Marco Rubio

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on September 13, 2016, at 10 a.m., in room SR-328A of the Russell Senate Office Building.

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on September 13, 2016, at 9:30 a.m.

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on September 13, 2016, at 10:30 a.m. to conduct a hearing entitled ``The National Flood Insurance Program: Reviewing the Recommendations of the Technical Mapping Advisory Council's 2015 Annual Report.''.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I am pleased to report that we had some encouraging news yesterday with the announcement of the Senate majority leader that additional money to fight the Zika virus would be included in the continuing resolution, which is the budget document that will help to move us forward at least through December and that hopefully will be moving through the Senate very soon. Throughout my time in the Senate, I have regularly opposed these short-term spending bills because I don't think funding government on a month-to-month basis is the smart way to run the government of the most powerful and important Nation on Earth. But with Zika becoming a public health emergency the way it has, this is a necessary exception for me to make. All of us, obviously, will reserve to see all the other details of this budget document, but assuming it is as reported--as I am aware in the conversations that are ongoing--I will be supporting this continuing resolution. It is worth making an exception for something like this when the Zika funding is in it. At this point, I just really believe we need to get Zika funding approved and moving. We need to make sure that the fight for Zika doesn't run out of money by the end of this month. For me, that is the most urgent priority. We can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. The perfect, I believe, is still the full funding that was originally requested--the $1.9 billion, which I supported. The good is what, hopefully, will be finalized soon and, hopefully, will pass quickly. But the unacceptable would be to do nothing and to let the money run out on the ongoing efforts to fight Zika. Even the $1.9 billion the administration requested months ago will not ultimately be enough. We do not know for sure how much more will be needed to win this fight, but the $1.1 billion for Zika that is being negotiated would be a step in the right direction and would mean more resources for my home State of Florida, which is in the continental United States and has been disproportionately impacted. Just yesterday, there were another six cases of confirmed transmissions in the State and not travel-related, and of course there is the suffering that is ongoing on the island of Puerto Rico, where a significant percentage of the population has now been affected and/or infected by Zika. I have been talking about this issue since January, and it has been frustrating to see it tied up in Washington's political games. As I said repeatedly, I believe both parties are to blame for our getting to this moment. On the one hand, I believe Members of my own party have been slow to respond to this, and there were efforts, I believe, to try to cut corners on funding, which will cost us money in the long term. But on the other hand, you have Democrats here inventing excuses--just making it up--in order to oppose it, and they do so for purely political reasons. You have an administration playing chicken with this issue by claiming that money would run out in August, only to discover that they had more money that could be redirected from other accounts. Now, thanks to the lack of action by Congress and by the administration, we have nearly 19,000 Americans who have been infected, including 800 in Florida and 16,000 on the island of Puerto Rico. We have 86 pregnant women in the State of Florida who have tested positive for the virus, which we know carries the risk for heartbreaking birth defects. As I said, the Florida Department of Health announced that it wasn't 6; it was 8 new non-travel-related cases, bringing that total to 64. That means there are 8 new cases of people who got Zika somewhere in America, probably in Florida. Zika has also had a devastating economic impact on Florida. The Miami Herald reported that Miami hotel bookings are down, airfare to South Florida is falling, and business owners in affected areas are reporting steep losses. Polls show many visitors would rather stay away. As tourism takes a hit, so will the entire economy in the State of Florida, since tourism is one of our cornerstone industries. That is why we see all of us from Florida working together across the aisle to get this done. For example, I have worked with my colleague Bill Nelson, the senior Senator from Florida, from the very beginning. I will be meeting with our Governor Rick Scott later today about the same issue. The bottom line is that at the national level, like at the State level in Florida, there is no excuse for this issue to be tied up in politics any longer. My colleagues, Zika is not a game, and we need to pass this funding as soon as possible so that our health officials and experts have the resources they need to conduct the vital medical research that will lead us to a vaccine and ultimately help eradicate Zika in Florida, across the United States, on the island of Puerto Rico, and beyond. So yesterday's announcement is encouraging. We are closer than we have ever been to getting something done, and now I hope will be the time for action. Hopefully, we will have something soon that is public and that we can get passed right away. I sincerely hope that Senate Democrats won't once again make up or find some excuse to oppose it, and I hope that Members from our party will work cooperatively as well. I hope, ultimately, that the House will also do the right thing so that we can get this done and we can move forward on the research necessary for the vaccine, on the money needed to eradicate these mosquitoes, and, ultimately, on the treatments that people will desperately need to deal with Zika once and for all.

