Jeff Sessions

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, on Sunday, during a joint press conference in Hannover, Germany, with Chancellor Angela Merkel, the President of the United States said this: And with respect to Congress and the Trans-Pacific Partnership-- That is the big 5,000-page trade agreement the President is trying to move through Congress-- I think after the primary season is over-- After the primary season is over-- the politics settle down a little bit in Congress, and we'll be in a position to start moving forward. Because I know that we had a majority of members in the past who were in favor of this deal. Otherwise we wouldn't have gotten the authority for me to go ahead and fast track the agreement. But I think we all know that elections can sometimes make things a little more challenging, and people take positions, in part, to protect themselves from attacks during the course of election seasons. I would suggest the American people should be very uneasy about their President making such a statement as that. We have already heard that there are plans by a number of forces and interest groups to try to slip this TPP through after the election in a lameduck congressional session. Why would that be the case? Well, the President says it right here: The American people are uneasy about it. They are not for this. Support for it is sinking. Elections are turning on it. And it does not need to become law. I am firmly opposed to this agreement. I believe it is bad for our country. It bothers me that if it is such a good deal, why don't they bring it forward? Why don't we have a debate here while elections are on? Why aren't people willing to go home and explain to their constituents how and why they voted the way they did and how and why they believe the way they do? What is wrong with that? Why wait until after, when things settle down a little bit, in the President's words, when people can't be held accountable by their constituents for the votes they cast or they think they may be able to slide away afterward? I don't like this. I don't think it is the right thing to do. I think it is arrogant. What the President is fundamentally saying and what a lot of these special interest groups are saying is, well, we know you in Congress are so smart, and we know the President is smart. But, the people out here, they don't understand how smart we all are, and we just need to get this done, and so we will have this trade agreement. But we understand you probably shouldn't do it right now while elections are going on because, well, you might get your clock cleaned. They might vote you out of office. So we will see if we can't work up a way to pass it sometime in the future. The President has made it clear that he intends to continue to push through this 5,544-page trade agreement that the American people don't want. Polls show consistent disapproval of the TPP. A March poll by Americans for Limited Government found that 51 percent of Americans did not know anything about it. I would say at least 50 percent of the Members of Congress don't know much about it. It is more than 5,000 pages. I have probably spent more time on it than the vast majority have, and it is rather difficult to read. No wonder the American people say they don't know a lot about it. But of those who claim to be familiar with it, 58 percent oppose it. There are a lot of reasons for this, and we will talk about it more. Today, U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman announced that they are beginning the 13th round of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership--TTIP, they call it--with the European Union in New York. So this is the second part of the fast-track. The fast-track guarantees a fast vote--without amendments, without the option to filibuster, on the floor of the Senate for less than 2 days, and you get an up-or-down vote. That is what fast-track does. So we will have the Pacific agreement probably coming up first, and then we will have the TTIP, the Atlantic agreement, and then there is a third one, the Trade in Services Agreement. All of these are huge trade agreements, unlike anything we have seen before, creating in the Pacific an international trade union similar to the beginning of the European Union that Britain is trying to get out of. I think we should be very dubious about that. How is the trade agreement faring in Europe? How about Germany, which is probably one of the leading trading countries in Europe? A poll by the Bertelsmann Foundation, a nonprofit organization that studies domestic and international politics, found that only 17 percent of Germans feel that TTIP--the transatlantic partnership--would be a good deal even though less than 2 years ago it had a 55-percent positive rating. This study found that the more people learn about the agreement, the more they oppose it. The same thing is happening in the United States, in my opinion. The President has referred to the TPP as the ``most progressive trade deal in history.'' Its chapters create new labor and environmental provisions that the public really knows nothing about. Even the economic data the White House promotes as proving the validity of the TPP, if we look at it carefully, we can see that their own report and study that they cite the most--that signing the agreement will decrease the rate of American manufacturing jobs by 120,000. How is this good for America? By their own study, we are going to lose 120,000 manufacturing jobs that we would have maintained had we not signed the agreement. Another study by Tufts University said the country will lose 400,000 jobs. We are going to go into the differences in the studies, we are going to see the assumptions utilized in the model the President cites, and we are going to see that the assumptions they made are not reasonable. They are extreme assumptions--assumptions that would never occur in the next 15 years as they assume they will occur. No wonder they can justify positive numbers with those kinds of assumptions. I think all of us have to begin to reveal--and the American people need to be more alert--how bad this international agreement really is, how it will not positively affect the lives of most Americans. It is just not going to do so. We will look at how the Korean trade deal that I supported in 2011 came nowhere close to being beneficial to the United States. In 2011, when President Obama signed the deal, the President said that it would increase American exports by $10 billion to South Korea. I thought that was a good thing. It sounded pretty good, but their estimates were way off. The model that experts used to study the Korean trade deal is the same one they are using to study the TPP, and so we have a pretty good test: Did we increase exports by $10 billion each year to South Korea, as the model suggested? Well, their imports to us increased by $12 billion, and as of last year, we only increased our exports to Korea by less than a couple of hundred million dollars more than in 2011. So we didn't get any increase at all--virtually none. They had a huge increase to us, and our trade deficit with our allies and friends in South Korea increased 280 percent. This is a serious matter. The same thing happened: They used this same computer model when we signed the agreement with China in 2000. We then had a little less than $70 billion in trade deficit with China. They assumed our exports to China would grow at the same rate as China's exports to the United States would grow. Did that happen? No. What is the trade deficit with China today? Pushing $400 billion. Our trade deficit went up 6 percent again last year. So who is right here: The American people, who are worried about their jobs, their wages, their incomes, or the experts who promised all these grand things if we would just sign these agreements and everybody is going to be better off for it? I think the American people are the ones who have been proven right by this data.

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to have 1 additional minute.

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, the President does not need to be threatening our allies in Britain about the decision of their own people on whether to exit from the European Union. They are not happy with how things are going in the European Union. A lot of people are concerned about it. It is heading toward a close vote. The people of the United Kingdom can make their own decision without hearing advice or threats from the President of the United States. I don't blame them for being offended by it. This is certainly not an acceptable position for the President to take. Madam President, I appreciate the opportunity to share these remarks. I want to push back from the President's recent statements about this trade agreement, how he plans to move it through when people aren't watching. I also think Congress needs to speak and assert that we affirm the right of the people of the UK to decide whether to remain in the European Union. I thank the Chair. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, today I wish to discuss S. Res. 408. I am delighted that the Senate has unanimously declared April as National Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia Awareness Month for the fourth consecutive year. I would like to thank my friend and able colleague, Senator Ben Cardin of Maryland, for joining me in this legislation. This resolution is very important to me and my family as my grandson Jim Beau is a CDH survivor. I specifically wanted to speak today, April 19, to commemorate Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia Action Day. Charities and families in 60 countries and cities all over the U.S. are working together to raise CDH Awareness through State and town proclamations, lighted buildings, Parades of Cherubs, fundraisers, and other events. CDH is a birth defect that occurs when the fetal diaphragm fails to fully develop. The lungs develop at the same time as the diaphragm and the digestive system. When a diaphragmatic hernia occurs, the abdominal organs move into and develop in the chest instead of remaining in the abdomen. With the heart, lungs, and abdominal organs all taking up space in the chest, the lungs do not have space to develop properly. This may cause the lungs to be small and underdeveloped. A diaphragmatic hernia is a life-threatening condition. When the lungs do not develop properly during pregnancy, it can be difficult for the baby to breathe after birth, or the baby is unable to take in enough oxygen to stay healthy. Several members from the CHERUBS group visited my office yesterday. I was encouraged by their good spirit and enthusiasm. These individuals have been coming to Capitol Hill every year for the last several years to advocate for Federal assistance for this birth defect. Over the last 4 years, we have made good progress. We have seen an increase in funding at the National Institutes of Health, NIH. In fiscal year 2015, the NIH funded approximately $3,300,000 in CDH research. This is an increase of $800,000 from fiscal year 2014. We have also seen an increase in awareness and education. But more research is needed. The cause of CDH remains unknown. Most cases of diaphragmatic hernia are believed to be multifactorial in origin, meaning both genetic and environmental factors are involved. It is thought that multiple genes from both parents, as well as a number of environmental factors that scientists do not yet fully understand, contribute to the development of a diaphragmatic hernia. Congenital diaphragmatic hernia is a birth defect that occurs in 1 out of every 3,836 live births worldwide. The CDC estimates that CDH affects 1,088 babies in the U.S. each year. Every 10 minutes, a baby is born with CDH, adding up to more than 700,000 babies with CDH since just 2000; yet most people have never heard of CDH. Up to 20 percent of cases of CDH have a genetic cause due to a chromosome defect or genetic syndrome. According to the CDC, babies born with CDH experience a high mortality rate ranging from 20-60 percent depending on the severity of the defect and the treatments available at delivery. The mortality rate has remained stable since 1999. Approximately 40 percent of babies born with CDH will have other birth defects, in addition to CDH. The most common is a congenital heart defect. Awareness, good prenatal care, early diagnosis, and skilled treatment are the keys to a greater survival rate in these babies. That is why this resolution is so important. In 2009, my grandson Jim Beau was diagnosed with CDH during my daughter Mary Abigail's 34th week of pregnancy. At that time, no one in my family had heard of CDH before. My family was very lucky that Jim Beau's defect was caught before he was born and that he was in the right place to receive excellent care for his CDH. He is now a happy, rambunctious 6-year-old. The resolution Senator Cardin and I introduced is important because it will bring awareness to this birth defect, and this awareness will save lives. Although hundreds of thousands of babies have been diagnosed with this defect, the causes are still unknown, and more research is needed. Every year more is learned and there are more successes. We are making good progress, and we must continue these efforts. I want to thank my colleagues for joining me in supporting this legislation to bring awareness to CDH. I thank the Chair.