Floor Statements

Madam President, I appreciate the opportunity to be on the floor this afternoon with my colleague from Kansas.

It is 2 months ago tomorrow that Hamas carried out these horrific attacks in Israel. Now, bear in mind that the Jewish State--and this is the world's only Jewish State--is in a fight for their very survival because Hamas has decided that they are going to continue this. They said October 7 was basically the beginning. And they continued to do this over and over and over.

Now, this is why we have said let's deal with the aid to Israel and do it separately from Ukraine and from Taiwan. And let's also talk about our border. So there is a reason for what we are doing.

Now, I know that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle do not want to have a pay-for. House Republicans have chosen to have the pay- for. And yes, indeed, this Chamber needs to be working with the House to fund a resolution to this issue. And I appreciate that my colleague from Washington brought up the fact that we need to work through this issue. Indeed, we do. So let's work through these issues separately.

When it comes to Israel aid, there are some urgent needs that are there. There is $4 billion to replenish the Iron Dome. This is a wonderful technology that we have worked with Israel in creating. It is incredibly effective. They need $4 billion for replenishment.

Bear in mind--I said Hamas has told us--they did it once; they are going to do this again.

They need $1 billion for munitions. They need $50 million for help to evacuate Americans, $150 million to help secure our Embassy in Jerusalem.

And using the money that was set aside for additional IRS agents but has not been used--that makes sense to Tennesseans, that we would do that.

I tell you where Tennesseans do have a problem. They look at our national debt, $34 trillion. That is about $100,000 for every man, woman, and child.

I have a grandbaby who will be 4 months old tomorrow--his debt share, $100,000.

Think about what we are doing. Think about what effect this will have 18, 19, 20 years from now, when that child draws their first paycheck, and how it is going to limit their opportunity.

Another thing that doesn't seem to make sense, while we all agree that Israel needs to receive their funding, Tennesseans don't want this to come attached with billions of dollars for other programs, like $10 billion for global humanitarian assistance and more than $2 billion for assistance to resettle refugees.

This is something that separately needs our attention. If we want to talk about securing borders, let's secure our border first. When we talk about aid to Israel, let's do it, and let's pay for it.

I appreciate my colleague from Kansas.

I yield the floor.

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

Madam President, the Wall Street Journal had such an interesting report in last week, and I wanted to bring this to everyone's attention. As you know, I have talked so much about the importance of protecting our children from what is happening online.

The Journal had worked with the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, and they were reporting on the tests that they jointly had conducted on Instagram. What they were trying to do was to see what type of content that Instagram's algorithms were recommending to pedophiles who were interested in sexual content.

Now, think about this, because in the physical world, you have got laws against pedophiles and the content that they are making and creating and distributing. But in the virtual space, our children do not have that protection. That is the premise that the Canadian Centre for Child Protection was working from, and this is what the Wall Street Journal was reporting on.

The results were absolutely disgusting. When you go in and you look at what they saw, you realize that Instagram actually delivers short videos showing content of children and adults in sexual situations. See, it is serving it up for these pedophiles. It is delivering it. All they have to do--a click of the mouse, and it is right there on their screen.

Here is an example feed that the test produced. Bear in mind, their researchers are going in. They are looking at this, and this is some of the content that was found in the researchers' feed: an adult uncrosses her legs to reveal her underwear; sprinter at a track meet runs over a small boy who steps on the track; advertisements promoting trips to Disneyland; child in a bathing suit records herself posing in a mirror; adult-content creator gives a ``come hither'' motion; girl dancing in a car while a song with sexual lyrics plays. That is a snippet of what one researcher had come up in their platform, in their feed.

The tests also found that Instagram was providing videos and pictures of missing and exploited children as well as videos confirmed to be child sexual abuse material. We call that CSAM. At the Senate Judiciary Committee, we have done some good work in working to prohibit CSAM and to protect our children. All of this legislation should come to the floor. It should be immediately passed.

Now, of what I have just read to you of what the researcher found, there is even more. The report showed that Instagram was well-aware that its algorithms could produce this stream of content. Bear in mind, this is illegal content. This is child sexual abuse content.

