Floor Statements

Madam President, I rise today to support Judge Brett Kavanaugh and to join the chorus of Members of the Senate and millions of Americans who are coming to the conclusion, as I have, that Judge Kavanaugh will be an excellent addition to the U.S. Supreme Court. He has outstanding qualifications for the Court, but some of my friends on the other side of the aisle are desperately seeking to find an argument--any argument--to derail his nomination.

The latest attempt by my friends on the other side of the aisle is to claim they simply do not have enough information about him to make an informed opinion. Yesterday, the distinguished minority leader of the Senate came to the floor and suggested that Republicans and Judge Kavanaugh are hiding something. This raises the question: How much can you hide about a distinguished judge who has been issuing opinions for 12 straight years on the circuit court of appeals? How much can you hide about that person's legal philosophy?

In the past, my friend Senator Schumer has asserted that the best way to evaluate judicial nominees was to review their judicial record. Perhaps he should follow that advice this year, 2018, in our approach to Judge Kavanaugh. In 2009, when considering Judge Sotomayor's nomination to the High Court, my friend the senior Senator from New York encouraged this body to focus on the nominee's 17-year record as a judge rather than engage in what he called fishing expeditions.

To supplement Judge Kavanaugh's 12-year record of judicial opinions, the Senate is receiving a lot of documents--more than 1 million documents so far, the largest volume of records ever reviewed for any Supreme Court nominee. It is the largest volume of records ever. If our Democratic friends want documents, we have them for our Democratic friends to read.

In addition, Judge Kavanaugh has submitted more than 17,000 pages in response to the Senate Judiciary Committee's questions. The documents that have been turned in from his time in the Bush White House total more than 238,000 pages. Most of these were already available to the public. In comparison, Judge Gorsuch made available 182,000 pages. Justice Kagan, when she was being confirmed, made available 170,000 pages for review. In comparison, Judge Kavanaugh's number is 238,000 pages.

What has changed? I think the American people know what is happening in this debate. The Senate should not be distracted by these stall-and- delay tactics. Instead, let's focus on the fact that Judge Kavanaugh brings with him a respected reputation and legal record. He has written some 300 published legal opinions. Let's use the Schumer rule and judge him on those legal opinions.

Judge Kavanaugh's positions have already been adopted by the Supreme Court. No fewer than 13 times, the Supreme Court has adopted for the law of the land an opinion put forth at the circuit court level by Brett Kavanaugh. I will admit that on one occasion, the Supreme Court partially reversed Judge Kavanaugh. To me, it is better than a 13-to-1 record of being adopted and upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Judge Kavanaugh has earned positive attention and praise for being a good mentor, producing a number of clerks who have gone on to work for the U.S. Supreme Court itself. One of his former clerks wrote in July: ``No court-of-appeals judge in the nation has a stronger, more consistent record than Judge Brett Kavanaugh.'' Indeed, Judge Kavanaugh is known for being thoughtful, principled, and a jurist who will defend conservative values and uphold the sanctity of the Constitution. That is exactly what the American people want. It is exactly what the American people have voted for.

Recently, I had the opportunity to meet with Judge Kavanaugh, like many of my colleagues. I found him to be just as his reputation and record suggested--smart, genuine, approachable, and well qualified to serve on the highest Court of the land. What I have not found in my review of Judge Kavanaugh's qualifications is any indication that he is radical or outside the judicial mainstream, as some of my colleagues might contend.

It is disappointing to see that negative assumptions about Judge Kavanaugh were reached almost immediately after his nomination or even before the nomination took place, well before lawmakers could meet with him or take a serious look at his background. One activist group hastily sent out a press release opposing Judge Kavanaugh before filling in his name. It is clear that the message would have been the same no matter whom President Trump chose--just fill in the blank: Oppose President Trump's nomination of judge blank. He is radical and outside the judicial mainstream.

The American people understand this. The American people also chose President Trump in large part, I believe, to fill the vacancy left by the late Justice Scalia. This was a decision we preserved for the American people on election day. President Trump selected an excellent jurist in Judge Gorsuch, and I am certain Judge Kavanaugh will follow in the same great tradition.

The outside noise involving Judge Kavanaugh should not deter the Senate from upholding its constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on judicial nominees. Frankly, we need to get this done before the first Monday in October, when the new session of the Supreme Court will meet. If we follow the precedence of the last two confirmation processes, we will indeed have plenty of time to do that.

