Tom Cotton

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Mr. President.

Mr. COTTON. Let's vote.

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. I thank Senator Boozman. Mr. President, Police Officer Kevin Dale Apple of the Pea Ridge Police Department protected the community he loved for 23 years, but Officer Apple's long and honorable career in law enforcement was cut tragically short just a couple of weeks ago. It all began with a call to ``be on the lookout'' for a blue Jeep that was fleeing from police in Rogers. Officer Apple and a fellow officer spotted the vehicle at a convenience store, and they sprang into action, approaching the car to speak to its occupants. When they did, the driver of the Jeep rammed one of their police cars and then struck Officer Apple, dragging him to his death. He succumbed to his injuries at the age of 53. Officer Apple's death is a tragedy and a crime, but it is also a reminder; it is a reminder of the grave danger that police officers face across the country every day when they put on the bulletproof vest and leave home, not knowing whether they will go home that night to take it off. This year alone, in being barely halfway through the year, 162 law enforcement officers have died in the line of duty across our country. Officer Apple's death is also a reminder that, every time an officer approaches a suspect, he or she may be exposed to hidden threats, which may be a concealed weapon or, in this case, a vehicle that has been transformed into an instrument of death. All of the comfortable critics of the police who love to second-guess their every move, while officers are under incredible stress and danger in the heat of the moment, can stand to learn that sobering fact. Officer Apple's death is also a warning of the tragic consequences of ill- conceived, soft-on-crime policies. The woman who killed Officer Apple, Shawna Cash, was known by police long before that fateful day. She was facing multiple counts of theft and other drug-related offenses, but she was reportedly released from jail due to the coronavirus. When criminals get let out of jail and are put back on our streets, tragedy tends to follow. A brave officer would still be alive today if his killer had remained behind bars. The trade-off here should be obvious. This criminal, with a rap sheet longer than your arm, should have remained in jail, and Officer Apple should have gone home to his friends and his family. For every future Shawna Cash who gets let out of jail early because of the coronavirus or soft-on-crime policies or other foolish and naive reasons, just remember: There could be another Officer Apple or another murder victim or rape victim. Like every victim of the terrible murder wave sweeping our Nation, Officer Apple's life mattered. He leaves behind loved ones like Dalene, his mother, and Kyle, his brother. He leaves behind fellow officers and comrades who remember his jokes and his goofy sense of humor. He leaves behind a legacy of 23 years of honorable, courageous service to his fellow Arkansans. Officer Apple will not be forgotten, and we must never forget the lawmen who lay down their lives to keep the rest of us safe. We will respect Officer Apple's memory just as we respect every law enforcement officer who wears the badge with honor. I yield the floor.

Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the vote previously scheduled at 11:30 a.m. start now.

Mr. COTTON

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

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. There is a disturbing trend in the not-so-friendly skies these days--a big spike in confrontations, often violent, on American airplanes. It is all the more disturbing because it is totally unnecessary. In most cases, these disputes go back to one of the Biden administration's dumbest policies--the mask mandate at airports and on airplanes. When the Wuhan coronavirus broke out in our country last year, confusion and uncertainty reigned, but within a couple of months, some commonsense standards had emerged: Protect the elderly and the frail. Outdoor activities are safer than indoor ones. Keep your distance. Wear a mask when you can't for prolonged periods inside. Be civil and kind to each other. Thanks to Operation Warp Speed, these standards are largely a thing of the past. Americans are tired of it, and they want their freedoms back, and they are right. But too many Democratic politicians and know- it-all bureaucrats don't want to give up their newfound powers. No single action captures this power grab by government busybodies better than the TSA's decision to extend its zero-tolerance mask mandates for planes, trains, and buses until September, through the summer travel season. This mandate applies to the vaccinated and the unvaccinated alike, as well as kids over the age of 2. Passengers without a mask or accompanied by children without a mask can lose their seats and be banned from airlines and subject to a $1,500 fine. This draconian and punitive policy has no basis in science. After all, airports typically have larger spaces and higher ceilings than, say, a grocery store and pharmacy. Planes have some of the most advanced air filtration systems available in the market today. But this stupid mandate does have real-world consequences. Just last month, a Colorado mother and her family were removed from their flight because the plane's captain didn't believe that her 3-year-old son with autism would keep his mask on. This mother, unfortunately, was not the first to be removed from a flight, and I am sure she won't be the last if this absurd mandate remains in place. This policy discourages family travel after a year of separation and forces Americans with children, especially children with disabilities, to cancel travel or else live in constant fear that an untimely tantrum or a bad day could ruin their trip and cost them more than $1,000 in fines. As the father of two young boys, I can only assume the morons who cooked up this rule don't have children, or perhaps they outsource their kids to nannies and au pairs during flights, just as they do during their dinner parties and fancy retreats. Young kids, especially when they are in a new location surrounded by strangers, tend to act out and misbehave, as any parent will tell you. That entirely predictable behavior shouldn't result in their whole family being kicked off planes, trains, and buses far from home or their destination. I must also observe--although I know that facts have nothing to do with this mandate--that young kids are also the least likely to get the coronavirus and the least likely to spread it. Now, I concede that it is not only young kids who sometimes cause problems on planes. There are too many instances of grownups refusing to wear masks or berating flight attendants merely trying to do their job. These unruly adults should know better, of course, but so should the politicians and the bureaucrats who imposed this idiotic mandate in the first place. Millions of Americans are flying again, and to say simply that ``they should follow my rules'' is impractical and ignores all we know about human nature. The mandate, therefore, hurts not only passengers but also flight attendants. In our line of work, we probably fly more than most Americans these days. Over the last couple of months, I have personally seen so many flight attendants set up for failure by the Biden administration. They usually don't want to boss around their passengers or kick them off an airplane and cause a scene that will go viral on social media, but they are also told they have to enforce this stupid mask mandate, and it is all for no good reason. It would be one thing if there was scientific evidence that suggested that these masks in airports and on airplanes or buses or trains actually slowed the spread of the virus among the unvaccinated, but that is not the case. Even the Secretary of Transportation, Pete Buttigieg, can't defend these mandates on the merits. He doesn't even try. The only rationale he could give when recently asked about the mandate was, ``They're a matter of respect,'' to which I would respond, how about some respect for Americans and their common sense? If you can't defend a policy on the merits, you shouldn't have the policy, and the Biden administration should therefore immediately rescind its mask mandates for airports and airplanes and buses and trains. Vaccinated Americans and their young kids should not be forced to wear face coverings on airplanes or anywhere else, for that matter. It is unnecessary, it is unscientific, and in the case of children, it is cruel. I think I speak for millions of Americans when I say: Mask mandates have long since outlived their usefulness and their welcome. We have all but won the war against the Wuhan coronavirus. It is time for us to act like it, to reclaim victory and reclaim our freedom. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

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

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, I had not planned to speak about the Democratic power grab known as S. 1 and H.R. 1, the For the People Act. I have said my piece on this bill before on the Senate floor and in many other forums. But I have listened to my Democratic friends all day long talk about this bill. We will later today vote on what is known as a motion to proceed to the debate on this bill. That motion will fail. It won't come close to passing. And our Democratic friends are saying: They won't even debate. They won't even debate election reforms. Well, first off, let me say, if you ask me what the Republican plan to federalize our elections is, my answer is, we don't have a plan to federalize our elections. We don't think we should federalize our elections. We think the States and their counties have done a pretty good job, traditionally, of running our elections. I would also remind my Democratic friends that what they present as some kind of unprecedented affront to having a democratic debate in the Senate happened repeatedly, hundreds of times, in the last administration. My Democratic friends simply voted not even to have a debate--not even to have a debate on, say, a coronavirus relief package last summer, which could have gotten aid to families and businesses when they needed it. When the pandemic was still raging, when vaccines were still months away, they filibustered even a debate until after the election, when we passed, in December, almost exactly the same bill that was under consideration. They blocked even a debate--even a debate--on policing reforms last summer that might have helped provide police departments across the country with additional financial support or training resources. I could go on and on about the bills on which they blocked even a debate, like protecting unborn children who can survive outside their mother's womb. Yet, today, the Democrats act as if it is some terrible affront that we are not even going to have a debate on a bill that would be one of the biggest power grabs by Washington in the history of our democracy. Then you have a lot of Democrats who are complaining that the civic rules and customs--the filibuster has to go. They say it is a racist relic of the Jim Crow era. I will acknowledge that some Democrats over the years used the filibuster to block civil rights progress, but I will also remind my Democratic colleagues that, yes, they used the filibuster hundreds of times in the last administration. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record this letter written on April 7, 2017, persuasively authored by Susan Collins and Chris Coons and signed by more than 60 of our fellow Senators urging Senator McConnell and Senator Schumer to ``preserve the existing rules, practices and traditions as they pertain to the right of Members to engage in extended debate on legislation.'