Former Meta employees--and, of course, we know Meta owns Facebook and Instagram. Former Meta employees told the Journal that Meta knew its algorithms could specifically aggregate content sexualizing children. And this ties in with so much of what Senator Blumenthal and I have found as we led hearings looking into what was happening in these online platforms and how it was affecting our children. These platforms know what is happening. They are fully aware. They know that these algorithms will aggregate that content and then they will serve it up to you--fully aware of it.

But you know why they don't change it? They don't change it because they put profits over the protection of our children. They make a conscious choice to keep it the way it is.

Now, before releasing Reels, that app, Meta's safety staff warned the product would chain together videos of children and inappropriate content. The safety team actually provided recommendations that Meta should either increase those content detection capabilities or prevent the recommendation of any content containing--minors being a part of this content. They gave them choices and options and said: Here is a way that you can go about protecting children before you put Reels and that platform out there.

Now, those are two suggestions that were made to Meta by their own staff. This is how you can protect children: Increase your detection capabilities or prevent the recommendation.

Now, it is the algorithms that feed up these recommendations: If you like this, you are going to like this. You loved this. Just wait; you are going to love this.

Now, Meta said no to each of those. There again, why is it that they said no? Well, it is what we see repeatedly: They are putting profits ahead of protecting our children.

So think about this. How do these platforms--how does Meta get their net worth? Well, all of this is based on the number of eyeballs they capture, the length of time that they can keep people on their site. So they ignore the suggestions on how to make that site safer for our children.

Meta employees actually said that preventing the system from pushing this content to users who are interested in it--well, what users do you think are interested in child sexual abuse content? It is pedophiles. It is criminals. So here you go. These employees said that preventing the system from pushing this content to users interested in it ``requires significant changes to the recommendation algorithms that also drive engagement for normal users.''

I cannot believe that they are so hardened, that they are so careless, that they would think that: If somebody wants this, serve it up. It may have a child who is sexually exploited or even a child who is missing in that video, but--you know what--serve it up. They think the dollar is worth it.

The Journal also reported on Meta documents. Now, this is not just hearsay. It is not anecdotal. These are actual corporate documents. Now, these documents showed that ``the company's safety staffers are broadly barred from making changes to the platform that might reduce daily active users by any measurable amount.''

Now, in other words, they have the tools; they have the technology. They could put in place things that would protect children, but the company will not let the employees take the action that would protect children because it might mean that a user is not on the site for as long a period of time. And as I said, they get their valuation from the number of eyeballs they capture and the amount of time they spend on the site.

This is absolutely unbelievable, but it is the way Meta is choosing to operate. And Meta is not alone. You have got others of these social media platforms that are right in there with them. They keep dishing up this harmful and destructive content.

Why do we have a mental health crisis for our children in this country? Could this possibly be a part of the problem? Why is it that one in three American teenage girls has contemplated suicide? Could this possibly be a part of the problem? Why is it that we are finding out that well over a third of all kids meet a drug dealer online? Why is it that we are learning that children that meet and are groomed by a sex trafficker are first meeting them online?

The lack of care and concern for our Nation's children: stunning. And this is Big Tech. They would rather make a buck than protect a child. Don't try to take away their ability to keep people locked in on that screen. The longer they can keep them, the happier they are.

Well, all of this is one of the reasons that, for the last several years, Senator Blumenthal and I have worked on the Kids Online Safety Act, and we have

continued this work because it is obvious that these platforms cannot be trusted to do even the bare minimum to protect our Nation's children. We are saying, a bare minimum.

Now, the Kids Online Safety Act has the support of 49 Senators in this Chamber, and I thank everyone who is a part of this. We also, Madam President, have 230 advocacy organizations in this country that are in support of the Kids Online Safety Act. And interestingly enough, with the polling we have seen lately, 86 percent of the American people support the Kids Online Safety Act.

Here is what it would do: First, it would force platforms to give families the ability to protect minors' information, disable addictive product features, and opt out of algorithmic recommendations. These are all things that parents and kids want to be able to do because, maybe, there is stuff that they are seeing that they really don't want to see.

