Dianne Feinstein

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise to introduce the Visa Waiver Program Security Enhancement Act. I am pleased to be joined by Senator Flake, who is the lead Republican cosponsor, as well as Senators Heitkamp, Coats, Heinrich, Johnson, Bennet, Ayotte, Warner, Baldwin, Tester, King, Klobuchar, Boxer, and Blumenthal. This bill would improve the security of the Visa Waiver Program, which is used by about 20 million travelers a year. The horrific attacks in Paris and the emergence of ISIL make it absolutely clear that we must strengthen the Visa Waiver Program to protect our country. This bill would do just that. 38 countries are now part of the Visa Waiver Program. Nationals from these countries may come to the United States for up to 90 days without a visa. Travelers through the program use an online application to gain approval to travel to the United States. Many of these travelers simply apply for approval from their home computer. Participating countries must also enter into valuable intelligence- sharing agreements with the United States. By comparison, only about 36 million people secured visas for business, tourism, and other temporary purposes to the United States from 2005 to 2010--an average of only 6 million per year. As we all know, fewer than 2,000 refugees from the Syrian conflict-- which go through a heavy vetting process--were admitted to the United States over the last 4 years. Put that in perspective: fewer than 2,000 Syrian refugees over 4 years, versus 20 million travelers through the Visa Waiver program annually. The vetting for a refugee takes 18 to 24 months, whereas an application to travel through the Visa Waiver Program can be approved within seconds. That should tell us how much of a priority improving the security of this program is. Today, there are thousands of citizens from European visa waiver countries that have gone to fight in Syria. In fact, the Visa Waiver Program includes numerous countries that have populations in which some people have become radicalized. The program includes 38 countries, including the following: Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, The Netherlands, and The United Kingdom. So, nationals of these countries who travel to Iraq or Syria to train and fight may then be able to cross back into Europe and then come to this country on a visa waiver. As is now clear, some who committed the recent attacks in Paris were French and Belgian nationals. The attackers in the Charlie Hebdo attacks--the Kouachi brothers-- were born and raised in France. They were French nationals as well. The European Union Justice Commissioner said in April of this year that 5,000-6,000 Europeans could be fighting in Syria. More than 1,500 are French nationals. This is why the Visa Waiver Program, at the current time, poses a major risk--it is a quick and direct route for a terrorist to come to the United States without a visa. The group known as ISIL has publicly threatened to attack the United States and we have every reason to believe they will exploit every opportunity to do so. So we must take strong action. A major concern is also the problem with lost and stolen passports, which could be used by dangerous individuals to gain entry to the United States on the Visa Waiver Program without raising red flags. According to INTERPOL, nearly 45 million passports have been reported lost or stolen within the past 10 years. Let me repeat that: 45 million lost or stolen passports circulating worldwide. Passports typically are valid for five to 10 years, which means many of these lost or stolen passports have not yet expired. If a blank passport is stolen, it may have no expiration date at all. A foreign fighter could use one of the millions of unexpired lost and stolen passports to travel to the United States through the Visa Waiver Program in order to do us harm. Today, the first face-to-face interaction and biometric check that a first-time Visa Waiver Program traveler would have with any U.S. official is when the person reaches the port of entry, like a United States airport. That provides only a narrow window to detect that the individual is a person who is intent on committing an attack. This Visa Waiver Program Security Enhancement Act would strengthen the Visa Waiver Program in a variety of ways, making our nation safer and protecting an important stream of international tourism and commerce. First, the bill says that a national of a Visa Waiver country who has traveled to Iraq or Syria in the last five years would have to get a visa instead of using the Visa Waiver Program. The effect of this would be that the person would have to go through the normal consular process--in which biometric information would be taken, and the person interviewed--instead of traveling to the United States on a visa waiver. Second, the bill would require that biometric data, such as digital photographs or fingerprints, be provided to the U.S. government prior to boarding a plane to travel to the U.S. on the Visa Waiver Program but only for those individuals for whom we do not already have biometrics. Today, biometrics are not taken until a traveler from a Visa Waiver country first enters the United States at the port of entry. That is too late, and it leaves the opportunity for a person seeking to commit an attack against the aircraft itself to do so. We have recently seen that ISIL is willing to take down airliners. We know what sort of tragedy can happen when terrorists take control of an airplane. We must do everything we can to make sure an ISIL member does not board an aircraft bound for the United States with the intent to take it down. This bill would make the biometric requirement effective within one year, prioritizing areas of danger, and would enable the Department of Homeland Security to extend the roll-out on a country-specific basis. The Department of Homeland Security has already announced its intent to expand Customs and Border Protection preclearance to new foreign airports, including in Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, and the United Kingdom--all Visa Waiver countries. As the bill is currently written, those foreign nationals who travel through the preclearance process would satisfy the biometric requirements of the bill. The simple fact is that we need to develop a way to screen and verify individuals biometrically before they get on a plane to the U.S., and this bill would do that. Third, the bill would eliminate