked on the CHIPS bill and that it was our committee that first pointed out some of the challenges with 5G and Huawei as well as some of the more recent work.

One of the ways we were able to do that--and we have got a lot of the committee staff behind us--is because, literally, Mike Casey knew everyone in the IC and the DOD. He knew where they were. He knew where the bodies were buried, both literally and figuratively, and could make sure that, as we tried to go off into other directions, that basic core function of oversight was never, never undermined. Again, he did this always--after a little nudging--in a bipartisan way.

I am extraordinarily proud of that and proud of the service that he has provided in educating me on a lot of issues that I was not that familiar with as I came on to the committee and in keeping our Intel Committee staff together. That bipartisan nature has continued under his leadership in our workings with Vice Chair Rubio and his team as well.

So, while we say goodbye to Mike, we also wish him well as he embarks on his critical new role. As Director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, Mike will face many of the same challenges we have wrestled with on the Intelligence Committee.

As we all know, the truth is that national security is no longer simply about who has got the most tanks and guns and ships and planes. It really is about who is going to lead in artificial intelligence, quantum computing, 5G, cyber security, synthetic biology. All of these are areas in which Mike, in his new job, will also have to point out threats, both external and internal, to America's leadership.

He will--as I mentioned, he is committed--respond to our staff member John Rosenwasser at any moment, day or night, 7 days a week, 24 hours a day, to make sure that we finally finish security clearance reform and make sure, in terms of insider threats, that we don't see repeats of what has happened, unfortunately, too many times. So while Mike Casey might be leaving our staff, it is safe to say he will not be leaving my speed dial.

We will miss you, Mike.

Most importantly, I give him these final words of advice: Don't screw it up.

I yield the floor to my good friend, the Senator from Oklahoma.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the privileges of the floor be granted to the following member of my staff, Max Slaiman, today.

Mr. President, I was absent on Wednesday May 31, 2023, for rollcall vote No. 134. Had I been present, I would have voted nay on the motion to proceed to H.J. Res. 45, providing for the congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Department of Education relating to ``Waivers and Modifications of Student Loans''.

Mr. President, I was absent on Wednesday May 31, 2023, for rollcall vote No. 135. Had I been present, I would have voted nay on H.J. Res. 45, providing for the congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Department of Education relating to ``Waivers and Modifications of Student Loans''.

Mr. President, I was absent on Tuesday, May 30, 2023, for rollcall vote No. 133. Had I been present, I would have voted yea on confirmation for Darrel James Papillion, of Louisiana, to be U.S. District Judge for the Eastern District of Louisiana.

Mr. President, I was absent on Wednesday, May 31, 2023, for rollcall vote No. 134. Had I been present, I would have voted nay on the motion to proceed to H.J. Res. 45, providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Department of Education relating to ``Waivers and Modifications of Federal Student Loans''.

Mr. President, I was absent on Thursday, June 1, 2023, for rollcall vote No. 135. Had I been present, I would have voted nay on H.J. Res. 45, providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Department of Education relating to ``Waivers and Modifications of Federal Student Loans''.

Madam President, I rise today in recognition of the retirement of Alan Kohler.

Alan leaves the FBI as Assistant Director of the Counterintelligence Division, a challenging post he has held since 2020. Over his long and impressive career with the FBI, Alan has continuously worked on our most pressing national security issues. It is a career that has truly lived up to the FBI's

motto of ``Fidelity, Bravery, and Integrity.''

As part of its history, the Senate Intelligence Committee has worked to ensure the intelligence community works seamlessly across its many Agencies and with our allies to protect Americans. That is a goal Alan Kohler committed his life's work to, whether he was serving overseas as legal attache in the United Kingdom to coordinate efforts with our closest ally or developing new means of integrating and cooperating across Agencies like the Counterintelligence Task Force he established during his time as Assistant Director, his accomplishments have inspired junior agents and personnel to break through Agency stovepipes in defense of our Nation.

Alan's faithful service to the Bureau spanned three decades, through some of our Nation's darkest days. He joined the FBI in 1996 and was assigned to work counterintelligence cases in the Washington field office, right in the wake of and in the midst of some of the most damaging espionage cases the U.S. has faced. In the days after the attacks on September 11, Alan bravely served on the evidence recovery team at the Pentagon in Arlington, VA.

After transferring to the New York field office in 2006, Alan Kohler worked cases that led to the arrest of 10 Russian illegals in 2010, earning the Attorney General Award for Exceptional Service and changing the way Americans understood the intelligence activities of our adversaries. He was also fortunate enough to be assigned as assistant special agent in charge of the Norfolk field office where he was responsible for all of the FBI's counterintelligence, counterterrorism, and crisis management programs for that community.