Next, it would give parents the safeguards that are needed to protect their kids' online experience as well as a dedicated channel to report harmful behavior. We have met with parents who talk about reporting cyber bullying, reporting videos that are different challenges online. Some of these parents, their children have been injured. Some of them have lost their lives. Some of them committed suicide. They want a dedicated channel to report harmful behavior, and the legislation requires these platforms to respond to parents and kids.

Predatory content and content that promotes self-harm, suicide, and eating disorders to minors will now, indeed, be a problem for these platforms to deal with. No longer would they be able to deny and deflect knowing this content is on their site.

We also included requirements for annual risk assessments and independent research reports we can use to assess safety threats to underage users.

Madam President, it is time for the Senate to finally act on the harms online platforms are posing to our little ones. Our Kids Online Safety Act, the REPORT Act--we have got great bills that would rein in some of this reckless behavior.

And as I have described, platforms like Meta know. They are fully aware of the harms this is causing. We have had whistleblowers talk to us about the harms and that they know these harms exist.

So with 49 Members of this Chamber supporting the legislation, it is time that we move forward with it, and we should get this done before the end of the year.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, the United States has a long history of standing for freedom and self-determination.

From the 1940s through the 2010s, under President Trump, our Nation has stood with Israel, in defense of Israel. We were there in 1948 when Israel became a country. We stood with them through the Six-Day War and the Yom Kippur War, the Camp David peace talks, negotiations with the PLO, two intifadas, and multiple attempts to implement a two-state solution.

Under President Reagan, we fought the spread of communism across multiple continents because we understand that the unchecked spread of Marxist influence will threaten our very survival. This wasn't just ideological saber rattling. The Soviets had a staggering number of nuclear warheads at their disposal. It was important to eliminate as many of those as we could. Reagan was remarkably clear-eyed about this.

Again, it wasn't a question of politics. It was a matter of recognizing the danger and then finding a way to neutralize that danger. We accepted that it was our duty to protect global security because no one else had the power or the resolve to do that.

And since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014, the United States has been a leading provider of aid to the Ukrainians because Vladimir Putin has the same propensity toward violence and conquest that motivated his predecessors.

This is also why we have fought so hard to provide our partners in Taiwan with the weapons and funding they need to defend themselves against communist Chinese aggression.

Over the past 3 years, our reputation--our Nation's reputation--as a champion of freedom has become tarnished by Joe Biden's foreign policy and his policy of appeasement. Nothing has been more damaging than his refusal to protect our sovereignty here at home. A strong border is the most basic element of our national defense. It is what guarantees our right to exist as a country, and Joe Biden has abandoned it entirely.

When he took office and declared law and order obsolete, he didn't just invite millions of migrants across our border; he invited the new axis of evil--Russia, China, Iran, North Korea--to declare open season on their neighbors. China became more aggressive toward Taiwan. Putin invaded Ukraine. And Hamas violated a ceasefire and slaughtered Israelis in their beds.

The Biden administration's response has only made things worse. They exploited the plight of the Ukrainians as

a distraction from their own terrible policies. They have all but ignored China's human rights violations. And, to date, they put more pressure on Israel than on Hamas to lay down arms.

Joe Biden's attempts to curry favor with the new axis of evil won't keep us safe because these nations aren't here to make friends. Their goal--the goal of that axis of evil--is to exploit our weaknesses until it becomes impossible for us to fight back.

This is a battle over borders, and, if we want to win, we need to lead by example and reassert our right to exist as a sovereign nation. We should start by securing our very own border.

In fiscal year 2023, the Border Patrol recorded more than 3.2 million enforcement actions along our southern border. In addition, we caught 151 known and suspected terrorists trying to illegally enter our country.

The Senate will have an opportunity to address this before the year ends, but I fear my Democratic colleagues will block those efforts or, worse, offer a half-baked solution and call it a job well done.

The majority leader insists that the issue of border security is just too partisan, and the majority whip insists that since we let the issue of border security go unattended for 30-plus years, we can afford to let it go just a little bit longer.

This is absolutely nonsense. I think it is also dangerous. If Joe Biden refuses to defend the sovereignty of his own country, our adversaries will assume they can act as aggressively as they want without any meaningful resistance from the United States.

If we refuse to defend ourselves, how can we be effective in defending Israel, our strongest ally in the Middle East?