the use of older-generation passports by any citizen of Visa Waiver Countries. Within 90 days of enactment, all Visa Waiver travelers would be required to have a valid, unexpired, machine-readable passport that is tamper-resistant and incorporates biometric identifiers. The Department of Homeland Security has announced that it will roll this out administratively, but this provision would make it a clear statutory requirement. Fourth, the bill would strengthen the intelligence sharing that is the bedrock of this program. The Department of Homeland Security has been able to gather valuable data from Visa Waiver countries under existing information sharing agreements. There are three such agreements. One relates to information regarding known or suspected terrorists. The second relates to sharing of fingerprint data pertaining to serious crimes. And the third requires provision of lost or stolen passport information directly or via INTERPOL. It is my understanding that--although countries have signed these agreements--not all have fully implemented them. This bill would require that those agreements be implemented, not just signed. The bill would also establish several new information-sharing provisions, which the Department of Homeland Security would be required to examine in assessing whether a country can join or stay in the Visa Waiver Program. One such provision would require DHS to consider whether a country contributes to and screens against INTERPOL's lost and stolen documents database. Let me explain why this is important. Simply put, INTERPOL's lost and stolen documents database is not as frequently used as it could be. Increased use of INTERPOL's database could assist all nations, including those outside the Visa Waiver Program, to prevent travel using lost or stolen passports and thus to inhibit the international movement of foreign fighters. This bill would also require DHS to consider whether a country collects and shares biometric information of refugee and asylum seekers--an important provision to help the United States ensure bad actors are prevented from traveling to the United States. It would also require DHS to consider whether a country shares intelligence about foreign fighters with the United States, as well as with international organizations like INTERPOL. Lastly, the bill would require that countries participating in the Visa Waiver Program have Federal Air Marshal agreements in place. The Paris attacks demonstrate beyond any doubt that the Visa Waiver Program creates a security risk for our country. The Visa Waiver Program Security Enhancement Act will address vulnerabilities in the Visa Waiver Program, improve information sharing, and help keep our country safe. I urge my colleagues to support this bill.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I wish to bring attention today to the 108,000 foster children in our country who right now are waiting to be adopted. Of these, more than 14,000 are in California. These are children who cannot safely be reunited with their biological families and are without a permanent place to call home through absolutely no fault of their own. These are children who are waiting for a family, wanting to belong, and needing our help. Of these children, more than 20,000 age out of the foster care system every year. They are sent on their way and expected to make it on their own. This is unacceptable. What do we know about their outcomes? It isn't good. Around half of foster youth graduate high school, and less than three percent earn a college degree. Around a quarter will become homeless after aging out of the foster system. Many will find their way into the justice system. Now, imagine a different outcome. Children are meant to be in a family. All children deserve love, safety, and permanency. No child is unadoptable. November marks National Adoption Month, and November 21st is National Adoption Day. This highlights not only the need to find loving homes for children who are waiting, but celebrates those who have opened their hearts and chosen to build their families through adoption. Children in foster care are not just in need, they are waiting for a family to give their love and to share their joy. In 2014, more than 50,000 children were adopted from foster care. What adoption means to youth who have been through foster care is best said in their own words. From Athena, a young lady in Pasadena, CA, who was adopted from foster care: ``Adoption is very dear and important to me. As an older youth in the system, you expect to have no support, let alone adoption as an option. But being a part of a family was all I ever wanted and deep down it is what most foster youth want because it means love, stability and a place for one to grow and excel in.'' And from Cassidy, an adopted teenager in California: ``If you take a chance on a foster child by adopting them, you give them a chance to be who they were born to be. Let's make `aging-out' a term no longer needed in the English language.'' Darnell, an older teen adopted in California, explains what finding a permanent family means to him: ``Adoption means I have a second chance at life, I know I am loved and have a safe place to call home. When strangers take you into their home and love you just for who you are; you can relax and live a regular life.'' All children in foster care deserve this second chance at having their forever family and a safe and loving home. I encourage those who are interested in learning more about adoption from foster care to visit www.adoptuskids.org. This is also a time to celebrate the many volunteers and mentors who provide a positive, stable relationship for a child going through a time of vast uncertainty. There may not be a simple solution, but we do know what gets us closer. Programs that provide comprehensive resources--tutoring, mentoring, mental health services, and adults that build meaningful relationships with youth leads to improved outcomes, including higher rates of permanency. Focused family finding efforts that reach out to extended family members and others who have played a role in the life of the child gets results. That means fewer youth who age out of the system. We can and must do better because 20,000 of our Nation's foster children aging out of the system each year is simply unacceptable. These are our most vulnerable, the ones recovering from trauma, abuse, and neglect. The ones who are at high risk of being sold into child sex trafficking and a number of other terrible outcomes. I look forward to working with my colleagues to ensure a better future for foster youth in our country and, as Cassidy, a teenager who was adopted from foster care in California says, make the term ``aging out'' one that we no longer need to use. Thank you.