In 2017, after Russia's unprecedented interference in our elections, Alan established the FBI's Foreign Influence Task Force, an entity we on the Senate Intelligence Committee continue to rely on to collect on and report threats to the very foundation of our democracy.

As chairman of the Intelligence Committee, I have relied on Alan's integrity to provide the committee with honest and timely information, even when it was not easy for him to do. He consistently demonstrated professionalism in all our engagements and modeled a constructive relationship between the executive and legislative branches. It was a professionalism born of his commitment to safeguard our Nation. I am certain Alan will find ways to continue to serve as he enjoys his very well-earned retirement. I would also like to recognize his family who has supported him throughout his tremendous career.

Mr. President, I have come to speak on a different topic, but I want to commend my friend the Senator from Illinois for his comments. I agree with him.

Just yesterday, my colleague and dear friend Senator Kaine and I met with four of the families who were part of one of that litany of shootings, in Virginia Beach, where a mentally deranged individual came in and brutally murdered 12--mostly city employees and a few folks who were there to try to get city services. The anguish, pain, and hurt of these four families 4 years after the fact reflect the kind of anguish and hurt that the families in Nashville are feeling and so many countless others.

I commend the Senator again and agree that it is incumbent upon us to do our job. Thoughts and prayers are not enough.

I thank him for his comments.

Madam President, I want to thank my friend--is it 43 years?--Senator Kaine for his comments.

I apologize to the Presiding Officer and folks up front that I didn't hear all his comments. So you may be hearing from me a bit of repetition of what Tim has already said, but I think, in terms of Judge Ballou, who Senator Kaine has already mentioned, a little bit of repetition might be appropriate.

I also join with Senator Kaine in urging all my colleagues, in about 8 minutes, to support President Biden's choice to serve as a U.S. District Court judge for the Western District of Virginia. He really is--Bob Ballou is a pillar of the Virginia legal community.

I want to start with where Senator Kaine left off. He went through our whole vetting process under the Trump administration. And the fact that someone has, at least in terms of our criteria, I think, qualified as an extraordinarily competent, well-suited individual under both President Trump and President Biden is a real credit. And I give the White House credit for moving forward and putting his name forward.

I think Senator Kaine has already mentioned the fact that he got bipartisan support in committee, something that, unfortunately, is becoming rarer and rarer; but, as probably has already been indicated, this is the kind of individual who has both the legal acumen and the temperament, I think, to be a great judge.

He is a Virginia native, originally from Roanoke, a two-time UVA graduate. Following his time at UVA and UVA Law School, he originally clerked for Judge Peter Beer of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.

Following this brief stint outside of Virginia, he returned to private practice in Richmond and Roanoke, where he litigated complex civil issues.

In 2011, he was selected by the article 3 judges of the Western District to support as a magistrate judge. Over the past 12 years, Judge Ballou has continued earning the respect and admiration of those article 3 judges that, hopefully, after the next few days, he will actually serve with and, I think, will do, again, a great job.

He will be replacing retiring Judge Jones. Senator Kaine and I both have had the pleasure--and I think Senator Kaine actually may have practiced with him occasionally. But they are big shoes to fill, and he will do that.

Again, as has been mentioned, Judge Ballou has been really known as a magistrate judge for his temperament, the fact that lawyers who appear in his courtroom indicate that he works diligently, he always has an open mind, and he has a real sense of fairness.

He loves Southwest Virginia. His father had served as a State court judge. He has been very involved in community and charitable activities throughout the whole region.

This is, I think, a man whose time has come. I wish he would have been already on the bench. We will have a chance to rectify that with our move to cloture today and then, hopefully, in a couple of days later, his confirmation as a judge from the Western District of Virginia.

So I heartily join my friend Senator Kaine and urge the confirmation of Judge Ballou as a judge to the Western District of Virginia.

With that, Madam President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, I rise today in joining my other colleagues, organized by my friend the Senator from Hawaii, to ask my colleagues to vote against the resolution, which I think we will be taking up literally in the next 10 minutes, which would strip away a commonsense Department of Labor rule that simply provides fiduciaries-- remember who we are talking about: fiduciaries, people who are responsible, under ERISA plans, to think about their beneficiaries over the long term. We are trying to make sure that those fiduciaries who are charged with maintaining retirement plans have the ability to adequately account for environmental, social, and governance factors.

I know some of my colleagues have come on the floor and said this is an

attempt by the Department of Labor to somehow mandate the retirement investments of hard-working Americans. Nothing could be further from the truth. The truth is, we look at profit and loss, we look at cash reserves, and we look at financial accounting. But the idea that environmental, social, and governance factors can't even be looked at is an interference in the business cycle that really kind of goes beyond the pale.

