Mitch McConnell

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I have 12 requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority leaders. Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate: committee on agriculture, nutrition, and forestry The Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 9:30 a.m., to conduct a hearing. committee on banking, housing, and urban affairs The Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 10 a.m., to conduct a hearing. committee on energy and natural resources The Committee on Energy and Natural Resources is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 10:15 a.m., to conduct a hearing. committee on energy and natural resources The Committee on Energy and Natural Resources is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 10:15 a.m., to conduct a hearing on the following nominations: Daniel Habib Jorjani, of Kentucky, to be Solicitor, and Mark Lee Greenblatt, of Maryland, to be Inspector General, both of the Department of the Interior. committee on foreign relations The Committee on Foreign Relations is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 11 a.m., to conduct a hearing on the following nominations: Pamela Bates, of Virginia, to be Representative of the United States of America to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, with the rank of Ambassador, and Christopher Landau, of Maryland, to be Ambassador to the United Mexican States, both of the Department of State, Jennifer D. Nordquist, of Virginia, to be United States Executive Director of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, Eliot Pedrosa, of Florida, to be United States Executive Director of the Inter- American Development Bank, and other pending nominations. committee on the judiciary The Committee on the Judiciary is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 10 a.m., to conduct a hearing. select committee on intelligence The Select Committee on Intelligence is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 9:30 a.m., to conduct a closed business meeting. subcommittee on cybersecurity The Subcommittee on Cybersecurity of the Committee on Armed Services is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Monday, May 20, 2019, at 9:30 a.m., to conduct a hearing. subcommittee on emerging threats and capabilities The Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities of the Committee on Armed Services is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 4:30 p.m., to conduct a hearing. subcommittee on personnel The Subcommittee on Personnel of the Committee on Armed Services is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 2:15 p.m., to conduct a hearing. subcommittee on seapower The Subcommittee on Seapower of the Committee on Armed Services is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 11 a.m., to conduct a hearing. Subcommittee on Federal Spending Oversight and Emergency Management The Subcommittee on Federal Spending Oversight and Emergency Management of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, May 21, 2019, at 9:30 a.m., to conduct a hearing.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it stand adjourned under the previous order, following the remarks of Senator Brown.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, for the information of all Senators, we will vote on the confirmation of the Nielsen, Clark, Nichols, and Bell nominations, in the order listed, at 4:30 p.m. tomorrow.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule XXII, at 2:15 tomorrow, all postcloture time on the Collins nomination be considered expired; further, that if confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to legislative session for a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, today, I am introducing Federal legislation to make 21 the new minimum age for purchasing any tobacco product anywhere in the United States. Let me say that again--a new age nationwide for purchasing anything classified as a tobacco product-- cigarettes, e-cigarettes, vapor products, and everything else. It shouldn't be 18 any longer; it should be 21, and this legislation will make that happen. I recognize I might seem like an unusual candidate to lead this charge. I am the senior Senator from Kentucky. I have consistently stood up for our Kentucky farmers, including our tobacco farmers. I championed the tobacco buyout back in 2004. But actually my long experience with this subject and my commitment to farm families are part of what has convinced me that now is the right time to do this. I would like to say a few words about why. Tobacco has been deeply intertwined in our Nation's history from the very beginning. Native Americans grew it and used it before European explorers ever arrived. John Rolfe--the famous settler who later married Pocahontas--kick-started Virginia's export economy using foreign tobacco seeds in 1612. By the eve of the Revolution, tobacco was a major export and a huge part of our colony's prosperity. Many tobacco farmers were energetic early backers of independence. George Washington grew tobacco at Mount Vernon, at first as his primary crop. In Benjamin Franklin's newspapers, some of the earliest ads for American tobacco ran alongside the essays urging Americans to stand up for freedom. Several