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I come to the floor again--I believe for the 10th time since March--to discuss the Zika virus. The first time I talked about this was back in January. There was a report out that said Zika, the disease, was being transmitted by mosquitoes and there was an outbreak in Brazil. Immediately for me alarm bells went off because being from Miami, FL, my hometown, if you go to the airport and look at the board, the number of flights coming from Brazil to South Florida, the numbers are high. There are dozens of flights a week back and forth. My immediate thought at that time was that this is going to be an issue for Florida and ultimately for America, given the amount of travel back and forth. I also saw the outbreak in the territory of Puerto Rico, a place I have taken a tremendous interest in since my time here. As everyone knows, Puerto Rico is not officially represented in this Chamber, but I, along with my colleagues Senator Menendez of New Jersey and Senator Nelson of Florida, have always looked out for the interests of the island and its people who are U.S. citizens. So knowing the link between Florida and Puerto Rico and the link between Zika and Puerto Rico, I knew as early as January that this was going to be an issue. I immediately talked to our Border Patrol folks and our Customs people at our airports and seaports about ensuring we are doing everything we can. In March, when the President came out in February and March and talked about the need for $1.9 billion to fight Zika, I believe I was the first Republican--certainly in this Chamber--to come out in favor of that request because my argument at the time was, we don't know fully what we are dealing with here, but let's get ahead of it. Let's jump in front of it and let's deal with it. Otherwise it will only get worse. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. In much of April and March, there was not much attention paid to this. So cases started coming up domestically, mostly travel-related. The Senate did move, and I am proud of the fact that after some back and forth, this place worked. We worked across the aisle, and I worked with Senator Nelson on his proposal and other proposals. In fact, I believe I am the only Member of Congress who voted in favor of every single Zika proposal because in my mind I wanted the money to flow so local governments and States could deal with it and researchers could develop a vaccine. We passed a law for $1.1 billion. It was a product of compromise. It was less than what the President asked for, but it began to move. Unfortunately, the House had a different idea and this is where we are today. When we left in July, there had not been a reported case of a transmission of Zika by a mosquito, but as I warned through April, May, June, and July, it was only a matter of time. If you spent any amount of time in Florida, you know it is hot, it is humid, that it rains, and there are a lot of mosquitoes. You have a State which is a key entry point between key areas and the continental United States and you have mosquitoes. It didn't take a scientist or an expert in Zika to know the combination of those two things were going to lead to locally based transmission. Sadly, that is what is happening. There is a neighborhood in Miami, FL, called Wynwood. This was an area that is economically depressed and it has come alive. It is a center of art. They have these murals where graffiti artists were allowed to come in and put in these extraordinary murals. It is not graffiti. It is art. It is a place where the art community is centered and has come alive with some of the best restaurants in South Florida. This is the Wynwood community. It is a magnet for tourists. There are people who fly to Florida, and South Florida in particular, and go straight to Wynwood because they want to be in that area. It was the first area impacted, and the CDC came out with a warning telling people to avoid a neighborhood. This is usually the kind of advisory that goes out about avoiding other countries, telling Americans and travelers, specifically, to avoid a certain part of a certain neighborhood. Can you imagine the impact it had on the businesses in that community? We talked about the human toll of Zika, of the infection, and of what it does to unborn children, but there is also the economic impact of having a lead health care agency in charge of public health in America issue a warning to Americans to avoid a neighborhood in an American city. I promise you that was not good for those businesses. Some of these businesses had to close for weeks on end and days on end. Then a few weeks later we had reports of the disease being transmitted on Miami Beach. I don't need to tell you about Miami Beach. Everyone knows about Miami Beach. It is the cornerstone of tourism in South Florida. People come to Miami Beach from all over the world to enjoy world-class beaches, nightlife, entertainment, and restaurants. I want you to put yourself in a position of a small business owner--not just a large hotel chain, which is relevant here, but a small business owner. Imagine if you are a family who runs a restaurant on Collins Avenue in Miami Beach. You are depending your whole year, your budget and your payroll is built on a predictable pattern of travelers coming in the summer and coming in the fall and especially in the winter. You are estimating the number of travelers who will come in. They will leave money at these restaurants and they are going to go home. Now you have a report of these transmissions and similar warnings as well. What you learn from this is that this Zika issue is not just a health care issue--and that is by far the primary focus of what our attention should be--but it is also an economic issue and it is hurting small businesses. It is hurting the municipalities. Miami Beach as a city is going to see tax revenues go down. It is going to hurt the State of Florida because of failed tax revenue and so forth. It is going to hurt one of the engines of our tourism sector--the reports of this transmission. You know what is hurting it even worse? When people turn on the news, people are hearing there are people being infected with Zika in Florida and Congress is still haggling and fighting over it and can't get anything done. That does not inspire confidence. So today I have filed a bill, an additional bill, in addition to calling on us to move on Zika. Let me touch on this first. It is inexcusable. How did we get to this point? How did a public health crisis become a political tool to be played with back and forth? Yet that is what Washington has become, a place that has become expert at literally turning any issue into a political issue, and it has done so again with this issue. That is why people are grossed out and disgusted with American politics. When they watch the news and see this fighting, they don't get it. They understand there is this problem with Zika, and it is spreading and hurting people. We just had a case of a child born in Miami Dade County, at the Jackson Memorial Hospital--not with microcephaly but with Zika--a child, a baby, starting out life infected with Zika. They are asking: How can you guys turn this thing into a political issue? That is what Washington has done. Both parties are to blame. It took too long for some in my party to come to the realization this was important. On the Democratic side, they have come up with excuses to be against the proposal, but I will say this: The Senate did it. The Senate funded it. I think at this point, that is probably the fastest and best way forward, if we are serious about funding this, is to go back to what the Senate did. I continue to work with our colleagues to make sure that is a part of whatever vehicle we use to fund the government and keep it open through most of the rest of this year. But today I filed a bill to help people being economically impacted by it. It is a bill that deals with the Small Business Administration. What it does is it basically gives the Small Business Administration the authority to give out small business loans to communities negatively impacted by health-related travel advisories issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As you know, as I said earlier, the CDC has already issued those travel advisories to Wynwood and for the South Beach areas of Miami-Dade County, but that does not mean a week from now there will not be another area added to that, including another area in your State, my colleagues. You don't know when that is coming. So if they were hit by a storm, they would qualify for this. If they were hit by any other disaster, they would qualify for this. They have been hit by a storm. It happens to be a health care storm. It is hurting them economically. We need to make sure they have the flexibility and the ability to provide this short-term, low-interest loans to small businesses to be able to weather this health care Zika storm. I don't know for the life of me why anybody would be against this. I don't know what possible way you could try to politicize it. I am not sure why anybody would object to it. My hope is, we can move quickly on this. It is important. I know there is a lot of jurisdictional pride around here and committees will say: Well, you have to come through us first because we are the chairmen and this is our committee. I hope you can make an exception on this issue because these businesses are hurting. They are hurting badly because of what has happened, and it is only going to get worse for them as these reports come out. I hope we can get that passed. Here is another thing people don't know. Our service men and women are deployed all over the world. Unlike people who travel, they don't have a choice. When the U.S. military tells you and your dependents you must now go to Honduras, you are now going to be stationed at a base in Guantanamo Bay or you are going to be stateside, but you are going to be in Puerto Rico--when they deploy you, you can't say: Well, I am not going because there is Zika there. You have to go. We need to make sure we are protecting our men and women. According to the Pentagon, as of today, there are 81 servicemembers and 19 dependents who have tested positive for the Zika virus. Three of them, by the way, are pregnant. So I have filed a second bill to protect our servicemembers from Zika. It is called the Servicemembers' Zika Protection Act. It provides U.S. troops with additional protections from the Zika virus by authorizing the Secretary of Defense to transfer funds within the existing Department of Defense medical and health research accounts in order to combat the Zika virus. I am hopeful we can unite behind that as well. With over 100 members of our military and their families already infected with Zika, we need to take specific precautions to help them and to help our foreign partners who host Americans on military bases in regions that are affected by Zika. So I am also hopeful Congress will ultimately arrive at an agreement this month to fund our Nation's response to Zika, but also that we ensure that those being deployed on our behalf receive every protection we can provide. So these, in addition to the broader argument about Zika, these are two commonsense approaches giving the Department of Defense flexibility to move existing money around, to provide additional protections for our service men and women and their dependents who are being deployed and impacted by Zika. This is not a theory. We have over 100 people now, including 81 in uniform, who have been impacted by it, and 19 of their dependents, 3 of them who are pregnant. Second, the small business relief. Please put yourself in the position of a family-owned business on South Beach or in Wynwood. They are being hurt. Instead of having 50 people coming in a day, they have 5 or 10. They need help. If they had lost power or been hit by a hurricane or a tornado, this would not be an issue, but they have been hit by a tornado of a different kind, one they did not cause and they could not predict and they could not insure against; that is, Zika. Let's make sure the SBA has the flexibility to provide them their loans. So in addition to funding this--we have to get the Zika thing done, it cannot continue to languish--we have to get the SBA flexibility built into our law so these small businesses can be provided the resources they need to stay open and not close down as a result of a travel advisory because of a disease being spread by mosquitoes. I think we would all agree we have to make sure we are doing everything we can to protect our men and women in uniform who are not going by choice. They are being deployed to these places where Zika is prevalent. They are being infected. There is no excuse for us to not help them as well. So these are the three things I hope we will do before Congress adjourns at the end of this month: Fund Zika fully, give flexibility for our small businesses that have been impacted by Zika to get SBA loans, and do everything we can by passing a law that gives the Department of Defense the flexibility they need to use existing money to protect our men and women in uniform and their families from being infected by Zika when deployed.