Floor Statements

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that prior to the scheduled votes, I be permitted to

speak for 6 minutes, Senator Lujan for 5 minutes, and Senator Cantwell for 5 minutes.

Madam President, every so often, this Chamber is granted an opportunity to alter the course of American history. These rare opportunities allow us to pick up the torch, hoist it high like those who came before, and carry it forward as we strive to create a more perfect Union.

Today, we have such an opportunity. In a few minutes, this body will consider the nomination of a preeminent economist, Dr. Adriana Kugler, to serve on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve. Already, she has broken barriers and blazed new trails--the first Hispanic American ever nominated to serve in that critical role.

But for my colleagues who will soon cast their votes on her nomination, I would just like to highlight what this means for the 62 million Latinos who call America home. Simply put, we see ourselves reflected in her story and her nomination.

Dr. Kugler is a first-generation American, the daughter of immigrants from Colombia. To hear her tell her story is to listen to the American dream come to life, from her grandparents who overcame tremendous obstacles--whether it was fleeing religious persecution, being orphaned at the age of 3, or dropping out of high school to help a widowed mother raise five siblings. Dr. Kugler's family instilled in her the importance of grit and resilience alongside an unwavering work ethic. As a result, her life's work has been to help others similarly rise above their station.

For more than 25 years as an economist, she has conducted essential research on labor markets, worker mobility, and firm productivity-- three areas that are essential to the Federal Reserve's mandate.

She currently serves as U.S. Executive Director at the World Bank after previously serving as Chief Economist at the Department of Labor, bringing a domestic and international perspective at a time when global economies have never been more connected. Because of this work, because of her sterling credentials and outstanding reputation, Dr. Kugler's nomination has earned the endorsement of 33 peer economists from across the political spectrum. In a joint letter, they called her ``a brilliant, objective economist who takes an evidence-based approach to decision-making and is an expert in policy evaluation.''

Make no mistake, Dr. Kugler is eminently qualified for the role she has been nominated for. At her confirmation hearing, she reaffirmed a fundamental commitment to the Federal Reserve dual mandate, pledging to continue its efforts to bring down high inflation that is hurting workers and businesses alike.

In addition to her qualifications and balanced approach to decision making, Dr. Kugler has demonstrated time and time again that she will uphold the Federal Reserve's long legacy of independent decision making. It is precisely because those decisions affect every community in our country that I am especially proud that Dr. Kugler will finally bring lived experience of being Latino in the United States to the Federal Reserve leadership.

That is right. In the nearly 110-year history of the Federal Reserve, there has never, ever been a Latino serving on this Board of Governors. Not once. Simply put, it is an affront to the 62 million Hispanic Americans who meaningfully contribute to our economy. It is out of step with the fact that our economic input as a community is nearly $3 trillion. And it violates the idea that the hopes and dreams of Latinos are essential to the promise of America.

So it is time for Latinos to serve the highest levels of the Federal Reserve. It is time for Latinos to be taken seriously as an essential part of our American family and economy. And it is time for us to confirm Dr. Adriana Kugler as a meaningful step towards that goal. Never again should a Latino or Latina have to wonder if they can rise from humble beginnings to occupy seats of power. Today's vote helps us do just that.

At its core, it is about changing the face of leadership so that our institutions, these bodies that we entrust with the future wealth and prosperity of our country, can fully reflect the Nation that they serve. In no uncertain terms, Dr. Kugler is a remarkable economist and a fantastic nominee to serve as the first Latina on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve. I am proud to have championed her historic nomination, and now it is time that we turn it into a historic confirmation.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, that only means I got there before you.

Mr. President, I rise in opposition to Senator Kennedy's amendment. I have a great deal of respect for my colleague. No one--no one--in this Chamber has taken a harder line against the Iranian regime than I have. No one. But in this case, a well-intended motion can produce very bad consequences. So let me speak to why I oppose the Senator's amendment.

These special drawing rights--I always love how my colleague from Louisiana can bring it to an earthy tone. We have poker chips we are throwing around, but these aren't quite poker chips; they are a critical liquidity tool to support lower income countries in response to global financial youcrises. It is in our interest to do so, to create stability. They assist in creating economic stability. They are an absolutely essential part of U.S. foreign policy tools, especially as we are dealing with the China challenge. We want to help these countries instead of China helping them.