I look forward to our consideration next month of Judge Kavanaugh. I look forward to the hearings, which will deal with his many qualifications for the Supreme Court. I think the American people will be watching, and they will see that he is a jurist capable and willing to do what is right and fair under the law.

A former professor summed it up very well in writing about Judge Kavanaugh for the New York Times. Professor Akhil Reed Amar said this: ``Good appellate judges faithfully follow the Supreme Court; great ones influence and help steer it.'' As a circuit judge, Judge Kavanaugh has influenced the Supreme Court, has steered the Supreme Court. It is now time for him to be elevated to the highest Court in the land, and I support his confirmation.

Madam President, I yield the floor.

What is the pending business?

Thank you.

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

On behalf of the majority, I ask for a rollcall.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Madam President, I intend to speak for a few moments as in morning business concerning the National Flood Insurance Program, which is set to expire tomorrow night at midnight, July 31, and which certainly this body will not allow to expire. We will undoubtedly reauthorize the program and not leave millions of Americans without flood protection at the height of the Atlantic hurricane season.

The House has sent us legislation that provides for a clean reauthorization, temporary as it may be. It will keep the program going without injecting reforms or changes, and it reassures homeowners and property owners across the country who rely on this program that it will still be there and that they can count on it.

We are not bathing ourselves in glory by doing this. I think we would all acknowledge that passing this reauthorization right before the deadline does not entitle us to pat ourselves on the back. Instead, it should motivate Members to work across the aisle to provide meaningful reforms. I have a suggestion or two for some meaningful reforms when we take this up on a permanent basis.

We may have assured Americans today and tomorrow that when we act on this, they can rely on the National Flood Insurance Program through November, but we need to assure them that they can rely on the program for the next year, for the next 5 years, or for 10 years. That will be a challenge over the next several months.

We need to make this program financially sustainable for the long term, but we also need to assure property owners that they are not going to be hit with a huge insurance bill they can't afford. History does not provide the public with very much encouragement with regard to actually getting some reforms done. We have to keep it going with a patchwork.

Out of the 41 times that the National Flood Insurance Program has been reauthorized over the past 20 years, reforms have been included only 3 times out of 41. That is not a great record. I hope that before the end of this calendar year, we can add a fourth substantive change to make some progress.

One thing I hope we can do is to enact the changes to the COASTAL Act in a bill that I have introduced called the COASTAL Implementation Act. If you recall, after Hurricane Katrina, we saw how discrepancies between wind damage and water damage on the total-loss properties often prevented property owners from being made whole. There was a dispute between the flood insurance folks and the wind insurance folks, and the property owner was caught in the middle.

The COASTAL Act and the followup COASTAL Implementation Act seeks to address these discrepancies with better data collection and more accurate poststorm assessments. More specifically, we want NOAA, or the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, to be able to assess the strength of wind and water at affected sites. With sound data, the property owners can receive fair compensation for their losses--some, perhaps, from the flood insurance coverage, and some from the wind insurance coverage. Reducing cases of ``indeterminate losses'' would ultimately reduce costs to the National Flood Insurance Program and better serve the public.

My other reform proposal also seeks to arm us with better data. I call this legislation the MEMA Act, which stands for Municipality Empowerment Mapping Achievement. Under this act, FEMA would publish the NFIP's rate maps. These maps would cover the entire United States, and they would be created using the latest technology. Information on an area's flood hazard risks should be accessible and comprehensive.

Accurate maps can also help to draw businesses to our smaller communities. Without this information, these businesses might go to a nearby urban area to invest. The playing field should be leveled in this regard. Other ideas, such as competition from the private sector, can help to bring down high flood insurance rates.

What we don't want to do is to drive folks away from coastal areas. Forty

percent of our population lives in a coastal county. There are 56 million jobs there, and more than $8 trillion is produced in goods and services, according to NOAA.

Let's also not forget about our rivers and inland waterways. The Mississippi River, for example, accounts for a $400 billion annual economic impact. When communities near a river, lake, or ocean suffer, the effects can ripple across the whole Nation. Try as we might, we can't prevent floods. We can mitigate and try to guard against them and try to strengthen our protection, but we can't eliminate flooding from happening. They are the most frequent natural disaster. We should do what we can to mitigate the damage and costs.