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I thank Senator Rubio for his comments and his heartfelt expressions. It is important, and his amendment is very commonsensical. It deals with a very real abuse that I know he and many Cuban Americans understand to be an abuse and want to see ended. This would be a good opportunity for us to pass it, and I understand Senator Rubio's frustrations that we seem to be unable to fix problems around this body. That is my feeling this afternoon, too--this frustration that we are not able to finally take action on things like the entry-exit visa system and complete it, as we promised to do for years. We get very close, but we don't get there. I thank Senator Rubio for his excellent leadership on this issue and support for the amendment that I have worked on. I think it is very reasonable and an appropriate amendment. It gives plenty of opportunity for us to carry out the necessary program in a reasonable way. The amendment I submitted will ensure the implementation of the statutorily required biometric exit system. It has been in law for a long time. It was first set in law in 1996--20 years ago. There were at least eight or more times where we mandated this legislation. The first one was in 1996. These requirements were basically ignored. They were eventually modified and then the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, occurred. Congress responded to that by demanding the government implement this entry-exit system when we passed the PATRIOT Act to provide greater security for America. It stated that an entry-exit data system should be fully implemented for airports, seaports, land border ports of entry ``with all deliberate speed and as expeditiously as practical.'' That was in 2001. If you remember what happened after 9/11, we had a 9/11 Commission-- and it was a bipartisan Commission--and that Commission was charged with a serious responsibility of analyzing our immigration system, analyzing our public safety system, our intelligence system, and all kinds of problems that made us more vulnerable than we need to be. One of their recommendations was that we have a system when you come into America on a visa, you clock yourself in--like many workplaces have-- and you clock yourself out when you leave the country and your time on your visa expires. Then the United States would know who would come and who had exited. Of course, we also know, if you recall back to that day, a number of the 9/11 attackers who killed 3,000 Americans came on visas lawfully. Several of them overstayed with the visas they had. So this was the response. We have the capability of doing this. We have had the capability for many years, and it has not happened. Ten years after 2001, the 9/11 attack, the 9/11 Commissioners met again. The purpose of their meeting was to ascertain how much of what they had recommended had actually been accomplished by the U.S. Government. One of the very first things they noted was the failure to complete the exit system. This is why it has become such a big issue. In 2002 we passed a law that further moved forward with the system. It required the government to install biometric readers and scanners at all ports of entry of the United States. In fact, we have a system to collect biometric information from individuals who wish to enter the country, but oddly we don't have the exit system. Why is it so much harder to have a system to allow you to document your exit than it is to document your entry? This is a serious problem. Subsequently, and consistent with the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, Congress passed the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, which mandated the entry-exit system be complete and be biometrically based. That is different from biographic. In a biographically-based system, you give your Social Security number and name and they check to see if somebody has a warrant out for your arrest or if you should be on a no-fly list or if you are connected with terrorism or organized crime or drug-dealing gangs or whatever is in our systems. You can just give a false name. That is not a very secure system at all. What the 9/11 Commission correctly concluded was, if you used a biometric system where they read your fingerprints, somebody couldn't come in and say they are John Jones and they are really Ralph Smith, who has a warrant out for his arrest for terrorism somewhere. That is the kind of thing this system was designed to do and can be done. Despite the relatively successful implementation of a biometric entry system, the Department has largely failed to implement the requirements. To date, the Department of Homeland Security has only implemented a handful of pilot programs. It is not hard to do. Yet they have been dragging their feet for years now. However, there are some promising developments on this system. The Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2016 created a dedicated source of money for implementation of the biometric exit. It has been estimated that this will result in approximately $1 billion in funds that will be used solely for the implementation of the biometric exit system. That is already in law and required to be a part of our legal and immigration system. Yet, even with this source of funding, hurdles remain to the implementation this system. My amendment will remove one of the biggest remaining hurdles to the implementation of the system. It simply states that no funds from this Federal aviation bill, which funds airports, runways, safety systems, and all of those different systems, can be expended ``for the physical modification of any existing air navigation facility that is a port of entry or construction of a new air navigation facility intended to be a port of entry, unless the Secretary of Homeland Security certifies that the owner or sponsor of the facility has agreed to a plan that guarantees the installation and implementation of the [biometric exit system] at such facility not later than 2 years after the date of the enactment of the Act.'' In other words, it gives them 2 years. They have to reach an agreement to actually take steps to fix this problem. I modified my amendment in an attempt to address some concerns that were raised by the airlines by explicitly referring to the $1 billion appropriated for this system. We received positive feedback from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which has to deal with this every day. My amendment also has been endorsed by the Border Patrol Union. They know this is a loophole in our system, a gaping hole in our security. They want to see it completed, and it is long overdue. The amendment allows the U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers and each airport that serves as a port of entry to create a solution that works specifically for the needs of the CBP and the limitations of each individual airport. It does require, however, that the parties agree to a plan that guarantees the system will be installed and implemented. The suggestions we have had in response as to the kind of language critics and objectors would like to see--it never has an end date. They say, well, you can begin a pilot project or you can do this, that, and the other, but they never give a date as to when it should actually be completed. Colleagues, this system can be made to work. In my opinion, it can be implemented in every airport in 6 months. We have companies that have this kind of system that is used all over the place, and even Disney World and Disneyland use a fingerprint system. It is on our cell phones. This is the kind of thing that is really no problem to make happen, but we lack the will and determination to see it through, and we let people who don't like it-- special interest groups--push back, and as a result, it somehow never gets completed. In fact, Homeland Security, airports, and airlines have already had a generous amount of time in which to get this completed. It could be done quickly. One manufacturer said: We should host a special products day. You should just have a day out here. People think it can't be done. Have a day and ask all the manufacturers around the country to bring forth their equipment that is being used in businesses and places all over the country, such as nuclear plants, and set them up and let us show you what we can do with it. Another company said: You don't even have to touch a screen. You can wave your hand in front of the screen, and it will read your fingerprints. These are proven products, and the prices are low and falling and at the most basic level. If Apple and Samsung can put it on their phones, we can certainly do it at the airports. The special interests also say it will take up a lot of space. It will not take up a lot of space. Police officers have these kinds of fingerprint-reading systems in their automobiles. When they arrest somebody for a crime and want to know if there is a warrant for that person's arrest somewhere around the country, they ask that person to put their hand on the screen. The computer reads it and runs the fingerprint against the National Crime Information Center records. If it says bingo, there is a warrant for his arrest for murder, robbery, or drug dealing, they can detain that person. CBP can work with larger airports with international terminals and install physical equipment at their international departure gates. It is only the international departure gates. CBP--Customs and Border Patrol--can work with smaller airports and even deploy handheld systems similar to the ones that are in cars at the gates that handle international flights. Ultimately, all passengers exiting the United States need to do is place their hands on a simple screen--or with some devices, just wave their hands at it--and it will biometrically identify the passenger as truly the one shown on the flight documents as exiting the United States. You can come here with a false document. Terrorists work on these things all the time. Terrorists use false identification. We know there are systems out there making them by the thousands and tens of thousands. But if your fingerprint doesn't match the fingerprint of the person whose name you are using and it turns out to match somebody who is on a terrorist watch list, then you can stop it and create safety. If a person puts out their hand and there is a hit because the person boarding the plane is on a no-fly list, the passenger can be denied boarding or removed from the plane before it takes off, and their baggage can be removed from the plane before it takes off. Importantly, the United States will have a unified, automatically produced list of people who departed when their visa said they should depart and a list of people who did not depart when their visa expired. By the way, colleagues, several years ago the Congressional Budget Office found that 40-plus percent of people illegally in America came by visa. They came legally; they just did not leave. They said that number is increasing. I believe it is increasing rather rapidly, and we are going to see more of it in the future. If you don't have a system to identify people who overstay their lawful entry, then you do not have a lawful system of immigration. It is just that simple. For a host of reasons, this system should be based on fingerprints. The former Secretary of Homeland Security and former Governor of Pennsylvania, Secretary Ridge, set up this system some time ago. When I talked to him about it, I told him as a former prosecutor that it needed to be based on the fingerprint system. Some people had other ideas about it, such as eye or facial recognition. These things can technically be done, but they can't run a check on somebody who committed murder somewhere and has a warrant out for their arrest and is fleeing the United States, because our basic law enforcement system only has certain data of people who are wanted for criminal activity. You need to use the fingerprint. It has been proven, it works, and it is used in every criminal justice