The Biden administration supported a new round of special drawing rights allocations at the IMF. This funding played an essential role in helping countries address the COVID-19 pandemic and the related economic fallout of the pandemic, which we are still hearing about from many of these countries. Without this funding, many of these countries would have fallen to economic crisis, which means political instability, which means chaos, which means refugees coming to the shores of many countries.

The International Monetary Fund's rules dictate that a new general issuance of special drawing rights must go to all members. That means a requirement to prohibit SDRs for one country would prohibit SDRs for all countries. As a consequence, Senator Kennedy's amendment would effectively kill the possibility of issuing SDRs to any country ever again.

Now, Senator Kennedy offered the same exact amendment with the Endless Frontier Act on the floor in May of 2021. That amendment failed by a significant vote.

Of course we oppose those state sponsors of terrorism. Of course, we oppose those who would be responsible for genocide.

But I would note that most of our adversaries the Senator wants to pursue--which I would agree if we could do it antiseptically, but we can't--already face obstacles to drawing special drawing rights because of the sanctions that we have against them.

So due to the harmful impact this amendment would have on the Treasury Department's ability to respond to deficit in the global supply of reserves on a global crisis, I would vote no and I would recommend my colleagues do so, as well.

I reserve the balance of my time.

If we were talking about poker chips, I would be all in with Senator Kennedy. But what we are talking about is the ability to prevent a crisis in the world. That is something we can use. That is why the Senator's amendment needs to fail.

Vote on Amendment No. 1034

Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 638 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, I ask that there be unanimous consent for 3 minutes, equally divided.

Mr. President, this amendment is to reauthorize the Firefighter Cancer Registry, which was passed unanimously by Congress and signed into law in 2018.

The Firefighter Cancer Registry improves our Nation's ability to conduct research and gather data on the cancer risk associated with firefighting. It is a vital program, one that furthers our understanding of how to protect the brave first responders who run toward danger when everyone else runs away from it. And yet, on October 1 of last year, the program expired.

My bipartisan, commonsense amendment would reauthorize the program for an additional 5 years while bringing it into line with the current appropriation level.

Supported by Senators Murkowski, Brown, Klobuchar, Fischer, Rubio, and Tester, it would benefit both career firefighters as well as volunteers like my constituent Edward Diaz. He was the son of Eduardo Diaz, a North Bergen firefighter who tragically passed away in 2017 from pancreatic cancer. Today, he carries on his family's legacy of service as a volunteer firefighter in Hasbrouck Heights, NJ.

I submit to my colleagues, the Diaz family, along with their fellow brothers and sisters in the profession, are the reason we should all support this amendment today. Firefighting is more than a job. It is a calling, a calling that sometimes takes your life as we saw in the loss of two Newark firefighters within the last month.

Let's honor that calling by reauthorizing the Firefighter Cancer Registry Act with this amendment. I urge my colleagues to support it and reserve the balance of my time.

I yield the floor.

Vote on Amendment No. 638

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, as a strong supporter of U.S. assistance to Ukraine, I am keenly aware of the important role that appropriate and effective oversight plays in ensuring that support can continue. I support independent, effective oversight and believe we should be doing all that we can to make sure those oversight mechanisms are strong and that our inspectors general have the resources they need to carry out their work.

But given that we have an existing framework, given that there are three inspectors general who have been working day in and out, effectively, to conduct such oversight, I do not think we should create new offices and additional layers without evidence that the current framework is not working. So while I appreciate that my colleagues share the same goals of ensuring we have robust oversight of U.S. assistance to Ukraine, I do not agree that these amendments are the best way to achieve that goal.

The Wicker amendment would create a new office that could impede the work that is ongoing, not enhance it. There is an existing statutory framework for designating a lead inspector general. I have not heard a good case for why that framework should not be used here.

The inspectors general from the Department of State, USAID, and Department of Defense have been on the ground in Ukraine, conducting work of virtually all U.S. assistance involving multiple Agencies. They have an established working group that ensures oversight is efficient and not duplicative. Creating a new office, with the need for new staff and potentially conflicting roles, would likely make those efforts less, not more, efficient.