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I come to the floor again--I believe for the 10th time since March--to discuss the Zika virus. The first time I talked about this was back in January. There was a report out that said Zika, the disease, was being transmitted by mosquitoes and there was an outbreak in Brazil. Immediately for me alarm bells went off because being from Miami, FL, my hometown, if you go to the airport and look at the board, the number of flights coming from Brazil to South Florida, the numbers are high. There are dozens of flights a week back and forth. My immediate thought at that time was that this is going to be an issue for Florida and ultimately for America, given the amount of travel back and forth. I also saw the outbreak in the territory of Puerto Rico, a place I have taken a tremendous interest in since my time here. As everyone knows, Puerto Rico is not officially represented in this Chamber, but I, along with my colleagues Senator Menendez of New Jersey and Senator Nelson of Florida, have always looked out for the interests of the island and its people who are U.S. citizens. So knowing the link between Florida and Puerto Rico and the link between Zika and Puerto Rico, I knew as early as January that this was going to be an issue. I immediately talked to our Border Patrol folks and our Customs people at our airports and seaports about ensuring we are doing everything we can. In March, when the President came out in February and March and talked about the need for $1.9 billion to fight Zika, I believe I was the first Republican--certainly in this Chamber--to come out in favor of that request because my argument at the time was, we don't know fully what we are dealing with here, but let's get ahead of it. Let's jump in front of it and let's deal with it. Otherwise it will only get worse. Unfortunately, that didn't happen. In much of April and March, there was not much attention paid to this. So cases started coming up domestically, mostly travel-related. The Senate did move, and I am proud of the fact that after some back and forth, this place worked. We worked across the aisle, and I worked with Senator Nelson on his proposal and other proposals. In fact, I believe I am the only Member of Congress who voted in favor of every single Zika proposal because in my mind I wanted the money to flow so local governments and States could deal with it and researchers could develop a vaccine. We passed a law for $1.1 billion. It was a product of compromise. It was less than what the President asked for, but it began to move. Unfortunately, the House had a different idea and this is where we are today. When we left in July, there had not been a reported case of a transmission of Zika by a mosquito, but as I warned through April, May, June, and July, it was only a matter of time. If you spent any amount of time in Florida, you know it is hot, it is humid, that it rains, and there are a lot of mosquitoes. You have a State which is a key entry point between key areas and the continental United States and you have mosquitoes. It didn't take a scientist or an expert in Zika to know the combination of those two things were going to lead to locally based transmission. Sadly, that is what is happening. There is a neighborhood in Miami, FL, called Wynwood. This was an area that is economically depressed and it has come alive. It is a center of art. They have these murals where graffiti artists were allowed to come in and put in these extraordinary murals. It is not graffiti. It is art. It is a place where the art community is centered and has come alive with some of the best restaurants in South Florida. This is the Wynwood community. It is a magnet for tourists. There are people who fly to Florida, and South Florida in particular, and go straight to Wynwood because they want to be in that area. It was the first area impacted, and the CDC came out with a warning telling people to avoid a neighborhood. This is usually the kind of advisory that goes out about avoiding other countries, telling Americans and travelers, specifically, to avoid a certain part of a certain neighborhood. Can you imagine the impact it had on the businesses in that community? We talked about the human toll of Zika, of the infection, and of what it does to unborn children, but there is also the economic impact of having a lead health care agency in charge of public health in America issue a warning to Americans to avoid a neighborhood in an American city. I promise you that was not good for those businesses. Some of these businesses had to close for weeks on end and days on end. Then a few weeks later we had reports of the disease being transmitted on Miami Beach. I don't need to tell you about Miami Beach. Everyone knows about Miami Beach. It is the cornerstone of tourism in South Florida. People come to Miami Beach from all over the world to enjoy world-class beaches, nightlife, entertainment, and restaurants. I want you to put yourself in a position of a small business owner--not just a large hotel chain, which is relevant here, but a small business owner. Imagine if you are a family who runs a restaurant on Collins Avenue in Miami Beach. You are depending your whole year, your budget and your payroll is built on a predictable pattern of travelers coming in the summer and coming in the fall and especially in the winter. You are estimating the number of travelers who will come in. They will leave money at these restaurants and they are going to go home. Now you have a report of these transmissions and similar warnings as well. What you learn from this is that this Zika issue is not just a health care issue--and that is by far the primary focus of what our attention should be--but it is also an economic issue and it is hurting small businesses. It is hurting the municipalities. Miami Beach as a city is going to see tax revenues go down. It is going to hurt the State of Florida because of failed tax revenue and so forth. It is going to hurt one of the engines of our tourism sector--the reports of this transmission. You know what is hurting it even worse? When people turn on the news, people are hearing there are people being infected with Zika in Florida and Congress is still haggling and fighting over it and can't get anything done. That does not inspire confidence. So today I have filed a bill, an additional bill, in addition to calling on us to move on Zika. Let me touch on this first. It is inexcusable. How did we get to this point? How did a public health crisis become a political tool to be played with back and forth? Yet that is what Washington has become, a place that has become expert at literally turning any issue into a political issue, and it has done so again with this issue. That is why people are grossed out and disgusted with American politics. When they watch the news and see this fighting, they don't get it. They understand there is this problem with Zika, and it is spreading and hurting people. We just had a case of a child born in Miami Dade County, at the Jackson Memorial Hospital--not with microcephaly but with Zika--a child, a baby, starting out life infected with Zika. They are asking: How can you guys turn this thing into a political issue? That is what Washington has done. Both parties are to blame. It took too long for some in my party to come to the realization this was important. On the Democratic side, they have come up with excuses to be against the proposal, but I will say this: The Senate did it. The Senate funded it. I think at this point, that is probably the fastest and best way forward, if we are serious about funding this, is to go back to what the Senate did. I continue to work with our colleagues to make sure that is a part of whatever vehicle we use to fund the government and keep it open through most of the rest of this year. But today I filed a bill to help people being economically impacted by it. It is a bill that deals with the Small Business Administration. What it does is it basically gives the Small Business Administration the authority to give out small business loans to communities negatively impacted by health-related travel advisories issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As you know, as I said earlier, the CDC has already issued those travel advisories to Wynwood and for the South Beach areas of Miami-Dade County, but that does not mean a week from now there will not be another area added to that, including another area in your State, my colleagues. You don't know when that is coming. So if they were hit by a storm, they would qualify for this. If they were hit by any other disaster, they would qualify for this. They have been hit by a storm. It happens to be a health care storm. It is hurting them economically. We need to make sure they have the flexibility and the ability to provide this short-term, low-interest loans to small businesses to be able to weather this health care Zika storm. I don't know for the life of me why anybody would be against this. I don't know what possible way you could try to politicize it. I am not sure why anybody would object to it. My hope is, we can move quickly on this. It is important. I know there is a lot of jurisdictional pride around here and committees will say: Well, you have to come through us first because we are the chairmen and this is our committee. I hope you can make an exception on this issue because these businesses are hurting. They are hurting badly because of what has happened, and it is only going to get worse for them as these reports come out. I hope we can get that passed. Here is another thing people don't know. Our service men and women are deployed all over the world. Unlike people who travel, they don't have a choice. When the U.S. military tells you and your dependents you must now go to Honduras, you are now going to be stationed at a base in Guantanamo Bay or you are going to be stateside, but you are going to be in Puerto Rico--when they deploy you, you can't say: Well, I am not going because there is Zika there. You have to go. We need to make sure we are protecting our men and women. According to the Pentagon, as of today, there are 81 servicemembers and 19 dependents who have tested positive for the Zika virus. Three of them, by the way, are pregnant. So I have filed a second bill to protect our servicemembers from Zika. It is called the Servicemembers' Zika Protection Act. It provides U.S. troops with additional protections from the Zika virus by authorizing the Secretary of