Israel's sovereignty has been established across thousands of years of history, and still Hamas denies Israel's right to exist. That is how they justified violating the ceasefire and declaring war on the world's Jewish community, and it is frightening to see so many people in this country defending that decision. Every one of those individuals should watch the videos that we have watched from the GoPro cameras of those Hamas terrorists. It is revolting.

No peace plan is possible until Hamas is eliminated and the Palestinians recognize Israel's right to exist. To make this happen, we need to set an example by securing our own borders and then passing a stand-alone and straightforward aid package to help Israel do the same.

We all know that giving humanitarian aid to Gaza at this point means letting it go to terrorists. I would ask the majority leader and my Democratic colleagues to give Israel this funding without attaching dangerous conditions that will force them to undermine their own security.

Ensuring a free and sovereign Ukraine is also an important element of our foreign policy, but how can we speak with any real authority about Ukrainian self-determination while holding ourselves to a lower standard?

When Putin attacked, the United States backed Ukraine with our words and our actions because we knew that if we didn't, millions of people would pay the price for our appeasement. We have a historic obligation to Ukraine, and continuing to send aid will serve as a powerful deterrent.

The American people understand how important it is to maintain that pressure on Russia and Vladimir Putin, but they don't think they should have to sacrifice their own security to do it. They also are very concerned about the total lack of transparency surrounding these aid packages.

Here is a stat. Since February of 2022, the United States has approved $113 billion in total aid responding to Putin's war. This includes defense items sent via the Presidential drawdown authority, with no oversight. It is imperative that we have oversight and transparency around every single dollar that is going into Ukraine.

The reason? Right now Americans can't afford to spend even one more cent on gas or groceries, thanks to Joe Biden's Bidenomics. So they need to see that their money is actually going to be accounted for and that it is actually going to make a difference. We owe them a full accounting of how their money is being spent in Ukraine, how long we will maintain the flow of aid, and when they can expect to see us match those efforts here at home with our own border security plan. They also want to know: What is the strategy, and how are we going to make certain that Vladimir Putin does not win?

Joe Biden's actions speak much louder than his words. For 3 years now, he has projected nothing but weakness. He has sent a parade of diplomats to legitimize relations with the Chinese Communist Party. He has enabled Iran and its terrorist proxies--Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, ISIS Iraq, ISIS in Syria--and he has sent billions upon billions of dollars in security aid overseas without giving a second thought to securing our own border.

At the height of the Cold War, Reagan said:

[I]f history teaches anything, it teaches that simpleminded

appeasement or wishful thinking about our adversaries is

folly. It means the betrayal of our past [and] the

squandering of our freedom.

There is a lot of wisdom in that. We need to think about that history. Thousands of innocent people have already paid the ultimate price because Joe Biden has refused to heed that warning.

It is time to abandon this failed strategy of appeasement. It is time to project strength and resolve. It is time for our allies to know that they are our allies, that they can count on us. It is time for our enemies to fear us. It is time for us to make certain that we get an aid package--an aid package--to Israel. It is time for us to secure our southern border. It is time for us to know who is coming into this country and why they are coming into this country.

If Joe Biden doesn't act to secure our border and defend our right to exist as a free and independent country, we are going to see the violence that threatens the sovereignty of Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan bleed onto American soil, and no level of negotiation or appeasement will be able to stop it.

I yield the floor.

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

Madam President, over the past 52 days, we have watched a horrifying propaganda campaign take over our social media platforms.

Anti-Israel sentiment and support for Hamas terrorism has gone mainstream, and even Biden administration officials like Jake Sullivan admit that Hamas is using popular online platforms to push propaganda. Of course, TikTok is the enabler-in-chief in this regard.

Here are some stats for you: Between October 23 and 30, videos with the ``StandWithPalestine'' hashtag received 285 million views globally, while videos with ``StandWithIsrael'' hashtag received just 64 million views.

Now, keep in mind, these stats reflect the online discourse surrounding the deadliest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust 3 weeks after it happened. Everyone has seen the pictures and videos of what Hamas had done. We knew that they were holding innocent people and families and children hostage.