It is also worth reminding my colleagues that the National Flood Insurance Program is a program that serves ordinary people--workers and families who are just trying to make an honest living and who do not want to see everything they have washed away in a flood. These 5 million Americans pay their flood insurance premiums, and they should be able to live without worry that should a disaster strike, they will be left high and dry.

I call on my colleagues in the next day and a half to pass this short-term authorization, and, certainly, we will do that on a bipartisan basis. Then, let's give the Banking Committee and people who are concentrating on this issue some bipartisan support to pass much needed reforms.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Mr. President, I rise this morning to speak in favor of the National Defense Authorization Act. We are currently negotiating with Members of the Republican and Democratic Parties on how to consider amendments. We will eventually get there, as we do every year, because the NDAA bill has passed Congress--the Senate and the House-- and has been signed by the President for 57 years in a row on a wonderfully bipartisan basis. I expect, when it is all said and done, that will happen again this year.

As a matter of fact, I was just speaking to a group of Hawaiians who were gathered together under the leadership of Senator Mazie Hirono. Senator Hirono is the ranking member of the subcommittee that I chair, the Seapower Subcommittee. We were able to make the point and have been able to make the point at several forums about what a bipartisan issue this is, to protect our country through a strong Navy and through the provisions that we will enact under the Seapower title. Of course, this bipartisan exercise is a very important fulfillment of our constitutional responsibility. It is right there in the preamble--to ``provide for the common defence.'' And that is what our subcommittee has done.

The bill this year authorizes $716 billion for national defense. This is an increase from last year, and we finally got rid of the notion that we can somehow be a safe and secure nation and have this defense sequestration that had come upon us due to our inability to deal with the budget. Last year we authorized and appropriated $700 billion for national defense, and this bill would up that a little to $716 billion. My position is that we need every penny of that. The top line matches the figures we have set in the 2-year budget. That was passed by the House and Senate on a bipartisan basis and signed into law by the President of the United States, President Trump.

Secretary Mattis says this defense spending is essential at these levels to keep America safe and to support our men and women in uniform. Secretary Mattis authored the new national defense strategy, and it prioritizes preparing the Armed Forces for long-term strategic competition with China and Russia. We would like to be on a friendlier basis with China and Russia, but sadly, at this point, we are not. We are in a long-term strategic competition. I believe Secretary Mattis, when he says we need to do this, and the NDAA, which is the subject matter before us on the floor right now, recognize that. Strategy is driving the budget this year, not the other way around.

As I noted, I am chairman of the Seapower Subcommittee. Senator Hirono is my ranking Democratic member. We both recognize that upholding our maritime interests is becoming more and more critical. We are a maritime nation, and Americans need to understand this. The Seapower title recognizes this. It positions the Navy and Marine Corps to retain superiority over rapidly modernizing Chinese and Russian maritime forces.

I am happy to say that it accelerates the naval buildup toward the statutory 355-ship Navy, which was signed into law as a result of the NDAA last year. The SHIPS Act, which Senator Hirono and I both persuaded every member of our subcommittee to cosponsor--every Republican and every Democrat on the Seapower Subcommittee sponsored this. We were able to add the SHIPS Act to the NDAA last year and have it signed by the President of the United States.

The bill this year builds on what we hoped would be the result of the SHIPS Act. It authorizes $23 billion for building 11 new ships that we didn't intend to build otherwise--an increase of $1.2 billion above the DOD budget request. The statutory language signed by the President is actually getting us there. It adds over $1 billion in advanced procurement funding for attack submarines, destroyers, and amphibious ships that will stabilize the industrial base, encourage new suppliers to enter the marketplace, and save taxpayers money in the long run through this mechanism of advanced procurement funding for our attack submarines. It authorizes multiyear contracting--another cost-saver-- for our Super Hornet fighters, Hawkeye early warning planes, and two types of standard missiles fired from our Navy ships.

I am pleased with the progress we have made, and I am pleased that our work on the SHIPS Act last year is already paying dividends in terms of getting us much more quickly to the 355-ship fleet.

The NDAA also includes 12 provisions that were contained in a bill that Senator McCain and I authored in response to the tragedies of the USS John McCain and the USS Fitzgerald collisions. Frankly, there were other mishaps in the Pacific also. In the McCain and the Fitzgerald, 17 soldiers tragically died because of accidents involving our ships.