Defense to transfer funds within the existing Department of Defense medical and health research accounts in order to combat the Zika virus. I am hopeful we can unite behind that as well. With over 100 members of our military and their families already infected with Zika, we need to take specific precautions to help them and to help our foreign partners who host Americans on military bases in regions that are affected by Zika. So I am also hopeful Congress will ultimately arrive at an agreement this month to fund our Nation's response to Zika, but also that we ensure that those being deployed on our behalf receive every protection we can provide. So these, in addition to the broader argument about Zika, these are two commonsense approaches giving the Department of Defense flexibility to move existing money around, to provide additional protections for our service men and women and their dependents who are being deployed and impacted by Zika. This is not a theory. We have over 100 people now, including 81 in uniform, who have been impacted by it, and 19 of their dependents, 3 of them who are pregnant. Second, the small business relief. Please put yourself in the position of a family-owned business on South Beach or in Wynwood. They are being hurt. Instead of having 50 people coming in a day, they have 5 or 10. They need help. If they had lost power or been hit by a hurricane or a tornado, this would not be an issue, but they have been hit by a tornado of a different kind, one they did not cause and they could not predict and they could not insure against; that is, Zika. Let's make sure the SBA has the flexibility to provide them their loans. So in addition to funding this--we have to get the Zika thing done, it cannot continue to languish--we have to get the SBA flexibility built into our law so these small businesses can be provided the resources they need to stay open and not close down as a result of a travel advisory because of a disease being spread by mosquitoes. I think we would all agree we have to make sure we are doing everything we can to protect our men and women in uniform who are not going by choice. They are being deployed to these places where Zika is prevalent. They are being infected. There is no excuse for us to not help them as well. So these are the three things I hope we will do before Congress adjourns at the end of this month: Fund Zika fully, give flexibility for our small businesses that have been impacted by Zika to get SBA loans, and do everything we can by passing a law that gives the Department of Defense the flexibility they need to use existing money to protect our men and women in uniform and their families from being infected by Zika when deployed.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, before I begin my remarks on the vote on Zika, I do want to join the chorus of those voices thanking the majority leader for bringing the water bill, which also has important priorities for the State of Florida, in particular the Central Everglades planning process, which will allow us to begin the process of moving forward on a series of programs that are important not just for restoring the natural flow of the Everglades but for helping coastal areas of Florida that were impacted over the last few months with algae blooms as a result of water runoff from Lake Okeechobee. There is a lot more to be done. This project alone will not solve this problem, but it is the single biggest project out there that we are closest to achieving and that can move us toward that goal. If the Senate can move forward, I, too, will ask my colleagues over the next few days to allow this issue to move forward. Let's get this passed. There are many good priorities here for many States in this country, but for Florida in particular. The Central Everglades Planning Project has taken so long to get to this point, and I thank Senator Inhofe for working with me on it to ensure that it is part of this package. I am hopeful we can continue to move forward and get this done. It is important for Florida, particularly for our coastal areas, and for those who care deeply about the great natural treasures of this country--the Florida Everglades.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. That is all right. No objection.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, on a separate topic, I rise today to discuss the spread of the Zika virus. As many of my colleagues know, I have been calling for funding to confront this crisis to be included in the continuing resolution Congress is hopefully going to pass in the coming weeks. First, in light of tonight's vote, I want to take a step back and look at how we have gotten to this point. I want us to think about how long we have known about this crisis. I want us to think about how many warning signs had to be ignored for us to still be having this debate. And I want all the American people who are concerned about and impacted by the virus to know the truth about our deliberations up to this point. The truth is that every Senator has known about the Zika virus since at least January. We all knew then that it was a threat. The World Health Organization warned in January that Zika would spread throughout most of the Americas by the end of this year. In February, as the number of travel-related cases in the United States grew, President Obama made an emergency spending request of $1.9 billion. I supported that request. The vast majority of Congress, for political reasons, did not. So the virus continued to spread. Since then, I have come to the floor of the Senate to urge my colleagues to take action on Zika on at least eight separate occasions. I have written letters, I have written laws, and I have supported every single Zika proposal that has come before the Senate regardless of which party wrote it. Tonight will mark the 12th time--the 12th time--I have voted to move forward on funding to take on Zika. But tonight, for the third time, the minority party--the Democrats in the Senate--have blocked more funding to fight this virus. And I want to be frank. At times, my own party has not taken the issue seriously enough either. In the eight times I have come to the floor to deliver speeches about this issue, I have called out both parties, and I have repeatedly warned it was only a matter of time before we had a mosquito transition in the mainland of the United States. Tragically, that time has now come and, with it, an increase in infections. In July, when we last voted on this issue, there were approximately 1,300 cases of Zika in the continental United States and 2,900 cases in U.S. territories. Since that time in July, these numbers have more than doubled to over 2,700 cases of Zika in the continental United States and over 14,000 cases in U.S. territories, particularly Puerto Rico. That includes 625 pregnant women whose babies are now at risk of complications, including very serious ones like microcephaly. These are not statistics. These are real people. As the infection rate continues to snowball, our health officials and experts desperately need additional resources to combat this crisis. I continue to support supplemental legislation to fund the fight against Zika, but we simply cannot afford to wait any longer. That is why I have requested that any legislation to fund the Federal Government beyond the 30th of September include additional resources to combat and, hopefully through a vaccine, eradicate the Zika virus. For Congress, this is our moment of truth on this incredibly dangerous issue. We are going to continue to see more explosive growth in infections if people keep conspiring, for political reasons in an election year, to do nothing. My colleagues on both sides of the aisle and in both Chambers--in the House and the Senate--now face a choice: Are the political points you hope to gain from posturing on this funding really more valuable than saving lives, protecting pregnant women, and preventing unborn children from being afflicted by this disease? And ask yourself this: How will history remember this moment 20 years from now if, God forbid, there are hundreds or even thousands of children who are born with microcephaly while we stood here playing politics and did nothing? This has the potential to tarnish the legacy of our generation of national leaders and, far worse, to cause grave health challenges for an untold number of Americans. My colleagues, for the life of me, I cannot understand why any Senator with any chance to do something about this would stand in the way any longer. My message to both parties and both Chambers for this month is simple and straightforward: Zika is not a game. And if you think it is, then you should take your game somewhere else. This issue is about human beings, not political chess pieces, and we have a duty to solve it. It will not stop until Congress does what is necessary to respond to this public health crisis. Enough waiting. Enough games. Congress needs to act, and it needs to act now. With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, with all that has occurred in our country over the past few weeks, I wanted to take a moment to bring everyone's attention to something that had a profound impact in my home State of Florida and something all Americans should reflect on. This weekend, the Navy's Flight Demonstration Squadron--most famously known as the Blue Angels--will take to the skies over Pensacola for the Pensacola Beach Air Show. It will be their first air show appearance in Florida since that fateful day of June 2, when they lost Capt. Jeff Kuss, a U.S. Marine Corps Aviator, and the No. 6 airplane in the Blue Angels lineup. Captain Kuss, simply put, was an American hero. Like all Blue Angels pilots and the men and women who support the Blue Angels mission, Captain Kuss was the very best of what our military and our Nation has to offer. He was a war hero. He served our country proudly over hostile skies in Afghanistan. He was a decorated aviator who earned the Strike Flight Air Medal and the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal during his time with the Corps. I commend the Marine Corps for training such a skilled aviator, as well as Naval Air Station Pensacola, where he first started flying in 2007. Captain Kuss was a hometown hero, a local boy from Durango, CO, who graduated from Durango High School and attended Fort Lewis College. He fulfilled a lifelong dream by performing a flyover with his teammates over Super Bowl 50 and then watched his Denver Broncos win their third Super Bowl championship. Captain Kuss was a hero in his own home. A loving son to his parents Janet and Michael, a devoted husband to his wife Christina, and loving father to his two young children, Calvin and Sloane. The same attributes that Captain Kuss demonstrated throughout his life--service, sacrifice, loyalty, faith, devotion--they were all present in his final moments as well. He could have ejected, but instead he stayed with his plane and steered it away from a more populated area to spare any additional loss of life. I know that in our country today there is ample reason for pessimism. We hear plenty from various voices about what is wrong with our country, but let's take a moment to reflect on the life of Capt. Jeff Kuss and the Blue Angels because they are everything that is right about our country. The love they share for one another, the sacrifices they make in service to our Nation, and the devotion they have to their calling represents the very best of the American spirit. The rumble of those engines over the skies of Pensacola this weekend will not just be a resumption of their duties as aviators and military professionals; it will be a tribute--a tribute to Captain Kuss and the life he spent doing what he loved. To the people of Pensacola, the ``Cradle of Naval Aviation'' and the place the Blue Angels call home, the Blues are their