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I wish to speak in favor of the Clean Power Plan. This plan shows real American leadership when it comes to climate change, proof that we are taking responsibility for the world we leave to our children. The debate over the Clean Power Plan is a question of whether we should take any action at all on climate change, a shocking question considering how long we have known about the ways we are harming the planet. A recent report by Inside Climate News shows that Exxon scientists were warning the company's leadership about climate change as early as 1977. The Exxon scientists wrote: ``There is general scientific agreement that the most likely manner in which mankind is influencing the global climate is through carbon dioxide release from the burning of fossil fuels.'' Even before that, scientific advisers first cautioned the President about climate change in 1965--50 years ago this month--explaining that carbon dioxide from fossil fuels would ``almost certainly cause significant changes'' and ``could be deleterious from the point of view of human beings.'' And as far back as 1956, the New York Times reported early evidence connecting climate change with greenhouse gases from fossil fuel combustion. That prescient article concluded with a sad commentary: ``Coal and oil are still plentiful and cheap in many parts of the world, and there is every reason to believe that both will be consumed by industry as long as it pays to do so.'' Today, decades later, we not only have even more scientific evidence of climate change, we are actually seeing the real-world consequences of inaction. This past September was the planet's warmest September in the 136- year history of weather records. The last 5 months in a row all set world records for hottest average temperatures. Last year was the planet's hottest recorded year, and the last two decades include the 19 hottest years on record. Global sea levels rose 7 inches in the last century. And since the beginning of the industrial era, the acidity of the oceans has increased by 26 percent, which could destabilize the food chain. My own home State of California is seeing firsthand the effects of higher temperatures and changing precipitation patterns. We are in the midst of an epic drought, which scientists say has been made 15 to 20 percent worse due to human-induced changes in the climate. This has made a drought into a disaster. The Sierra snowpack, which accounts for a third of the State's drinking water, is down to 5 percent of its usual levels, the lowest in 500 years. The wildfires in California are made even more terrifying by the hot, dry conditions. And the fire season now lasts 75 days longer than just 10 years ago, resulting in more and larger fires. Southern California and the Central Valley have the worst air pollution in the country, home to six of the top seven regions of worst ozone smog pollution. This is made worse by hotter conditions. But this is just the beginning. Unless we dramatically change course, children born today will witness calamitous changes to the world's climate systems in their lifetimes. Sea levels will rise another 1 to 4 feet this century based on thermal expansion of the oceans and continued melting of land-based ice. This would inundate Miami Beach, the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, and 85 percent of New Orleans. In addition, a portion of the west Antarctic ice sheet large enough to raise global sea levels by 4 feet has begun an irreversible collapse. We have to slow down this process as much as possible and make sure the same doesn't happen to the rest of Antarctica or Greenland. By midcentury, ice-free summers in the Arctic Ocean could be routine. The global volume of glaciers is projected to be reduced by up to 85 percent this century. And massive numbers of species will go extinct because many plant species cannot shift their geographical ranges quickly enough to keep up with the rate of climate change. This future is unacceptable. We cannot leave future generations a planet in such terrible disrepair. I will not see California become a desert State, with aquifers overrun by salt water and coastal cities overwhelmed by storm surges. My colleagues must understand that we will never relent in the fight to save the planet. I understand some States are afraid of an economy without fossil fuel extraction. But I assure you that transitioning to a new economy will be easier than coping with the devastating effects of global warming. That brings me to the issue we are debating today: the Clean Power Plan. Although the final rules were only recently completed by the EPA, the Supreme Court set us on this path 8 years ago when they found in effect that the Clean Air Act compelled the regulation of greenhouse gases. It puts us on a path to cut national emissions from the electricity sector by 32 percent over the next 15 years, using tools that each State can tailor to its own unique situation. It is a remarkably flexible regulatory approach that will harness the ingenuity of the American people to confront and roll back the effects of climate change. I know this approach can work because I have seen it work in California. In the last 10 years, the State has implemented a number of changes: an economywide cap-and-trade program to return statewide emissions back to their 1990 levels by 2020; a renewable portfolio standard requiring 50 percent renewable electricity by 2030; regulations to double energy efficiency by 2030; a low carbon fuel standard to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from transportation fuels at least 10 percent by 2020; and a program to reach 1 million zero- emission vehicles by 2020. Here is the thing: even though California is making these changes, the State continues to grow. The economy grew by 2.8 percent last year, with a 1.3 percentage point reduction in the unemployment rate. Both of those figures are better than the national average. As a result, California is already on track to meet or exceed the Clean Power Plan's targets. And more importantly, California's leadership is showing others just how much we can accomplish. Internationally, California's