Based on studies that we commissioned in this Congress, we came back--Senator McCain and I--and introduced provisions. I will mention five of them today.

They are included in the base NDAA bill.

First, we direct a comprehensive review of the Navy's cumbersome and confusing chains of command. This confusing chain of command in the Pacific has been a problem.

We limit the duration of ships homeported overseas to no more than 10 years. After 10 years of being homeported overseas, forward-deployed ships must now rotate back to the United States more frequently to avoid being overtaxed from constant operations. That is in this bill.

We give forward-deployed ships more sailors. We have had a shortage there, regrettably, inflicted somewhat because of defense sequestration.

We require the Navy to develop a more realistic standard workweek assessment. I know the Presiding Officer understands this from the testimony we have received. The old system led to sailors routinely working 100-hour workweeks. Is it any wonder that our sailors were fatigued and burned out,

with 100-plus-hour workweeks? This NDAA bill, which we must pass and get to the President, would end that. It would also allow the Secretary of the Navy more flexibility in the personnel process to keep talented officers in the Navy and to keep talented officers in the Marine Corps.

One other thing I will mention is that we have the title of CFIUS reform. CFIUS simply stands for Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States--CFIUS. This provision is designed to protect our interests with regard to the designs of China, and it came to us, actually, out of the banking bill. We need to stop China from gaining access to military technology and gaining access to strategically important industries in the United States through buying our companies. China is buying American companies and then getting access to the intellectual property owned by those companies. This is what CFIUS reform does.

NDAA includes the Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act, adopted unanimously by the Senate Banking Committee, and would give the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, or CFIUS, more authority to prevent foreign acquisitions of our sensitive technologies.

This is a good bill. It is a wildly popular bill in the military. It provides increased resources for those men and women who strapped on the boats, who put on the uniform and stepped forward voluntarily--not a single person in the military has been forced to do this; they stepped forward voluntarily--to do the hard things so that we can live in peace and prosperity and comfort in the United States.

This is a popular bill in the other body. We are taking their bill and making some adjustments, but we will get that ironed out in conference. We will, once again, fulfill our constitutional duty to provide for the common defense and show that when it comes to national defense and providing security for the people of this great Nation, this is, indeed, a bipartisan determination and a bipartisan exercise.

So I urge us to get moving on this, and I certainly believe--I am convinced--that before the end of the week, we will have an affirmative vote and move this bill toward the President's desk.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I yield the floor.

Seeing no other Members seeking recognition, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Frank Tedeschi and Steven Fowler, defense fellows in Senator Rounds's office, be granted floor privileges for the remainder of the day.

Mr. President, I rise today to comment about the economy, but I want to observe that I am proudly wearing a seersucker suit today. I would mention to my colleagues that Senators have worn seersucker suits for decades, for literally centuries, on this Senate floor.

This is officially Seersucker Thursday in the Senate--a tradition that was begun by my predecessor, the former majority leader, Senator Trent Lott of Mississippi, and has been carried on until today by the senior Senator from Louisiana, Mr. Cassidy. It is a time for those of us who choose to humble ourselves and call attention to ourselves at the same time to have a little fun in a bipartisan manner and to recall the days of old, before there was air conditioning and before we worried so much about how we looked.

I thank Senator Cassidy for getting a bipartisan group together to have a little fun and remember the days of old, when a lot of folks wore seersucker suits.

Accomplishments of the Republican-led Congress

Mr. President, we ought to be smiling today because the economy is doing so well. The economy is strong and getting stronger. We have 1 million more jobs in America than we had 6 months ago. Last month, we added a quarter of a million jobs in just 1 month. We have a 3.8- percent unemployment rate--an excellent report, the lowest in 18 years. So I am glad to rise this afternoon and say a word or two on the occasion of the 500th day of the Trump administration and of a Republican Congress. We seem to be doing things right. I hope the American people are recognizing that.

The May jobs report was full of good news. Beyond the 3.8-percent unemployment rate, which I have already mentioned, the number of long- term unemployed--those out of work for 27 weeks or longer--has dropped. Wages are on the rise. These are markers of a strong, energized economy.

