Bill Nelson

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Madam President, I am going to defer to my colleague from Connecticut, since at 5 p.m. we will be discussing the nominees which I will speak to. But before we do, I just want to point out two things to the Senate. First of all, the lead story of ``60 Minutes'' last night was about the death master file which is put out by Social Security. Interestingly, the story was from the extraordinary standpoint that a number of people are told they are dead when in fact they are very much alive and all of the horror they go through in trying to correct somebody's having made a mistake--a clerical error--that in fact they were dead by the alteration of one number or a name or just sheer overlook. But there is another problem with the death master file, and we have tried and tried to get that from Social Security. Unless you have an immediate use--a legitimate use for the death master file to be made public, such as a life insurance company--they would have a legitimate use to know who had died so they could stop the payments. Something else the ``60 Minutes'' program pointed out was that Medicare did not catch a lot of payments going out. But unless you have a legitimate use, by suddenly putting on line the death master file, it opens up all of these Social Security numbers for criminals to come in and create a new identity, file a tax return, and get a refund on a fictitious tax return. I want to continue to encourage the Social Security Administration. They claim they don't have the legal authority until we can give them the legal authority they are looking for. We think they have it administratively in their power not to put it out there. That is the right thing to do. Negotiations With Iran As I yield to the very distinguished Senator from Connecticut, a tremendous member of our commerce committee, I want to say I was sad last week--and am still sad this week--that nearly half of the Senators of the Senate sought to inject themselves by writing to the Ayatollah, trying to derail the negotiations that are ongoing on matters of life and death. If they don't think Iran having a nuclear weapon is a matter of life and death, they have another thing coming. Trying to derail the negotiations, while in fact the negotiations are going on at the very hour of the writing of that letter, and still are--and we won't know until the 24th of this month if in fact they are successful. I will come back when we get into the executive session about the nominees. I look forward to hearing from the Senator from Connecticut.