million pounds of tobacco were actually used as collateral to help secure the loans they needed from France. Years later, Lewis and Clark used it as a peace offering to the Native Tribes they met while they were headed west. And, like too many other parts of early American history, tobacco's development was closely linked with the sin of slavery. So tobacco has been a part of this country right from the start--so much so, in fact, that right here in the U.S. Capitol, artisans replaced the traditional designs in many of the Roman-style columns and chiseled American tobacco leaves in their place. Right here in this Chamber, we still have some old spittoons. We used to have Senate snuff boxes filled on the taxpayers' dime. The residue on the floors used to be so considerable that Charles Dickens warned fellow visitors not to pick up anything they dropped unless they had a pair of gloves on. One of the Senators Dickens actually admired most from that visit was Henry Clay. And, befitting the Commonwealth of Kentucky and our own rich history with the crop, that legendary Kentuckian was also a legendary tobacco enthusiast. When the first settlers came over the Appalachians into what is now Kentucky, tobacco offered the perfect opportunity to jump-start their new lives. A pocketful of seeds was enough for a downpayment on a new, economically secure future for your family. Kentucky had fertile soil. We had favorable summers. We had inland waterways and access to the Mississippi for shipping. Before long, burley tobacco was a staple crop for literally tens of thousands of Kentucky farms. For a time, we led even Virginia and North Carolina as the No. 1 tobacco State. Generations of farmers, even if they weren't primarily tobacco growers, would plant a little corner of it to help float the rest of the operation. Farming tobacco put shoes on kids' feet. It put dinner on the table. For many in Kentucky, tobacco made the American dream possible. It is a central pillar of our State's history. In fact, back in the early 1900s, there was literally an armed conflict called the Black Patch War that revolved around tobacco prices. Farmers were against farmers. We are talking about beatings and horse whippings. Barns were burned. Eventually, martial law was declared in part of Kentucky. We are talking about neighbor-on-neighbor violence that was reminiscent of the Civil War--all over tobacco prices. The conflict was actually memorialized in the book ``Night Rider,'' the first novel by Robert Penn Warren, the famous Kentucky- born writer who won multiple Pulitzers and served as U.S. Poet Laureate. A few decades later, in the late 1930s, Senator Alben Barkley--the only other Kentuckian to serve as majority leader--set up a top-down quota system that got Washington heavily involved in the tobacco market to try to provide price special assurance for farmers. So when I first arrived here in the Senate in 1985, more than two- thirds of Kentucky's farmers grew some tobacco, and it accounted for almost half of the value of all the agricultural production in my State. But, of course, demand for U.S. tobacco has gone down as, among other factors, our knowledge of the health consequences has gone up. Even as early as the late 1800s, when the transition began from all the varied forms of tobacco toward the modern, mass-marketed, mass- produced cigarette industry, there was concern. Those concerns went mainstream with the Surgeon General's report on smoking in the 1960s, and of course our understanding has only grown with more research. By 2004, these concerns, plus foreign competition, were making that quota system less of a helpful backstop and more of a stranglehold. So there was interest on all sides in unwinding this archaic system without pulling the rug out from under our growers. I secured the Fair and Equitable Tobacco Reform Act, known as the tobacco buyout, which President Bush 43 signed into law. It wound down the special treatment for tobacco, while also providing the farmers who had invested heavily in these quotas 10 years of buyout payments to ease their transition. What has happened since then has been a very exciting story. Just as Kentucky farmers once led the Nation in cultivating tobacco and helped write that important chapter in American history, they are now helping to write the next chapter of innovation. We aren't interested in banning tobacco. We aren't interested in turning our backs on adults who choose to use these products or pretending we aren't proud of the Kentuckians who still grow it. But as the market has settled, many of our farmers have seized the opportunity to try new things. Just a few years before the buyout, almost 30,000 Kentucky farms were still growing tobacco. It still made up about one-quarter of all of our farmers' cash receipts statewide. But the 10-year buyout program ended in 2014. These days, instead of 30,000 farms growing tobacco in the Commonwealth, it is more like 2,600. It still brings in hundreds of millions of dollars, but now it is only 6 percent of our total receipts from agriculture. Freed from the sunk costs of a quota system, our farmers have been able to participate in a more free market and reap the benefits. In fact, overall cash receipts from agriculture actually set a new record in 2014--the very same year the