cap-and-trade program was used as a model for China's cities and provinces. Now, President Obama has leveraged the ambition of the Clean Power Plan to convince the Chinese to combine their regional cap-and-trade programs into a national carbon strategy. This is how bold leadership achieves results. And this December in Paris, the Clean Power Plan will serve as the keystone of America's national climate ambitions, helping convince the world that we will be the leaders we promise to be in combatting climate change. The Senate shouldn't be considering a rejection of the Clean Power Plan. Our real responsibility is to find ways to be even more ambitious. Today's vote changes nothing. If Congress were to pass this resolution to disapprove of the Clean Power Plan, the President's veto would not be overridden. The Clean Power Plan will be implemented. I believe the Clean Power Plan will not only reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but that process won't be nearly as difficult as some now fear. The Clean Power Plan will be seen as one of the many important steps we took to stabilize global temperatures. I truly think we are making headway in the fight against global warming. Environmentally conscious individuals are marking changes in their own lives, and those are driving changes in the economy and in State policies. Those changes spurred reform on the national level, and now, we are seeing real action on the global stage. Today's ``show vote'' on the Clean Power Plan won't diminish those successes. Thank you.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, if we look at that, that is 91 feet with the twin 33s and the cab, 91 feet of truck. Thirty-eight States do not want that in their States. This bill overwhelms that. We had an amendment in the Appropriations Committee that would prevent that. It was a tie vote. Senator Wicker and I ask you, please don't force States to do this before the safety work is done by the Secretary. We have 4,000 people killed every year from these trucks in all kinds of horrific accidents--and they are not as long as this one. These trucks would not only be on the freeways, but they would be in the villages, the towns, and the cities as well. I hope you will support this motion to instruct to protect the 38 States and say: Before you do this, do the safety investigations and tell us these trucks are safe. I yield the floor.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, and this is the first time I will have objected, I would like--since my name was raised and a communication of mine was read--to explain the circumstances. Yes, this is a press release that I wrote, and, yes, I do feel that the wife of this man should be released from house arrest and the man himself, the Nobel laureate, should be released by the Chinese. He has certainly served time for a substantial period, and more than that I do not believe it works to the benefit of China, the family, human rights or the progress of the country. Unlike the Senator from Texas, I have had a long experience with the Chinese, going back more than 30 years. I know what can convince them to move toward a goal and I know what will become a real stumbling block and a point of opposition. To change the name of a street on which the Chinese Embassy in the United States rests will only be a greater stumbling block to achieving this goal, so I will object to that. Since my name was also raised--or San Francisco's name was raised in his prior discussion, I would respectfully ask if I could make a few remarks about Kate Steinle and the situation the Senator from Texas has raised.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Thank you very much. Respectfully, Senator, I do not believe that you know much about San Francisco. I am a lifelong San Franciscan. I served the city as a mayor for 9 years, president of the board of supervisors for 7 years, and another 8 years as supervisor. I believe I know something about the city of my birth, my education. The reason for the defeat of the sheriff is multifaceted. It doesn't just begin with one thing, and I want you to know that. With respect to the situation we spoke about, which is whether a local sheriff should in fact respond to a Federal Government request, if that request is for a detainer, if that request is for a communication, I believe very strongly that sheriff should do that. And was that part of the campaign of the sheriff that is going to be the sheriff-elect? I can't say with any specificity, but I can say that is my belief. I think going overboard and punishing everybody makes very little sense. So I am hopeful the Department of Homeland Security, through its efforts with the PEP program, will be able to secure cooperation from the city and county of San Francisco. If it does not, then that is another story. But I believe the Department is making headway in discussions with other communities that are in fact sanctuary cities. Since we are on the subject, in 1985, as mayor of the city, I was the first person to be sought out by the archbishop who asked for a brief reprieve or a reprieve for nuns from El Salvador, and that was the first piece of legislation. It was small and it was restricted to a country that was in a civil war with some terrible things happening. Since that time, the sanctuary concept has expanded considerably and, to some extent, I think far beyond what it should be. But I think the way to do this is through hearings and discussion among the Members and not with over-the-top rhetoric that moves visceral impulses--because we have to live, Senator, by the public policy we espouse, and we have to know that it is wise and prudent. I deeply believe that. So I just wanted to clarify the record, and I thank the Senator for allowing me to do so. I yield the floor, and I object.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Will the Senator allow a question?