team. Think about whatever major sports team you have in your hometown and the love the community gives those professional or college athletes who compete on national television. It pales in comparison to the bond the people of Pensacola have to their home team, the Blue Angels. Our State and the community in Pensacola took the loss of Captain Kuss very hard. To the people who saw him around town, he was Jeff, a friend, a neighbor, and someone to be proud of. And true to the spirit of Pensacola, the community has rallied to provide comfort to Captain Kuss's teammates and to his family. I am so proud my home State is home to the Blues. I am proud Pensacola continues to embrace the Blues and to make every member of the Blue Angels family a part of the Pensacola family. I am proud the Blues will return to the Pensacola Beach Air Show this weekend, and I am proud the United States has a military made up of extraordinary Americans like Capt. Jeff Kuss. So I ask all Americans to keep Captain Kuss and his family in your prayers. Thank God for him, for our military men and women and families who sacrifice alongside them, and for the freedom they risk their lives to preserve. I ask that God bless Captain Kuss and his family and God bless the Blue Angels as they fly this weekend and in the weeks, months, and years to come. Central Everglades Planning Project Mr. President, I recently addressed the Senate and our Nation about truly a disaster that is wreaking havoc on my home State of Florida. It is a thick and putrid algal bloom known as the blue-green algae that has appeared along large stretches of the St. Lucie River and the Indian River Lagoon. This is happening because nutrient-rich water--basically, water that has things in it like fertilizer--is running into Lake Okeechobee from north of that lake, which is the lake in the center of our State. Historically, that water sat in Lake Okeechobee but would run southward through the Everglades, but with development and canal systems and so forth, that all stopped. So now that water sits in the lake, and it is held back by the Herbert Hoover Dike, which was put in place to prevent flooding and the loss of lives of those who live around Lake Okeechobee. When the water rises to levels that threaten the integrity of that dike, it needs to be released. And instead of being released in a clean form to the south the way it once historically was, it is now released to the east and to the west. These waters, rich in nutrients, are released into estuaries and canals that also have nutrients in them because of storm water runoff or because of seepage from faulty or old septic tanks. When that flow reaches the ocean, the estuaries, the lagoon, the lake, or the river and is under the hot sun--as it is during the summer--the conditions become ripe for an algae bloom. That is what we are seeing now. Although the bacteria is always present in the waters, it needs the present circumstances to form, and, unfortunately, the conditions we have now have been a perfect storm. This winter and spring provided numerous storms and produced so much rain that the Army Corps of Engineers began discharging water in January, and it hasn't stopped since. I recently requested the Army Corps to stop these harmful discharges. They agreed to slow the discharges but not to stop them entirely. With the State of Florida's emergency declaration, more water is able to be held north of the lake, which allows for less water to be discharged east and west out of the lake. I was there a couple of weeks ago, and it is a disgusting sight to see and to smell and to breathe. The algae has forced the closure of several beaches, killing fish and oysters, hurting tourism, harming local businesses, and sinking property values. People are canceling their vacations, and all of this is hurting the local economy in the Treasure Coast in enormous ways. So far, we have done a number of things to help address this problem. For example, I supported our Governor's request that President Obama declare this a Federal disaster so that resources can be made available to the impacted communities. I asked that the President approve this request promptly so that the much needed resources can be deployed. My office has also been working for months with the Small Business Administration on the harmful impacts of the discharges. In April we were able to get the SBA to ensure disaster loans were made available to businesses suffering from these discharges. We were recently able to confirm with the SBA that the disaster loans will apply to those affected by the current algal blooms. We have been in touch with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention about making sure the concerns many have about the health impacts of the algae are properly looked at and addressed. I was pleased to learn this week in a meeting that the CDC has been working with the State of Florida, and I have asked them to stand ready, should the State require more assistance. Perhaps the single most important long-term solution we can put in place is the need for the Senate and for the House to pass and for the President to sign the authorization for the Central Everglades Planning Project, which will divert these harmful discharges away from the coastlines and send more water south through the Everglades. We cannot lose our focus when it comes to these projects. As you heard a moment ago, the Senator from Michigan mentioned the water bill. Along with 29 other Senators, I sent a letter to Senate leadership, asking that the Water Resources Development Act receive floor consideration. I have also urged the leaders of the Senate to take this action, specifically because of the merits of the Central Everglades Planning Project included in that bill and because of its importance to Florida. I want to focus the rest of my time here on a new problem that emerged just last Friday. It deals with the discharges from Lake Okeechobee. As I mentioned, these discharges--the water being released--have been ongoing since January of this year, and what the discharges do is lower the salinity levels and cause the algae to bloom. Just when you think you have had enough problems to deal with on this, the Federal Government came out of nowhere last Friday and threw in another wrench. The Obama administration, through the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, ``recommended'' that the South Florida Water Management District force more water from the north into that lake that is already releasing too much water, and they did so in order to protect 10 snail kite bird nests--10 bird nests. If the local water district does not comply with this ``recommendation,'' the Federal Government has threatened to sue them. As I have just covered, the Lake Okeechobee discharges are part of the problem. Yet here come Federal regulators from a completely different department asking for more discharges. And why? To protect 10 bird nests. In Florida, we love our wildlife. We love our Florida panthers. We love our dolphins. We love our manatees. If you drive across the State, I can't tell you how many animals you will see on people's license plates because Florida's Department of Motor Vehicles provides many options for people to show just how much they love and support the different animals, the flora and fauna that our State has. In fact, I am one of those people with one of those plates. I have an alligator on mine, although it is the University of Florida Gator. We love our wildlife in Florida, but when you have situations and conflicts like this one, you are essentially trying to figure out whose side to be on: 10 bird nests of a species with numbers on the rise or millions of Treasure Coast residents and the marine life that inhabits those waters? The answer should be clear. Stop the discharges and side with the millions of people on the Treasure Coast. But the Federal Government is clearly not on their side. What the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service is demanding is truly beyond comprehension, and it is an example of a Federal bureaucracy run amok. If the local water district does as the Federal Government demands and releases held water into Lake Okeechobee, the Army Corps of Engineers is going to be forced to increase discharges into the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee estuaries. These regulatory decisions are having a real impact on Floridians, on our ecology, on our economy, and on our very way of life up and down the Treasure Coast. I asked the Director of Fish & Wildlife, as well as the Secretary of the Interior, to immediately reverse this harmful, tone-deaf instruction that, if they implement it, will only prolong the ecological crisis along the Florida waterways. Just admit that this makes no sense--no sense at all. Reverse this order, and let's focus on everything else we need to be doing on this algae issue and that we were focused on before the Federal Government decided to create yet another problem to deal with. Tribute to Emily Bouck Mr. President, on a third and final topic, today I would like to acknowledge a valued and long-term member of my Senate office who recently left our office. Emily Bouck has been on our team for nearly 7 years. She started as an intern on my 2010 Senate campaign and then came here to the Senate, proving herself, taking on every challenge asked of her, and ultimately helping me develop higher education and health care policies. Among the many issues that Emily handled for us, she worked tirelessly on the Zika issue and finding a way to help those afflicted with it. Everyone in my office has come to trust Emily's expertise. That is why she will be missed. We thank her for her service to our office and to the people of Florida, and we truly wish her the very best. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Vermont, who is next, for yielding me just a couple minutes. I want to be brief and to the point. Congress is 1 week away from recessing before the conventions. We have yet to appropriate significant funds to fight Zika. At this point, quite frankly, I don't care whose fault it is anymore--Republicans or Democrats. This whole partisan argument that is going on around this issue is inexcusable. Every single day now we have massive numbers of Zika cases being reported in my home State. Every day new records are being set. Just today a new case was found in a county that hadn't had a case yet. Forty-five out of fifty States in this country now have a Zika case. We have yet to see a local transmission, but it is coming, and I don't know, for the life of me, how anyone in this Chamber can go back home a week from now and say: We are going to be on recess for 6 weeks, in the peak of the summer, in the peak of mosquito season, in the peak of travel season, and we have appropriated nothing for the Zika virus. This makes no sense to me. Do you want to know why Congress's approval rating is at 1, 2, or 3 percent, if that? It is because on an issue of public health we cannot find a way forward. My hope is that in the days to come, we will have an understanding that allows us to move forward. I am not just talking to the Senate, I am also talking to the House. Let's appropriate money and move forward and deal with this issue appropriately, with the urgency it deserves, or everyone is going to have to answer to their constituents as to why this public health crisis has blossomed and bloomed and we did nothing about it. I truly hope, in the hours and days leading up to our recess, we will find a rapid and quick way forward so we can address this and fix it and give our people the help they need in the short term and ultimately move toward the money we need to research for a vaccine so this issue can be prevented and this disease can be prevented from spreading in the future. Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.