buyout ended. I am proud the 2004 policy I achieved has been a success. Kentucky farmers have taken the ball, however, and they have run with it. I mentioned that George Washington initially planted a whole lot of tobacco at Mount Vernon before a variety of factors led him to scale it back and experiment with other things. One of those new crops was hemp. That was all the way back in the 1770s. As usual, George Washington knew what he was doing. Industrial hemp is making a comeback today, and Kentucky farmers asked for help to change the outdated Federal laws that confused the plant with cannabis and prevented them from exploring the crop. In 2014, I fought and won for farmers the right to explore hemp through State pilot projects. In last year's farm bill, my provision finished the job and made hemp a fully legal commodity nationwide. Now we are seeing the future take shape right before our eyes. Farmers in 99 of 120 counties are growing hemp. Processors are reporting more than $50 million in gross sales. And this is just one of the new crops our farmers are using to chart new directions and connect Kentucky's past with its future. I realize this has been quite a history lesson, but Kentuckians are used to hearing sweeping statements about our tobacco industry from folks outside the State who know none of this history and yet have no problem forming strong opinions. We are proud of our past. We are proud of who we are. But Kentucky farmers don't want their children to get hooked on tobacco products while they are in middle school or high school any more than any parents anywhere want that to happen. Kentucky is proud of what we make, but we also take pride in the health and development of our children. The sad reality is that Kentucky has been the home to the highest rates of cancer in the country. We lead the entire Nation in the percentage of cancer cases tied directly to smoking. Our State once grew tobacco like none other, and now we are being hit by the health consequences of tobacco use like none other. Nationwide, we are in the middle of a completely new public health epidemic that is really threatening our progress in youth tobacco use-- the use of e-cigarettes and vaping. This spike has been concentrated in teenagers--and not just 18-year-olds. Moms and dads across the country are seeing their middle and high schoolers take up this new habit and start down a deadly path that our society has previously spent decades working hard to close down. From 2017 to 2018, high school students' use of what are classified as tobacco products shot up by nearly 40 percent. That is a staggering figure, especially in a single year. That increase is driven almost entirely by vaping. The brain is still developing at this young age. When teenagers use tobacco, they are quite literally altering their brain's chemistry and making it more susceptible to addiction. Many young vape users aren't buying the products themselves but sharing them with a friend. And remember, 90 percent of adult daily smokers say they used their first tobacco product before age 19. Youth vaping is a public health crisis. It is our responsibility, as parents and public servants, to do everything we can to keep these harmful products out of high schools and out of youth culture. We need to put the national age of purchase at 21. That is why I am introducing this legislation in recognition of tobacco's storied past in Kentucky and aware of the threat that all tobacco products pose now and for future generations. I am proud to partner on this effort with Senator Tim Kaine, who represents another Commonwealth with a long history of growing tobacco. I know there is interest from Members on both sides of the aisle, including Senators Young, Romney, Schatz, and others. This is not a zero-sum choice between farmers and public health. We can support both. We need to support both, but the health of our children is literally at stake. That is why I will make enacting this legislation one of my highest priorities, and I look forward to working with all of our colleagues to make that happen.

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, today, I am introducing Federal legislation to make 21 the new minimum age for purchasing any tobacco product anywhere in the United States. Let me say that again--a new age nationwide for purchasing anything classified as a tobacco product-- cigarettes, e-cigarettes, vapor products, and everything else. It shouldn't be 18 any longer; it should be 21, and this legislation will make that happen. I recognize I might seem like an unusual candidate to lead this charge. I am the senior Senator from Kentucky. I have consistently stood up for our Kentucky farmers, including our tobacco farmers. I championed the tobacco buyout back in 2004. But actually my long experience with this subject and my commitment to farm families are part of what has convinced me that now is the right time to do this. I would like to say a few words about why. Tobacco has been deeply intertwined in our Nation's history from the very beginning. Native Americans grew it and used it before European explorers ever arrived. John Rolfe--the famous settler who later married Pocahontas--kick-started Virginia's export economy using foreign tobacco seeds in 1612. By the eve of the Revolution, tobacco