Mr. COTTON. They note that these rules have changed on our Executive Calendar when we consider traditional nominees or executive branch nominees, but they say: We are mindful of the unique role the Senate plays in the legislative process, and we are steadfastly committed to ensuring that this great [American] institution continues to serve as the world's greatest deliberative body. Therefore, we are asking you [Senator Schumer and Senator McConnell] to join us in opposing any effort to curtail the existing rights and prerogatives of Senators to engage in full, robust, and extended debate as we consider legislation before this body in the future. Let me remind you, more than 60 Senators signed this. Twenty-six Democrats currently serving in the Senate signed it, 27 if you include the Vice President. Let me just give you a few notables. As I said, the Vice President signed it. The following chairs of Senate committees signed this letter 4 short years ago: Senators Leahy, Warner, Cantwell, Carper, Reed, Stabenow, and Menendez. Some other notable Senators--as I said, it was authored by Senator Coons, one of Joe Biden's closest friends in the U.S. Senate. Senator King, who often finds himself in the middle of consequential debates; Senator Heinrich, who apparently has changed his tune and today is advocating aggressively to eliminate the filibuster, just like Senator Schatz; Senator Booker; Senator Feinstein, one of the longest serving Democrats in the Senate; Senator Kaine, who was the Vice Presidential nominee for the Democratic Party in 2016; Senator Tester, again, who often finds himself in the middle of consequential, bipartisan negotiations. Yet, somehow, something has changed since 2017. Something has changed, and most of these Democratic Senators now think that the Senate rules must be destroyed so they can pass their massive power grab. What could it be that has changed? What could it be? I don't know. Maybe--maybe it is that Democrats have the most slender reed of power with Joe Biden in the White House and a 50-50 Senate and a four- seat majority in the House. I wish my Democratic colleagues understood that the shoe can pinch when it is on the other foot.

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Madam President, SGM Max English served the Nation honorably for over 28 years in the U.S. Army. He fought in combat operations throughout World War II and bravely led 36 men as a platoon sergeant in the Battle of the Bulge. His extraordinary service continued to the Pacific theater in the waning months of the war. Only a few years later, he returned to the Pacific to fight in the Korean war. During his service in the Second World War, Sergeant Major English was injured in Germany and was awarded the Purple Heart. During the Battle of Bulge, Sergeant Major English fought and repelled repeated Nazi attacks and ultimately helped break the back of Hitler's forces. After sustained combat operations in Europe, Sergeant Major English served in the Southern Pacific theater and pursued the treacherous mission of rooting out irreconciled Japanese Imperial Army forces after their country's unconditional surrender. A member of ``the greatest generation'', Sergeant Major English again answered the call of duty when he was deployed to the Korean war. There, his unit was tasked with repatriating Americans formerly held as prisoners of war during the conflict. The heroic actions of Sergeant Major English's unit directly contributed to the implementation of an armistice to stop the fighting on the Korean Peninsula. Sergeant Major English is a man of exceptional character and commitment to the United States who embodies the American spirit and serves as an inspiration for today's fighting men and women. I join all grateful Americans in congratulating him for his outstanding service and patriotism and thank him for a job well done.

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, 8 short months from now, the greatest athletes in the world will gather together and compete in the 24th Olympic Winter Games. Usually, Americans await this awe-inspiring event with enthusiasm and excitement. This year, though, we await it with apprehension and, frankly, disgust. That is because next year's games will be held in the People's Republic of China--a Communist nation that enslaves workers, puts women and children in concentration camps, sterilizes women, and unleashed a global pandemic that killed millions and upended the global economy. The 2022 Games will be located in Beijing--a 5-hour train ride away from the Wuhan lab where the coronavirus pandemic likely originated and a day away from Xinjiang Province, where the Communist Party is committing genocide against ethnic and religious minorities and has herded more than 1 million innocent souls into concentration camps. The Chinese Communist Party may believe that extravagant pageantry will distract us from the reality of what they have done, but no amount of rushed urban cleaning can wipe away the moral stain that permeates the capital city of China. No golden torch can redeem the moral bankruptcy of communism. No fireworks display can make us forget that Beijing is the epicenter of evil in the world. It is no exaggeration to state that the Chinese Communist Party is the purist, most powerful, and most pervasive force for evil in the world. Locating the Games in Beijing will enrich and embolden the Chinese Communist Party and strengthen their hold on their captive people. That is why the International Olympic Committee should immediately-- immediately--rebid the 2022 Games and award it to a free democratic nation. I will note that this is entirely feasible. If the Tokyo Summer Games can be postponed a year due to an event that was no fault of Japan's Government, we can certainly rebid the Winter Games on short notice if China is perpetrating crimes against humanity. I would observe that the Winter Games are far smaller and easier to move than the Summer Games. The Winter Games include fewer than half the number of sports, nearly 4,700 fewer medals, only one-quarter the number of events, and less than half the competing country. There are many, many Western democracies that could easily, easily accommodate a relocation of the Games on short notice. Some of our European partners, like France, Switzerland, Sweden, and Italy have more than enough winter sporting venues and hotel capacity and transportation capacity to host these Games with 8 months' notice. Many of them have hosted modern Games before. Many of them host national and international winter sporting competitions. If the IOC fails to rebid the games, however, the United States should fully embrace an economic and diplomatic boycott. No U.S. official, company, or spectator should participate in and legitimize China's despotic and totalitarian actions. American companies should not profit off of genocide and oppression or help line the pockets of the Communist Party officials perpetrating these crimes against humanity, these grotesque atrocities. If--and it is a big if--we can keep our athletes safe, they should compete in the spirit of the great Jesse Owens. They should stare tyranny in its eye and defeat China in every field of competition. But the only Americans--and I mean the only Americans--who should step foot on Chinese soil are the athletes, their coaches, their essential support staff, and the necessary personnel to ensure their safety. If the games remain in China, it will pose unique challenges to the safety, security, and privacy of those limited number of Americans who do attend, though. The U.S. Government must be fully prepared for the dangers to which these athletes and supporting personnel would be exposed. First, the Chinese Government operates the most extensive, sophisticated, and invasive police state anywhere on Earth. Members of the American delegation should expect the Chinese authorities to bug their hotel rooms, their vehicles, and to hack all of their electronic devices. Second, China has an ignominious history of arbitrarily detaining American citizens and other Western visitors to gain political and economic concessions, placing exit bans on foreign nationals. Members of the American delegation could be detained during their visit. Former Assistant Secretary of State David Stilwell apparently shares these concerns, stating that ``spectators have good reason to beware Xi Jinping's Beijing Winter Olympics.'' And I would add especially those, like, say, the Houston Rockets' general manager, Daryl Morey, who have spoken out against the Chinese Communist Party's abuses in Hong Kong, Tibet, Xinjiang, and many other places. Third, the Chinese Communist Party's infringement of privacy knows no limits, and our Nation's representatives should prepare our athletes and their staff accordingly. China even considers DNA collection as a vital intelligence-gathering objective, wants to use DNA data to catapult Chinese biotech companies to global market dominance, and has reportedly conducted research on biologically enhancing its soldiers. During the Olympics, of course, the DNA of thousands of world-class athletes could prove an irresistible target to Communists in Beijing, whose evil sometimes seems to verge on science fiction. So whether through the ruse of COVID testing or testing for performance-enhancing drugs, China will have the opportunity to steal the very DNA of our elite athletes--young men and women, in many cases young boys and girls, who deserve our protection. For all of these reasons, and many more, President Biden should forcefully call on the International Olympic Committee to rebid the 2022 Winter Games. We must be ready if they fail to do so. That is why I have sent the President a letter urging him to prepare for the various challenges that our athletes will confront if they compete in Beijing and asking if the Communist authorities are cooperating with U.S. efforts to protect our athletes. If the safety, security, and privacy of our athletes cannot be guaranteed, the United States should, and indeed must, adopt a total and complete boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics. No American should be put in harm's way for the sake of a sporting event. President Biden ought to make these terms absolutely clear to Communists in Beijing, and we should not compromise on them. The athletes we send to the Olympics are not Democrats or Republicans. They do not wear donkeys or elephants on their uniform. They have no party insignia. They are Americans, wearing the Stars and Stripes, bearing the standard of our great Nation. It is the responsibility of our government to protect these champions, and I hope this is an area in which our divided government can unite.