The Paul amendment would add further and unnecessary complexity to ongoing oversight efforts. It would likely impair ongoing oversight by drawing personnel away from the inspectors general already engaged in oversight work. Instead of ramping up current efforts, inspectors general would spend time deconflicting or sorting out personnel issues. It is also unclear how an expanded Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction--SIGAR--would successfully pivot to oversight of Ukraine assistance or how it would an expanded mandate would be funded.

I am committed to ensuring that we have robust, independent, effective oversight of all U.S. assistance to Ukraine. But the answer to ensuring that we have successful mechanisms for such oversight is not to create new structures and additional layers of bureaucracy. It is to make sure those who already have the tools, expertise, and resources to conduct oversight and audit spending, have sufficient resources to do so, and for us to hold them to account. That is precisely what I intend to do, and I call on my colleagues in this body to do the same.

Mr. President, section 36(b) of the Arms Export Control Act requires that Congress receive prior notification of certain proposed arms sales as defined by that statute. Upon such notification, the Congress has 30 calendar days during which the sale may be reviewed. The provision stipulates that, in the Senate, the notification of proposed sales shall be sent

to the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

In keeping with the committee's intention to see that relevant information is available to the full Senate, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the notifications which have been received. If the cover letter references a classified annex, then such annex is available to all Senators in the office of the Foreign Relations Committee, room SD-423.

Mr. President, I rise today to recognize the tireless efforts of one man to protect and defend the beating heart of the American economy: our manufacturing industry. Over a long career of service, Mr. John W. Kennedy of Madison, NJ, has advocated for greater prosperity and economic security in the Garden State. In particular, I want to thank Mr. Kennedy's outstanding work at the New Jersey Manufacturing Extension Program, or NJMEP.

Since 2012, Mr. Kennedy has led NJMEP, first as chief operating officer and then as chief executive officer, working to advance their mission of providing U.S. manufacturers with the resources they need to succeed. Supported by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, NJMEP has spread innovative technologies and best practices across New Jersey, boosting operational excellence, innovation and growth, and workforce development.

Studies have shown that for every dollar invested into NJMEP, they have in turn generated over $13 of added value. This remarkable return on investment goes hand in hand with the mission-oriented focus of the program which seeks to serve those who serve others. Today, Garden State residents can thank NJMEP for creating hundreds of thousands of highly skilled manufacturing jobs and contributing more than $7 billion in economic value.

Make no mistake, NJMEP has been able to succeed thanks to Mr. Kennedy's shining leadership. When his colleagues speak of him, the first thing they mention is his signature emails fired off every morning at 5:30 AM. This unflagging work ethic and unbridled passion for improving the lives of those around him is an inspiration to us all. He is the reason that NJMEP was able to grow from a 12-person operation to a well-oiled machine of more than 50 employees, catapulting it as the top-rated manufacturing extension program in the country.

Three years ago, when the first COVID wave reached our shores, John

and NJMEP were swift in identifying critical actions that governments could take to shield manufacturers from bearing the brunt of the impact. Whether it was prioritizing the health and equipment needs of frontline workers or advocating for manufacturers to be properly deemed as essential businesses, John's expertise and decisive leadership was invaluable.

In a similar way, Mr. Kennedy was immensely involved when Congress was drafting the CHIPS and Science Act last year. He provided strategic clarity about how to best protect and secure our domestic and international supply chains, the lifeblood of our Nation's economy. Thanks to him and his insightful recommendations, we included provisions in the bill that established a National Supply Chain Database, a landmark program that accurately tracks American manufacturing capabilities and inventories in real time. Because of John, our economy is now more secure against not only global pandemics, but also natural disasters, cyberattacks, foreign adversaries, and a myriad of other threats.

Beyond his professional career, Mr. Kennedy takes time to give back to the community. Prior to serving at NJMEP, he founded and sold two manufacturing businesses which provided him firsthand knowledge of the sector. He has also served on the local and national executive board for the Boy Scouts, the New Jersey Special Olympics, and the board of directors of the Park Avenue Club Foundation.

Today, I join his loving wife Cecelia, their son Sean, and all New Jerseyans in congratulating Mr. John W. Kennedy on his storied career and selfless service. Thanks to his dedicated leadership, not only has our economy created untold prosperity, we have also secured that prosperity for future generations. He is a shining example of why ``Made in the USA'' and ``Made in New Jersey'' are the best labels in the world.