It is terrible enough on its own, but we know that it is also a symptom of a very serious disease. We have seen more than enough evidence to suggest that TikTok's executives are manipulating user sentiment with Israel. Why would they do this? Because leveraging the anti-Israel cause is in the best interest of their handlers in the Chinese Communist Party.

By silencing Americans and those who are pro-Israel and other westerners who counter anti-Semitic propaganda, they can ingratiate themselves with the Arab world and undermine the United States as the global superpower and chief mediator in the Middle East.

They know that by doing this, they are normalizing terrorism and genocide, but it puts the CCP and their partners in the new ``axis of evil'' even one step closer to global domination, and that is their goal. Russia, China, Iran, North Korea--that ``axis of evil''--they intend to push themselves to global domination. So going after Israel, going after pro-Israel, allowing anti-Semitic conversations to be carried out, they are OK with that. They look at it and say: small price to pay for us to be able to get our way.

Well, I have looked through the past few weeks of coverage of the role of TikTok and how they have played into this, and I came across story after story defending the platform and the firehose of pro- terrorist content that it promotes. And, of course, you are going to have story after story defending TikTok--of course--because it is OK with them to promote terrorism and to promote genocide.

Lately, those same mainstream media outlets have all been obsessed with context, and I think we can all benefit from understanding the context around what is happening with this content that is online.

Here is the context: The context is, the Chinese Communist Party has complete control over what does and does not go viral on TikTok.

A Forbes investigation into TikTok and ByteDance--and ByteDance is the Beijing company that owns TikTok, the CCP board member of ByteDance.

So the Forbes investigation into TikTok and ByteDance revealed that a ByteDance tool, which is run by TikTok staff in China, is tracking mentions of what it considers to be ``sensitive words.'' They do this across the company's products.

Now, some of these sensitive words may be things that are anti-CCP, anti-positions of the CCP, anti-Xi Jinping or anti-Mao. Those are considered sensitive. They draw the attention, and they get labeled by the staff as ``sensitive words'' that are forbidden or that must be killed or that are prohibited. In other words, TikTok is censoring the speech, and they are, in part, blocking some posts from ever being seen. This is why you have the hundreds of millions who are seeing pro- Hamas posts and the tens of millions who are seeing a pro-Israel post.

There is something else that we should all be aware of. And parents, listen up on this. The tool also tracks every time one of these words comes up. So if you are repeatedly posting something that is pro- Israel, that gets tracked every time. Also, it is recording who said it, so your identity is revealed, and where you are located. Think about that--who you are, where you are located, what you are saying. That is surveillance and tracking.

Now, as this Chamber is aware, Senator Blumenthal and I and others at Commerce and Judiciary Committees have had lots of hearings on these social media platforms. And at one of the hearings, we had TikTok's CEO come before Congress, and he told lawmakers, under oath, that his platform does not promote or remove content at the request of the Chinese Government.

What we now know? That is false. They are doing this.

But word lists in ByteDance's ``sensitive words'' tool deal directly with content that Beijing wants to silence, including language critical of China's Government, their military, their history.

Simply tracking speech isn't enough for communist China. They are using these tools to control dissent. In April of this year, Joe Biden's own Department of Justice announced that they were investigating the CCP's use of social media platforms to hunt people down and silence them.

They charged 40 officers of China's national police with orchestrating transnational repression schemes against Chinese dissidents living--get this--living in the United States. There, again, they are coming after our citizens, trying to censure, trying to control, trying to manipulate.

If TikTok's bias pushed their algorithm in the other direction, Congress would have already banned it in the United States. Instead, the vast majority of the left and their friends in the media are treating the pervasiveness of this pro-Hamas, pro-terrorist, pro-murder sentiment like the latest viral phenomenon.

The best, most recent example of this is the appalling popularity of Osama bin Laden's letter to America. This

didn't happen on its own. We had TikTok pushing along on this. The TikTokers thought that the architect of the 9/11 attacks made some good points. Their obsession spread to other platforms as well. At one point, the letter clocked in more than 719 million impressions, and that was just on X.

TikTok eventually took down mentions of the letter, but by then the anti-Semites had revealed themselves and exposed other young people to the insanity in their videos. It is disgusting--absolutely disgusting-- that you would have the applauding of a letter from Osama bin Laden.