Mr. NELSON

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

Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, I want to speak on a number of issues. I rise in support of the nominations of Christopher Hart to be chairman and Bella Dinh-Zarr to be a board member of the National Transportation Safety Board. The National Transportation Safety Board helps keep all of us safe. When a terrible crash happens, we watch on television or read about the crash and wonder what happened. But it is the National Transportation Safety Board that steps in. During those first moments, they get in, preserve evidence, sift through the debris, and then figure out what went wrong. They play a difficult role. They must put aside all differences between jurisdictions, politics, and partisanship to get the job done. In the last month alone, the board has launched investigations into a ship collision in Texas, a plane veering off the runway in New York, two terrible and fatal train crashes in New York and California, and a tragic incident in DC where smoke filled one of the Metro tunnels and resulted in a passenger dying. They are also helping with an oil train derailment in West Virginia and one in Illinois that sparked fires and an evacuation. Their work plays a critical role in guiding our decisions about safety and their recommendations have influenced safety improvements. They have played a role in everything from drunk driving and seatbelt laws to the amount of rest that pilots and truck drivers should get, and they are also helping to shape the safety requirements of travel in the future. In October of last year, a test flight for commercial space flight ended in tragedy when an experimental spacecraft broke apart in midflight over the desert in California. The National Transportation Safety Board stepped in to investigate the tragic accident. They are still conducting the investigation, and the results are going to help us better address the future safety of commercial space flight to and from the edge of space, which is what that spacecraft was designed to do. This is why it is so critical that we select people with technical knowledge and human compassion to put the pieces of these tragedies back together. We have two great nominees. Christopher Hart is a dedicated public servant with an extensive career in transportation safety. He has served as Vice Chairman of the NTSB for 5 years; and since April 2014, he has served as the Acting Chairman of that agency. Like Mr. Hart, Dr. Bella Dinh-Zarr has a distinguished career in transportation safety. She currently serves as the director of the FIA Foundation, which is dedicated to promoting safe and sustainable transportation. Previously, Dr. Dinh-Zarr worked in various safety capacities with the Make Roads Safe campaign, the American Automobile Association, and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. They are both good leaders, and I ask the Senate to join me in supporting their nominations. Takata Airbags Mr. President, I wish to provide the Senate with an update on what every Senator has had their attention called to--the Takata airbag recall. We have seen five deaths. We have seen a spate of serious injuries related to these defective airbags. One of the deaths occurred in my home State of Florida. Through my position of working with Chairman John Thune of the Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee, I have been pushing Takata and the automakers to speed up fixes for these defective airbags. People are driving around with a lethal bomb in their steering wheel. If it is defective and it goes off, they are filled with shrapnel. That has killed five people. It is documented in this country that it has killed five people. Nobody ought to be driving, therefore, a car for months when, in fact, they have a known defect that can seriously kill them. Well, it is just not acceptable, and the progress has been painfully slow. We received a letter from NHTSA noting that only 2 million of the vehicles recently recalled--2 million of 17 million--are all that have been repaired as of the end of last year. That letter notes that Takata has continued to stonewall NHTSA's request for documents related to the defect. It is now being fined $14,000 a day until they start cooperating fully. They have also failed to produce a number of critical documents that the Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee has requested as part of its investigation into this mess. Earlier today, Senator Thune and I sent a letter to Takata again requesting that they turn over these documents to the committee as soon as possible so that we can complete our investigation into how this mess happened and, very importantly, how we can get people's cars fixed so they are not driving around with this bomb about to explode in their steering