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, the Democrats want to call their voting bill the For the People Act, but I would suggest you not be fooled by the marketing. This bill has nothing to offer the people of our country. The so-called For the People Act is, in fact, a partisan takeover of our elections that seeks a government of the Democrats, by the Democrats, and for the Democrats. So it is no wonder that it is their very top priority and it is literally the first bill filed in both the House and the Senate this year. If this bill passes, it will shatter our Nation's faith in the fairness of our democracy, weaken the security of our elections, and attempt to entrench Democratic rule in the swamp, unchallenged, for decades to come. S. 1 is a Federal takeover of our elections that would usurp the constitutional prerogative of the States in determining what the Constitution calls the ``Times, Places, and Manners of holding elections.'' While our Constitution has always given Congress the power to determine certain aspects of how elections are conducted, the Founders envisioned that this power would be exercised, in the words of Alexander Hamilton, only under ``extraordinary circumstances'' and only as ``the last resort.'' For example, Congress could intervene if States were simply refusing to hold Federal elections in an attempt to deprive Congress of the Members needed to operate under the quorum rules of the Constitution. Of course, we face no such extraordinary circumstances today. No matter the outrageous claims of hysterical journalists and politicians, almost every story you hear and every Democratic claim you hear about State election law reforms misrepresents those reforms or doesn't put them in proper context. The Democratic Party--the very head of the Democratic Party, President Joe Biden, referred to Georgia's election reform, for instance, as a ``new Jim Crow,'' even though it has far, far more access to the ballot than Democratic-run States like New York and, yes, Joe Biden's own Delaware. I might also note that Kentucky passed a fairly sweeping election reform bill earlier this year. It still doesn't go as far as Georgia's bill did in providing early access to the ballot. Yet there is no condemnation of Kentucky's bill. I wonder why. Could it be because Kentucky has a Democratic Governor? The Democrats want to use these kinds of misrepresentations to pass S. 1, which would give all power over our Nation's elections to Democrats in Congress, who think anyone should be able to vote, at any time, at any place, and in any manner, with remarkably little concern even for the basics of election integrity, such as establishing the identity and the legality of individuals who are casting the ballots. The bill before the Senate would invalidate voter identification laws in States across the country--laws that simply require individuals to present valid photo identification in order to vote. Now, Democrats like to pretend that voter ID laws are racist, just as they like to pretend that anyone who opposes them is also racist. That would be a surprise to most of the American people, though. According to recent polling, three-quarters of Americans support photo ID requirements, including 70 percent of Black voters, who support photo ID requirements. That is a pretty big claim of false consciousness by the Democrats. After all, it is no great burden to present a driver's license or photo identification at the polling place in order to vote. It is not some devious tactic to suppress any group of voters. If it was, maybe we would need to ask some of these politically correct airlines, like Delta, why they require passengers to present photo identification before boarding flights. Are they engaged in some nefarious, racist practice of traveler suppression? I don't think so. I think voter ID laws are a basic means of securing the vote, just like three-quarters of all Americans think. Yet S. 1 would still eliminate them all, allowing anyone to register to vote, under any identity, without presenting proof that they are who they claim to be. The Democrats' bill would also make permanent many of the vote-by- mail expansions that were rushed through as ill-considered emergency measures during the pandemic last year. The free-for-all of ballot harvesting and mail-in voting during the 2020 elections caused many Americans to doubt the integrity of that vote. Removing guardrails against fraud will only convince more voters that the electoral process is rigged. Responsible elected officials should be trying to assuage voters' fears by implementing adequate safeguards on our elections. After all, many of these practices were unheard of before the 2020 election. Now, the Democrats like to say that they have to pass S. 1 in a response to these State election reforms, but I would point out that this bill was introduced in the House 2 years ago, before the States passed any of the election reforms. Oftentimes these State election reforms are being passed by legislatures that were appalled by their Governor's sweeping power grabs. So no matter what the conditions, the Democrats think it is always time to nationalize our elections. Another provision of the Democrats' election bill would repeal donor privacy laws that keep the IRS from harassing nonprofit organizations about the identities and addresses of their donors. Democrats claim that this change is about dark-money mega donors, but it would apply to any middle-class family who donates a few hundred dollars a year to a cause they care about, like a church or a charity. Yet, if the Democrats have their way, bureaucrats at the IRS would be able to force nonprofits to name their donors or risk losing their tax-exempt status. This should alarm anyone familiar with the IRS's track record of unfairly targeting conservative groups. After all, just last week, we saw a conveniently timed leak of legally protected tax returns that came out right before the Senate Finance Committee had a meeting to justify higher taxes. What a coincidence. Now, these are just a few of the proposals in the Democrats' election bill. I haven't even talked about the public funding of campaigns. I haven't mentioned transforming the Federal Election Commission into a partisan weapon to be used by the President's party against the opposition. All of these provisions and many more encourage fraud, harassment, and corruption in our campaigns and elections. Not coincidentally, they all seem to work to the advantage of the Democrats or at least to the Democrats' perceived self-advantage. It is little surprise, then, that this partisan bill is supported only by Democrats--not even all Democrats, for that matter, not all the Democrats here in the Senate and not all the Democrats in the House, which passed it earlier this year by the thinnest of margins. So I am proud to be a part of the bipartisan majority in the Senate that is opposing the Democratic Party's attempted takeover of our States' election processes. Political office in America is not a birthright of any party or any politician, so the Democrats should try winning their elections fair and square instead of taking them over in a centralizing power play. I yield the floor.