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I don't believe there is anything I said that related to our letting aggravated murderers and others who would reap great harm to our society. I do not favor that, and I would like the record to clearly reflect that.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. If I might respond--I think the Senator from Texas is a member of the Judiciary Committee, I am a member of the Judiciary Committee, and the chairman of the Judiciary Committee is on the floor. It is something we ought to take a look at. I haven't reviewed the case law, I don't think ever on this specific point, and I would like an opportunity to do so. But what I really bristle to is the extreme rhetoric and throwing everybody into the same basket as somebody who is a violent criminal, because the immigrants whom I know in California by and large are not violent criminals. They are family people. They sustain the No. 1 agricultural industry in America. They work hard, they pay their taxes, they get in line for legalization, they are good citizens, and our economy is better for them, not worse. So I don't want to impugn everybody, which your broad, sweeping language, candidly, does.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I wish to speak about the unfortunate extension of the deadline for the implementation of positive train control, or PTC. As one of the authors of the Rail Safety Improvement Act of 2008-- which established the PTC mandate--I stand here committed to ensuring that PTC is installed on all our Nation's railways as soon as possible. Current law states railroads must fully install PTC by the end of this year. For a variety of reasons, we all know this is not feasible for all railroads. But we can't let this drag on indefinitely. It's a matter of public safety. We must get this done. The focus of the current debate has been on why an extension of the mandate is necessary, but I would like to take a step back and remind my colleagues why the mandate itself is necessary. On September 12, 2008, the inattentive conductor of a Metrolink train--a commuter railroad in the Los Angeles area--missed a red light and entered a stretch of single track going the wrong way. The train collided with a Union Pacific freight train, which completely demolished the first commuter car. The accident killed 25 and injured more than 100. This was an absolute tragedy for my State and the country. What is even more tragic: It was 100 percent preventable. Had PTC been installed, we would have avoided this tragedy. The National Transportation Safety Board has been recommending the installation of PTC since an accident in Connecticut in 1969. This technology is lifesaving. It prevents train-to-train collisions and overspeed derailments and other rail dangers. PTC could have saved 25 lives in Chatsworth. In fact, PTC could have saved at least 288 lives and prevented more than 6,500 injuries in accidents across 36 States since 1969. In 2008, at long last, Congress passed a law requiring PTC implementation by the end of 2015, giving railroads 7 years to comply. It is extremely disappointing that most railroads will not meet this deadline. It didn't have to be this way. The passenger railroads in California took this legal and moral imperative seriously. They committed resources. In fact, Metrolink will be the first system in the Nation to fully implement positive train control when the Federal Railroad Administration gives its final certification by the end of this year. The Bay Area is also well ahead of the curve. Caltrain will begin operating PTC on its line between Gilroy and San Francisco by the end of the year, with final certification expected early next year. These stories show that it can be done on time. But the sad fact is few railroads will meet the 2015 deadline as mandated by law. Yes, there were some unanticipated challenges and procedural hurdles that have contributed to the delay. But more devastating were legal challenges from the industry and railroads failing to commit the necessary resources. So here we are today, debating an extension. Let me be very clear: the PTC extension provision the House sent over is flawed. In my view, we need to be forcing railroads to implement this as soon as possible, and the House proposal fails to do that. Instead, it gives all railroads a blanket extension until 2018, even those that would be done well before then. The Secretary of Transportation can take enforcement actions against railroads that miss certain annual milestones between now and 2018, but the railroads themselves get to establish those milestones in the first place. After the 3-year blanket extension, railroads can request an additional 2-year extension, so long as a railroad is about halfway complete with implementation. That means they will have until 2020--12 years after Congress first mandated the technology and 50 years since the National Transportation Safety Board began calling for it. This is effectively a 5-year extension, precisely what railroads have been lobbying for. There are better options available. In fact, we anticipated the need for an extension years ago and worked to find reasonable compromises. First, in 2012, we tried to modify the mandate. I supported a provision that passed the Senate in that year's transportation reauthorization bill. It would have kept the deadline in 2015, but allowed the administration to grant up to three 1-year extensions to railroads on a case-by-case basis only when necessary and where railroads were working diligently. But the railroads wanted 5 years, and the provision was dropped from the final bill. Then earlier this year, debate began anew. The Commerce Committee approved a bill that would provide railroads with a blanket extension of 5 to 7 years. I thought that was reckless and unnecessarily long. Together with several of my colleagues, we reintroduced separate legislation along the lines of the provision that passed the Senate in 2012. This started negotiations that led to the two different provisions now included in the House and Senate transportation reauthorization bills. These provisions are each much improved from a blanket 5- to 7-year extension, but both remain flawed. In my view, it would be fair and reasonable for the remaining policy differences between these two provisions to be resolved during conference. I hope the conference would lead to a policy that takes the best parts of both approaches and would be packaged as part of a bill that provided sufficient resources for the commuter railroads to comply with the mandate. We should let that process play out. We should not rush to pass bad policy on this 3-week extension. I now want to take a moment to describe something that has disturbed me throughout this entire process. That is the aggressive stance of the railroad industry. As we have seen in public, railroads have threatened to stop service for rail passengers around Christmas and stop transporting certain chemicals before that. Union Pacific's demand letter was the most