system in the United States. When he left office after going round and round about this subject, Secretary Ridge said: I have one bit of advice for my successors, and that is, use the fingerprint. I believe he was totally correct, and it still remains the only real system that will work. Let's also be aware that numerous countries across the world-- including New Zealand, Singapore, and Hong Kong--have been using biometric systems for years. This is nothing new. Others do it, and we can do it too. Ending this failure has bipartisan support. My subcommittee, the Subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest, held a hearing on January 20 of this year entitled--I thought it was a pretty good title--``Why is the biometric exit tracking system still not in place?'' That is a pretty good question. Well, during the hearing, we got promises from government officials, but there was no commitment that they would actually complete the system. They said: Oh, we are doing pilot projects. We are considering this and working on it. Well, they have been working on it for 20 years. We had our members who were there--all three Democratic members who were at that subcommittee hearing said they favor this. There is no real opposition to it. Just a few weeks after the hearing, Secretary Johnson of Homeland Security made public statements directing DHS to begin implementation of the system at our airports by 2018. To begin implementation when? In 2018. There was no promise that it would be completed, and there was no assurance that they were going to make the system a reality. This is at least an acknowledgement that it is needed, but we need a completion date. It is these kinds of lulling comments that we have heard for years that have resulted in no action. If people in the Senate would like to know why the American people are not happy with the performance of Congress, this is a very good example. Congress promises to fix the problem, even claims we voted for and passed laws to fix a problem, and then it stands by while two decades go by and nothing happens. Why? Well, their special interests speak up. We have lobbyists sending out letters telling Members to oppose the Sessions amendment. It is time for us to represent the national interest. The time for the special interests is over on this subject. Congress has spoken repeatedly. The American people are getting tired of this. I am getting tired of this. Who runs this place? Elected representatives or some high-paid lobbyist somewhere? They have been dragging this out and fighting it tenaciously with every effort they have had for years, and it has not happened and America is at risk because of it. Airports and airlines are happy to get Federal assistance whenever they can. They better be trying to cooperate and make their airlines even safer than they are today. It is time to fulfill the promise and commitment we made to the American people. How much longer can this go on? We promised the American people a system that will demonstrably improve our national security. We voted for it time and again. We have bipartisan support for it. If we can get a vote on this amendment, we will see a huge bipartisan majority vote for it. I don't know who would vote against it. But we don't get to vote, and as a result nothing happens for years. This was noted by the former Commissioners on the 9/11 Commission in a report issued in 2014: Without exit-tracking, our government does not know when a foreign visitor admitted to the United States on a temporary basis has overstayed his or her admission. Had this system been in place on 9/11, we would have had a better chance of detecting the plotters before they struck. That is why it is important. We have long known that visa overstays pose a serious national security risk. A number of the hijackers on September 11 overstayed their visas. The number of visa overstays implicated in terrorism since that date is certainly a significant number. A new poll came out earlier this year that indicates that three out of four Americans not only want the Obama administration to find those aliens who overstay their visas but to also deport them. Why not? They came here for a limited period of time. We have a law that says they can stay for a certain amount of time. It is not that hard to get a visa to the United States, but shouldn't they leave when their visa is up? Do they just get to stay here and take a job, perhaps from an unemployed American citizen? The same poll indicates that 68 percent of Americans consider visa overstays as a ``serious national security risk'' and 31 percent consider visa overstays as a ``very serious'' national security risk. There is no doubt as to why. The risk to our national security is too high for us to maintain the status quo. We must fulfill this promise. We must do everything we can to implement the system. I hope that some way, somehow, before this bill goes to final passage--dealing with airports and public safety issues--we fix this problem. Why not? I don't know a single person who opposes it, but we couldn't get the amendment up; we couldn't make it pending. The Democrats objected to it. Now we have an objection to having a vote on it before final passage of the legislation. So I am frustrated. I have been pushing this for years. Even the Gang of 8 bill had it in there. So this is not something that I think is in any way unreasonable. It is time to bring it to a conclusion. I urge my colleagues: Let's figure out a way to make this happen. I appreciate Senator Thune, who is managing the bill. He is definitely for it and wants to see it happen. But right now we have objections from the Democratic side, and we don't seem to be able to get it through. I urge my colleagues to reevaluate and approve passage of this amendment that should have virtually unanimous support in the Senate. Mr. President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, today I wish to congratulate the Airbus workers at their new facility in Mobile, AL, for completing their first jet, the first Airbus A321 in the United States. Airbus and its Alabama employees have worked tirelessly for several years toward this achievement. The Airbus A321 is an advanced airplane and constructing it is no easy task. There is no doubt that building the A321 required immense dedication from the workers in the plant to the suppliers across Alabama and the entire southeast. I am pleased that Airbus continues to be a leading participant in the manufacturing resurgence in Alabama. The company joins hundreds of others that have recently located their operations in our State, which is a testament to the quality of Alabama products. It is great news indeed for America that one of the finest aircraft manufacturing companies is producing popular, fast-selling models in the United States, and specifically in Mobile, AL. While this accomplishment is only the beginning, let us join together and enjoy the celebration of this important milestone for Airbus, Alabama, and the people of our community.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I would like to speak on an amendment I have submitted that will ensure the implementation of what is already required by statute: a biometric exit system for the United States. The law has required a biometric--that means a fingerprint, as opposed to biographic, which is name and birth date--system that allows us to know who is coming into this country on a visa and whether they left when they were supposed to leave. It is absolutely critical to the safety of the United States. It is something the 9/11 Commission recommended as a high priority. Ten years later, when they did their Review Commission report to see how their recommendations had been carried out, they noted that one of their top concerns was the failure of Congress to complete the system. Right now when you come into the United States, you put your hand on a screen and they clock you in biometrically, and then when you leave, there is no system that clocks you out. It is just like going to work every day. You take one of these iPhones. It has got this place on the bottom where you put your finger. I put my thumb on it. I don't have to put in my pass code; it simply reads my fingerprint. This is done all over America. These screens are not expensive. They don't require a lot of space. It is something that should be done. It has not been done. The first requirement for this was in 1996 through the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act. The requirements were largely ignored, and eventually modified until the terrorist attacks on September 11 caused us to focus again on the issue. Congress responded by once again demanding that government implement an exit system with the passage of the USA PATRIOT Act, which stated that an entry and exit data system should be fully implemented for airports, seaports, and land border ports of entry ``with all deliberate speed and as expeditiously as practical.'' Fifteen years ago, that occurred. Congress then reiterated its demand for a biometric entry-exit system in 2002 when it passed the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act. This bill required the government to install biometric readers and scanners ``at all ports of entry of the United States.'' Subsequently and consistent with the recommendations of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, Congress passed the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, which mandated that the entry-exit system be biometrically based. That was 12 years ago. Despite the relative successful implementation of a biometric entry system, the Department of Homeland Security has largely failed to implement this required biometric exit system. To date, Homeland Security has only implemented a handful of pilot programs. They have had one excuse after another, and failed to do so. There have been some promising developments in recent months, I would note. Of primary importance is the fact that Congress passed the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2016. This created a dedicated source of funds for the implementation of a biometric exit system. It has been estimated that this fund will result in approximately $1 billion that will be available solely for the implementation of the biometric exit system required by law. Yet, even with this significant source of funding, the administration continues to dawdle. My amendment will end that delay and bring this matter to a close. It will complete the system that the 9/11 Commission said was essential for our national safety and security. My amendment simply states that no funds from the FAA bill that we pass can be obligated or expended for the physical modification of existing air navigation facilities--that is, a port of entry--or of the construction of a new air navigation facility intended to be a port of entry, unless the Secretary of Homeland Security certifies that the owner or sponsor of the facility has entered into an agreement that guarantees the installation and implementation of such a facility not later than 2 years after the date of the enactment of the act. In other words, they have to complete the contract to make this system work, and then we give them 2 full years to accomplish it. That is more than enough time. The amendment allows Customs and Border Protection officers at each airport that serves as a port of entry to create a solution that works specifically for the needs of CPB and the airport. It gives them some flexibility to work these things out. It does, however, require-- finally and I hope fully--an agreement that guarantees that the system will be installed and implemented at the airport in 2 years. These airports drag their feet. Airlines drag their feet. They do not like to be bothered about this. It is not in their priorities, but it is not going to cause them great problems. It is not going to cause the airplanes great problems. Somebody needs to be representing the national interest around here, what is in the public interest. They don't get to undo a law passed by Congress 20 years ago that should have already been implemented years ago. It is that simple. This deal could be done in 6 months if we had an administration that was determined to get it done. The equipment is already available all over the country. Many police officers have these screens in their cars. They arrest someone for DUI, and they make them put their hand on the screen, and it runs a check throughout the United States. They find out that someone arrested in Alabama has a warrant for murder in New York City. That is the way the system is working today all over the country. We can't make this work at an international airport to ensure people who have a