wheel. Safety can't wait. Bob Levinson Mr. President, sadly, this week is the eighth year that Bob Levinson, a retired FBI agent who disappeared on a tourist island in Iran called Kish Island, has not been seen or heard from. He has a wife and seven children. A couple of years ago, the family received a video. A few months after that, they received a photo. In these extensive discussions with Iran over matters of war and peace as to whether Iran is going to be willing to step down and not have a nuclear weapon, one of the discussion items also is not only the three known Americans in captivity in Iran but Bob Levinson, who has been missing for 8 years. Only the Iranian Government can produce the evidence of what has happened to Bob and where he is, and we continue that vigil. I yield the floor.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, the House of Representatives recently passed H.R. 749, the Passenger Rail Reform and Investment Act of 2015. I am pleased to see the House take bipartisan action on this bill. Intercity passenger rail is a critical part of our transportation infrastructure. People in many regions of the country are in desperate need of better ways to travel between fast-growing cities, and passenger rail is our best hope at relieving congestion on highways and runways that don't have additional room to expand. The House bill is a good step forward. H.R. 749 would maintain current levels of Federal support for Amtrak to operate routes that connect the country. It would also authorize some additional funding to invest in passenger rail projects and improve a Federal loan program that can be used for rail infrastructure. This is a productive place to start. The authorization levels in this bill are too low to get our passenger rail network where it needs to be, let alone to keep up with the rest of the world by bringing high-speed rail to the United States. H.R. 749 also fails to address critical rail safety priorities or even reauthorize funding for the Federal Railroad Administration's safety oversight activities. We can and must do better than a flat-funded authorization bill that turns a blind eye to safety and to the growing needs of our country. I look forward to working with my colleagues in the Senate to improve this bill and make some real progress toward developing modern, safe, and efficient passenger rail options that America deserves.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, when 47 Republican Senators signed a letter sent to the Ayatollah Khomeini, it was a letter that although supposedly instructive of the constitutional provisions of the separation of government in the United States, in effect, it was a letter to erode the negotiating position of the President of the United States and his administration in trying to reach an agreement to not have a nuclear weapon capability of building a bomb in Iran. I think history will show the strength of American foreign policy has always been bipartisanship when it comes to the interests of America as we look out and have to defend ourselves against our enemies. Indeed, Iran with a nuclear bomb would be one of the gravest threats to our national security as well as to our allies. It saddens me that we have come to the point where we are so divided that nearly half of the Senators, on a partisan basis, in this great institution of the U.S. Senate, would in effect try to cut the legs from underneath the President and his administration in trying to reach an agreement to avert a nuclear bomb. So much has been said about this issue, but one common theme runs throughout, and it is that people seem to know what the agreement is as it is being negotiated in secret. This Senator will reserve judgment. This Senator is also an original cosponsor of the bill we filed to have Congress weigh in on any future lifting of economic sanctions that have been imposed by the Congress, and this Senator feels that is an appropriate role, under the separation of powers, of our job as Congress. But when we see a major part, on a partisan basis, of our government try to undercut and kill the negotiations while they are going on at this very moment in Geneva, then that goes a step too far. I am saddened. I think about what this Senator would have done when the President was not Barack Obama but George Bush. I cannot imagine that I would have tried to undercut the President of the United States representing this country and trying, on matters of war and peace, to keep peace. We can disagree about the specifics, but we still have to honor the institution of the Presidency, and when it becomes matters of war and peace, then we have to unify. That is why I am so saddened that we have come to the point at which we appear to be so divided. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. I thank the Chair.