Let me quote the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. The Wall Street Journal recently ran an editorial entitled, ``The Rising Jobs Tide.'' It points out how much has changed for the better over the last year and a half. There are 3 million more full-time workers than we had when this administration began. More than 2.5 million jobs have been added. More than 2 million of these jobs are occupied by Americans between the ages of 25 and 34.

The editorial concludes: ``In the last year business confidence has improved, investment is increasing and workers are reaping the benefits.''

Those are American workers who are reaping the benefits, and I am pleased to rise this afternoon and agree with the Wall Street Journal.

I also want to give a shout-out to the New York Times, which is something I haven't made a habit of doing on the Senate floor. The New York Times said that they have run out of words to describe how good this economy is. There is widespread acknowledgement of this, and I think it is a result of the things this Congress has been trying to do, the things this administration has been trying to do and succeeding in doing, putting policies in place that are designed to create jobs and make it easier on job creators, and they are having a powerful impact.

I am proud of things we have done, like the historic tax cuts--lower taxes. This has meant that middle-class families have more money to live the lives they want to live. This has meant that job creators are not losing out to foreign competition. This has meant that we have ushered in bonuses for some 4 million Americans. Minimum wages are going up from company to company. Energy bills are lower.

Speaking of energy, we are producing a lot more energy now, and I am proud to have been part of that. I am proud to have been part of the vote that allows us to explore energy in a very small part of Alaska called the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, something our distinguished colleague Senator Stevens stood for and worked for tirelessly when he was alive and when he was a Member of this body.

Support for our troops and our veterans has increased. After years of defense sequestration--which Secretary Mattis said harmed our national security more than an enemy could have--we have ended that, and the military is finally getting the money it needs to be prepared. This means a modernized force. It means statutory recognition that we are going to get to a 355-ship fleet that can respond to complex challenges around the world.

Just recently we passed the VA MISSION Act, which allows us to continue to improve options and healthcare choices for our veterans.

We rolled back one of the major problems that existed with ObamaCare. We didn't get it all done, but we did roll back the individual mandate--the law that required free Americans to buy a product or pay a big tax whether they wanted to or not. We were able to do that as part of the tax cut legislation, and I am proud that we took this penalty off the backs of hard-working middle-class Americans.

We rolled back a ton of regulations. We have used the Congressional Review Act and actually started doing that on January 20, 2017, the first day of the Trump administration. We passed 16 Congressional Review Act regulations and put them on the President's desk that first day to repeal harmful, burdensome, well-intended but job-killing regulations that had come forward in the last days of the Obama administration.

We passed the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act to provide relief for our small banks, for our community banks, so we are not treating them like some New York bank or some of the largest banks in the country. We freed up the small banks to have a little more ability to loan money to job creators, to small business people seeking to borrow funds and expand their workforce, to allow families to get a loan just a little bit easier with a little bit less regulation so that they can lead the kinds of lives they have wanted to.

We passed legislation to fight opioid abuse. We are not through in that regard. We know we still have a problem. If it were easy, we would have solved it a long time ago, but we are tackling that, and we are accomplishing good things and getting good results.

This is a great economy. The New York Times says so. The Wall Street Journal says so. I think Middle America says so when we are back at home going from county to county, having our town meetings and speaking to our constituents.

We are determined to bear down this summer. We have canceled the August break, and I congratulate the leadership for doing that because we have a lot of things yet to do.

We have a defense bill to pass. We are on it now, and we are going to be on it hopefully with amendments and meaningful improvements next week. Additionally, we are going to pass a farm bill. We are going to pass an FAA reauthorization. We are going to pass legislation strengthening our water infrastructure. For the first time in a long time, our goal--our fervent belief--is that we can get back to the practice of passing our spending bills in regular order and avoiding this last-minute, end-of-the-year omnibus process. Nobody on either side of the aisle likes that process, unless you are one of the one or two people in the room writing those bills, which the President has correctly denounced, and which the American people do not understand.

So we are going to get back to regular order, take these bills one or two or three at a time and put them through the regular process like we are supposed to do.

In addition to that, I hope we have an opportunity to continue confirming conservative judges at the rate we have been. Over one- eighth of the circuit court of appeals is now comprised of new conservative judges, appointed by President Trump and confirmed by the Senate in the last year and a half.

So I am proud of this 500-day process. I am proud of our accomplishments. I am proud to give this interim report and to say we need to resolve to keep it up and build on this great record that has given us the lowest unemployment rate in decades and the most Americans working ever in the history of our Republic.