limited-time visa in the United States actually leave when they are supposed to? And when we find out someone may be a terrorist or connected with some illegal enterprise or terroristic plan, we want to know if they actually left the country or are still in the country. This is something law enforcement--the FBI and Homeland Security--needs to know about. I was told by one company that there are many competitors who would bid for this work. There are all kinds of systems out there. One manufacturer suggested we should host in the Capitol a products day and let all these companies bring in their systems so staffers and Members of Congress can go out and see what the possibilities are and erase forever this idea that this is somehow impractical, not feasible, and can't be done. If Apple and Samsung and others can implement technology on your cell phone, on your mobile phones to access them, you can be sure the U.S. Government could work with the airports to complete a biometric exit system, as the law has long required. Such a system will not have large space requirements. U.S. Customs and Border Protection can work with the larger airports with international terminals and install physical equipment at their departure gates. CBP can work with smaller airports to deploy handheld systems at gates handling international flights. Ultimately, all a passenger exiting the United States needs to do is place his or her hand on a simple screen or, with some devices, even just wave their hand in front of it. We had an expert tell us they have a system you don't even have to touch the screen. You can wave your hand in front of it, it reads the fingerprints, and the device will biometrically identify the passenger as the person exits. Somebody can take your name, go to the airport, and exit the country with some sort of ID and claim they exited as you were supposed to exit, without this biometric check, because you can use any name. If they clear this screening area, they move into the boarding area. They will be allowed into the boarding area. If there is a hit because the boarder is on some no-fly list because of some danger, the passenger can be denied boarding or removed from the plane before it takes off, and their baggage can be removed from the plane. Importantly, the United States would then have a unified, automatically produced list of those who have departed on time and those who have overstayed their visas. Colleagues, I would note we are having a huge surge in the number of people who come to this country on a visa and don't go home. It now amounts to over 40 percent of the people illegally in the country who came on a visa, promising to go home at a certain time, yet who are not going home. We had a Democratic debate a few weeks ago when former Secretary Clinton said: Well, if you are found in the United States unlawfully you should only be deported if you have been indicted or charged with a violent felony. How did this become the law? You are not allowed to stay in the country. You can't stay in the country if you overstay your visa. That is the law. You are deportable right there, whether you are a good person or not, and even if you never committed a traffic offense. Now we have leadership in this country so detached from law, so detached from the will of the American people, they are saying you can come in and stay for years after overstaying your visa and only be deported if you commit a violent felony. This has to be brought to a conclusion. The American people want a lawful system of immigration--are they wrong to ask for that?--one that serves the interests of the American people, one that is worthy of a nation that validates the rule of law, or do we just give in? Do we capitulate to lawlessness, and anybody who comes and can get into our country--even for a month, presumably--and who commits a $50,000 bank fraud is not going to be deported because it is not a violent crime, even though the law says otherwise? Let me just note that for a host of reasons the system should be based on the fingerprint system where we maintain our extensive database. There are eye systems that will read your eyes, we have systems that will read your face, but, colleagues, do not be led into that. We are not ready to do that. There is no data system that supports a face system. Let's stay with the fingerprints, as experts have told us. Let me also note that numerous countries around the world, including New Zealand, Singapore, and Hong Kong, use a biometric system now. This is proven. There are approximately 17 countries. Ending this failure has bipartisan support. My subcommittee--the Subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest--held a hearing on January 20 entitled ``Why is the biometric exit traffic system still not in place?'' During the hearing, we got promises from the administration but no commitment regarding when such a system would actually be deployed. Just a few weeks later, Secretary Johnson of Homeland Security made statements directing the Department of Homeland Security to begin implementation of the system at our airports by 2018--begin the implementation by 2018. So this is another mere promise--the kind of promises that have never resulted in the production of a system, and that uncertainty must end. The obvious missing piece is an actual completion date. This bill would create that. It is these kinds of lulling comments we have heard for all these years that have kept us from actually following through on the system. If Congress would like to know why the American people are not happy with their leaders in Washington, this is a good example of it, a very good example. Congress promises to fix a problem, we even vote for a bill to fix it, and in this case we voted for bills to fix it, they passed and became law and require the problem to be fixed, but it doesn't happen. As decades go by, we sit by and nothing ever happens. A special interest group speaks up here and a special interest group speaks up there and somehow it never happens. It is time to fulfill the promise and commitment to the American people. We promised the American people a system that would demonstrably improve our national security. As noted by former Commissioners on the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States in a report issued in 2014, ``Without exit-tracking, our government does not know when a foreign visitor admitted to the United States on a temporary basis has overstayed his or her admission. Had the system been in place before 9/11, we would have had a better chance of detecting the plotters before they struck.'' We have long known that visa overstays pose serious national security risks. A number of the hijackers on September 11 overstayed their visas. The number of visa overstays implicated in terrorism since then is certainly a significant number. A new poll came out earlier this year that indicates that three out of four Americans not only want the Obama administration to find these aliens who overstay their visas--not just the ones who have committed violent felonies--but also deport them. The same poll indicates 68 percent of Americans consider visa overstays as a ``serious national security risk,'' and 31 percent consider visa overstays as a ``very serious'' national security risk. And there is little doubt about why. The risks to our national security are too high for us to maintain the status quo. We are having more and more people traveling by air to the United States from around the world. We simply allow them to come on a very generous basis. They commit to leaving after a given period of time. Whether it is for a vacation or a job, they then plan to return to their home country, and we need a system to know if they are complying with that. We must fulfill the promise we made to the American people and do all we can to complete this system. My amendment would do so. It would finally bring this to a conclusion because it would say to the Air Force: We have money to help you do your runways, expand your airports, and do the kinds of things you would like to, but we want this agreement in place first. Mr. President, I understand that some on the Democratic side intend to object to calling up this amendment. It was my intention at this time to call up this amendment. I don't see any Democrat here, but I have been told that is what they want to do, and they passed that word along. So in an act of courtesy, I will not call up the amendment at this time, but we need to bring it up. Every Democratic member of my subcommittee who attended the hearing--Senators Schumer, Feinstein, and Franken--all said they favored fixing this. I think we have a bipartisan agreement if we can get a vote, but, once again, we may not be having a vote. That would be very distressing because I don't see how anybody could oppose the final completion of this much needed product. I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

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

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, the Nation has lost one of the greatest Justices ever to sit on the Supreme Court, Antonin Scalia. My condolences and prayers go out to his wife of 55 years, Maureen, his 9 children, and 36 grandchildren. My thought is that Justice Scalia's greatness was founded on the power of his ideas. His defense of those founding principles of America at the highest intellectual level is unprecedented, to my knowledge, in the United States. Over his career, he moved the legal world. As a young lawyer out of law school, I remember what the trends were and how Justice Scalia relentlessly, intellectually, aggressively, and soundly drove the message that many of the ideas that are out there today are inconsistent with the rule of law and the American tradition. The trend was relentlessly toward activism. Judges were praised if they advanced the law--not when they followed the law, or served under the law, or the Constitution, but if they advanced it. By advancing it, what that really means is you change it. If you advance it, it means the legislature hadn't passed something that you would like, or the Constitution doesn't advance an idea that you like, then you figure out a way to reinterpret the meaning of the words so it says what you would like it to say and what you wish the legislature had passed. One of the bogus ideas at that time--you don't hear much about it anymore, but it was current, and it was mainstream then--was that the ink-stained parchment, well over 200 years old and right over in the Archives Building, was alive. Our Constitution, they said, was a living document. Well, how ridiculous is that? The judges said that the Constitution gave them the power to update it, advance it, and make it say what they wanted it to say. They even contended that it was the duty of the judge, not just the privilege of the judge, to advance the words of the Constitution. Justice Scalia saw this as a direct threat, and he understood at the most fundamental level who was threatened by it, and that was ``we the people.'' You know how the Constitution begins with ``We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare . . . do ordain and establish''? Well, friends and colleagues, we establish this Constitution, the one we have, not the one some judge would like it to be or some politician would like it to be but the one we have. He boldly criticized the idea that a mere five judges--it just takes five out of nine--with lifetime appointments who are totally unaccountable to the American people. We are prohibited from even reducing their pay, which I support because we want an independent judiciary. Judges need to know they are given independence and a lifetime appointment because we trust them to serve under the Constitution and not above it. They serve under the laws duly passed by the elected representatives of the people of the United States, not above those laws. They were not given the power to set policies that they would like to set no matter how strongly they feel about it. That is not what they have been given to do. He boldly criticized those ideas and those individuals and didn't mind saying it in plain words: You are setting policy, you are not following the law. I would say that Professor Van Aylstyne--while at William & Mary or Duke--had a great quote about this. He said: If you really honor the Constitution, if you really respect the Constitution, you will reinforce it as it is written whether you like it or not. If judges today can twist the Constitution to make it say something it was not intended to mean, how might a new Court--five judges in a new age a decade or two from now--reinterpret the words to advance an agenda during that time? Isn't that a