was a major export and a huge part of our colony's prosperity. Many tobacco farmers were energetic early backers of independence. George Washington grew tobacco at Mount Vernon, at first as his primary crop. In Benjamin Franklin's newspapers, some of the earliest ads for American tobacco ran alongside the essays urging Americans to stand up for freedom. Several million pounds of tobacco were actually used as collateral to help secure the loans they needed from France. Years later, Lewis and Clark used it as a peace offering to the Native Tribes they met while they were headed west. And, like too many other parts of early American history, tobacco's development was closely linked with the sin of slavery. So tobacco has been a part of this country right from the start--so much so, in fact, that right here in the U.S. Capitol, artisans replaced the traditional designs in many of the Roman-style columns and chiseled American tobacco leaves in their place. Right here in this Chamber, we still have some old spittoons. We used to have Senate snuff boxes filled on the taxpayers' dime. The residue on the floors used to be so considerable that Charles Dickens warned fellow visitors not to pick up anything they dropped unless they had a pair of gloves on. One of the Senators Dickens actually admired most from that visit was Henry Clay. And, befitting the Commonwealth of Kentucky and our own rich history with the crop, that legendary Kentuckian was also a legendary tobacco enthusiast. When the first settlers came over the Appalachians into what is now Kentucky, tobacco offered the perfect opportunity to jump-start their new lives. A pocketful of seeds was enough for a downpayment on a new, economically secure future for your family. Kentucky had fertile soil. We had favorable summers. We had inland waterways and access to the Mississippi for shipping. Before long, burley tobacco was a staple crop for literally tens of thousands of Kentucky farms. For a time, we led even Virginia and North Carolina as the No. 1 tobacco State. Generations of farmers, even if they weren't primarily tobacco growers, would plant a little corner of it to help float the rest of the operation. Farming tobacco put shoes on kids' feet. It put dinner on the table. For many in Kentucky, tobacco made the American dream possible. It is a central pillar of our State's history. In fact, back in the early 1900s, there was literally an armed conflict called the Black Patch War that revolved around tobacco prices. Farmers were against farmers. We are talking about beatings and horse whippings. Barns were burned. Eventually, martial law was declared in part of Kentucky. We are talking about neighbor-on-neighbor violence that was reminiscent of the Civil War--all over tobacco prices. The conflict was actually memorialized in the book ``Night Rider,'' the first novel by Robert Penn Warren, the famous Kentucky- born writer who won multiple Pulitzers and served as U.S. Poet Laureate. A few decades later, in the late 1930s, Senator Alben Barkley--the only other Kentuckian to serve as majority leader--set up a top-down quota system that got Washington heavily involved in the tobacco market to try to provide price special assurance for farmers. So when I first arrived here in the Senate in 1985, more than two- thirds of Kentucky's farmers grew some tobacco, and it accounted for almost half of the value of all the agricultural production in my State. But, of course, demand for U.S. tobacco has gone down as, among other factors, our knowledge of the health consequences has gone up. Even as early as the late 1800s, when the transition began from all the varied forms of tobacco toward the modern, mass-marketed, mass- produced cigarette industry, there was concern. Those concerns went mainstream with the Surgeon General's report on smoking in the 1960s, and of course our understanding has only grown with more research. By 2004, these concerns, plus foreign competition, were making that quota system less of a helpful backstop and more of a stranglehold. So there was interest on all sides in unwinding this archaic system without pulling the rug out from under our growers. I secured the Fair and Equitable Tobacco Reform Act, known as the tobacco buyout, which President Bush 43 signed into law. It wound down the special treatment for tobacco, while also providing the farmers who had invested heavily in these quotas 10 years of buyout payments to ease their transition. What has happened since then has been a very exciting story. Just as Kentucky farmers once led the Nation in cultivating tobacco and helped write that important chapter in American history, they are now helping to write the next chapter of innovation. We aren't interested in banning tobacco. We aren't interested in turning our backs on adults who choose to use these products or pretending we aren't proud of the Kentuckians who still grow it. But as the market has settled, many of our farmers have seized the opportunity to try new things. Just a few years before the buyout, almost 30,000 Kentucky farms were still growing tobacco. It still made up about one-quarter of all of our farmers' cash receipts statewide. But the 10-year buyout program ended in 2014. These days, instead of 30,000 farms growing tobacco in the Commonwealth, it is