explicit, acknowledging that ``this will cause significant economic disruption for our country,'' but that it ``is in the best interest of our employees and shareholders.'' The railroads claim that the fines that will be charged next year by the Federal Railroad Administration would be so draconian that they would be unable to continue operating as railroads. It is very difficult to believe the government would fine railroads to such an extreme. The government's goal is simply to compel the fastest possible implementation of PTC. The railroads also say that in the event of a PTC-preventable accident, they would be liable for excessive damages. But as we all know, there is a liability cap for passenger accidents. And for hazardous materials accidents, the railroads have been shipping chlorine and ammonia for decades. It is offensive that only when a railroad could face full liability for an accident that they find operation without PTC to be unacceptably dangerous. The railroads' overtly political threats of economic calamity are not constructive. They serve only to create a hysterical atmosphere that prevents meaningful negotiations. It is entirely inappropriate that the railroad industry would make hostages of America's passenger rail services and chemical shippers in order to secure their favored legislative outcome. What we are discussing today is a bad proposal. We should be prioritizing public safety. But this House-passed provision does not. The proper place for this debate is in the long-term transportation reauthorization bill. It is very unfortunate that this has been attached to a must-pass short term extension of the highway trust fund.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. President, I rise today to submit a resolution recognizing the 20th anniversary of the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. On November 4, 1995, after a major peace rally, then-Prime Minister Rabin was gunned-down by an Israeli nationalist. Rabin's brutal assassination ended the life of a man who lived for peace. Today, with renewed terrorism and violence in Israel and the Palestinian territories, leaders should look to the example of Mr. Rabin, who forged peace against long odds. His assassin may have ended his life, but his message must live on. During Mr. Rabin's first term as Israel's Prime Minister, he laid the foundation for peace with Egypt by concluding the Sinai Interim Agreement on September 1, 1975. The eventual 1979 Camp David Peace Treaty officially ended hostilities between the two nations. Importantly, Egypt became the first Arab state to recognize Israel. Today, because of Mr. Rabin's work, Egypt and Israel remain at peace. During Mr. Rabin's second term as Prime Minister, he continued to seek peace with Israel's neighbors. He led the effort to sign the Oslo Accords, which created the Palestinian Authority, and which serves as a framework for the creation of a Palestinian state today. For their efforts, Mr. Rabin, Yasir Arafat and Shimon Peres won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize. That same year, Israel and Jordan also signed a peace treaty, making Jordan the second Arab state to establish peace with Israel. On this, the twentieth anniversary of the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, I offer my condolences to his family. May they continue to find solace in the legacy of a leader who sought peace when others sought war. May leaders all around the world look to him for inspiration on how to lead courageously and chart a more peaceful future for one's people.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Chair.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the time be charged equally on both sides.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Thank you, Mr. President. I wish to begin by thanking the chairman for his work on the bill. For me, this has been a 6-year effort. It hasn't been easy. It hasn't been easy because we have tried to strike a balance and make the bill understandable so that there would be a cooperative effort to share between companies and the government. Last Thursday the Senate showed its support for moving forward with two strong votes. We had a vote of 83 to 14 to invoke cloture on the substitute amendment, showing that there is, in fact, deep bipartisan support for moving significant legislation to the President's desk. To that end, I ask unanimous consent that editorials from the two major U.S. newspapers be printed in the Record.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. The first is from the Washington Post dated October 22, entitled ``The Senate should take a crucial first step on cybersecurity.'' The second is in today's Wall Street Journal, and it is entitled ``A Cyber Defense Bill, At Last: Data sharing can improve security and consumer privacy.'' I also note the endorsement from Secretary Jeh Johnson on October 22. I have been privileged to work with our chairman. We have really tried to produce a balanced bill. We have tried to make it understandable to private industry so that companies understand it and are willing to cooperate. This bill will allow companies and the government to voluntarily share information about cyber threats and the defensive measures they might be able to implement to protect their networks. Right now, the same cyber intrusions are used again and again to penetrate different targets. That shouldn't happen. If someone sees a particular virus or harmful cyber signature, they should tell others so they can protect themselves. That is what this bill does. It clears away the uncertainty and the concerns that keep companies from sharing this information. It provides that two competitors in a market can share information on cyber threats with each other without facing anti-trust suits. It provides that companies sharing cyber threat information with the government for cyber security purposes will have liability protection. As I have said many times, the bill is completely voluntary. If a company doesn't want to share information, it does not have to. Today, we will vote on up to seven amendments. As late as this morning, Senator Burr and I have been working to see if we can reach agreement to accept or voice vote some of them, and I hope these discussions will be successful. However, I remain in agreement with Chairman Burr that we will oppose any amendments that undo the careful compromises we have made on this bill. Over the past 10 months, we have tried to