Mr. RUBIO

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

Mr. RUBIO. I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak as in morning business.

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, as you and others are well aware, Florida is often associated with its crystal blue waters, sport and commercial fishing, and pristine vacation destinations. This summer, a thick and putrid algal bloom known as the blue-green algae is threatening all of that and much more along large stretches of the St. Lucie River and the Indian River Lagoon. On Friday, I visited the area, and I can tell you this is an economic disaster in addition to an ecological crisis. I met many of the people whose lives have been thrown into turmoil. The algae has forced the closure of several beaches. Even this morning we were hearing reports of a surf camp where kids go out and learn how to surf and paddle board and so forth. They sign up in the summer to do this, and they are having parents canceling, and in some cases having to cancel themselves because of this. There were beaches closed during the Fourth of July, which is the peak season for many of these resorts, hotels, and local businesses. That is why I say they have been thrown into turmoil. Beyond that, this algae bloom is killing fish and oysters. It is hurting tourism. It is harming local businesses. It is sinking property values. Imagine if you just bought a home on the water there--the values are largely tied to access to water and the boat dock--and now you step outside, and sitting right there on your porch, basically, there is a thick green slime that some have compared to guacamole sitting on the surface of the ocean. You can imagine what that is doing to property values. Parents, of course, are viewing all of this and are concerned for the health of their children. There are a number of things we can do to address this immediately, and I have been working to make these things happen. First of all, let me describe how this is happening. This is happening because nutrient-rich water--water that has things in it like fertilizer--is running into Lake Okeechobee, which is at the center of the State. It is the largest inland body of water in the State. Historically, the water that sat in Lake Okeechobee would run southward into the Everglades. With development, canal systems, and so forth, that all stopped. Now this water is held back by a dike, which is put in place to prevent flooding. When the waters need to be released, they are released east and west. These waters are already rich in nutrients in Lake Okeechobee, and then they are released into the estuaries and canals, which also have nutrients in them because of runoff from faulty and old septic tanks. When these things reach the ocean, when they reach the estuaries, when they reach the lagoon or the lake or the river and they get into this heat, the result is what we are seeing now. Last week I wrote the Army Corps of Engineers, and I urged them to stop the discharges from Lake Okeechobee until the balance and health of the ecosystem in the area can recover. By the way, these discharges have been ongoing since January of this year, which has lowered salinity levels, and it caused the algae to bloom. I also invited the Assistant Secretary of the Army Corps to visit the area so they can witness the conditions firsthand. I was pleased that after my request the Army Corps announced it would decrease the discharges but, of course, much more needs to be done. My office has also been working with the Small Business Administration for months now on the harmful impact of these discharges. In April, we were able to ensure disaster loans were made available to businesses suffering from the discharges. Just yesterday, we were able to confirm that the disaster loans will apply to those currently affected by the current algal blooms. Perhaps the most important long-term solution that we can put in place is for the Senate and the House to pass and the President to sign the authorization for the Central Everglades Planning Project. The Central Everglades Planning Project will divert these harmful discharges away from the coastlines and send more water south through the Everglades. This is a project I had hoped would have been authorized in the last water resources bill in 2014, but delays by the administration in releasing the final Chiefs report prevented that from happening in 2014. Thanks to the leadership of Chairman Inhofe, the Central Everglades Planning Project is included in the EPW committee-reported Water Resources Development Act of 2016. Last week, I joined 29 of my colleagues in urging our leaders to bring this important bill before the full Senate. I plan to continue this support, and I hope we are able to get the Central Everglades Planning Project signed into law as soon as possible. Finally, we also need to know the long-term health risks posed by this algal bloom. I mentioned a moment ago that many parents are concerned about the safety of their kids as they play outside this summer. Let me tell you why they are concerned. The algae I saw lining the shores and in the coves and inlets will literally make you sick. There are already people complaining of headaches, rashes, and respiratory issues. At Central Marine in Stuart, you could not stand outside near the water and breathe the air without literally feeling sick. The smell is indescribable. The best thing I can use to describe it is if you opened up a septic tank or opened sewage in a third world country--that is how nasty this stuff is. By the way, when it dies, it turns this dark green-blue color, and then it becomes even more toxic. No one knows how to remove it. No one knows what is going to happen to it after it dies, except it is going to sit there. That is why we have been in contact with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which has been working with State officials, and I requested that they keep me informed and that they remain vigilant in their efforts to assist those impacted by the algae. This is truly a crisis for the State of Florida, but we are fortunate that Florida is well equipped to handle this issue. I have spoken to the Governor and to key officials on the ground about this. This should continue to be a joint effort by the Federal and State governments. Should the government decide this warrants a Federal disaster declaration, I will urge the President to approve it. That means that more resources could flow to those who have been negatively impacted by this, especially small businesses that have seen themselves in the peak season truly hurt by this event. In the meantime, Florida continues to face this serious problem, and unfortunately there simply is no silver bullet. Its effects will linger for quite some time. For people who are suffering through this right now, that is not a promising thing for me to say. If that were my house facing this algae, if that were my business wiped out with the cancelations, I would be angry too. It is important to remember this is not just an ecological crisis; it is a tragedy for the people on the Treasure Coast who have had to watch this algae threaten their communities and their livelihoods. This is a heated issue, as you can imagine, because we are talking about people's homes. We are talking about a way of life. Many people came up to me and said they grew up in the area, they remember the days where their whole summers were spent near that water, and now they can't even go in it. When we see a place as naturally beautiful as the Treasure Coast looking and smelling like an open sewer, you have a visceral and angry reaction to it. I know that I did. Sadly, whenever there are emotional and heated issues like these, people on both sides are willing to exploit them. Anyone who tells you they have the silver bullet answer to this problem is simply not telling the truth. They are lying. I have talked to experts, dozens of them. I visited with people across the spectrum on this issue, and the reality is that solving this issue will take time, persistence, and a number of things. There is no single thing we can do. There are a number of things, and they all have to happen in order for this to get better. These problems have existed for decades. This didn't happen overnight. This isn't something that started 2 weeks ago. This has been going on for decades. I have now been a Senator for a little less than 6 years, and in my time here, we have made steady progress on this issue. But it is not coming as fast as I would like, and it is not coming as fast as the people of the Treasure Coast need. The worst thing we could do right now is to divert critical resources from a plan that will work, from a plan designed by scientists, from a plan designed by experts that will work, but we have to put that plan in place. That is why I once again urge my colleagues to move forward on the Central Everglades Planning Project. It will allow us to begin the process of authorizing these important projects that will not only retain more water but will result in cleaner water going into Lake Okeechobee, cleaner water flowing out of Lake Okeechobee, and cleaner water moving south into the Everglades, the way it should be flowing and not east and west into these impacted communities. I am calling the Presiding Officer's attention to this because, as I have detailed, this is far from being merely a State issue. We do have our work cut out for us on the Federal level to help get this solved, but I am committed to this task. I ask my colleagues for their assistance so we can ensure that 5 and 10 years from now we are not still here talking about this happening all over again. With that, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I am a proud cosponsor of the Compressive Addiction and Recovery Act, or CARA, a bill that would help Americans in the fight against the opioid and heroin epidemic sweeping across our Nation. Due to the Orlando tragedy that took place on Sunday, I was unable to be present today to vote in favor of going to conference on CARA to finalize the legislation and further assist Americans in their battle against addiction. If I were present during the vote, I would have voted in favor of going to conference on CARA.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on May 26, 2016, at 10 a.m., in room SD-226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Transnational Crime, Civilian Security, Democracy, Human Rights, and Global Women's Issues be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on May 26, 2016, at 9 a.m., to conduct a hearing entitled ``Cartels and the U.S. Heroin Epidemic: Combating Drug Violence and Public Health Crisis.''