Thank you.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I have 2 requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority leaders.

Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate:

Committee on the Judiciary

The Committee on the Judiciary is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Thursday, June 7, 2018, at 10 a.m., to conduct a business meeting and hearing following nominations: nominations of Ryan Wesley Bounds, of Oregon, to be United States Circuit Judge for the Ninth Circuit, J. Campbell Barker, and Jeremy D. Kernodle, both to be a United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Texas, Susan Brnovich, to be United States District Judge for the District of Arizona, Chad F. Kenney, to be United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, Maureen K. Ohlhausen, of Virginia, to be Judge of the United States Court of Federal Claims, Britt Cagle Grant, of Georgia, to be United States Circuit Judge for the Eleventh Circuit, Allen Cothrel Winsor, to be United States District Judge for the Northern District of Florida, and Patrick R. Wyrick, to be United States District Judge for the Western District of Oklahoma.

Select Committee on Intelligence

The Select Committee on Intelligence is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Thursday, June 7, 2018, at 10 a.m. to conduct a closed hearing.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Allie McDonnell, an intern in Senator Sullivan's office, be granted floor privileges until the end of the day.

Mr. President, I rise today to pay tribute to the Republic of Azerbaijan, which celebrated the 100th anniversary of its declaration of independence on May 28.

The United States was one of the first countries to recognize Azerbaijan's independence. The country faced horrific challenges when it was invaded by the Bolsheviks in 1920 and later incorporated into the Soviet Union. With the end of the Cold War and the demise of the USSR, Azerbaijan once again achieved its independence on August 30, 1991. Our country recognized Azerbaijan's independence that same year and established diplomatic relations with the Republic of Azerbaijan on February 19, 1992.

Azerbaijan is a key security partner of the United States. For example, Azerbaijani troops have served in Afghanistan since 2002 to assist the United States and our partners in NATO. Additionally, the country supports the United States through the Northern Distribution Network, which allows for the transit of nonlethal supplies through Azerbaijan's territory to our forces in Afghanistan and permits the overflight through its airspace of U.S. military personnel heading to Afghanistan.

Azerbaijan also stands as an example of a secular, Muslim-majority country that has excellent relations with its own Jewish community and has maintained diplomatic relations with our strong ally, Israel, for over 25 years.

Through the Southern Gas Corridor, Azerbaijan will provide energy to our allies in Europe, thus lessening the continent's reliance on Russia for gas.

For this and many other reasons, I commend the Republic of Azerbaijan and its people on this significant anniversary.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I rise this morning to encourage my colleagues to support and cosponsor the Mobile Accuracy and Precision Broadband Act, also known as the MAP Broadband Act.

If we want to get broadband deployment right in this country, if we want to close the digital divide, particularly in rural America--in that great heartland of America--we need for the FCC to be working with an accurate map, and right now they are not working with an accurate map. The agency needs to know which areas are in the most desperate need for consistent wireless service, and the FCC's current map does not even come close to doing this.

I certainly was not alone in my surprise when I saw the coverage shown on the map released by the FCC in late February. It portrayed my home State of Mississippi as basically a wireless hot spot, with only 2 percent of my State not covered with a reliable 4G LTE connection.

This was an absurd conclusion based on what is actually taking place on the ground. That would mean that 98 percent of my State should have one of the fastest mobile broadband connections on the market. That is ridiculous.

I doubted that the map was accurate based on my own experiences, but I wanted to know what others had to say. So I did a survey in April. I sent out a survey asking Mississippians to tell me about their issues with connectivity. Their responses, which totaled more than 1,800, supported my conclusion that the FCC map is just wrong, and something needs to be done about it. The responses also reaffirmed what is at stake if the FCC does not correct the situation and get these maps right.

Mississippians and Americans across this great country need better service so their children can do their homework. They need it so they can FaceTime with loved ones who are away from home in military service. They need it for jobs. They need it for healthcare. A bad connection is inconvenient, to be sure, but it means so much more to public safety and jobs.

Americans in rural areas should not be at a disadvantage because of where we live. Strong, dependable broadband paves the way for economic growth for us all, and it allows for life-giving telehealth and cutting-edge agricultural technologies.