blow to the very concept of the democratic Republic we have? I think so. I will tell you that this has been a long and tough intellectual battle. You don't hear many people say that paper document over in the Archives is a living thing. Of course it is not a living thing. It is a contract. The American people have a contract with their government. They gave it certain powers and reserved certain powers for themselves. They reserved certain powers for their States, and the Federal Government is a government with limited power. This is absolutely, undeniably fundamental, and people don't fully understand it today. I remember when I was a U.S. attorney back in Alabama and an individual brought me a high school textbook. He said: I want you to see this. The book said: How do you amend the Constitution? It talked about several different ways to amend the Constitution, such as Congress and the Constitutional Convention, but it also said by judicial decision. He said: Mr. U.S. Attorney, I thought the judges were bound by the Constitution. They don't get to change the Constitution. Well, of course that is correct. But, in effect, we have had many instances when judges, through their interpretation, have in effect amended the Constitution. It is an absolute legal heresy, and they should not do that. It weakens the power of the democracy. One of the things that I think is very unfortunate is that judges have created an incredible amount of law that is contrary to common sense in the area of religion in the public life of America. Many of these cases are very confusing. But Justice Scalia, in a series of cases where he wrote the majority opinion, or wrote the dissent, or wrote concurring opinions, applied the principles of the Constitution as they were intended to lay out a lawful and commonsense framework for faith in the public square. I think that is a significant achievement. When Chief Justice Roberts came before our committee for confirmation, I remember telling him: Sir, I would like you to try to clear up and bring some common sense to the expression of faith. You have a right to free speech in America, you have a right to the free exercise of religion under the Constitution, so how has it gotten around that you can be protected more in filthy speech than you can be protected in religious speech? So as I said, Justice Scalia issued a series of opinions that were important on this subject. For example, in 1992, the Supreme Court decided Lee v. Weisman. This case involved a challenge to a Rhode Island public school policy that permitted a member of the clergy to deliver prayers at middle school graduation ceremonies. In this instance, a rabbi had delivered a prayer at one such ceremony, and one of the families in attendance that objected brought suit, alleging that the school's policy permitting prayer at graduation was a violation of the First Amendment's Establishment Clause. By a vote of 5-to-4, the Supreme Court concluded that the school's policy violated the Establishment Clause. Justice Scalia dissented. He wrote: In holding that the Establishment Clause prohibits invocations and benedictions at public school graduation ceremonies, the Court--with nary a mention that it is doing so--lays waste a tradition that is as old as public school graduation ceremonies themselves, and that is a component of an even more longstanding American tradition of nonsectarian prayer to God at public celebrations generally. Two years later, the Supreme Court decided Board of Education of Kiryas Joel Village School District v. Grumet. This case involved a challenge to a New York statue that tracked village boundaries to create a public school district for practitioners of a strict form of Judaism known as Satmar Hasidim. By a vote of 6-to-3, the Court concluded that the government had drawn political boundaries on the basis of religious faith in violation of the First Amendment's Establishment Clause. Justice Scalia dissented. He wrote: the Founding Fathers would be astonished to find that the Establishment Clause--which they designed to insure that no one powerful sect or combination of sects could use political or governmental power to punish dissenters, has been employed to prohibit characteristically and admirably American accommodation of the religious practices--or more precisely, cultural peculiarities--of a tiny minority sect. . . . Once this Court has abandoned text and history as guides, nothing prevents it from calling religious toleration the establishment of religion. Ten years later, in 2004, the Supreme Court decided Locke v. Davey. In this case, a student challenged a Washington State statute which created a scholarship for students enrolled ``at least half time in an eligible postsecondary institution in the state of Washington,'' but excluded from eligibility for this scholarship students seeking degrees in devotional theology. A student sued to enjoin Washington from refusing to award him a scholarship. By a vote of 7-to-2, the Supreme Court upheld the statute. Justice Scalia dissented. He wrote that: When the State makes a public benefit generally available, that benefit becomes part of the baseline against which burdens on religion are measured; and when the State withholds that benefit from some individuals solely on the basis of religion, it violates the Free Exercise Clause no less than if it had imposed a special tax. That is precisely what the State of Washington has done here. It has created a generally available public benefit, whose receipt is conditioned only on academic performance, income, and attendance at an accredited school. It has then carved out a solitary course of study for exclusion: theology. The next year, the Supreme Court decided McCreary County v. ACLU of Kentucky. This case involved a challenge to the placement of the Ten Commandments on the walls inside two Kentucky courthouses. By a vote of 5-to-4, the Supreme Court held that the placement of the Ten Commandments inside of courthouses was a violation of the First Amendment's Establishment Clause. Justice Scalia dissented. He wrote that: Historical practices demonstrate that there is a distance between the acknowledgment of a single Creator and the establishment of a religion. The former is, as Marsh v. Chambers put it, ``a tolerable acknowledgment of beliefs widely held among the people of this country.'' The three most popular religions in the United States, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam--which combined account for 97.7% of all believers--are monotheistic. All of them, moreover (Islam included), believe that the Ten Commandments were given by God to Moses, and are divine prescriptions for a virtuous life. Publicly honoring the Ten Commandments is thus indistinguishable, insofar as discriminating against other religions is concerned, from publicly honoring God. Both practices are recognized across such a broad and diverse range of the population--from Christians to Muslims--that they cannot be reasonably understood as a government endorsement of a particular religious viewpoint. More recently in 2014, Justice Scalia dissented from a denial of certiorari in the case of Elmbrook School District v. Doe. In this case, the entire seventh circuit, over three dissents, held that a suburban Milwaukee public high school district violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment by holding its graduation in a nondenominational church. Justice Scalia wrote that: Some there are--many, perhaps--who are offended by public displays of religion. Religion, they believe, is a personal matter; if it must be given external manifestation, that should not occur in public places where others may be offended. I can understand that attitude: It parallels my own toward the playing in public of rock music or Stravinsky. And I too am especially annoyed when the intrusion upon my inner peace occurs while I am part of a captive audience, as on a municipal bus or in the waiting room of a public agency. In this case, at the request of the student bodies of the two relevant schools, the Elmbrook School District decided to hold its high-school graduation ceremonies at Elmbrook Church, a nondenominational Christian house of worship. The students of the first school to move its ceremonies preferred that site to what had been the usual venue, the school's gymnasium, which was cramped, hot, and uncomfortable. The church offered more space, air conditioning, and cushioned seating. No one disputes that the church was chosen only because of these amenities. In this case, it is beyond dispute that no religious exercise whatever occurred. At most, respondents complain that they took offense at being in a religious place. It bears emphasis that the original understanding of the kind of coercion that the Establishment Clause condemns was far narrower than the sort of peer-pressure coercion that this Court has recently held unconstitutional. Although many of his dissents were memorable, not all of Justice Scalia's notable opinions on religion in public life were issued in dissent. In 1995, Justice Scalia wrote the opinion for the Court in Capitol Square Review and Advisory Board v. Pinette, where the Court rejected an Establishment Clause challenge to the Christmas season display of an unattended Latin cross in a plaza next to the Ohio State Capitol. Writing for the Court, Justice Scalia said: Respondents' religious display in Capitol Square was private expression. Our precedent establishes that private religious speech, far from being a First Amendment orphan, is as fully protected under the Free Speech Clause as secular private expression. Indeed, in Anglo-American history, at least, government suppression of speech has so commonly been directed precisely at religious speech that a free-speech clause without religion would be Hamlet without the prince. And just last term, Justice Scalia wrote the opinion for the Court in EEOC v. Abercrombie & Fitch Stores, a case about accommodation on the basis of religion in the employment environment. In this case, a Muslim individual who wore a head scarf as part of her religious observation applied for a job at a clothing retailer, but was not hired due to the company's policy, which prohibited employees from wearing ``caps.'' In reversing the court of appeals in favor of the applicant, Justice Scalia wrote that: Congress defined ``religion'' for Title VII purposes as ``including all aspects of religious observance and practice, as well as belief.'' Thus, religious practice is one of the protected characteristics that cannot be accorded disparate treatment and must be accommodated. As we see, these opinions by Justice Scalia involve parties of varied faiths--Christians, Jews, and Muslims. Regardless of the identity of the party, Justice Scalia's opinions on religion in public life consistently evidence a deep respect for the unique history of religious pluralism in this country and a heartfelt appreciation for its positive impact across the landscape of the nation. While some may say his opinions are not consistent, I disagree. Religion in American life is an important and complex subject. Judges must think carefully but not abandon common sense as so many opinions have. Justice Scalia saw limits on free exercise of religion when it came to the contention, for example, that one's religion required the use of drugs that a State had declared illegal. So this is an important area that needs to be cleared up so that we can bring some reality to the question of the expression of religious conviction in public life. Because the Constitution says we shall not establish a religion--Congress shall not establish a religion. It doesn't say States couldn't establish a religion; it says Congress can't establish a religion. It also says ``nor shall Congress prohibit the free exercise thereof.'' So you can't prohibit the free exercise of religion. I think we have forgotten the free exercise clause and over- interpreted the establishment of religion. Some States at the time had established religions. Most of the countries in Europe had a religion that they put in law for their country, and we said: No, we are not going to establish any religion here. You have the right to exercise your religious faith as you choose. Madison and Jefferson particularly believed it was absolutely unacceptable for this government to tell people how to relate to that person they considered to be their creator. That was a personal relationship that ought to be respected and the government ought to have no role in it. Like Madison and Jefferson, Justice Scalia, too, believed in American exceptionalism. Indeed, he was truly exceptional. Although he will be impossible to replace, his seat on the Supreme Court will