I am often regarded--I have to acknowledge this--in my caucus as sometimes being a Member who has the most experience with capitalism, the most experience with business. I absolutely believe in our system. There is nothing better. But the idea that today--and I don't want to copy some of the comments that have been made, but the idea that today, a lot of folks who have never been able to read a balance sheet are going to come in and tell paid fiduciaries what they can consider or what they can't consider in terms of the long-term economic returns for their beneficiaries--I wonder if things have gotten a little topsy- turvy here.

I can imagine if some people were saying ``Well, we need to make sure we have this rule in place'' or ``Overrule this rule'' or ``Put this binding in place'' if you are talking about day traders or if you are talking about a hedge fund that only looks at the next quarter's results--the kind of short-term capitalism that too often, I think, is eating at the core of our great system. But if we are going to look at long-term returns, we ought to take and have to take into consideration factors--in many cases, factors that may not have been as relevant 30, 50, 70 years ago. Some are going to say we can't look at those.

Unfortunately, my colleagues across the aisle have decided to take away a useful term, a useful set of analyses, something that has been asked for by these pension funds, by these beneficiaries, and instead try to turn it into a political issue.

Let me recall back 75 years ago. If you look at the Fortune 500 and the companies that were involved in that Fortune 500, about roughly 75 to 80 percent of those companies' assets were tangible assets. What does that mean? It means it was their plant. It was their equipment. It was their machinery.

Fast-forward--and a lot of this is due to great innovation in the technology field--and those same Fortune 500 companies are dramatically different than the companies named 60, 70 years ago. If you look at their balance sheets today, 75, 80 percent of their assets are intangible assets. What are intangible assets? Intangible assets are things like intellectual property, and that is coming about from a healthy workforce. But more than anything else, it is the men and women who work at these firms. Virtually every CEO I have heard from in the last 10 years has said: My biggest asset is my workforce.

The idea that somehow--because ESG is not just E; it is also S, and that falls into workforce--the idea that somehow a pension fund can't look at workforce retention, workforce quality, workforce characteristics as a measure of what they want to invest in, to me, is a little whacky.

Let me actually call on a reference sort person, whom I hope my colleagues on the other side of the aisle will acknowledge, and that was President Trump's Chairman of the SEC, the Securities and Exchange Commission, Jay Clayton, whom I had a very good working relationship with. He said that human capital disclosures can and should inform investment decisions.

Chair Clayton said:

Our current disclosure requirements date back to a time

when companies relied significantly on plant, property, and

equipment to drive value. Today, human capital represents an

essential driver of performance for many companies albeit in

different ways.

So under Mr. Trump's SEC, there was a rulemaking process that started to make sure that human capital components can be an appropriate focus of reviews, particularly for companies and entities that want to invest for the long term.

I am concerned that this approach we are taking today might indirectly preclude those fiduciaries who represent pension funds, long-term investors--they are no longer going to be able to actually look at this critical criteria around human capital.

The other thing is, the Department of Labor rule--and I know a lot of my colleagues have spoken to this and talk about: Well, what about the environment? I think we all would recognize or most of us would recognize the fact that climate change is real and poses a rapidly growing threat to the long-term feasibility of investments made on behalf of hard-working Americans.

While this Department of Labor rule won't direct our Armed Forces, I think it is really important to understand that the FFRDCs, the federally funded research and development corporations--the RANDs, the MITREs, the CNA, which does naval work analysis, federally funded--if we are going to apply these same kinds of Department of Labor prohibitions on our Armed Forces, we couldn't allow the CNA to look at the long-term effects on the Navy--and I don't want to give away a secret here, but they have been looking at this issue for over 20 years--that they couldn't make those kinds of predictions about what effect sea level rise would have on our Navy.

I tell you, we are blessed in the Commonwealth of Virginia to have the world's largest Navy base, in Norfolk, and I can assure you, virtually every year or every other year, we have to raise the piers, literally spend hundreds of millions of dollars to raise the piers to make sure that Navy base can still be utilized.

So if it is a smart enough, good enough requirement that the Navy and our Armed Forces are looking at the E of ESG, why would we preclude the private sector from doing that?

I think the Department of Labor's rule on ESG is both practical and necessary. I think those funds that chose not to abide by it, that is their right. That is what capitalism is all about--making choices. But the notion that we are going to somehow come in and impose requirements on the market and take away long-term investors' ability to consider human capital, to consider the effects of climate change, and I have not even touched--I know we are going to have to go to a vote--on issues around corporate governance, all which can lead to, longer term, better returns. If this was a rule about day traders and quarter-to- quarter hedge fund folks, I might get it. But in terms of protecting the long-term value creation in long-term sustainable capitalism, I think this effort today sadly misses the mark and will do a great deal of damage.

I urge my colleagues, when the vote comes, to vote against the CRA.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the rules of procedure of the Select Committee on Intelligence be printed in the Record.