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Madam President, today the Senate will vote on Kristen Clarke's nomination to head the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division--one of the most powerful positions at the Department of Justice. I will, of course, oppose her nomination. We get a lot of partisan nominees around here. So that is not very surprising. But Ms. Clarke isn't just partisan. She is extremely partisan. She called Senator Murkowski ``shameful.'' She accused Senator Manchin of being disingenuous. And she casually slandered 200-- 200--sitting, Senate-confirmed judges as ``white male extremists.'' If confirmed for this position, she will be entrusted with representing the U.S. Government in front of those very judges--not exactly a credible advocate for our people, if you ask me. Ms. Clarke's radicalism doesn't stop with ad hominem insults. It thoroughly infects her professional judgment as well. Ms. Clarke has consistently demonstrated that she is more interested in attacking police and calling everybody a racist than finding the facts or reviewing the evidence. When it comes to racially incendiary cases, she proudly fans the flames of division. Last year, she repeatedly--repeatedly--spread the falsehood that Jacob Blake, who had a knife and was actively resisting arrest, was, in fact, ``unarmed'' when he was shot by the police. In part because of falsehoods like that one, riots engulfed the city of Kenosha, WI. She also claimed that Officer Darren Wilson, who shot and killed Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO, was only exonerated ``based on racism.'' When I asked Ms. Clarke if she had reconsidered that unsubstantiated opinion, she pretended not to know enough to answer the question, at first, which is remarkable given that the shooting in Ferguson is one of the most publicized and explosive cases in recent years; also remarkable because she apparently knew enough to tar a grand jury of normal American citizens as yes, once again, racist, but not enough to answer simple questions. Ms. Clarke's opinion on the Ferguson case sets her apart from other staunch liberals like Vanita Gupta and Eric Holder. Both have acknowledged that Officer Wilson was justified in the use of force, echoing the Obama Department of Justice, which came to the very same conclusion. In defiance of all evidence, in spite of her good friend Ms. Gupta's views, Ms. Clarke still dissents from this conclusion. So I cannot believe it--I am genuinely astonished--but Joe Biden has somehow found a nominee more radical than Vanita Gupta. That is an impressive accomplishment, one that should give Senators who supported Ms. Gupta more than ample ground to oppose Ms. Clarke Moreover, Ms. Clarke is a firm and, until very recently, a vocal supporter of defunding the police. Ms. Clarke wrote an article less than a year ago--not some college paper. Less than a year ago, Ms. Clarke wrote an article with ``Defund the Police'' in the title. She stated: ``Must invest less in police'' three times in the text of that article. She also wrote: ``I advocate for defunding policing operations.'' I don't know. Call me naive. Call me simple. When you write an article entitled ``Defund the Police'' and when you say, ``[W]e must invest less in the police'' and ``I advocate for defunding policing options,'' it sounds to me like you support defunding the police. But, apparently, I am wrong about that because when she was asked about this at her hearing, Ms. Clarke denied--amazingly, denied--that she supported defunding the police. She claimed that when she wrote that ``we should defund the police,'' she actually meant that we should not defund the police. Astoundingly, she blamed an editor for coming up with the title to her piece but conveniently can't recall what an alternative title she suggested would have been or whether she objected to a title that was apparently the exact opposite of what she intended. Now, maybe this shouldn't be surprising. After all, her article title was ``I prosecuted police killings. Defund the Police--but be Strategic.'' Apparently, the strategy is lying, because that is what we saw at our committee. We said: Ms. Clarke, the title of your article is ``Defund the Police.'' Like, I didn't choose the title. Ms. Clarke, you wrote three times in the story ``defund the police.'' She is like: I don't support defunding the police. But, Ms. Clarke, you wrote here, as well, that we should invest less in the police. She is like: No, I don't think we should invest less; we should invest more. The old argument: It is not my dog. It didn't bite you. You kicked him first. Regardless of what she and her defenders might say, one thing is crystal clear: A vote for Kristen Clarke is a vote to defund the police. Finally, not surprisingly, we come to Ms. Clarke's consistent dishonesty, duplicity, and evasion throughout her hearing and written statements. In one particularly bizarre incident, Ms. Clarke claimed in her hearing that she was proud to have the endorsement of the National Association of Police Organizations, a group which represents nearly a quarter million law enforcement officers. Now that would be big news, a huge endorsement. So I asked my staff to get me a copy of the endorsement letter. It turns out they couldn't because it doesn't exist. Now, that is not good, but people misspeak all the time, especially when under pressure. So I wanted to give Ms. Clarke a chance to correct the record. I asked for clarity in a written question. Thankfully, Ms. Clarke responded that she had misstated the facts. OK. That is fine, I accept that explanation. Again, people misspeak. No one is perfect. Yet imagine my surprise when I received an answer to another written question that claimed almost verbatim the same thing she had said in her hearing--that she was endorsed by this organization. She similarly responded to at least three other Senators that she was endorsed by this organization, even after admitting just a few pages earlier in her written answers that she had misstated that she had such an endorsement. At that point, that is not a simple mistake. It is not misspeaking. It is not a fib. It is totally and completely untrue in written testimony to the U.S. Congress. Yet she has not apologized. She has not acknowledged this blatant lie. This episode sadly proves that she lacks the transparency and honesty to be trusted in such an important position. You know, my Democratic colleagues have, for the last 4 years, endlessly lectured about the need for the Department of Justice to be free from partisan politics and for it to be run by serious, competent individuals. They seems to have a slightly different view today. From her extremism to her lack of candor, Ms. Clarke is unfit to lead any organization in the Department of Justice--indeed, simply to serve the Department of Justice. If the Democratic Senators vote to confirm Ms. Clarke, they will be responsible for every battle she wages in Joe Biden's war on the police, and I will make sure that their voters know about it I yield the floor.

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Madam President, as the disasters pile up left and right from these early months of the Biden Presidency, one might be called the Tail of Three Pipelines--three separate pipelines, three separate challenges, united by one consistent theme. In each case, the foolishness and weakness of the Biden administration has led to the disaster. First, President Biden began his administration by killing the Keystone XL Pipeline on day one. This decision was a gift to the radical environmentalist nonprofit industry in Washington, DC, and destroyed thousands of good, high-paying, blue-collar, American jobs, including many jobs in my home State of Arkansas. Second, last week Russian-affiliated hackers attacked the Colonial Pipeline--an artery that supplies nearly half the fuel for the east coast--causing widespread gas shortages across the Southeast. Instead of making the hackers feel the full wrath of the U.S. Government, the Biden administration called the attack a private sector concern. Colonial then paid the hackers over $4 million in ransom, presumably with Biden administration foreknowledge and acquiescence, if not explicit support. This payment, of course, will only encourage further such attacks on American companies. Third and finally, yesterday the Biden administration announced it will waive major, legally mandated sanctions against the Russian Nord Stream 2 Pipeline into Germany. This refusal to implement sanctions approved by Congress directly benefits by design the Russian company building Nord Stream 2 and its CEO, who--you won't believe it--is a former Communist, East German Stasi officer and longtime crony of Vladimir Putin. President Biden's decision to cave on Nord Stream 2 is just the latest show of weakness towards Russia by this administration, which is strange, coming from a party that spent the last 4 years all chesty and boastful, pretending they were Jack Ryan in a Tom Clancy novel. Nord Stream 2 will serve as a noose around the neck of Europe's energy supply. It will allow Russia to squeeze the sovereign nations of Eastern and Central Europe into submission. You may think I am exaggerating, but Russia has used energy as a weapon of foreign policy many times in the past. In 2009, for instance, Russia shut off the flow of natural gas to Europe during a dispute with Ukraine, causing energy shortages in the dead of winter. Russia has reduced or shut off gas to Austria, Poland, Romania, Lithuania, and Slovakia whenever those countries have refused its demands or otherwise displeased the Kremlin. Nord Stream 2 will deepen Europe's addiction to Russian gas and make it ever more dependent on the dealer. All of Europe could suffer, but Ukraine would be hurt the most of all. If the Nord Stream 2 pipeline comes online, Russia could bypass Ukraine entirely. This would not only cost Ukraine's economy billions of dollars in transit fees, it would also give Russia the ability to isolate and starve this proud nation. It is hard to imagine a worse time for this to happen, with Russian troops massed on the Ukrainian border, while Russia's dictator salivates over conquering or further partitioning this country. It is no wonder that the vast majority of Europe sees the dire danger posed by this pipeline. The European Parliament voted overwhelmingly against it on three separate occasions, including just last month. The United Kingdom, France, and Eastern Europe firmly oppose its construction as well. It is only a small but influential group of German elites who support this misguided plan. It is ironic that these men and women of power and privilege would doubtlessly claim to support the so-called liberal international order, as is the fashion in such circles, but their actions are directly empowering a dictator who poses the greatest threat to their dreams; a man who rose to power and has maintained it through extortion, murder, and brutality. Putin's most recent political rival, Alexei Navalny, was poisoned with a nerve agent and today is rotting in a Russian penal colony. Navalny's only crime was exposing the corruption and depravity of the Russian state. Yet President Biden wants to enrich and reward this very regime. Ultimately, the pipeline is emblematic of the Biden administration's ``America last'' foreign policy, but there is still time to stop it. I am urging the President to reverse course immediately. There is little room for error left at this late, perilous stage. Nord Stream 2 is 95 percent completed. Like an outstretched arm, Russia's pipeline extends ominously within reach of Germany's shore. We have to move quickly and in concert with our allies to make sure it extends no further. This Russian pipeline is bad for America and bad for Europe. If the President wishes to take the reins of international leadership, this is his opportunity. Kill Nord Stream 2 now, and let it rust beneath the waves of the Baltic. I yield the floor.