We have seen this hatred rear its head before in the form of stalking, harassment, vandalism, and physical violence. A high school in New York descended into chaos last week when a group of teenagers formed a lynch mob to hunt down a Jewish teacher who had attended a pro-Israel rally.

Earlier this month, Halal International did a poll and found that anti-Semitism on campus has become so out of control that more than one-third of Jewish college students feel they have to hide their religion. This is appalling. It also shows the ignorance of many of these young people, and it is evidence that the CCP's influence operation has taken hold.

So it is time for the U.S. Senate to take this seriously. As I said, it is the symptom of a disease. It is neither reasonable nor rational to suggest that China would create a tool capable of manipulating public opinion on a global scale and then that they would choose not to use that tool to their advantage.

You know, we have talked a lot about TikTok and what they are doing in this country. We have talked a lot about how TikTok in China is very different; it is an educational tool. It is very different from what you see here with funny videos or cat videos or some of the very disturbing content that is being pushed on our Nation's youth.

There is bipartisan agreement that the very existence of this tool-- this surveillance, this propaganda tool--that the Chinese Communist Party has created, which we call TikTok--there is evidence that the very existence of this poses a threat to our national security and to that of our allies, which means the Senate should have absolutely no trouble throwing its support behind a ban on TikTok in the United States.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask that we vitiate the quorum call.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that we vitiate the quorum call so we can move to the funding of--the Israel funding bill from the House.

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

Mr. President, on behalf of Senator Hagerty and myself, I want to congratulate our friend Butch Spyridon on his induction into the JA Nashville Business Hall of Fame.

Before he retired this summer, Butch served for 32 years as the top executive of the Nashville Convention and Visitors Corp, NCVC. Under his leadership, the NCVC transformed Music City into the commerce, tourism, and entertainment hub it is today. Before Butch, the country music lovers who crowd the famous honky-tonks of lower Broadway and the classical music lovers who fill the Schermerhorn made their pilgrimages to other destinations. Before Butch, corporations and nonprofits chose other conference destinations; now, they compete for space at the Music City Center. Today, music historians drawn to the city by the Bluebird Cafe, RCA Studio B, and the Ryman Auditorium can also explore the National Museum of African American Music, the Gospel Music Hall of Fame, and the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum because Butch understood the cultural importance of these interconnected genres. He was a vital part of recruiting the city's professional sports teams and pushed the effort to build massive sports complexes where they could play. He turned Independence Day and New Year's Eve celebrations into major tourism spectacles and, in 2019, welcomed the NFL Draft to lower Broadway, the most successful draft event in League history.

In 2023, Butch received the 100th star on the Music City Walk of Fame for his unparalleled contributions to the economic and cultural success of Nashville, TN. It is our privilege to congratulate him once more on this latest, greatest honor: Hall of Fame Laureate.

On November 10, the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment lost five soldiers when their helicopter crashed during a training flight over the Mediterranean sea. Their names are CW3 Stephen R. Dwyer of Clarksville, TN; CW2 Shane M. Barnes of Sacramento, CA; SSG Tanner W. Grone of Gorham, NH; SGT Andrew P. Southard of Apache Junction, AZ; and SGT Cade M. Wolfe, of Mankato, MN.

In honor of the brave Night Stalkers of 1st Battalion, Charlie Company, I want to recite a few portions of the Night Stalker Creed for the record.

Service in the 160th is a calling only a few will answer

for the mission is constantly demanding and hard. And when

the impossible has been accomplished the only reward is

another mission that no one else will try.

. . . I serve with the memory and pride of those who have

gone before me for they loved to fight, fought to win and

would rather die than quit.

I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the complete Night Stalker Creed.

On behalf of all Tennesseans, I want to offer my prayers and support to those soldiers' families and to the brave men and women of the 160th. Their motto is ``Night Stalkers don't quit.'' And I would encourage my colleagues to join me in supporting them as they bring the spirit of those words to bear against our enemies around the globe.

Madam President, every year I visit all 95 counties in Tennessee; and while the expectations of local leaders vary from urban to suburban to rural areas, two things remain constant. They expect lawmakers to act in the best interests of the American people and act in good faith.