eventually be filled by the next President. After that nominee is confirmed, his or her decisions will likely impact our Nation for the next 30 years and far beyond. Next year, when we debate this eventual nominee's qualifications to assume Justice Scalia's seat, we need look no further than his own words for wisdom to guide us as we consider our decision. In no uncertain terms, Justice Scalia's McCreary County dissent reminds us that: What distinguishes the rule of law from the dictatorship of a shifting Supreme Court majority is the absolutely indispensable requirement that judicial opinions be grounded in consistently applied principle. That is what prevents judges from ruling now this way, now that--thumbs up or thumbs down--as their personal preferences dictate. That is the governing principle that Justice Scalia abided by-- unwavering commitment to the rule of law even when reaching the outcome that the law dictated did not align with his policy preferences. This-- above all things--is the duty of a judge or Justice, and it is a principle that has fallen by the wayside far too often in recent years. It is imperative that we keep these words in mind when we consider appointments not only to the Supreme Court, but all lifetime appointments to the Federal judiciary. I thank the Presiding Officer and yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, today I wish to recognize Dr. Mark Foley, who has served with great distinction and honor at the University of Mobile for more than 17 years. Dr. Foley has served as president of the University of Mobile since 1998 and is the third president of the university since its founding in 1961. He will be retiring from his post on July 31, 2016. Dr. Foley came to the University of Mobile during a critical transitional time and led the school through a period of significant growth. Under his guidance, the university has flourished. Facilities have been updated, the school is on more solid financial footing, and programs and the stature of the university have improved. During his time at the University of Mobile, Dr. Foley led the university to invest $44.8 million in capital projects, including a recent $7 million campus enhancement program that thoroughly revitalized the campus. Under Dr. Foley's leadership, the university gained national recognition from U.S. News & World Report, America's Best Christian Colleges, America's Best College Buys, and many more. Dr. Foley helped to integrate a Christian worldview into all aspects of academics, campus life, and university operations at this quality Baptist-affiliated institution. The university now has more than 1,500 students enrolled in over 40 undergraduate and graduate programs. A former truckstop operator, Dr. Foley was ordained as a Baptist minister in 1990 after receiving his master of divinity degree from the New Orleans seminary. He received his doctorate from that same institution in 1992 and completed postdoctoral studies in education. Though the university was struggling with a variety of financial problems when Dr. Foley took over in 1998, he turned the school around. The University of Mobile has continued to thrive under Dr. Foley's tenure. As a native of Mobile, AL, it has been my honor to work with Dr. Foley and witness the great accomplishments he has achieved at the University of Mobile. His hard work and genuine passion for higher education is apparent and the students of the University of Mobile will miss his leadership. I would like to take this opportunity to thank him for all he has done for the university, for Mobile, and for Alabama. I thank the Chair.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I would like to talk for a few minutes about the crime problem we have in America today, the dramatically increasing problem of heroin abuse. Over the last week, we have had a lot of discussion about this crisis, which I am afraid we are just on the cusp of. I think it is going to get worse, based on my experience and my best judgment, but the effort to understand and address it has been going on for a while. In January, we had a good hearing on this issue in the Senate Judiciary Committee, and I want to mention a few things I think we ought to keep in mind as we address this very important problem. Just as background, I served 15 years as a prosecutor, 12 as a U.S. attorney, a Federal prosecutor, and 2\1/2\ as an assistant U.S. attorney. So that was my background when I came here. I was very active and studied the drug and crime problem in America, and I learned some things. There are cycles in this, and people wrote about it over the years. I think we are, unfortunately, moving into another cycle, and we have to be very careful. It is so painful to have a large prison population. We don't want to have that. Year after year, everybody wants to look for alternatives to prison, and we have tried, but if you go too far, you end up not having sufficient consequences for crime, not detaining dangerous offenders, and you end up increasing crime, increasing deaths of Americans from murders and other things, increasing heroin and serious drug problems that destroy families, destroy lives, destroy communities, and result in violence and death. It is a very real problem. A lot of people think, well, if you want to use heroin, so be it. Well, these people can't function. How are they going to survive? They either steal or they get on welfare or they have to go to treatment. And who pays for it, since they do not have any money? We have proven and seen for decades that drug use can be brought down, fewer people can become addicted. In the early 1980s, Nancy Reagan, as President Reagan's wonderful wife, formed the ``Just Say No'' program, and hundreds of thousands of volunteers nationwide in every community in America got together in their communities--they got the treatment community, the law enforcement community, the prevention community, the education community, and the schools--and they worked and worked and crafted policies that would create a climate of hostility for the use of dangerous drugs. The idea was to bring down the use. As a result, the use of illegal drugs dropped by half. It took us 15 or more years, but it dropped by half steadily. What a tremendous victory. In 1980, half of our high school seniors admitted they had used an illegal drug sometime in that year. What an unbelievable number. It had been going up steadily, it peaked, and then it began to go down under this sustained effort. What I have been worried about for some time, and have warned about it, is that if you don't maintain that but start going in the other direction, you can expect drug use to increase. It is that simple. And it is happening. Lives--and young people's lives--will be destroyed by this, families will break up, and children will be scarred. Drug use is no fun, innocent thing. It is destructive. If this Nation is using half as much illegal drugs as before, it is a better nation. It just is. And if we double the amount of drug use in America, it will be a more dangerous Nation and not as good a nation. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, over 47,000 people died from drug overdoses in the United States in 2014. In 2014, 47,000 died. That is one drug overdose death for every 12 minutes. And 61 percent of those overdoses involved opioids. The rate of all opioid overdoses in the United States has tripled since 2000. Overdoses have tripled since 2000. Heroin overdose deaths specifically have increased sixfold since 2001--600 percent--and have more than tripled in just the past 4 years alone. According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, there were approximately 169,000 new heroin users in 2013. According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, in 2004, approximately 589,000 people in the United States had an opioid use disorder. We used to call that addiction--a problem. It is affecting their lives. The Drug Enforcement Administration's 2015 National Drug Threat Assessment noted that ``drug overdose deaths have become the leading cause of injury death in the United States, ahead of motor vehicle deaths and firearms.'' This is a significant matter. As DEA Acting Administrator Chuck Rosenberg, a bright, young mind appointed by President Obama, noted last July that ``[a]pproximately 120 people die each day in the United States of a drug overdose.'' Some argue that the increase in heroin abuse is due to over- prescription of opioids from prescription drugs--you get addicted from a prescription drug, and then you move to heroin. I am sure that has some validity, but according to a January 14, 2016, study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, one of the premier authoritative medical journals in the world: In the majority of studies, the increase in the rates of heroin use preceded the change in prescription-opioid policies, and there is no consistent evidence of an association between the implementation of policies related to prescription opioids and increases in the rates of heroin use or deaths, although the data are relatively sparse. Alternatively, heroin market forces-- Please hear this, colleagues-- Alternatively, heroin market forces, including increased accessibility, reduced price, and high purity of heroin appear to be major drivers of the recent increases in rates of heroin use. So it is purity, price, and accessibility. While treatment and accountability are critical to breaking the cycle of addiction, it is not the whole solution. We must also reduce the availability of heroin--we simply have to do that--and other illicit opioids. In December of last year, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Tom Frieden said it is important ``that law enforcement''--a lot of people don't want to talk about this. We have police officers, sheriffs' deputies, Federal agents, drug enforcement agents, and Border Patrol agents. He said it is important ``that law enforcement intensify efforts to reduce the availability of heroin, illegal fentanyl, and other illegal opioids.'' Similarly, Drug Enforcement Administration Acting Administrator Rosenberg said in the DEA's National Drug Threat Assessment that, in addition to providing treatment to addicted opioid abusers, ``law enforcement must continue to have the tools it needs to attack criminal groups who facilitate drug addiction.'' I have been there. I was part of law enforcement's efforts. I invested a tremendous amount of my time in the Coalition for a Drug Free Mobile, the Partnership for Youth, Bay Area Drug Council--groups like that--working on a volunteer basis to change the use of drugs in the community. Law enforcement was always a critical part of it, and law enforcement does have the capability in ways that others don't to reduce the availability, make purity levels less, and otherwise restrict, raising the price of an illegal drug. The DEA's 2015 National Drug Threat Assessment confirms this. They studied the price of the drugs. One thing that tells us whether or not law enforcement and interdiction are effective is to discover if the price is going up or down. Mexican drug cartels are flooding the United States with cheap heroin and methamphetamine. When I was a young prosecutor, it was coming from Turkey, the Middle East, and that was pretty much shut off. President Carter did some good things. I was an Assistant U.S. Attorney and came back a few years later as a U.S. Attorney, but during that time they somehow reduced the supply of heroin from the Middle East. As a result, heroin addiction dropped all over the country, and very little heroin was in the heartland of America--mainly just in the big cities. We are also getting cheap methamphetamine from across the Mexican border, which is wide open. The statistics from the DEA Drug Threat Assessment confirm that, from 2010 to 2014, the amount of heroin seized every year at the southwest border has more than doubled. Well, are we catching that much more? No, we are not catching, I am sure, any substantially larger percentage. We are just having a larger amount moving across the border. The price has fallen, so we know we have more. If prices stay low, more people will try it more often, and as the purity level is higher, more people will get addicted sooner and often die quicker. These drug cartels are partnering with criminal gangs and fueling violence in our cities and communities. According to DEA's 2015 Threat Assessment, Mexican drug cartels ``control drug trafficking across the Southwest Border and are moving to expand their presence in the United States, particularly in heroin markets.'' They import, transport, and are now actually selling it in our cities instead of just bringing it in across the border. In 2013, the