Mr. COTTON

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

Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, over the weekend, Israeli fighter jets demolished an office building in Gaza that housed the members of Hamas, the terrorist organization dedicated to wiping Israel and its people off the map, and they are actively pursuing that mission as we speak by firing thousands of rockets and missiles indiscriminately into Israeli cities. To minimize civilian casualties, the Israeli Defense Forces gave persons in the building 1 hour advance notice the building was coming down. Everyone evacuated safely, including, one sadly assumes, Hamas fighters. When the airstrike came, there were no reported civilian casualties. Certain activists in the press seem to meet every Israeli airstrike against terrorists with outrage, but this one elicited even more self- righteous indignation than usual. It quickly came to light that the Associated Press and Al Jazeera had news bureaus in that very building. The AP had lost prime real estate in the strike--real estate with a rooftop terrace. Some even lost their cameras. The AP's top newsman said he was ``shocked and horrified'' by an airstrike that caused no casualties. He also disclaimed any knowledge of Hamas's presence in the building, despite ``actively check[ing].'' Many other journalists and their advocacy organizations also mounted up on their moral high horses against Israel. But the AP story just didn't add up. So I asked a few basic questions in a speech right here yesterday afternoon; namely, why was the Associated Press sharing a building with Hamas in the first place? Did it knowingly allow its journalists to be used as human shields by a U.S.-designated terrorist organization? Did the AP pull its punches and decline to report for years on Hamas's misdeeds? One would think that these are simple and reasonable questions, but I directed them to a media organization. So the usual suspects circled the wagons, expressing more outrage at my audacity to question AP's leadership than they do at Hamas for trying to kill Jews by the thousands. Keith Olbermann called me an ``anti-Constitution, anti-Free Press, racist fascist.'' One Slate reporter wrote that I was making ``deranged insinuations'' and going to ``bat against civilians in a war-zone,'' even though no civilians had been harmed in this airstrike. The constant refrain of their criticism was that I was attacking the brave reporters of the Associated Press's Gaza bureau. My claims were baseless, reckless, ``without evidence,'' they claimed. But, in fact, there is plenty of evidence that some media outlet station in Gaza allowed themselves to be used as pawns by Hamas. According to an article from the Atlantic magazine in 2014, written by none other than, yes, a former Associated Press reporter, the AP had abundant reason to suspect Hamas's presence years before the IDF informed them by telephone last weekend. According to the article, Hamas fighters burst into the AP's Gaza bureau during a previous conflict and threatened the staff. Hamas also launched missiles right outside the AP's office. In each case, somehow the intrepid reporters of the Associated Press's Gaza bureau didn't even report on these incidents. The AP instead turned a blind eye to terrorism and embraced a culture of silence on behalf of murderers who actively endangered its own reporters and staff. What is equally scandalous is that the AP continued to locate their offices in a building they knew was dangerous. The AP had been in that building for 15 years. Hamas fighters had threatened AP staff and its offices and launched missiles right outside on the street. In 15 years did no one ever say: Gosh, I wonder why Hamas keeps running around our office building? Did no one in AP's leadership think: You know, maybe we should move our people to a safer building in a better neighborhood? Under the circumstances, I am not sure what is worse, that the AP knew they shared their building with Hamas or that they didn't know. Instead of uncovering the truth, the AP concealed it. Then, when the IDF carried out its fully justified and wholly appropriate airstrike, the AP condemned Israel in one final parting gift to their neighbors from Hamas. Now, one would think that this episode might result in some soul- searching. The AP's leadership might see it as a humbling moment, instead of an opportunity to self-aggrandize and play the victim. But the AP's willingness to double down on their Hamas apologism raises, yet again, some more uncomfortable questions. Would the AP allow its reporters to share a building with al-Qaida? What about ISIS? Because there are little differences between these U.S.-designated terrorist organizations and Hamas. Some prestigious news outlets have fallen pretty far from the heights they once occupied. Being a reporter, and, certainly, a war correspondent, can be honorable work. Great men and women, including Winston Churchill, have dedicated themselves to the profession. Correspondents have gone to the frontlines and reported on some of the deadliest conflicts in human history with courage, commitment to truth, and patriotism. During the Second World War, for example, a great American named Ernie Pyle marched alongside GIs in North Africa, Italy, Normandy, and the Pacific, reporting right up until the moment he was killed by Japanese machine-gun fire. He did some of his very best work for none other than the Associated Press. Ernie Pyle was the farthest thing from an old press hack. He described the fighting up close and advocated for better pay and conditions for the troops. He could be critical of the services when they were wrong, but he never forgot whose side he was on, and he never gave up his commitment to telling the stories of normal people and the hard-working troops on the frontline. Before America's entrance into the war, Pyle reported from the streets of London during the Blitz, recounting the terrifying scenes for readers back home in the States. He told the story of a resolute people under siege and forced into bombshell shelters by an indiscriminate and evil attacker--a people unbent and unbroken by terror, dedicated to victory, no matter the adversity. We often learn from reporting like that, but you may not read it these days in the Associated Press. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. COTTON