Mr. NELSON. Is my understanding correct that it is the time for the minority?

Mr. NELSON

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

Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, I first wish to say to the Senator from Connecticut that this Senator agrees with him. It should never come down to this. The whole purpose of that section of the Affordable Care Act is in fact to provide insurance to as many people as we can, especially the 40 million people who for years and years have been going without insurance, and it is doing a pretty good job. In the second year of expanding the State exchanges or the Federal exchange, as the Senator has described, lo and behold, of the 8 to 9 million nationwide, over 1 million of those 8 to 9 million are in my State of Florida. So I thank the Senator for his courage, his insight, and his clarity and his statement. Iran's Nuclear Program Mr. President, I want to talk about S. 615. It is legislation filed last Friday, and this Senator was 1 of 11 Senators who filed it originally. There were five Republicans and six Democrats, and it was filed by the chairman and the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. This is legislation giving Congress a say with regard to a potential agreement that would be enacted in the negotiations between the United States, which includes the P5 plus Iran--over preventing Iran from having a nuclear weapon. This Senator was assured by the Republican sponsors of this bill that the bill would not come up until after the negotiations had concluded on March 24. Obviously, this Senator would not have sponsored legislation that would try to predetermine or nix the negotiations before they had a chance to succeed. Yesterday or the day before the majority leader filed a rule XIV to bring the process directly to the floor. It is my understanding he is intending to go to that legislation next week, but that still is almost 2 weeks before the negotiations are to conclude. I want the negotiations to be successful. It is very important to the national security of the United States that Iran not have a nuclear weapon. That is obvious to the national security of Israel as well. Yet we are about to take up legislation that would start talking about the lifting of sanctions before an agreement has even been reached. Well, this Senator is not going to have any part of that. Therefore, if this legislation is brought up before the negotiations conclude on March 24, this Senator will not support the efforts to proceed to the consideration of the legislation in the Senate. It is one thing to enter into these matters of considerable national security and try to disrupt them, it is another thing looking at the consequences if these negotiations don't succeed and we can stop Iran from having a nuclear weapon, that one alternative, a very serious alternative, is war, but it is another thing to make representations to a Senator that are not fulfilled, and this Senator doesn't like it one bit. I conclude by saying there has been a lot of commentary about the Prime Minister's speech yesterday. This Senator feels like where the Prime Minister was arguing against negotiations that are ongoing before the negotiations are concluded--I don't think that is in the interest of the United States. I don't like that one bit. This Senator also feels that when a foreign leader comes in front of the Congress--the representatives of the American people--for what to this Senator is obvious political advantage in an election that is to take place in just 2 weeks, I don't think that is right either. This Senator is one of the strongest supporters of Israel, and this Senator has had the privilege not only of the perspective of Armed Services but also my past service for 6 years on the Intelligence Committee. I have visited with all of the intelligence apparatus of Israel, and it has been a seamless effort in trying to protect the interests of the United States and Israel with our intelligence apparatus. When partisan politics is injected into this, it is not good, and it is not good for the relationship. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, I was necessarily absent for yesterday's vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to go to conference on the House message to accompany H.R. 240, the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act. I would have voted nay. As well, I was necessarily absent for yesterday's vote on the motion to table the request to go to conference on H.R. 240, the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act. I would have voted aye.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, I would say to the Senator from Massachusetts, Amen. Amen. We can't play around with our national security by holding somebody's legislative ideal as a means of holding up the national security and holding the national security of this country hostage. electronic devices and privacy rights Mr. President, I came to talk about another issue. In the first part of the week, the Washington Post had an article that followed a series of articles in other newspapers, such as the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, about a device that was given certification by the Federal Communications Commission called a stingray. This device, when used properly by law enforcement--specifically, the FBI--not only can locate and absorb the content of communications over cell phones but can also locate the specific location of that cell phone. It