Last Thursday, Chairman Durbin and Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee seemed to fail those tests, according to Tennesseans, because when they convened the hearing, they wanted to authorize subpoenas for Harlan Crow, Leonard Leo, and Robert Arkley.

Now, the claim was: This is all about transparency. But the only thing that they are willing to be transparent about is the contempt for the Supreme Court and for the American people who still believe in the importance of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Now, if they cared about protecting the Supreme Court, they would have shown more concern about the death threats against the conservative Justices that were coming from the far-left wing of the Democratic party.

There is no good faith to be found here. This is yet another political assault against conservative Justices who issue decisions that many of the Democrats do not like--and we have seen it before.

So they take this approach: If you can't pack the Court, rewrite the ethics rules; if you can't rewrite the ethics rules, just use the Senate to launch a mass prosecution of your political rivals.

In an effort to force my colleagues to show the American people where Democrats truly stand on protecting the country's best interests, I proposed

a few amendments of my own to that subpoena authorization. Well, those amendments proved to be a little bit too politically inconvenient for the Chairman. So here are the amendments that I proposed and things Tennesseans have wanted answers to.

Now, this summer, we learned that Justice Sotomayor's staff had been pressuring the public institutions that host her speaking engagements to buy her books. She got a $3 million book advance--not reported. She has made $4 million on the sale of the books.

We also know she has refused to recuse herself in not one but two copyright infringement cases that involve the publisher of her book. So I filed an amendment issuing subpoenas to her staff and her publisher so we can get to the bottom of this ethical conundrum.

I also proposed we subpoena Jeffrey Epstein's estate to provide the flight logs for his private planes. Given the numerous allegations of human trafficking and sexual abuse surrounding the late Mr. Epstein, I believe the committee has an interest in identifying everyone complicit, no matter their political affiliation.

And we also need to get to the bottom of the investigation into Elon Musk. We know that the Biden administration gets nervous at the thought of conservatives speaking freely online. So, it is no surprise they are trying to weaponize multiple Federal Agencies against Mr. Musk and his company. I proposed a subpoena to compel the DOJ and the FTC to turn over all documents related to that sham investigation.

The far left is the enemy of free speech, and their hostility toward conservatives is on display in the form of their repeated efforts to take down President Trump. So I filed a subpoena amendment for all documents related to any political donations made by Special Counsel Robert Mueller's staff.

And for the executive branch, we have a couple of amendments that I have filed. The first would authorize a subpoena for Secretary Becerra to come before the Committee and explain to us how his Agency has lost track of 85,000 unaccompanied children--migrant children--who have come to this country. I have talked about this several times on the floor.

How can you lose track of 85,000 migrant children? They did it. We need to know. So that is why they are getting a subpoena.

The second would subpoena the DOJ to provide all documentation concerning the termination of the China Initiative. Now that was one of the best tools we have had to fight against Chinese espionage and Chinese spies on U.S. soil.

Now, if I were Chairman Durbin, I wouldn't want to debate those subpoenas either because they strike at the heart of one of the Biden administration's most dangerous governing principles.

There are two tiers of justice in this country. Obviously, that is the way this administration wants it. There is one tier of justice for people the Democrats need to protect and for their cronies and buddies and friends and one for people that the Democrats need to destroy to maintain their hold on power.

Tennesseans are deeply afraid of what this means because they know where they stand in this new approach of two tiers of justice.

I don't know if or when Chairman Durbin will reconvene to discuss these subpoenas, but I hope that, when the time comes, he will abandon this latest assault on the Supreme Court and allow the committee to pursue real accountability.

Madam President, I came to the floor back in June to talk about Biden's border crisis, and I called for my Democratic colleagues to join me in passing legislation to stop the invasion occurring at the southern border. That month, Border Patrol recorded almost 145,000 enforcement encounters with illegal immigrants.

I had hoped that the numbers would convince my colleagues across the aisle and this administration to step up and do something about it, but, over the last 5 months, it seems that my colleagues across the aisle have put their heads in the sand and that the border crisis has reached catastrophic levels.

In September, Border Patrol reported almost 270,000 enforcement encounters. Think about that--270,000 enforcement encounters.