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

Mr. COTTON. Madam President, just 4 short months ago, hopes were running high in the Middle East. ISIS was wiped off the map, the Iranian regime and its terrorist proxies were in retreat, and Israel was forging historic peace deals with its neighbors. All along the way, the United States was instrumental in this progress. But in just a few months, the Biden administration has dashed those hopes with its policy of weakness and appeasement. The forces of terror are again on the march. Pillars of smoke and fire are rising from Tel Aviv and the holy city of Jerusalem. The assault on Israel by terrorist groups like Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad is the latest and most concrete evidence yet that the Middle East is spiraling toward chaos. But instead of standing firm with Israel, the Biden administration's policy of endless accommodation is fanning the flames of conflict. The President should show strength. Instead, he is broadcasting indecision and weakness. Our greatest ally in the Middle East is under attack. Yet the Democratic Party refuses to say: We stand with Israel. The night sky over the Jewish State blazes with the starbursts of intercepted rockets, and the Biden administration only offers muted calls for restraint. Where are the righteous denunciations of the terrorists responsible for these repeated, premeditated, and unprovoked attacks? Where are the statements of solidarity with Israel? Please. From this administration and from this Democratic Party, we can't even get the President's spokeswoman to say that the United States would help resupply munitions for Iron Dome, Israel's lifesaving missile defense system. So this afternoon, let me provide a little clarity that the President and his party appear incapable or unwilling to articulate. The fault for the death and destruction in the streets of Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Gaza, and the West Bank lies not with the Israeli Government, much less with the Israeli people. The belligerents in this conflict aren't morally equivalent, the way it is often presented in supposedly enlightened circles. Put simply, there are good guys, and there are bad guys. Israel seeks peace. Terror groups seek death and destruction. Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad are not legitimate state actors. They don't speak for the Palestinian people and don't truly care about them. These groups are terrorist organizations run by evil men who commit evil acts in pursuit of the evil dreams of an evil ideology. They purposely fire waves of unguided rockets at civilian targets, while they protect themselves from reprisal using babies, hospitals, schools, and dupes in the media as shields--what cowards, attacking innocent civilians while they hide behind women. Of course, Hamas and the Islamic Jihad don't act alone. The Palestinian Authority supports, encourages, and funds terrorism in the form of so-called martyr payments--pensions paid to terrorists who attack Jews. The PA perpetuates cycles of violence by refusing to acknowledge the existence of Israel, teaching anti-Semitism in its schools and leaving its people to wallow in poverty as wards of the international community. And we all know who funds and arms Palestinian terrorist organizations, the world's foremost supporter of terrorism, the Islamic Republic of Iran. For decades, Iran's theocrats have staged demonstrations where their fanatical supporters scream: ``Death to America'' and ``Death to Israel.'' The assault on Israel today shows that those chants are not idle threats. Iran's ayatollahs are deadly serious about wiping the Jewish State off the map. That is why Iran arms Palestinian terrorists with some of its most lethal weapons. Hamas's arsenal of 10,000 rockets might as well have ``Made in Iran'' stamped on the side. Those are the villains of this conflict, but let's not forget the heroes. Standing courageously against this organized onslaught is the State of Israel, our closest ally in the region. Over the past week, terrorists have fired approximately 3,000 missiles and rockets into Israel. In response, Israel has defended itself with technological miracles like Iron Dome. It has carried out precision airstrikes against military targets, and, as always, Israel has gone to extraordinary lengths to minimize civilian casualties, despite the terrorists' best efforts to maximize and then publicize any carnage. While Hamas and the Islamic Jihad fire indiscriminately from Palestinian schools, office buildings, and apartments, Israel responds by hitting those launch sites, but only after--only after--they warn civilians, allowing them to evacuate first. Regrettably, these warnings also allow terrorists to escape, but Israel bears that cost because it values innocent life, unlike its terrorist enemies. You may have heard of one recent example Last week, Israel carried out an airstrike against a building used by Hamas intelligence personnel, a building that also housed the Associated Press. An hour before the airstrike, the Israeli military called the AP and other civilians in that complex and warned them to depart. This precaution, once again, allowed Hamas terrorists to escape but also allowed reporters and other civilians to vacate the premises before the airstrike occurred. As a result, no civilians died, and Hamas lost a terrorist haven. Now, in any other country and with any other military--except America's, I have to add--one would hear praise for that military's restraint and commitment to the laws of order. But because this military is the IDF and the country is Israel and the people are the Jews, they are widely condemned around the world and on the left in America. If you cut through the hysterics and the hyperbole, you can see the truth clearly: One side seeks to maximize carnage and the other seeks to minimize civilian casualties. Besides, I must observe, why is the Associated Press sharing a building with Hamas? Surely, these intrepid reporters knew who their neighbors were. Did they knowingly allow themselves to be used as human shields by a U.S.-designated terrorist organization? Did AP pull its punches and decline to report for years on Hamas's misdeeds? I submit that the AP has some uncomfortable questions to answer. Yet the AP and its fellow journalists are in high dudgeon about Israel's wholly appropriate airstrike. Leave it to whiny reporters to make themselves the story and the victim when terrorists are shooting missiles at innocent civilians. In any event, the moral standing of the competing forces in this conflict is simple and clear. Our greatest ally and the only democracy in the region against an Islamist theocracy and its terrorist partners--most Americans know which side they are on. I speak for them when I say that we stand with Israel. Unfortunately, too many elected Democrats have taken a different stand. Members of the so-called ``Squad'' in the House of Representatives have called Israel an apartheid state and accused it of war crimes. Remember, these aren't obscure backbenchers. Many Democrats herald these Representatives as the future of their party. Meanwhile, 27 Democratic Senators have called for an immediate cease- fire to the conflict. Even the Democratic floor leader, who has long styled himself as Israel's great defender, has joined this moral equivalence, calling for immediate cease-fire. Hear me clearly. The handwringing calls for a cease-fire are tantamount to Hamas propaganda. Both sides are not the same in this conflict, no matter what the Democrats naively imply. If Hamas puts down its weapons, there would be peace. If Israel puts down its weapons, there would be no Israel. Thankfully, Israel's leadership is resolute, united, and committed to victory. The United States should respond to this terrorist onslaught with equal resolve. That means we should give Israel the time, space, and resources to destroy Hamas's war machine and protect its own people. We should also ensure that Israel has the military hardware to weather this crisis. Hamas may have as many as 10,000 missiles, rockets, and mortars in reserve. Meanwhile, Hezbollah lurks to the north with many times that arsenal. We should, therefore, endeavor to ensure that Israel has more interceptors for Iron Dome than Hamas has rockets to kill Israelis. Moreover, we ought to cut off aid to the Palestinian Authority until we can be absolutely sure that not a dime of taxpayer money is being used to buy and build rockets or pay pensions for murderous terrorists. And, finally, the Biden administration ought to immediately end its misguided flirtation with the theocrats in Iran by recalling its chief negotiator and appeaser, Rob Malley, from negotiations in Vienna. If the Biden administration reenters the failed Iran nuclear agreement and grants sanctions relief to the regime in Tehran, in very short order that appeasement payoff will be converted into rockets aimed at Israel, as well as at American troops throughout the region. While Israel is under attack, we have heard plenty of talk and mealymouthed statements from politicians. But in this moment of crisis, Israel needs more than words. Israel needs and deserves our full support to defend itself and its people and to achieve a just and lasting peace. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. COTTON

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

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, our Nation just concluded National Correctional Officers and Employees Week. Because the Senate was not in session last week, I want to take this opportunity to recognize these heroes and everything they do to protect our people and uphold the rule of law. Every day, correctional officers go in to work to guard and operate our Federal prisons, State prisons, and local jails. They not only administer justice on behalf of innocent victims, but they also defend the guilty from unjust adversity. They combat the drug trade so that addicts can recover. They fight back against vicious prison gangs so that inmates can have a chance to find redemption instead of recidivism. They confront the most violent offenders so that persons with short minimum-security prison sentences don't turn out to have what is a death sentence. Without safety, security, and structure, our prisons and our jails would devolve into anarchy, into chaos, and crime. Correctional officers combat these forces of disorder so that these facilities can instead be centers of self-improvement and, indeed, correction. As a result, many inmates are able to pursue education, learn marketable skills, and find solace in God. The profession of a correctional officer is both noble and very dangerous. Fewer than 450,000 correctional officers protect and police approximately 1.5 million inmates in a normal year, around the clock, every minute of every day. Riots, jailbreak attempts, and targeted anti-police violence are common and result in particularly high-risk situations for correctional officers. In a 9-year period measured by the National Institutes of Health, correctional officers suffered over 125,000 work-related injuries and 113 tragically lost their lives. Correctional officers willingly endure this danger, suffer these injuries, and sometimes give their lives so that our families, neighborhoods, and communities can be safe. The least we can do is to recognize their sacrifice and express our gratitude. This year, our correctional officers did even more than usual. For the past 14 months, they have worked tirelessly to keep our inmates healthy in the middle of this global pandemic. They shifted normal confinement arrangements, and they maintained order among the population under enhanced stress due to coronavirus protocols. Correctional officers have done an amazing job and saved so many lives during this crisis. Sadly, some even paid the ultimate price for their work. They should be proud of their work, and we ought to be proud of them. So from the floor of the U.S. Senate, I certainly can say I am proud of our correctional officers. But our Nation should go beyond gratitude. We ought to give correctional officers the funding, the wages, the equipment, the facilities, and the support that they need. To start, Congress can finally crack down on contraband cell phones. Inmates use them to maintain their criminal enterprises from behind bars and to terrorize those who put them there. They also use them to victimize other inmates and to prey upon random victims outside prison walls. In other words, prisoners use these cell phones to undermine the life's work of correctional officers. Contraband cell phones are even used as tools of retribution against the officers themselves. In 2010, a gang member imprisoned in South Carolina used a contraband cell phone to order the murder of Captain Robert Johnson. Captain Johnson was then mercilessly shot six times in the chest and stomach in his own house. Remarkably, he survived the attack, and he is now a leading advocate for taking action against contraband cell phones. Regrettably, the use of contraband cell phones shows no sign of slowing. On the contrary, they are becoming ubiquitous weapons inside of our prisons. While available technologies can be helpful, it is also increasingly clear they are not capable of solving the problem alone. So that is why I will soon be reintroducing my Cell Phone Jamming Reform Act. This bill would empower State prisons to install jamming technology and turn contraband cell phones into nothing but useless paper weights. This easy and commonsense step will honor the hard work of correctional officers to clean up our streets and to keep our Nation safe. The men and women of this country--law-abiding citizens and those who serve their time alike--owe a debt to our Nation's correctional officers. So I, once again, want to thank them for their courageous and diligent service. And I hope they took time last week to celebrate National Correctional Officers and Employees Week because they certainly deserved it.