does so by making the cell phone think that it, the device, is the cell phone tower. So instead of the cell phone radio waves going to the normal cell phone tower, they would come to this device called a stingray. If used properly, it can be used to go after the bad guys-- terrorists and criminals. Of course, that is one of the reasons this device was created and certified by the Federal Communications Commission. Part of the protections, as used by the FBI and local law enforcement, to get content is to treat it as if they were going to break into somebody's home to get evidence. Our constitutional protections regarding the right of privacy require that the law enforcement agency go to a judge--an impartial part of the judicial branch--in order to get a court order to show probable cause that a crime has been committed and therefore the constitutional right of privacy is trumped, and with this court order, law enforcement can go in and get the evidence. Well, as technology continues to evolve and explode, of course, questions about our constitutional right of privacy get a lot more difficult, and so now law enforcement wants to pinpoint the location of a cellphone so they can go in and grab that person. Again, it would seem that the constitutional right of privacy needs to have the protection of a judge's order, and it is this Senator's belief that the FBI, when employing this type of device, would, in fact, use those constitutional protections. Different news articles have raised questions about how this device is handled once it is turned over to local law enforcement and whether they are being adequately trained on judicial protections, and indeed, are they employing those protections. The news articles, as evidenced by the Washington Post this past Monday, would indicate that those judicial protections are not being employed. So this Senator, as one of the co-leaders of the commerce committee, along with the chairman of the committee, John Thune, has written to the FCC and asked them what information they have about the rationale behind the restrictions placed on the certification of the stingray-- the device that was certified by the FCC--and whether those similar restrictions have been put in place for other devices. As technology continues to improve, we are going to see a lot more of these types of devices. We need to know whether the FCC has inquired about the oversight that may be in place in order to ensure that the use of the devices complies with the manufacturer's representations to the FCC at the time of the certification. We are asking for a status report of the task force that was previously formed so we can look at these questions surrounding the use of the stingray. This is not the last time we are going to be asking these questions-- not necessarily about this device, the stingray. There is a multiplicity of devices that are coming out on the market, and the question is: What about our privacy? Of course we are reminded about this issue every day because every day we read about another data breach in the newspaper. I have filed legislation with regard to data breaches to ensure that at least the company has the obligation to notify the poor customers that their data is suddenly out there in the Internet ether because of that data breach. A lot of these questions are going to continue to be asked. What about the device called the Pineapple? I had no idea this device existed. Here is what it does: If I go into a Starbucks and use their wireless Internet, someone could be sitting outside of that Starbucks in their car, or at one of the outside tables, with this device called a Pineapple, and instead of my wireless device using Starbucks' Internet system, it is on that Pineapple device and all of my communications are going directly to that person, and that person is able to steal all of my private information. That is a major theft. This is scary. Yet that device has been around for several years. We have major privacy questions. The Presiding Officer, who is a member of the commerce committee, knows that we are going to be grappling with these issues, along with other committees, such as judiciary, on the right to privacy. In the meantime, we have raised these issues with the FCC on this most recent detailed expose about this device called the stingray. If it is employed for our national security and our personal safety, which is the job of the government, then it is a good thing; however, if it is employed for other reasons, such as invading our constitutional right of privacy, that is another thing. It is time for us to stand up for the individual citizens in this country and their right to privacy. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. NELSON. Would the Senator believe that if the Department of Homeland Security is shut down that essential personnel will be required to work, but essential personnel--the following--will not be paid? For the first time people engaged in the war--namely, the U.S. Coast Guard that is in fact involved in the Middle East in the war, along with the services from the Department of Defense--for the first time in the history of this country they will be essential to continue work but will not be paid. Would the Senator believe that in addition, Customs and Border Patrol personnel who are essential, as well as TSA, which is essential, will continue to work but without pay and that is what will happen this Friday if we do not fund the Department of Homeland Security?