No one thinks my State is an exception to the FCC map. I have yet to hear from any colleague in the Senate who thinks this national map accurately reflects the coverage back in our State. So I propose that we continue to work together with legislation to direct the FCC to get this right. Let's harness the best data for closing the digital divide. Let's make sure decisions are informed by the most accurate maps possible.

Now, what is at stake here? There is $4.53 billion that is at stake here. The way we are headed now with this program and with this inaccurate map, the Mobility Fund Phase II program is about to go forward with funds being distributed based on a map that is absolutely wrong.

So my bill would do four things that I think would help. My bill would give challengers more time to voice their concerns and submit better data.

It would require the FCC to extend the challenge process by 90 days.

My bill would also require the FCC to disclose which phones should be getting 4G LTE service so consumers can know whether their service meets these expectations. In addition, it would require the FCC to provide monthly updates on the percentage of areas on the map that are being challenged and the number of challengers.

Fourth, we would monitor the effectiveness of the Mobility Fund Phase II program by the agency offering annual updates on how mobile wireless service is being expanded.

If anyone in the Senate, if anyone in the House, if anyone who can hear me today has a better idea, I am open to adding that to the bill. But at the end of the day, rushing through this challenge process is not in the best interests of Americans who are waiting for fast wireless coverage. It is not in the best interests, frankly, of the Commission, which needs to take the time to get it right, and we are out to help them to do that.

There will be original cosponsors from both sides of the aisle today when I drop the bill. Those who want to be a part of the challenge process need time and resources to put forward sound information-- information to help the FCC develop a map that truly portrays broadband limitations in this country. An accurate map would also help ensure the proper use of billions of taxpayer dollars--public dollars--to lead to real results to get us where we need to go.

We cannot go forward and we should not go forward with the data we have. My legislation today would take a big step in ensuring that before we distribute these billions of dollars, we need to make sure that we know what we are talking about, that we have the right information, and that we get it right.

Thank you.

Mr. President, I rise this morning to encourage my colleagues to support and cosponsor the Mobile Accuracy and Precision Broadband Act, also known as the MAP Broadband Act.

If we want to get broadband deployment right in this country, if we want to close the digital divide, particularly in rural America--in that great heartland of America--we need for the FCC to be working with an accurate map, and right now they are not working with an accurate map. The agency needs to know which areas are in the most desperate need for consistent wireless service, and the FCC's current map does not even come close to doing this.

I certainly was not alone in my surprise when I saw the coverage shown on the map released by the FCC in late February. It portrayed my home State of Mississippi as basically a wireless hot spot, with only 2 percent of my State not covered with a reliable 4G LTE connection.

This was an absurd conclusion based on what is actually taking place on the ground. That would mean that 98 percent of my State should have one of the fastest mobile broadband connections on the market. That is ridiculous.

I doubted that the map was accurate based on my own experiences, but I wanted to know what others had to say. So I did a survey in April. I sent out a survey asking Mississippians to tell me about their issues with connectivity. Their responses, which totaled more than 1,800, supported my conclusion that the FCC map is just wrong, and something needs to be done about it. The responses also reaffirmed what is at stake if the FCC does not correct the situation and get these maps right.

Mississippians and Americans across this great country need better service so their children can do their homework. They need it so they can FaceTime with loved ones who are away from home in military service. They need it for jobs. They need it for healthcare. A bad connection is inconvenient, to be sure, but it means so much more to public safety and jobs.

Americans in rural areas should not be at a disadvantage because of where we live. Strong, dependable broadband paves the way for economic growth for us all, and it allows for life-giving telehealth and cutting-edge agricultural technologies.

No one thinks my State is an exception to the FCC map. I have yet to hear from any colleague in the Senate who thinks this national map accurately reflects the coverage back in our State. So I propose that we continue to work together with legislation to direct the FCC to get this right. Let's harness the best data for closing the digital divide. Let's make sure decisions are informed by the most accurate maps possible.

Now, what is at stake here? There is $4.53 billion that is at stake here. The way we are headed now with this program and with this inaccurate map, the Mobility Fund Phase II program is about to go forward with funds being distributed based on a map that is absolutely wrong.

So my bill would do four things that I think would help. My bill would give challengers more time to voice their concerns and submit better data.

It would require the FCC to extend the challenge process by 90 days.