heads of the Chicago Crime Commission and the Chicago Office of the Drug Enforcement Administration both named El Chapo Guzman, the infamous leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, as Chicago's ``Public Enemy #1.'' So a man in Mexico, moving heroin and methamphetamine into the United States and hammering Chicago with it-- Chicago named him as their No. 1 public enemy. It cannot be a coincidence, as the FBI's uniform crime statistics show, that the murder rate in Chicago increased by approximately 18 percent during the first 6 months of 2015. At that rate, it is a 36 percent increase in murders in Chicago in 1 year. This is an unbelievably dramatic surge in murders. Another example is Atlanta. DEA's Atlanta office reported an increase of heroin availability from a rating of ``stable'' in the first half of 2013 to ``high'' just a year later. According to the FBI's uniform crime statistics, the murder rate in Atlanta increased by approximately 15 percent in the first 6 months of 2015. This is an unsustainable thing. The old rule is a 7-percent increase and your money doubles in 10 years. When you get 15- and 18-percent increases in 6 months--that's 30 percent in 1 year--you are doubling the crime rate, the murder rate, in 3 years. At a November hearing of the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control, I asked DEA Deputy Administrator Jack Riley about these drug distribution networks and the people in local communities pushing the drugs, selling the drugs, and collecting the money. This money eventually ends up back in Mexico, Colombia, and South and Central America, funding the evil, violent drug cartels that are destabilizing whole nations. He responded that it is ``almost as big a problem as the cartels themselves.'' When I asked him whether these drug traffickers are the ones causing the violence and death on our streets, he responded that ``they are the ones that regulate themselves by the barrel of a gun.'' If you want to collect a drug debt, you can't file a lawsuit in Federal court. You collect it by the barrel of a gun. By its very nature, drug distribution networks are violent criminals. It has always been so, and it will always be so. Conducting an illegal enterprise, they have to maintain discipline, and they use threats and violence to maintain it and collect their debts. We must not forget what became obvious in the early 1980s, when I was a U.S. Attorney: Drug dealers and their organizations are not nonviolent criminals. These are violent crimes. Rather than enforcing the law and making it tougher on drug cartels by keeping our border secure, the Obama administration has done exactly the opposite. Our unsecured borders make it easy for the cartels to flood our country with cheap heroin, and the administration has made it clear that officers are not to deviate from the President's lawless immigration policy. They are blocked from doing their job and following their oath. Just last week--and as someone who has worked closely with Federal Drug Enforcement officers and immigration officers as a Federal prosecutor--Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Gil Kerlikowske testified before the House Committee on Appropriations that ``if you don't want to follow the directions of your superiors, including the president of the United States and the commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, then you really do need to look for another job.'' Do you hear what he is saying there, colleagues? What he is saying is that if you want to do your job and enforce the laws as the laws are written, which we have ordered you not to do, and you go on and do it anyway, then look for another job. It is one of the most amazing things I have seen in my entire law enforcement career. ICE officers-- Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers--who enforce drug laws, along with immigration laws, these officers sued their supervisors. They sued their supervisors, alleging that they were being ordered to violate their oath to enforce the immigration laws of the United States by these restrictive policies. It is hard to overestimate the destruction the Obama administration's policies--their Executive amnesty, their refusal to sufficiently fund and man the border--are causing to law enforcement. A big part of this now is the openness to heroin, methamphetamine, marijuana, and other drugs that are being imported. I take that statement by the Commissioner of Customs and Border Protection as a direct threat to those officers who want to follow their oath and do their duty. In August 2013, a dramatic event occurred that was too little appreciated. Attorney General Holder, the Attorney General of the United States, ordered Federal prosecutors not to charge certain drug offenders with offenses that carry mandatory minimum sentences that are in law. If you have so much drugs, you have a minimum penalty. You can get more than that, but you at least have to serve this minimum penalty. He ordered them not to charge those crimes. This is directing prosecutors not to follow the law. It has contributed to a decrease in the number of traffickers being prosecuted and convicted. According to data from the Executive Office for United States Attorneys, at the end of 2015--in December--the 6-month average of drug prosecutions was down 21 percent compared to 5 years ago. And what are we seeing? A surge in crime, particularly drugs. Excluding prosecutions in magistrate courts, the 6-month average was nearly 32 percent lower at the end of 2015 than 5 years ago. We haven't cut the number of drug prosecutors. We haven't cut the number of DEA agents. This is policy that softens the enforcement of drug crimes against what we have been doing for 25 years, and it is having an impact. I am afraid it is going to continue. Meanwhile, State and local law enforcement agencies are not given the tools they need to continue taking these dangerous drug traffickers off of the streets. On December 21, 2015, the Department of Justice chose to stop all equitable sharing payments to State, local, and tribal partners under the Asset Forfeiture Program. These are seized proceeds, moneys that are seized from drug dealers, big fancy cars and boats that they seize. For the last 20 years, Federal and State officers worked together. The Federal Government has a good system for forfeiting the money. Then, when the forfeiture is over, it is divided among the agencies. As a result, State and local people are willing to commit law officers to participate in these local task forces because they are helping clean up drugs in their community, helping identify and prosecute nationally significant drug dealers, and they get some compensation back from it when they find a truck full of money. I personally have seen cases where $1 million, $500,000, $800,000 in cash was seized from these people. Some people think, oh, this is wrong; you shouldn't take their cash. This is the ill-gotten gain of an illegal enterprise and they should be able to keep it? They have no proof of any lawful source of this money. Virtually every time, in addition, there is evidence to prove it is connected to drugs. Half the time, they don't even show up to contest the seizure because they know they have no defense to it. This stops this sharing, and it is undermining the unity of effort that we really need to be successful. A joint letter signed by the International Association of Chiefs of Police, the National Association of Police Organizations, the Major County Sheriffs' Association, the National Sheriffs' Association, the National District Attorneys Association, and the Major Cities Chiefs Association, pointed out that ``the suspension of equitable sharing payments may cause some agencies across the country to reconsider their ability to participate in joint task forces with the Federal Government.'' In other words, they are going to stop participating. ``The effects of this decision are far reaching and not only a disservice to law enforcement, but also to the public they are sworn to protect.'' Mr. President, if there is a limit on my time or others are waiting to speak, I will wrap up. Otherwise, I have about 5 minutes to wrap up. I see my colleague Senator Leahy, the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee. I don't want to block him. If my time is up, I will yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. While law enforcement resources are being cut off, law enforcement officers are being blocked from doing their jobs, and drug prosecutions are being reduced, the administration and some in Congress want to push and advance a criminal justice ``reform'' bill. But these proposals will have a tendency, I am afraid, to worsen the current problem by allowing for more reductions in sentences than are already occurring and early release of thousands of dangerous drug traffickers, and the weakening of penalties for those prosecuted under our drug trafficking laws, which have already been weakened--sending the wrong message at exactly the wrong time. I am very concerned about this. I love my colleagues, and I know their hearts are in the right place, but I am convinced we should not be heading in this direction at this time. Make no mistake, Federal prisons are not filled with low-level, nonviolent drug possessors. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 99.7 percent of drug offenders in Federal prison at the end of fiscal year 2012 were convicted of drug trafficking offenses, not drug possession. Drug trafficking is inherently violent activity, and it only serves to fund the drug cartels while fueling violence in our cities. According to the FBI, violent crime overall increased across the United States during the first half of 2015, by 6.2 percent for murders and 17 percent in the larger cities for murder--the largest single-year increase since at least 1960. Already this year, homicides in Chicago are double what they were all of last year. This is a complex subject. It is too soon to know the total reason for this increase, but it cannot go unnoticed that over the last decade the Sentencing Commission, which sets standards for sentencing in the United States--outside of the minimum mandatories that are set by our law passed by Congress--has unilaterally imposed reductions in the sentences for drug inmates currently in prison. So we reduced the sentences for those in prison and they are getting out earlier. The most recent reduction in sentences resulted in the release of more than 46,000 drug traffickers--not drug possessors, drug traffickers--which has been wholeheartedly supported by the Obama administration. According to Bureau of Justice Statistics, 77 percent of drug offenders released were rearrested within 5 years. Hear this now: 77 percent of these drug offenders were rearrested within 5 years, with 25 percent of those rearrested being rearrested for a violent crime-- somebody hurt, maybe dead. Maybe that is part of the murder rate increase. Take Wendell Callahan, a Federal drug felon who was convicted of trafficking in crack cocaine and released early pursuant to the Sentencing Commission's directives. Upon his early release, he proceeded to brutally murder his ex-girlfriend and her two little girls, 7 and 10. He would have been deep into a 12\1/2\-year Federal sentence if it had been maintained, but the Sentencing Commission reduced it. The judge granted his petition for early release because of his ``good behavior'' in prison, and that led the judge to conclude he did not pose a danger to the safety of the public, even though in his background--when he was convicted and got the 12 years, he had previously been convicted in connection with a shooting offense and another drug offense. This is why you have to have some controls on judges. I have been there, and I saw it before the sentencing guidelines were passed. The Federal prison population is at its lowest level since 2008. We are already on a downward course of the drug Federal prison population being reduced. There are only 160,000 inmates in Bureau of Prisons custody today, well below its peak. The Bureau of Prisons has stated that this ``downward population trend is expected to continue into Fiscal Year 2017,'' bringing the Federal prisons population to the lowest level since 2005. The population is up. Crime is going up. The prison population is falling rather rapidly. Admissions to Federal prison have declined every year since 2011. You hear: We are filling our prisons. We are doing more and more. Actually, there are other things that are already happening. It is happening in State prisons, too, where larger numbers are incarcerated than in the Federal prisons. One of the reasons we are having this large decline