My colleague from Texas was just on the floor a few minutes ago, talking about this very issue.

Now, as wars rage on two continents, we have more to worry about than just drug smugglers and gun runners and human traffickers, who are exploiting our open border. Suspected terrorists are infiltrating our southern border at unprecedented rates. Thousands of people from Russia, China, Iran, and other nations aligned with the new ``axis of evil'' have tried to enter this country undetected. If something doesn't give, an attack on our homeland is inevitable. It is not a matter of if it will happen. It is a matter of when.

I am truly at a loss for what will finally convince my Democratic colleagues to take back control of our border. It is wide open. But, today, I want to appeal to them using an idea I hope everyone can agree on, and it is all about protecting children.

Children are being used, abused, and trafficked by the cartels at the southern border. These sick individuals view these precious children as cargo, and the stories you hear from survivors are unimaginable. I think my Democratic colleagues are well aware of this practice of child recycling. Adults at the border who want an easy way into the United States will rent or buy children and present themselves as family. So the children are then dragged across the border with that unrelated adult who is often a single male. When they are no longer useful to the disgusting criminals, they are taken by the cartels and smuggled back into Mexico to be used again and again and again. Border Patrol says there are some children who have been recycled eight and nine times. The Border Patrol sees them coming across. They have identified some of these children.

This is a completely disgusting practice, and I have proposed two pieces of legislation to stop this evil practice.

Earlier this year, I introduced the End Child Trafficking Now Act, which would criminalize child recycling, reinstate the DNA testing program, and create harsh penalties for migrants who want to skirt the law. This legislation would require DHS to deport illegal aliens who refuse to take a DNA test. If the DNA test proves that the migrant is lying and that there is no proof of a family relationship, then HHS would step in and process that child as an unaccompanied minor, and the trafficker would face a maximum 10-year prison sentence for falsely posing as a family.

Now, my colleagues and this administration wanted to stop DNA testing. They said it took too much time. It takes 45 minutes--45 minutes. This is something that is common sense. We need to get that bill to the President's desk and test for that DNA.

Last Tuesday, I led 17 of my Senate Republican colleagues in introducing the PRINTS Act. Currently, Federal law prohibits Border Patrol from fingerprinting children under the age of 14. This doesn't make any sense, and experts agree that fingerprinting these children would make it easier to investigate and eliminate these trafficking rings. It would also help the Federal Government keep track of the unaccompanied migrant children entrusted to their care. The legislation is simple. It would give our law enforcement at the border the authority to fingerprint noncitizens under the age of 14.

Like the End Child Trafficking Now Act, it would finally criminalize this horrific practice of child recycling, and it would remove the authority of unelected bureaucrats to waive fingerprinting requirements for illegal immigrants. This legislation would save lives. This would protect children. It would help cut into all of this human trafficking and sex trafficking that is exploding in this country.

You have heard the Governor of New York and the mayor of New York City talk about prostitution rings that are popping up all over the city--the same for Chicago, the same for Minneapolis, the same for Boston, the same for Denver. We are hearing it from these big sanctuary cities. So it is important that we pass the PRINTS Act and that we save these lives. I think this is an important step--both of these pieces of legislation--to protect children who are coming to our border.

Madam President, this week, President Biden plans on meeting with

President Xi Jinping, and I would ask the President and his advisers: What have we gotten out of previous talks with the Chinese Government? Do they have any goal other than appeasement?

Several American officials have already sat down for this same photo op. So we know exactly what we are going to get out of it--not much.

What we do know is that Chinese drug lords will continue killing Americans with the fentanyl they are smuggling across our southern border via all of the drug cartels that are bringing it in. The Chinese military will continue menacing our partners in Taiwan and the Pacific island nations, and the Chinese spies who control TikTok will continue pushing terrorist propaganda at our American teenagers and college students.

We should not reward this behavior by lending legitimacy to the Chinese Communist Party, and we certainly should not allow this latest diplomatic charade to lure the country into a false sense of security. China is our adversary. We ought not to be sitting down with China until they stop shipping fentanyl into this country, until they stop participating as a part of the ``axis of evil,'' and we need to make certain that we treat them as an adversary, not as an ally.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

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