My bill would also require the FCC to disclose which phones should be getting 4G LTE service so consumers can know whether their service meets these expectations. In addition, it would require the FCC to provide monthly updates on the percentage of areas on the map that are being challenged and the number of challengers.

Fourth, we would monitor the effectiveness of the Mobility Fund Phase II program by the agency offering annual updates on how mobile wireless service is being expanded.

If anyone in the Senate, if anyone in the House, if anyone who can hear me today has a better idea, I am open to adding that to the bill. But at the end of the day, rushing through this challenge process is not in the best interests of Americans who are waiting for fast wireless coverage. It is not in the best interests, frankly, of the Commission, which needs to take the time to get it right, and we are out to help them to do that.

There will be original cosponsors from both sides of the aisle today when I drop the bill. Those who want to be a part of the challenge process need time and resources to put forward sound information-- information to help the FCC develop a map that truly portrays broadband limitations in this country. An accurate map would also help ensure the proper use of billions of taxpayer dollars--public dollars--to lead to real results to get us where we need to go.

We cannot go forward and we should not go forward with the data we have. My legislation today would take a big step in ensuring that before we distribute these billions of dollars, we need to make sure that we know what we are talking about, that we have the right information, and that we get it right.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I have been recognized to close the debate on this motion. In a few moments, we will be voting on the motion to proceed to this resolution. I will be voting no and urge my colleagues to do so.

This debate is about a free and open internet, and it is also about a thriving and innovative internet. We can have both. For decades, we have had both, and we can continue to do so if we are smart about this.

Does every Senator in this Chamber believe in a free and open internet? Yes.

Does every Member of this body want to prevent blocking and the throttling of the internet? The answer is a resounding yes.

Does any Member of the Senate advocate, as my friend from Massachusetts just suggested, that a company or two gets to set the rules for the entire internet? Absolutely not.

Do all Senators and all Congressmen want the internet to be a source of innovation and job creation and prosperity as it has been for a quarter century? I hope so.

I hope we all want this information superhighway, this technology superhighway to continue its success. I hope we all want the internet to continue being that phenomenal platform for market competition, health advancements, investment, technological progress, efficiency, and safety. I hope we all want this.

If we all want this great engine to keep going, it is important to ask how all this happened in the first place. How did we get here? How did we arrive at this point in our Nation's history, with a dynamic internet economy that is truly the envy of the world?

The answer lies in the creativity and ingenuity of the American spirit. This has allowed the internet to thrive under the light-touch regulatory framework that has governed the internet for most of its history.

Let's revisit a little of that history. It was in 1996. I was a freshman Member of the House of Representatives at this time under a Democratic President, under a Democratic administration. Our country was at a crossroads on how to govern this new thing called the worldwide web, the internet. No one could have imagined the success of the internet we have today, but policymakers had the foresight not to regulate these new emerging information services like the services of a bygone era.

Instead, in 1996, during the Clinton administration, a very deliberative, thoughtful decision was made not to impose title II rules--the same rules from the 1930s that were modeled for the Bell monopolies, that were modeled for a time during the Great Depression. That was the pivotal decision that allowed this great internet economy to thrive and to be the success it is today.

Now let's fast-forward to recently, to 2015. That was the year the FCC made an ill-advised decision to change all that. Despite explosive growth, new applications, services, and consumer choice that the internet was delivering to Americans, the FCC imposed these title II rules, and that is what we are debating today. Almost immediately we saw a chilling effect on investment and innovation. U.S. companies were right to be uncertain about the archaic title II regulations and how they would apply to modern technology.

Fortunately, this misguided action was reversed last year. The FCC lifted the 2015 regulations and restored the light-touch regulatory framework that has benefited consumers for almost two decades and has resulted in this great success. Today, some in Congress are trying to give the government more control again, applying utility-style regulations that would threaten the internet as we know it. We should reject these efforts.

Let me say this: Many of my colleagues correctly, on both sides of the aisle, have been calling for bipartisan legislation to enshrine the net neutrality principles into law--legislation which I support, legislation which Members of the minority party have supported. If this resolution passes today, it will amount to merely a statement, nothing more.

Senator Thune will give Senators an opportunity to pass bipartisan legislation today. I hope we will do that. I hope, once this statement is made, we will move on to enshrining net neutrality principles into a law that protects consumers and promotes innovation.