thread a needle in fact to draft a bill that as I said gives the private sector the insurances it needs to share more information while including privacy protections to make sure Americans' information is not compromised. I see on the floor the ranking member of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, the distinguished Senator from Delaware, and I thank Senator Carper for all he has done to help us and also to make what I consider a major amendment on this bill, which as you know has been accepted. Several of today's amendments would undo this balance. Senators Wyden, Heller, and Franken have amendments that would lead to less information sharing. Each of them would replace clear requirements that are now in the bill on what a company or a government must do prior to sharing information with a new subjective standard that would insert the concern of legal liability. I would offer to work with these Senators and others as the bill moves forward and hopefully goes into conference to see if there is a way to achieve their goals without interfering with the bill's goal of increasing information sharing. Senator Leahy's amendment would similarly decrease the amount of sharing by opening up the chances of public disclosure through the Freedom of Information Act of cyber threats shared under this bill. While the bill seeks to share information about the nature of cyber threats and suggestions on how to defend networks, this information should not be made widely available to hackers and cyber criminals who could use it for their own purposes. Senator Burr and I worked closely with Senators Leahy and Cornyn in putting together the managers' package to remove a FOIA exemption that they viewed as unnecessary and harmful. I am pleased we were able to reach that agreement. However, the FOIA exemption that remains in the bill is needed to encourage companies to share this information, and I would oppose this amendment. The President has an amendment on the other side of the spectrum which I will also strongly oppose. This amendment would basically undo one of the core concepts of this bill. Instead of requiring cyber information to go through a single portal at the Department of Homeland Security, it would allow companies to share cyber information directly with the FBI or the Secret Service and still provide full liability protection. This change runs afoul of one of the most important privacy protections in the bill, which was to limit direct sharing of this cyber information with the intelligence community or with law enforcement. In other words, everything will go through the portal first, where it will receive an additional scrub to remove any residual personal information and then go to the respective departments. In this way the privacy is kept by not being able to misuse the authority to provide unrelated information directly to departments. If there is a crime, companies should be able to share information with law enforcement--I agree with that--but that is not what this bill is about. This bill is about sharing cyber information on threats so there can be greater awareness and better defenses. When there is a cyber crime and law enforcement is called in, we are talking about very different information. When the FBI investigates, it takes entire databases and servers. It looks at everything--far beyond the cyber information that could be lawfully shared in this act. So sharing with the FBI outside of the DHS portal may be appropriate in certain cases but not as a parallel option for cyber threat information. In fact, our bill already makes clear in section 105(c)(E) that it ``does not limit or prohibit otherwise lawful disclosures of communications, records, or other information, including reporting of known or suspected criminal activity.'' I would just refer to this chart which quotes section 105(c). It says exactly that. This amendment would undo the key structure of this bill--the central portal for sharing information located at the Department of Homeland Security--and decrease the ability of the government to effectively manage all the cyber information it receives. So I will oppose this amendment and urge my colleagues to do the same. I very much appreciate that the Senate will complete its consideration of this bill today. We still have a long way to go. We have to conference the House bill with our bill. I want to make this offer, and I know I think I speak for the chairman as well, that we are happy to work with any Member as we go into conference, but I hope we can complete these last few votes without upsetting the careful negotiations and compromise we have been able to reach. Again, I thank the Chair. I yield back the remainder of my time, and I yield the floor.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, I rise to oppose the amendment. This amendment would replace a key feature of the underlying bill. Right now, under section 104(d) of the managers' amendment, a company is required to conduct a review of any information before it is shared and remove any personal information that is not ``directly related to a cybersecurity threat.'' Senator Wyden's amendment, while well-intentioned, would replace that review with a requirement that a company must remove personal information ``to the extent feasible''--and there is the rub. This is a very unclear requirement. In this bill, we are trying to provide clarity on what a company has to do so that it is understandable. Companies understand what it means to conduct a review to see whether there is personal information and then strip it out. They don't know what may or may not be feasible, and they worry that this lack of clarity could create the risk of a lawsuit where the current language does not.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Therefore, I ask my colleagues to join with me in voting no on the Wyden amendment.