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Madam President, sadly, the United States is in the midst of the deadliest drug epidemic in our Nation's history, caused by some of the deadliest drugs ever created. It appears that more than 80,000 Americans died from drug overdose last year. By far, the biggest killers were lab-made opioids, such as fentanyl, which are cheap to produce and easy to mix with other street drugs such as heroin. These lethal cocktails have devastated countless communities and families across our Nation. Too many parents have come home to a dead child who mistakenly took a prescription pill or a so- called party drug laced with this deadly fentanyl. Illicit fentanyl, the kind created in underground Chinese drug labs or smuggled across our porous southern border by Mexican cartels, is made only to addict and kill. For those dark, terrible purposes, fentanyl is unsurpassed in the tragic history of addiction. It is 50 to 100 times stronger than morphine. Just 2 milligrams of fentanyl, an amount equivalent to a few grains of salt, is enough to kill a grown man. Just last December, police arrested a man in Arkansas carrying 7 pounds of fentanyl. Depending on the purity of that fentanyl, that would have been enough to deliver a fatal dose to up to 1.5 million Americans. That is far from the biggest fentanyl bust that police have ever made. That means that every time our Border Patrol stops a drug mule coming across our southern border, every time the Coast Guard intercepts a drug runners' vessel in our waters, and every time a SWAT team raids a drug dealer's stash house, they could be averting what is, in effect, a mass casualty attack on our country. Unfortunately, these Mexican drug cartels and Chinese superlabs are diabolically creative in waging this new kind of opium war against the United States. When American law enforcement started cracking down on fentanyl a few years ago, the cartels started producing so-called analogs or look-alike drugs that are chemically distinct from fentanyl, yet have no legitimate medical uses but will kill you just as quickly. Some of these analogs are even more powerful than fentanyl--up to 150 times more potent of a drug that I would remind you, once again, is, itself, 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine. Because these drugs are chemically distinct from fentanyl, prosecuting and shutting down their creators is often prohibitively expensive, requiring law enforcement to hire expert witnesses to testify the analog is, in fact, a deadly drug. In 2018, the Drug Enforcement Administration took the necessary and prudent step listing the entire class of fentanyl analogs as schedule I prohibited substances. This decision closed a deadly loophole that drug dealers were using to escape punishment from poisoning our citizens, while still allowing legitimate researchers to apply for and obtain approval to research these analogs for potential medical or scientific breakthroughs. The evidence suggests that this law enforcement action has been getting results. Since the classwide scheduling went into effect in early 2018, law enforcement encounters with uncontrolled fentanyl analogs plummeted by almost 90 percent. Of course, our work to solve the opioid epidemic is far from finished. We still have much to do to dismantle the cartels and drug trafficking networks that spread fentanyl and analogs and mix it with other drugs. But the DEA's efforts to control fentanyl analogs were a step in the right direction. Last year, the Senate voted unanimously to extend the DEA's emergency scheduling of fentanyl, but that extension is now set to expire. We have the opportunity--in fact, I would say we have the responsibility to permanently control these deadly fentanyl analogs so law enforcement has the legal backup it needs to take these dangerous drugs off the streets. If Congress doesn't act, this emergency scheduling order is set to expire next week. The authority of our Border Patrol to seize these drugs as they cross the border will be dramatically reduced. Cartels will, once again, be able to exploit loopholes to evade prosecution, and Chinese superlabs will get right back to work inventing new and creative ways to repackage fentanyl and to kill even more Americans. We cannot let that happen. I introduced a bill to solve this problem once and for all by merely eliminating the expiration date on the law that protects us against these fentanyl analogs. I am asking my colleagues to approve it just like we did last year--unanimously. I would also like to urge my Democratic colleagues to disregard the liberal activist groups that are lobbying against controlling these deadly fentanyl analogs because they hope to use it as a bargaining chip to reduce criminal penalties for the most serious drug traffickers. Think about that. More Americans died of a drug overdose last year than in any other year in our history. Yet these liberal activists are trying to help the drug traffickers who spread these very poisons. If they succeed, drug dealers will have an easier time killing Americans for profit, and prosecutors will have to waste valuable resources proving that each new form of fentanyl they encounter is, in fact, a deadly drug. We cannot play politics with this bill, trading the lives of innocent Americans for more lenient treatment of cartels and superlabs. Protecting Americans from deadly fentanyl should not be treated as a bargaining piece or poker chip. I ask my colleagues to think of the victims and think of the urgency of this measure. I am offering this bill on behalf of tens of thousands of Americans who were with us just last year but are not today because of these deadly synthetic drugs. I am offering this on behalf of the countless Americans who can still be saved if we act. I urge my colleagues to support this measure and, therefore, Madam President, as in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to immediate consideration of S. 1410, introduced earlier today; further, I ask unanimous consent that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. COTTON. I thank my colleague from New Jersey for these remarks. Time is not on our side. This emergency scheduling order expires next week. The Senate is not in session next week. I know that we want to empower addicts, as the Senator from New Jersey said; that we want to help give them the treatment they need to get back on their feet. That is a goal I share. We are talking, though, about drug dealers, drug traffickers, cartels, Chinese superlabs. If we do not pass an extension--in my bill, a permanent extension of this emergency scheduling order--it is the addicts who will be hurt because the drug dealers and these cartels and superlabs will simply begin to flood our streets, once again, with the synthetic fentanyl analogs, which I remind you, again, can be 150 times more potent than fentanyl itself, which is 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine. I hope my Democratic friends will reconsider in the short time we have this week, and we will be able to pass a permanent extension of this scheduling order. I yield the floor.

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, our Nation is in the midst of a historic crime wave that is affecting Americans of every background and walk of life. This surge in violence includes a shocking rise in hate crimes against our fellow citizens of Asian descent. Last year, the total number of hate crimes in America's largest cities dropped by 7 percent, but they surged by nearly 150 percent against Asian Americans. Often, these hate crimes target the elderly and the frail--people who can't fight back against their vicious assailants. Just last month, a 65-year-old Asian-American woman was knocked to the ground and repeatedly kicked in broad daylight on the streets of New York City while her attacker shouted anti-Asian slurs. We later learned that her attacker was a convicted murderer who was out on parole, thanks to criminal leniency policies. Instead of being in prison, locked up, where he belonged, he was brutalizing an innocent victim in broad daylight--yet more proof that being weak on crime doesn't reduce crime; it only invites more crime. A civilized society can't ignore such attacks on our innocent citizens. We have to protect them. We have to protect every citizen and get tough on violent hate crimes. Unfortunately, in response to this terrible rise in anti-Asian hate crimes, the Democrats initially introduced an extremely partisan bill intended to score political points. This flawed piece of legislation that the Senator from Hawaii originally sponsored contained provisions tailor-made to muzzle free speech. For example, the bill would have directed the Department of Justice to tell Americans how they were supposed to talk about this virus. I voted against proceeding to this bill, in part because of this crazy, radical idea to impose a speech code on how Americans can talk about this virus. Some say: How could you vote against it? Very simple. I will never support a speech code imposed on the American people on how they can exercise their First Amendment rights to talk about this pandemic. This whole idea is deeply concerning, especially because some in the media and some of our Democratic friends believe that even pointing out that the virus came from China is somehow inciting violence. That is as foolish as it is dangerous. Calling this virus--which, yes, came from Wuhan, China--the Wuhan virus is not racist, and it doesn't incite violence. You may recall, after all, that last year, journalists from such esteemed outlets as CNN, Reuters, the Washington Post, and the New York Times all used the terms ``Chinese virus,'' ``Chinese coronavirus,'' and ``Wuhan coronavirus.'' Were they inciting violence? Were they racist? No, of course not. They were following the centuries- old practice of referring to diseases by their geographic names. It wasn't anti-Spanish to call the influenza outbreak of 1918 the ``Spanish flu'' even though it didn't even start in Spain. It was not anti-Egyptian to use the term ``West Nile virus.'' What about the variants of this virus from Brazil? from South Africa? from Great Britain? We use those terms. Is that somehow going to have to be banned from polite society's lexicon as well? Second, I also want to point out that the Democrats' original bill, supposedly about the violence against Asian Americans, never actually used the term ``Asian American''--not once. Instead, it had some new, manufactured, mysterious term called ``COVID-19 hate crimes,'' which could have set a precedent for the even wider suppression of free speech against citizens who have no animus toward Asians and who haven't committed any crimes--citizens, for instance, who are concerned about the spread of the coronavirus due to the surge of illegal immigration at our border. According to the mainstream media, if you so much as ask a question about the unvaccinated and untested persons who are entering our country at the border every day, you are somehow bigoted or nativist or xenophobe. In the original version of the bill, the language ``COVID-19 hate crimes'' could have resulted in individuals opposed to illegal immigration being reported for merely expressing an opinion. Yet I am happy to report that this process, which had a bitter, partisan beginning, will soon have a rather uplifting and unifying end. Thanks to the diligent work of one of the hardest working Senators in the U.S. Senate, the Senator from Maine, these offensive provisions of the Democrats' original bill have been removed. The Senator from Maine has helped turn what was a bitter, partisan piece of legislation into something that now Members of both parties can hopefully support. Thanks to her efforts, this legislation is specifically focused on the crisis at hand and will improve the reporting of anti-Asian hate crimes. Soon, we will also vote on a series of amendments from some of my fellow Senators to improve this legislation even further. I look forward to voting for those amendments, for the substitute amendment, and for the bill, as amended. Today, this Chamber will take a step forward in fighting the rise of anti-Asian violence. I hope that we continue to make progress so that every victim gets justice and that further attacks are deterred