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Madam President, I wish to speak about the Ukraine. Lord knows the President of the United States has enough on his plate, and he is trying to make the right decisions about what to do in giving assistance to the Ukrainian people and to the Ukrainian army to hold off Vladimir Putin's troops that are masquerading as rebels but, in fact, are bringing in Russian equipment and Russian soldiers who put on different uniforms. It is because of that that I think the wise choice would be for the United States to give lethal armaments to the Ukrainian people. I was there in August. I spoke with all the members of the government--the Prime Minister, the Defense Minister, the Foreign Minister, the head of their Defense Council. At the time, I was surprised that they did not ask for lethal assistance but instead wanted up-to-the-minute intelligence, which was so important, and training. If my memory serves me correctly, in the Defense bill we provided about $350 million for that assistance. But the question of lethal armaments so that they can withstand the Russian tanks--if we want them to be successful--is exceptionally important in this Senator's mind and point of view. There is another reason. Mrs. Merkel is in town today, and her position is that she does not want Europe to provide lethal assistance. Well, Germany, of course, is not sharing a geographic line with the former Soviet Union, now Russia, and Germany is not feeling the heat, even though a major component and member of NATO, like so many of the other NATO members farther to the east. Some of the Baltic States--Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania--have substantial Russian populations. They are frightened of the realistic possibility of Putin, who has successfully taken a Russian-speaking part of Ukraine--namely, Crimea, which fell into his hand like a ripe plum--now moving on other parts of eastern Ukraine to establish a land bridge down to Crimea. What they fear is that suddenly the Russian army will amass on their border and use as a pretext, as Putin has done in eastern Ukraine, the coming in and rescuing and protecting of the Russian-speaking elements of those particular countries, particularly in the Baltics. There is a huge percentage of the population in Estonia that is Russian, likewise in Latvia and also Lithuania. I met with the President of Lithuania, a woman whom a lot of people refer to in very admiring terms as a tough cookie, and that is apparent when you meet her. But the concerns about the Russian aggression are clearly there. They are very concerned that if eastern Ukraine falls, they will be next. I think that is another reason that these courageous people who, after the break up of the Soviet Union, had so many years of corruption and bad government--now having thrown off the shackles of corruption, having a new government after all of those protests in the center of the capital city of Ukraine--I think it is incumbent upon us to help that little country defend itself against Russian aggression. When a Russian tank is bearing down on you, you need something that can penetrate the steel armor of that tank in order to stop that tank and all the other tanks from advancing. I will stop right there and shift gears.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Madam President, the third and last subject I wish to address is the launch of a major spacecraft/satellite which will be for the interest of the United States and the free world. Hopefully, that will take place tomorrow evening around 6 p.m. I was at the Cape last night thinking that the Discovery satellite was going to be launched atop a Falcon rocket on pad 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. All systems were go, save for the radar system on the eastern test range of the Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center. The radar system went down, and they obviously cannot launch a rocket if they can't track it precisely, just in case it were to err from its course and had to be destroyed. So it was postponed. It has now been rescheduled for tomorrow night at approximately 6 p.m. Why is this important? It is important because there are three major instruments. There are many more, but I will only mention three. No. 1, it will constantly aim an instrument at the Sun so when there is an additional solar explosion, which is a nuclear explosion on the face of the Sun, and all that additional radiation starts coming in what is known as solar wind to the United States, we can prepare for that nuclear radiation and save our satellites, save certain electrical grid systems, and warn pilots who are flying a route over the poles where the magnetic field of the Earth does not protect and repel against the nuclear radiation coming from the Sun, which is extremely important to commercial satellites, commercial systems on the ground, and is especially important to our military warning satellites. We are fortunate there is a satellite that was put up in the late 1990s. Its acronym is ACE. It had a design life of 5 years, which would have been the early 2000s. This little satellite keeps producing. It measures the solar wind, or nuclear radiation, coming from the Sun about every 40 minutes. It was supposed to have been dead years ago. It is still perking. This satellite will replace it and will warn us of a nuclear blast-- not every 40 minutes but much more rapidly, like every 1 or 2 minutes, which will give us the ability to save our systems on the ground and in orbit. That is one instrument. Now, since this payload will be at a neutrally buoyant point where the Earth's gravitational pull stops and the Sun's gravitational pull stops--called the Lagrangian Point No. 1, or L-1, between the Earth and the Sun--which is a little less than 1 million miles from the Earth, and because the gravitational pull of the Sun is much greater--it is about 92 million miles from the Sun--it will stay there and constantly look at the Sun in one direction, and in the other direction it looks at the Earth. These are the other two instruments. One instrument will constantly measure the heat coming from the Sun that is being absorbed by the Earth, and that instrument then also measures the amount of heat that is reflected off of the Earth and radiated back out into space. So if you want to measure exactly how the Earth is heating up, you get this very precise measurement of what is being absorbed minus what is being radiated back out into space, and you will know exactly how much heat the Earth is absorbing and how this planet is heating up. The final instrument is one that was conceived of by then-Vice President Al Gore, who at my invitation was there yesterday. I don't know if he is going to be able to stay over until tomorrow to see the launch. What Al Gore knew was