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, I rise regretfully to speak against the amendment directly following the important monument of 15,000 votes by one of the idols of my life, but so be it. As it might become very clear, Senator Burr and I, on a bill that came out of committee 14 to 1, have tried to keep a balance and have tried to prevent this kind of information sharing from being a threat to business so they won't participate. Therefore, the words that are used are all important as to whether they have a legal derivation. Senator Leahy's amendment would essentially decrease the amount of sharing by opening up the chance of public disclosure through the Freedom of Information Act of cyber threats shared under this bill. Now, we seek to share information about the nature of cyber effects and suggestions on how to defend networks. This information clearly should not be made available to hackers and cyber criminals who could use it for their own purposes. So Senator Burr and I worked closely with Senator Leahy and Senator Cornyn in putting together the managers' package to remove a FOIA exemption that they viewed as unnecessary and harmful. That has been removed in the managers' package.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I wish to speak and urge a ``no'' vote on amendment No. 2552, known as the Coons amendment. This amendment essentially adds another layer of review to the bill's current requirements. We worked this out in an earlier amendment with Senator Carper. This amendment goes further, and it could prevent parts of the government from quickly learning about cyber threats at machine speed because it would require an additional privacy review for any information going through the DHS portal. The Carper amendment that I spoke about was adopted as part of the managers' package, which made clear that the government should take automated steps to ensure that the real-time information sharing system can both protect privacy and allow for sharing at the speed necessary to stop cyber threats. Because the Coons amendment will slow down sharing via the DHS portal, I ask my colleagues to join me in voting no.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank you very much. Madam President, I just want to say a personal word to Chairman Burr, and maybe it is to everyone in this body. One of the things I have learned from two prior cyber bills is that if you really want to get a bill done, it has to be bipartisan, particularly a bill that is technical, difficult, and hard to put together, and a bill where often there are two sides. I thank you for recognizing this. We stood shoulder to shoulder and the right things happened, and now we can go to conference. I also want to say that we did everything in this bill we possibly could to satisfy what were legitimate privacy concerns. The managers' package had 14 such amendments, and before that our staffs sat down with a number of proposals from Senators and went over literally dozens of additional amendments. So we took what we could. When the chairman talks about the balance, what he means is that this is the first time the chamber of commerce has supported a bipartisan bill. This is the first time we had virtually all the big employers-- banks and retailers and other companies--supporting a bipartisan bill because today everybody understands what the problem of cybersecurity is much greater. So we stood shoulder to shoulder, and you all responded, and I am very grateful. There is still a lot of work to be done, but, Mr. Chairman, you and your staff have been terrific. I would like to single a couple of them out, if I might, in particular, Chris Joyner, Michael Geffroy, Jack Livingston, Janet Fisher, John Matchison, and Walter Weiss. I also want to thank Tom Carper, who has been working to get this bill passed as much as anyone. He wrote one of the key changes in the managers' package to improve privacy as information moves through the DHS portal. He was supported by his chairman, Senator Johnson. He has been a close partner throughout the process, and I thank him. I also thank Gabbie Batkin, Matt Grote, and the other members of Senator Carper's staff. We had incredible support from our committee. It is a committee of 15--8 Republicans and 7 Democrats. I thank Senator Collins, who was particularly concerned about the critical infrastructure of this country, as well as Senators Mikulski, Whitehouse, King, Warner, Heinrich, Blunt, Nelson, and Coats. I know they will help us push this bill forward as we go to conference with the House. I greatly appreciate the supporters of this bill outside the Senate, to include the U.S. chamber of commerce and the associations that have endorsed this bill, tech companies like IBM and Oracle, Secretary Jeh Johnson at the Department of Homeland Security, and NSA Directors Keith Alexander and Mike Rogers, and Lisa Monaco and Michael Daniel at the White House. On my staff, I would like to thank David Grannis, our staff director on the minority side. David has been there for these previous cyber bills, and it has proven to be a very difficult issue. David, you are a 10. I also thank Josh Alexander. Josh has been our lead drafter and negotiator and knows these cyber issues better than anyone. He has been tireless on reaching agreement after agreement on this bill, and is, as much as anybody, responsible for today's vote. I would also like to thank my former cyber staffer Andy Grotto, as well as Mike Buchwald, Brett Freedman, Nate Adler, and Nick Basciano. Thank you all so very much. Finally, I very much appreciate the work done by Ayesha Khanna in the Democratic leader's office and Jeffrey Ratner at the White House. We have the administration behind the bill, we have the Department of Homeland Security behind the bill, and we have the editorial pages of the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal, as well as the chamber of commerce, and most of the businesses of America. So, Mr. Chairman, you did a great job, and thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, reserving the right to object, I wish to make a couple of remarks as to why. Senator Cruz, believe it or not, I have actually played a role-- particularly in the 1990s--in helping dissidents be released by the Government of China and had some success. We did that by talking to the government. I think to do this in this way will set back the cause and actually be deleterious to the release of these people, so I object.

Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I would like to respond to that because we have been told that for the industries that support this bill, this amendment is a bill killer, and the opposition to it has come in far and wide. We have 52 industrial associations in business, finance, banking, petroleum, waterworks, railroads, public power, real estate, and retail--52 associations that are on your desk--supporting it. In particular, the health industry has weighed in against this amendment. We accomplished the purpose in our bill in a way that is acceptable. Please vote no. I yield the floor.