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on May 26, 2016, at 10 a.m., in room SH-216 of the Hart Senate Office Building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``A Review of the U.S. Livestock and Poultry Sectors: Marketplace Opportunities and Challenges.''

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on May 26, 2016, at 10 a.m., to conduct a hearing entitled ``Protecting America from the Threat of ISIS.''

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on May 26, 2016, at 10 a.m., in room SR-428A of the Russell Senate Office Building to conduct a hearing entitled ``Oversight of the SBA's 7(a) Loan Guarantee Program.''

Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Select Committee on Intelligence be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on May 26, 2016, at 2 p.m., in room SH-219 of the Hart Senate Office Building.

Mr. RUBIO

Mr. RUBIO. Madam President, we are on a motion to proceed to the National Defense Authorization Act, and there are so many different aspects of national security and defense that we touch upon. The Senator from West Virginia actually touched on one of them. A lot of people may not consider it that way, but the threat posed to the United States by transnational criminal groups operating out of Mexico and other parts of the hemisphere are a direct threat to the security of our people. We had a hearing earlier today in our subcommittee, the Western Hemisphere Subcommittee, and we heard testimony from government officials and the administration talking about the threats being posed. Here is the bottom line. You have these multibillion dollar, multinational entities operating south of our border. We all heard about El Chapo Guzman and the Sinaloa Cartel, but there are others as well, and they are both growing poppy opiates, but they are also manufacturing synthetic fentanyl. There is a prescription version of fentanyl, but this is a synthetic, nonpharmaceutical version, and all of it, basically 100 percent of the stuff they are growing, is being trafficked directly to the United States. There is not a State in the Union or territory in our country or jurisdiction represented by any Member of the Senate which has not been deeply impacted by this war they are waging against us. So it was an insightful hearing and I think reminds us that on the one side we need to deal with treatment aspects because people who are dependent on an opiate substance are sick and they need help as if it is a disease, not a crime. The other aspect of it is the people pushing the stuff into our country, deliberately targeting us. They are murderers. They are not just killers because they kill each other and innocent people, they are killers because they know the people they are selling these drugs to, they are deliberately trying to hook them on these drugs and they read and know the overdose deaths we have seen. There is an extraordinary growing military-to-military relationship between the national defense parts of our government and our partners in Mexico and other countries and will continue to be. There has to be because these groups need to be defeated or they will continue to spread their poison and death into cities, towns, and our States. Human Rights Madam President, another aspect of national defense that people don't think about when people think about national defense is the issue of human rights. So much of the instability that is happening around the world that we have to respond to militarily out of our national security interests are driven by the violation of human rights. Oftentimes our soldiers, sailors, our service men and women, when called to engage militarily or be present militarily in any part of the world, are also having to deal with the consequences of what is happening from a human rights perspective. Where it gets difficult is in many cases some of the countries that are violating the human rights of their people and others happen to be military allies of ours. It is always a balance that people argue, but no matter what our arrangements may be with any potential military partner anywhere in the world, we should never back away from the cause of human rights, for not only is it the right thing to do, which speaks to our values as a people and nation, but human rights is also a leading cause of instability. The violation of human rights leads to this instability. It is what causes people to take to the streets to try to get rid of their governments and their leaders. So I come to the floor today to bring to your attention an ongoing human rights issue that weighs heavily on me and should weigh heavily on all of us. Every day people are unjustly detained, tortured, publicly shamed, and murdered, often at the hands of their own government. Here is what their crimes are: simply disagreeing with the government--disagreeing through journalism, blogging, peaceful organizing, or for simply being in a different religion. In jail cells all around the world, there are innocent men and women who wanted nothing more than to freely express themselves in the society in which they live. The vast number of political prisoners held by repressive regimes is a sobering reminder of how much work remains to uphold basic human rights and advance democratic values. From Cuba to China, from Turkey to Saudi Arabia, people are suffering for exercising freedoms that our Creator gave them. I say the phrase ``political prisoners,'' but I remind you that these prisoners oftentimes are ordinary people like us--people who dream of a greater future for their country, people who envision a better life for their families and loved ones. They are journalists, bloggers, many are human rights activists, educators. Some are politicians. We also have pastors, mothers and fathers and students. America traditionally has been a voice for those oppressed. We as a country and as a people have engaged in what Ronald Reagan once described as ``the age-old battle for individual freedom and human dignity.'' It is unacceptable for America to forsake this legacy today, to turn its back on our fellow human beings who are losing their lives or being imprisoned for exercising their fundamental, God-given freedoms. This is why last September my office launched a social media campaign we call hashtag ``expressionNOToppression.'' Each week we highlight a different political prisoner or prisoner of conscience in an effort to put a human face on the many who suffer from oppressive regimes around the world. Today I come to share the stories of some of the people we have championed in the past year. In 2014, Tibetan writer and blogger Dawa Tsomo was detained for breaking China's cyber laws by publishing articles that the government considered ``politically sensitive.'' To this day, she is missing. Today, China is one of the most repressive countries in the entire world. In Cuba, matters are just as serious, if not worse. Beatings, public acts of shame, and termination of employment are well-known consequences of disagreeing with the Castro regime. The Castro regime has rearrested almost all of the 53 political prisoners it released as part of the supposed normalization of relations that President Obama undertook at the end of 2014. Remember the 53 names on the list of people they were going to let go as part of the normalization? Virtually all 53 of them have since been rearrested. The Cuban people know they deserve better. Groups throughout the island have continuously stood up against oppression. One of the most prominent is the group the Ladies in White or, in Spanish, Damas de Blanco. Many of those who make up this group are the wives and relatives of jailed dissidents protesting the unlawful imprisonment of their husbands, sons, brothers, and fathers. So each Sunday following Catholic mass, the Ladies in White take to the streets in a silent march. They are often harassed, arrested, and even beaten by the Cuban Government. In fact, this last Sunday, the leader of the Ladies in White was arrested. She will soon be placed on trial and can face between 3 months and 5 years in prison, but this sort of treatment hasn't stopped them. Week after week, these women continue to protest the Castro regime and fight for the freedom of their nation and of their loved ones. In the disaster that has become Venezuela, due to its incompetent tyrant leader, Nicolas Maduro, a tyrant who is an incompetent clown, we have seen one of the most prominent opposition leaders, Leopoldo Lopez, arrested and sentenced to 13 years 9 months in prison on charges of terrorism, murder, and grievous bodily harm and public incitement-- sounds like pretty serious charges. Here is the reality. Leopoldo Lopez, who was the Governor of a prominent state in the country, was imprisoned for advocating for a constitutional democratic and peaceful change in the Venezuelan Government. That is why he is in jail. Since the Venezuelan Government's crackdown on opponents began in February of 2014, dozens of innocents have been killed, thousands have been beaten and targeted for intimidation, and hundreds more have been jailed, not to mention that most of these political prisoners in Venezuela are men. Do you know what happens to the wives of these men in jail when they go visit their spouses in prison? They are often stripped-searched by male guards in front of their families as the act of ultimate humiliation. This is what we are dealing with in Venezuela. In late March of this year, the Venezuelan National Assembly passed a law that would extend amnesty to more than 70 prisoners in Venezuela because they had an election. Even though the Maduro government always steals the elections in Venezuela, the loss was so overwhelming they couldn't steal this election. So the opposition won control of the Venezuelan National Assembly, and they passed a law that extended amnesty to more than 70 political prisoners who are in Venezuelan jails simply because they opposed Maduro, not because they committed a crime. To no one's surprise, the tyrant Nicolas Maduro promised to block it. He claimed it was unconstitutional. Only a few weeks later, he sent a law to the supreme court and urged them to overturn it. Four days after his request, the supreme court--a supreme court which is illegitimate because it is completely stacked with his cronies--granted him his wish and declared the law unconstitutional. So that is why there has been a coup d'etat in Venezuela. That is why democracy has been canceled and why there is now tyranny. You have an elected national assembly being ignored, and you have a supreme court being stacked with cronies who are basically a rubberstamp for the tyrant. The result is the gross violation of human rights, most prominently of Leopoldo Lopez. In Pakistan, we have seen proponents of religious freedom murdered for criticizing blasphemy laws. In March of 2011, Shahbaz Bhatti, Pakistan's Federal Minister of Minority Affairs-- and, by the way, the only Christian to serve in Pakistan's Cabinet--was shot to death by the Pakistani Taliban outside of his mother's home. Five years have passed. The Pakistani Government has failed to bring his murderers to justice and have failed to reform the blasphemy law that continues to encourage violence, murder with impunity, and the marginalization of religious minorities. As a result, numerous other prisoners of conscience in Pakistan suffer behind bars. Finally, as President Obama visited Vietnam this week, a Vietnamese blogger and human rights activist named Nguyen Huu Vinh was languishing in a state prison for having voiced the wrong opinions about his government. These example are just a tiny window into the world of political oppression that exists today. Their cases are only a few that we have highlighted in our hashtag ``expressionNOToppression'' campaign. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a list of additional political prisoners we have featured.