that 42 years ago was the last time we had a full sunlit picture of the Earth. It was by the Apollo 17 astronauts on the face of the moon. They got the Earth just at the exact time. They were able to photograph one-half of the Earth, which was lit by the Sun behind the astronauts on the moon. That was the last time we had a full, live picture of the Earth. We have had many other pictures, but what they are is a strip here and a snippet there, and they are all stitched together--even though they were taken at different times--to make a composite of what the Earth looks like. What the satellite Discovery will do, as its camera looks straight back at Earth, taking about 13 photographs in a 24-hour period, since the satellite is between the Earth and the Sun, it is able to look back with the telephoto lens and it will always see the sunlit side of the entire side of the Earth as it rotates on its axis every 24 hours and as it rotates around the Sun every 365 days. That will give us a new perspective of the overview effect of what this home that we call planet Earth is and what it looks like on a daily basis every 2 hours. I yield the floor.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Madam President, the clock is ticking at the Department of Homeland Security, and we are about to run out of money. We will run out of money at the end of this month. If we get into a situation where the Department that is tasked with the protection of national security here at home does not have the funding to protect our borders, to protect the central location that directs our defense against cyber attacks, to protect us as we get on airplanes through TSA, and to patrol the waters of the coastal United States through our Coast Guard--if we don't have the money appropriated, then that, to this Senator, is inexcusable. This is all over a dispute about immigration because some people want to have it their way and only their way, and therefore, they cannot stand that the President has the legal authority to issue an Executive order. That is not the way to protect ourselves against all of these adversaries. When I came to Washington as a young Congressman many moons ago, it was very clearly understood that partisan politics stopped at the water's edge. When it came to matters of national security, there were no partisan politics. When it came to matters of foreign policy, there were no partisan politics. Oh my, how times have changed. Now, with the injection of ideological politics, it is time for us to move on.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Madam President, I wish to talk about the necessity of having an appropriations bill for the Department of Homeland Security and the fact that it is being held up over the issue of folks in the House of Representatives who do not want to appropriate money for the actions that the President has taken in trying to improve a dysfunctional immigration system. Holding up the funding for the Department of Homeland Security appropriations is absolutely ridiculous, in the opinion of this Senator. The fact is the clock is ticking because the funding runs out in just a couple of weeks--February 27. What does the Department's name imply? Keeping the homeland secure. In one regard, that means cyber attacks. Doesn't it occur to someone that we have had an extraordinary number of cyber attacks recently? Most everybody will remember Sony. People were attacking us because they wanted to stop the expression of free speech, in this case with regard to a movie the Sony company had produced. Because they got in and got all of the personal data and were manipulating the internal controls of the company with this cyber attack, it is the Department of Homeland Security that is charged. Hopefully, if we can ever pass a cyber security bill that can be signed into law, the portal through which the early warnings will come will be the Department of Homeland Security. By the way, that cost the Sony corporation about $100 million. How about what happened to all of the customers of Target: Addresses, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses were taken from 70 million Americans who were customers of Target. How about Yahoo: Passwords and user names were exposed to cyber attacks. How about eBay: Users' passwords, because of a cyber attack, had to be changed because they were compromised. How about a number of major banks, including JPMorgan Chase: Seventy- six million households and seven million small businesses' accounts were affected by the attack. How about Home Depot: Six million accounts were put at risk. That ought to be enough to continue the funding of the Department of Homeland Security, but there is a lot more. Most folks understand that TSA, which checks us as we go through the security at airports, at seaports--TSA is a part of the Department of Homeland Security. Are we going to cut off the funding for TSA--TSA that is now trying to stop the new kind of attacks with nonmetallic explosives? Remember, because of our intelligence apparatus, working through liaison partners in other countries, about 2 years ago a cartridge in a printer was discovered ultimately going onto an airplane that was bound for the United States--that was a nonmetallic explosive. We were fortunate we got that, but they continue. These folks who are trying to attack us all over the world are trying very ingenious ways to avoid the security, and we rely on TSA-- especially at American airports--to protect us. We simply in a couple of weeks can't afford for the appropriations to stop. How about immigration, U.S. Customs and Border Protection: Again, another responsibility of the Department of Homeland Security, and we are going to cut off the funding on what kind of folks are coming across our borders and what kind of folks we are going to be checking and rechecking and what kind of things they are bringing into the borders. There are a lot of people who want to get into this country to do us harm. That is the responsibility of the Department of Homeland Security. So it is not only ridiculous to this Senator, it is almost silly. But the problem is it is tragic, and it could be horrendous given the fact that people around the world are trying to harm us as we try to protect ourselves in our national security every day. This is a debate we should not be having. Unfortunately, it is a condition our politics have come to, and we need to stop that condition. I leave the Presiding Officer on a happier note. As the Senate goes into recess at the conclusion of my remarks, happily all of the Senators are going to a bipartisan luncheon where we are going to talk about things we can do together. Indeed, that is the happiest thing I have heard today. Madam President, as I yield the floor, I understand that pursuant to the previous order, the Senate will stand in recess.