Mr. COTTON

Mr. COTTON. Madam President, Colin Kahl is President Biden's nominee to be the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy. This is the top strategic planning position at the Department of Defense--the No. 3 position at our Department of Defense. The role is critically important to the national security of our country and the safety of our allies around the world. Unfortunately, Mr. Kahl is temperamentally and professionally unfit to hold this--or, for that matter, virtually any other--job at the Pentagon. He is impulsive, intemperate, offensive, and has consistently demonstrated terrible judgment. For the past several years, Mr. Kahl has endeavored, for some inexplicable reason, to be something of a Twitter celebrity--not exactly aiming his sights high. In pursuit of this goal, he has personally attacked the character and reputation of virtually every Republican Senator, as well, I would say, with lots of Democratic Senators. He has tweeted that Members of both parties who supported the withdrawal from the terrible Iran nuclear deal ``won't be satisfied until they get the war they pushed for decades.'' He wrote that 45 Senators who supported weapon sales to Saudi Arabia share ``ownership of the world's worst humanitarian crisis.'' This claim, in which he referred to the war in Yemen, of course, ignores the role of Iran's murderous, terrorist proxies, something, of course, that Colin Kahl repeatedly turns a blind eye to everywhere in the world-- Iran's evil malignancy. On a separate occasion, Mr. Kahl said that every Republican who supported an end to combat operations in Syria ``debased themselves at the altar of Trump.'' He then added that the party of Lincoln is ``the party of ethnic cleansing.'' Let's let that sink in for a moment. Joe Biden has nominated a man to be the No. 3 official at our Department of Defense who has accused one of the two main political parties in our country as being ``the party of ethnic cleansing.'' It is hard to imagine an uglier or more vicious accusation than that. Perhaps Mr. Kahl could ask Bill Clinton and Susan Rice, on whose watch the ethnic cleansing in Rwanda happened. When John Bolton was about to become the National Security Advisor, Mr. Kahl, quite reasonably, stated on social media: ``We are going to die.'' To my knowledge, we are not dead, and Mr. Kahl is very much alive, despite John Bolton being appointed as a staffer in the U.S. Government. He also claimed that the Republican Party had a ``death cult fealty'' to former President Trump. These statements and many more make it difficult to conceive of a circumstance in which this nominee could successfully forge a productive relationship with Members of the Republican Party in the Senate or the House or anywhere else, for that matter. Mr. Kahl's ranting and raving on social media in 2017 may have even gone from offensive to criminal on several occasions. It appears that several of Mr. Kahl's tweets divulge or confirm classified and sensitive information. I recently joined 17 of my fellow Senators in requesting a full FBI investigation into this very serious and troubling matter. No vote should occur until that important inquiry takes place. Now, the nominee's transgressions on social media are somewhat reminiscent of Neera Tanden's foolish statements on that social media platform. I think this Chamber set a reasonable standard when it rightfully rejected her nomination, and we ought to maintain that standard with this nominee. In many ways, though, Mr. Kahl's behavior is worse than Ms. Tanden's because his poisonous partisanship, his narrow-sightedness, and his short temper will directly affect his job. He is up for a post that is less partisan and more cooperative in nature than was Ms. Tanden's. His position will require him to be under extreme stress, where he will need to listen to a full range of options, engage in careful deliberation, and regularly make life-and-death decisions. I have to say, his auditions as a social media celebrity over the last 5 years don't inspire confidence in his ability to do so. When I asked him about this at his hearing, he said he may have gotten caught up in the passions of the moment or that these were stressful, trying times. Some of these social media statements, I would point out, came in the middle of the night when Mr. Kahl was presumably sitting on his couch at home watching his news feed. If he thinks that is a stressful or trying moment, what is he going to do when he is sitting in the Pentagon and Vladimir Putin is invading southern Ukraine? Talking about foreign policy decisions, I would point out that Mr. Kahl has been like Joe Biden--wrong about nearly every important foreign policy decision over the last decade. In 2010, Mr. Kahl said that concerns about a rapid withdrawal from Iraq were ``exaggerated'' and it was ``very unlikely to trigger a dramatic uptick in violence.'' He missed that one by just a little bit because soon thereafter, 30,000 radical Islamic extremists conquered a quarter of Iraq, and ISIS carried out horrific terrorist attacks on multiple continents. In 2012, he ridiculed then-Candidate Mitt Romney's, now-Senator Mitt Romney's assertion that Russia was a major geopolitical threat. Of course, 2 years later, Russia invaded Ukraine and conquered Crimea. It has since been an obsession of the Democratic Party, even though Joe Biden has once again reverted to the Democrats' traditional dovishness on Russia, something presumably Mr. Kahl would support. In 2017, he predicted that recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, where the seat of Israel's Government is located, would result in a ``third Intifada.'' Instead, Israel has signed multiple historic peace deals. In 2018, when President Trump warned Iran against pursuing nuclear weapons, Mr. Kahl wrote the ``war drums are already sounding.'' But no war happened. That same year, when President Trump withdrew from the terrible Iran nuclear deal, Mr. Kahl said: ``War will be all that is left.'' No war happened. In 2020, when the United States finally delivered justice by killing Iran's terrorist mastermind Qasam Soleimani, Mr. Kahl said Mr. Trump had ``started a war with Iran in Iraq.'' Yet again, no war happened. Mr. Kahl's inability to accurately assess these events almost defies probability. After all, even a broken clock is right twice a day. On issues of war and peace, Mr. Kahl is reliably unreliable and consistently wrong. This is not a fault that one of the chief strategic planners, the No. 3 official at the Pentagon, and one of the most powerful policy advisers in the government ought to have. No Pentagon nominee should be this partisan, this divisive, and this controversial. Republicans have given every Defense Department and intelligence nominee a fair hearing, and most have passed this Chamber with healthy bipartisan majorities and in some cases unanimously. Mr. Kahl is different. Mr. Kahl is different because his toxic statements and reputation would inhibit the workings of the Department of Defense. Every time, as Secretary Austin and senior Pentagon personnel testify before the Senate, Members of this body will wonder if the policies they are presented with are the product of hard-headed serious planning or the workings of a political hack. A man of Mr. Kahl's judgment and temperament and his record of disastrous policy judgments is unfit to be the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, and I will oppose his nomination, as every Senator should. I yield the floor