Mr. RUBIO. They span the globe from Angola to Laos, from Iran to Burma. All of these men and women were seen as a threat to the leaders of their nations. But I--and I agree the Presiding Officer as well--see them as heroes. Just because they aren't fighting on a battlefield doesn't mean they aren't putting their lives on the line for the greater good of their people and their nation. In a country where we are free to express ourselves, it is hard to grasp this risk. It is difficult to imagine a prominent journalist in the United States fearing for his or her life solely for doing their job or to fathom a popular blogger facing the death penalty solely for expressing their thoughts. Well, this should be just as unimaginable, to jail independent journalists in the rest of the world. The families of the prisoners I mentioned today have also paid a price. Most of these families spend their days and nights unsure if they will ever again see their loved ones. There are no visiting hours. There are no phone calls. In the cases of many on death row, their families often find out they have been executed on the state-run media. Children are being left to grow up on their own, wondering where their mother or their father has gone, wondering if they will ever feel their embrace again. But there are reasons to be hopeful, for when free people speak out, it can make a difference in the lives of the oppressed. As a result of numerous international efforts, including our hashtag ``expressionNOToppression'' campaign, some prisoners of conscience have been released from jail and reunited with their families, although they may not be able to return to their home country. We saw it in the case of the Cuban street artist known as El Sexto, who was freed last October after 10 months in prison. We saw it in the case of prominent Azerbaijani human rights activist Leyla Yunus and her husband Arif, who were released from jail only on the grounds of deteriorating health but have since been allowed to travel to the Netherlands for medical care and to be reunited with their daughter. Once released, many have agreed that our advocacy on their behalf was a great encouragement to them and their families and, by the way, likely resulted in better treatment or even a speedier release. A few years ago, famed Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky testified on Capitol Hill. He said of himself and fellow prisoners of conscience in the USSR that ``we could never survive even one day in the Soviet Union if our struggle was not the struggle of the free world.'' We should take to heart this sentiment he expressed and embrace the struggle of political prisoners who languish unjustly as I speak. We must do everything we can to raise awareness of the brutality taking place in repressive regimes around the world. We must not forget the hundreds of people who are being tortured or being deprived of their lives for trying to bring freedom to their land while illegitimate governments desperately cling to power. Even with our strategic allies, such as Saudi Arabia, we can never stop insisting that they show respect for women, for all human life, and for the God-given fundamental rights of all people. Oppressed peoples do not stay oppressed forever. Oppressive governments do not stay in power forever. Inevitably, the human yearning to be free and to achieve a better life for one's self and one's family eventually cannot be restrained. Today, I pray for those who are victims of their own government. I pray for the release of prisoners of conscience and their families. I pray that our own country stands firmly by its principles by calling for the sacred right of every man and woman and child to be free. Tribute to Maggie Dougherty Lastly, Madam President, on a point of personal privilege, I would like to take a moment to thank Maggie Dougherty, who has been a valuable member of my legislative team for the past 5 years and specialized in issues of human rights around the world. Her expertise and, just as importantly, her passion on these issues have been invaluable to me and to my staff. Her service to our country, to the people of Florida, to the Senate, and to many individuals and families like the ones I just mentioned who suffer around the world will not be forgotten. I thank you for your service, Maggie. I wish you the best of luck in your future endeavors. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. RUBIO

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