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

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Sadly, I have even more bad news to report today. Through public information, we have learned that an exploding Takata airbag appears to be responsible for yet another death. Less than 2 weeks ago, a Texas man who was driving with his 11-year-old cousin was involved in a low-impact crash. When the airbag deployed, instead of protecting him, the airbag ruptured and sent a metal piece of shrapnel into the man's neck. When the police arrived, he was already dead. We are awaiting more information from Takata and we are determined to get to the bottom of this. I look forward to working with the chairman on this issue. We plan to continue the investigation until all of our questions have been answered. We are going to do everything possible to get to the bottom of this issue so that consumers are made whole.

Mr. NELSON. I ask unanimous consent for 1 additional minute to conclude my statement.

Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, in light of the late hour, just before our votes, I will submit for the Record a statement which correlates with the chairman of our committee, and I thank the Senator for so much of his cooperation over last year and all the investigations and the hearings that we did, as well as now. What I will say that is new is I will provide an update on the status of the committee's investigation into the defective Takata airbags. When we had the hearing last November which I had the privilege of chairing, we received testimony from several witnesses, including a senior executive from the Takata Corporation, which manufactures the airbags involved in the rupture and the explosive incidents that basically have lacerated people with pieces of metal. The airbag that is supposed to save their lives, in fact, is endangering their lives, and in some cases killing them. This has happened to two of my constituents in Florida. While the hearing produced some basic information about the problem, many questions still remain. Senator Rockefeller, then the chairman of the committee, other Senators, and I sent a letter to Takata requesting information and documents related to Takata's airbag defects. In their initial response provided to the committee in early December, Takata included a list of all the incidents it was aware of that had allegedly involved a death or injury caused by a ruptured Takata airbag. Takata's response reveals that the scope of injuries involved in the Takata airbags appears to be greater than we previously thought. In its initial response, Takata identified 5 deaths and 64 injuries. Although some of these incidents may be ultimately tied to other causes, this potential injury figure is far bigger than what had been reported in the press. Unfortunately, 1 death and 17 of these injuries occurred in my State of Florida--more than any other State. Among the alleged injuries in my State, many were serious, including lacerations and fractures to the face, burns to the neck, face, and torso, and traumatic brain injury and hearing loss.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, there is a disturbing report in the Washington Post today about a major telephone company, Verizon, putting supercookies on the phones that its customers are using which will allow those customers to be tracked, and if that information is turned over to third parties, to be utilized for purposes of advertising, even though the customer has indicated they do not want that particular cookie placed on their device. Our staff on the commerce committee will be investigating this, and we certainly want to make sure that in this time of ubiquity of eyes prying all around in this electronic age we are living in that we preserve the rights of privacy for all individuals. This is a matter of particular importance to the commerce committee. It is of extreme importance to this Senator, and I will keep the Senate informed. Mr. President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. NELSON

Mr. NELSON. I ask unanimous consent for 1 additional minute to conclude my statement.

Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, in light of the late hour, just before our votes, I will submit for the Record a statement which correlates with the chairman of our committee, and I thank the Senator for so much of his cooperation over last year and all the investigations and the hearings that we did, as well as now. What I will say that is new is I will provide an update on the status of the committee's investigation into the defective Takata airbags. When we had the hearing last November which I had the privilege of chairing, we received testimony from several witnesses, including a senior executive from the Takata Corporation, which manufactures the airbags involved in the rupture and the explosive incidents that basically have lacerated people with pieces of metal. The airbag that is supposed to save their lives, in fact, is endangering their lives, and in some cases killing them. This has happened to two of my constituents in Florida. While the hearing produced some basic information about the problem, many questions still remain. Senator Rockefeller, then the chairman of the committee, other Senators, and I sent a letter to Takata requesting information and documents related to Takata's airbag defects. In their initial response provided to the committee in early December, Takata included a list of all the incidents it was aware of that had allegedly involved a death or injury caused by a ruptured Takata airbag. Takata's response reveals that the scope of injuries involved in the Takata airbags appears to be greater than we previously thought. In its initial response, Takata identified 5 deaths and 64 injuries. Although some of these incidents may be ultimately tied to other causes, this potential injury figure is far bigger than what had been reported in the press. Unfortunately, 1 death and 17 of these injuries occurred in my State of Florida--more than any other State. Among the alleged injuries in my State, many were serious, including lacerations and fractures to the face, burns to the neck, face, and torso, and traumatic brain injury and hearing loss.

Mr. NELSON. Sadly, I have even more bad news to report today. Through public information, we have learned that an exploding Takata airbag appears to be responsible for yet another death. Less than 2 weeks ago, a Texas man who was driving with his 11-year-old cousin was involved in a low-impact crash. When the airbag deployed, instead of protecting him, the airbag ruptured and sent a metal piece of shrapnel into the man's neck. When the police arrived, he was already dead. We are awaiting more information from Takata and we are determined to get to the bottom of this. I look forward to working with the chairman on this issue. We plan to continue the investigation until all of our questions have been answered. We are going to do everything possible to get to the bottom of this issue so that consumers are made whole.