more like 2,600. It still brings in hundreds of millions of dollars, but now it is only 6 percent of our total receipts from agriculture. Freed from the sunk costs of a quota system, our farmers have been able to participate in a more free market and reap the benefits. In fact, overall cash receipts from agriculture actually set a new record in 2014--the very same year the buyout ended. I am proud the 2004 policy I achieved has been a success. Kentucky farmers have taken the ball, however, and they have run with it. I mentioned that George Washington initially planted a whole lot of tobacco at Mount Vernon before a variety of factors led him to scale it back and experiment with other things. One of those new crops was hemp. That was all the way back in the 1770s. As usual, George Washington knew what he was doing. Industrial hemp is making a comeback today, and Kentucky farmers asked for help to change the outdated Federal laws that confused the plant with cannabis and prevented them from exploring the crop. In 2014, I fought and won for farmers the right to explore hemp through State pilot projects. In last year's farm bill, my provision finished the job and made hemp a fully legal commodity nationwide. Now we are seeing the future take shape right before our eyes. Farmers in 99 of 120 counties are growing hemp. Processors are reporting more than $50 million in gross sales. And this is just one of the new crops our farmers are using to chart new directions and connect Kentucky's past with its future. I realize this has been quite a history lesson, but Kentuckians are used to hearing sweeping statements about our tobacco industry from folks outside the State who know none of this history and yet have no problem forming strong opinions. We are proud of our past. We are proud of who we are. But Kentucky farmers don't want their children to get hooked on tobacco products while they are in middle school or high school any more than any parents anywhere want that to happen. Kentucky is proud of what we make, but we also take pride in the health and development of our children. The sad reality is that Kentucky has been the home to the highest rates of cancer in the country. We lead the entire Nation in the percentage of cancer cases tied directly to smoking. Our State once grew tobacco like none other, and now we are being hit by the health consequences of tobacco use like none other. Nationwide, we are in the middle of a completely new public health epidemic that is really threatening our progress in youth tobacco use-- the use of e-cigarettes and vaping. This spike has been concentrated in teenagers--and not just 18-year-olds. Moms and dads across the country are seeing their middle and high schoolers take up this new habit and start down a deadly path that our society has previously spent decades working hard to close down. From 2017 to 2018, high school students' use of what are classified as tobacco products shot up by nearly 40 percent. That is a staggering figure, especially in a single year. That increase is driven almost entirely by vaping. The brain is still developing at this young age. When teenagers use tobacco, they are quite literally altering their brain's chemistry and making it more susceptible to addiction. Many young vape users aren't buying the products themselves but sharing them with a friend. And remember, 90 percent of adult daily smokers say they used their first tobacco product before age 19. Youth vaping is a public health crisis. It is our responsibility, as parents and public servants, to do everything we can to keep these harmful products out of high schools and out of youth culture. We need to put the national age of purchase at 21. That is why I am introducing this legislation in recognition of tobacco's storied past in Kentucky and aware of the threat that all tobacco products pose now and for future generations. I am proud to partner on this effort with Senator Tim Kaine, who represents another Commonwealth with a long history of growing tobacco. I know there is interest from Members on both sides of the aisle, including Senators Young, Romney, Schatz, and others. This is not a zero-sum choice between farmers and public health. We can support both. We need to support both, but the health of our children is literally at stake. That is why I will make enacting this legislation one of my highest priorities, and I look forward to working with all of our colleagues to make that happen.

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 19, S. 163.

Mr. McCONNELL. 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. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10 a.m. Tuesday, May 21; further, that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, morning business be closed, and the Senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of the Collins nomination. Finally, I ask that the Senate recess from 12:30 p.m. until 2:15 p.m. to allow for the weekly conference meetings.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. If there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it stand adjourned under the previous order following the remarks of Senator Whitehouse.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I understand there are two bills at the desk due for a second reading en bloc.

Mr. McCONNELL. In order to place the bills on the calendar under the provisions of rule XIV, I would object to further proceeding en bloc.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, yesterday the Senate voted to confirm Kenneth Lee of California to serve as a U.S. circuit court judge for the Ninth Circuit. Yet another well-qualified nominee will now bring impressive legal experience and fine academic credentials to the job of upholding the rule of law as a Federal judge. Mr. Lee is far from the only nominee to an important position whom the Senate confirmed this week. On Tuesday we confirmed Michael Truncale of Texas to the Federal bench in the Eastern District of Texas, and today we will consider three more of the President's abundantly qualified picks to fill vacancies in the executive branch and in the judiciary. First, we will vote on Wendy Vitter of Louisiana, who has been nominated to be a U.S. district court judge for the Eastern District of Louisiana. Ms. Vitter's impressive legal career includes experience in private practice and a decade in the Orleans Parish District Attorney's Office, where she handled more than 100 felony jury trials. Ms. Vitter has been favorably reported twice by our colleagues on the Judiciary Committee. I would urge every one of our colleagues to vote to confirm her today. Following the Vitter nomination, we will turn to Brian Bulatao, nominated to serve as Under Secretary of State for Management. As I have mentioned, the job description is essentially that of chief operating officer at the State Department, ensuring that tens of thousands of diplomats, civil servants, and staff are provided for and a host of important missions around the world can actually be carried out. Fortunately, we have a strong nominee who is up to the task. Mr. Bulatao is a graduate of West Point and Harvard Business School. After service in the Army, he founded a business and worked in financial management before entering public service as chief operating officer at the CIA. In Chairman Risch's assessment, he is ``eminently qualified.'' Our colleagues on the Foreign Relations Committee certainly agree, having favorably reported his nomination with no opposition. It has been 11 long months since the Senate first received his nomination--11 months. I am glad that today we will finally be able to put partisan delay behind us and get the nominee confirmed. Finally, the Senate will vote today on the nomination of Jeffrey Rosen to serve as Deputy Attorney General. As I have discussed earlier in the week, the President has chosen a nominee with a rock-solid legal reputation who served with distinction as the Deputy Secretary of Transportation and who would be a clear asset to the Department of Justice and to the Nation in this new capacity. So I would urge my colleagues to join me in voting to confirm each of these three well-qualified nominees for Federal service.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, on another matter, this week I have been discussing the stark contrast between the remarkable opportunity economy that Republican policies have helped to unlock for the middle class and my Democratic colleagues' hard turn toward far-left ideas that would stifle all the progress. Our colleagues across the aisle, particularly over in the House, have given top billing to the legislation that would end Medicare as seniors know it, eliminate every private healthcare plan American families have chosen to meet their needs, and replace all of it--all of it--with a one-size-fits-all, government-run insurance system while piling heavy taxes on the middle class. And, of course, they have touted a proposal to drop an anvil--an anvil--on a high-speed U.S. economy and shove a host of new Federal rules between American citizens and their everyday life choices--all in the name of going ``green.'' Now, most of my colleagues across the aisle know full well what would happen if the supposed Green New Deal actually became reality. They know what winding down our affordable forms of domestic energy and the millions of jobs that support their production would do to a U.S. economy that is currently firing on all cylinders. They know what turning families' own choices about where to live, what to drive, and how to make a living into Washington, DC's official business would mean for the historic levels of job opportunities and the wage growth that we have seen over the past 2 years. All of that would come to a screeching halt. Remember, our Democratic colleagues tried to claim this outlandish proposal--this truly outlandish proposal--was just a conversation starter from the farthest left fringes. But, then, push came to shove. Then, the American people really saw the score because we brought the thing up for a vote. Right here on this floor we had the vote, and only 4 out of 47 Senate Democrats actually voted no. Only 4 of the 47 voted against this plan to bring our economy to a screeching halt. Forty-three of our Democratic colleagues couldn't bring themselves--couldn't bring themselves--to vote even against this--not even as Republican policies, taking the exact opposite approach, have helped the U.S. job market to drive unemployment lower than it has been in half a century--lower than it has been in half a century. They want to bring all of that to a screeching halt--not even as 19 different States have hit new record low State unemployment rates in just the year and a half since Republicans passed comprehensive tax reform. Well, I have good news for the American people. This Republican majority is going to keep fighting for you. We will not let these far- left dreams get in the way of more progress for middle-class families.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I move to proceed to legislative session.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 37.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I move to proceed to legislative session.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 201.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. McCONNELL

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I move to proceed to legislative session.