in State prisons is not public safety but tight budgets. They are cutting back on the prison population to save money. We can be smarter. Some people can be released early. I worked with my Democratic colleague, Senator Durbin, 6 years ago, I believe, and we reduced the crack penalties more significantly than a lot of people know. I thought that was justified. But we are now proceeding well beyond that, and it is causing me great concern. The Attorney General has ordered the prosecutors to not charge certain criminal offenses. Reducing sentences and releasing felons is equivalent to reducing the cost to the criminal enterprise of their criminal activity. It reduces the cost, the risk. Thus, crime--it is already rising--would further increase as a result of the criminal justice ``reform'' bill that would further reduce penalties. Can we take a breath, and let's think about this? I don't say there aren't some things we can do that will allow for some reduction in the Federal prison population. Some people probably serve more time than is absolutely necessary. But in truth, we have seen dramatic improvements over nearly 30 years, 25 years, in the reduction of crime. Until this surge, murder rates were less than half what they were in 1980 when I became a Federal prosecutor. Drug use dropped dramatically when Nancy Reagan started the ``Just Say No'' program, and drug use began to steadily decrease. It is now beginning to steadily increase. You have to have leadership from Washington. You can't have the President of the United States of America talking about marijuana like it is no different than taking a drink, saying I used marijuana when I was in high school and it is no different than smoking. It is different. And you are sending a message to young people that there is no danger in this process. It is false that marijuana use doesn't lead people to more drug use. It is already causing a disturbance in the States that have made it legal. I think we need to be careful about this. What if this is the beginning of another surge in drug use like we saw in the sixties and seventies that led to massive problems in our communities? The solution? Well, we have to control the border. All the heroin and a big chunk of the methamphetamine is coming across the Mexican border. We need barriers. We need more agents. People need to be arrested. They need to be deported. They don't get to be taken to some city in the United States they would like to go to and get released and asked to show up on bail, which they never do. That is an open invitation to illegality and illegal entry. We need to enforce our laws, and we have to make the consequences of drug trafficking a deterrent. We can do this. We have done it before, and it is all part and parcel with prevention programs, education programs, and treatment programs. All that has to be done, but it cannot be denied, in my opinion, that law enforcement plays a critical role in it. This means supporting, not blocking the efforts of law enforcement to do their jobs and giving them the tools to arrest drug traffickers and be effective at the border, putting them in jail, not giving them early release so they can commit more crimes. In January, a woman from Ohio named Tonda DaRe testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee at a hearing on the heroin and prescription opioid epidemic. She shared the powerful story of her daughter, who died from a heroin overdose. She said this: One of the things that I see happening in our little town that frustrates me is . . . our officers have worked so diligently to arrest people that they know are bringing this [heroin] in. Just [to] have them go in front of our judges and our judges just slapped these people on the wrist and sent them right back out the door. . . . The boy that sold my daughter the heroin that killed her just recently went back in front of a judge for his fourth offense for trafficking heroin. [It was the] fourth time he's been arrested for this and he was given five months. How [is] that possible? We can talk about making sure we have treatment and recovery for people who have been addicted, although many people never ever recover from addiction--except by the grave. That is the sad truth. We should make that a priority. But we cannot hope to solve these problems by only treating people on the back end of addiction without reducing the availability of those drugs and keeping the purity down and the cost up, not continuing to fall. We have to stop people from becoming addicts in the first place, and we can't let the fact that we have a heroin abuse epidemic cause us to forget that we have a drug trafficking epidemic too. Law enforcement is prevention. Experts tell us that the price, purity, and availability of drugs, especially heroin, fuels more consumption, more addiction, more crime, more death, and more human and family destruction. I wish it were not true. I wish there were more options, but law enforcement is a central part of this effort, and history proves it. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, tomorrow the Senate will be bringing up the Customs bill that I intend to support moving to. I believe it has a number of good provisions, and I hope to be able to support its final passage. But first, I want to bring attention to the weakened currency provisions that the conference report included. This is not the language that initially passed the Senate, but instead is much weaker. The Senate, several times, has affirmed the need to provide the Treasury Department and the Department of Commerce tools to prevent currency manipulation. In 2011, the Senate passed such a bill to provide the Commerce Department with enforcement mechanisms by a vote of 63-35. Second, in 2013, 60 Senators signed a letter to the U.S. Trade Representative, calling for the inclusion of enforceable currency provisions in Trans-Pacific Partnership. Finally, in May of 2015, the Senate passed by a 78-to-20 vote this Customs enforcement bill, which, for the first time, included new tools that are necessary to defend American manufacturers from foreign currency manipulations--the language to confront currency cheating that the Treasury Department acknowledges is occurring, but they have refused to take action to confront it. That original bill would have required, where this kind of currency manipulation occurs, action be taken to fix currency manipulation. Unfortunately, that language was removed from the conference report. I think it is time--and I think a bipartisan majority of this Senate believes it is time--for us to pass enforceable currency protection measures and make sure they make it to the President's desk. In June of 2015, a New York Times poll showed that 63 percent of Americans believe that trade restrictions are necessary, and only 16 percent of Americans believe that the Trans-Pacific Partnership would actually increase American jobs. I am absolutely convinced the American people are correct on that, based on a study of previous trade agreements and the analysis of studies by Tufts University and other groups. A May 2015 poll conducted by Ipsos, a leading polling and communications firm, found that 73 percent of the U.S. public believes Congress should oppose any ``international trade agreement that does not specifically prohibit currency manipulation.'' That is a strong polling number. A second Ipsos poll, conducted last year, found that 79 percent of respondents said that it was important for the trade deal to include enforceable currency protections. In August, the Chinese Government devalued its currency 4 percent, creating a regional currency war in that area involving Australia, Malaysia, and South Korea. All those fell against the United States dollar, making their imports to the United States less expensive and our exports to their countries more expensive. It happens just that way. Former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, one of the great heroes of the economic rebound of the 1980s, has said that years of trade negotiations can be wiped out in minutes by currency manipulation. I don't think there is any doubt about that. These depreciations throughout Asia further disadvantage American workers because they force our workers to compete against international competitors who receive discounts, in effect, on their exported goods in the form of artificially depressed currencies. These devaluations have a real impact. I have talked at length to steel manufacturers in my State. They have all told me that steel manufacturing is being hammered by this kind of currency manipulation, dumping, and other unfair, improper trade policies. But they specifically mentioned currency. Foreign market manipulations have virtually eliminated profit margins that were already slim in the steel industry. I had a conversation a few hours ago with a major paper company which said that currency manipulations have hurt their exports. They are still making the exports, but it has eliminated their profit. It is very problematic for them. They have to have profit, but they are trying to maintain their production, keep Americans working, and keep the plants operating, even though their profit margin has been hurt substantially by currency manipulation. In June of 2015, eBay reported that international currency fluctuations eliminated 8 percent of its sales. Instead of 6 percent sales growth, the company reported a 2 percent decline. Our foreign competitors are exporting their unemployment to the United States. That is the way it is done: You reduce your currency, and you export your products to the United States at a lower price. Our foreign competitors keep their people working and undermine the ability of American manufacturers to keep their employees working. Sometimes American plants are totally closed. A December 1 Wall Street Journal article highlighted the fact that the Chinese yuan had increased against most other major currencies but fallen 3 percent against the dollar. They let it decline against the dollar, thereby maintaining their trade advantage with the United States--their trade surplus, our trade deficit with China. Our trade deficit with China increased during January and increased substantially during the fourth quarter of last year. Our exports are down, our imports are up, and our trade deficit is up. A big part of that is improper manipulation of currency by our so- called trading partners. It is time we said no to this. We have the leverage and the capability of doing so. They need us more than we need them. When Governor Romney ran for President 8 years ago, he was in a debate and explained it very succinctly: If you don't stand up--in this case, to China--they will run over you. Critics say that if we stand up to China, it will create a trade war. But we are in a trade war; we are just not fighting. Finally, he said: And, anyway, they have a lot more to lose than we do in such an event. We have no obligation--as a matter of fact, we must stop being a patsy for those who take advantage of us. They need our markets. They desperately need to be able to sell huge amounts of products in our markets. If they will not comply with the rules of trade, we have a right to say no and to limit access to our markets. They say that would hurt American consumers--perhaps some--but in the long run, we cannot allow American manufacturing to be decimated by the sustained manipulation of trading partners. We have to have a manufacturing base in this country. The American people know this, and they are worried about that. Even a Walmart executive has said: If nobody is working in America, who is going to buy cheap products from abroad? He even started a program to try to buy more from America. Even the Department of Treasury in its October 2015 exchange rate report said, ``Our judgment is that the [Yuan] remains below its appropriate medium-term valuation.'' In other words, it is depressed. China devalued the Yuan. They gained market advantage over the United States and other countries. On the face of all of this, the White House has refused to adopt any enforceable measures. The Treasury Department repeatedly acknowledges we have a problem, but they have refused to take any action to confront it. This is the kind of weakness we cannot accept. The time has come in America where we cannot afford to lose a single American job to unfair trading partners. We have to end this. We have to defend our people who are hurting. While the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement that has now been signed by the President--off last week in New Zealand, 7,000 miles around the world. The President never even talked about it. Why didn't he talk about it? Why didn't they highlight it? Why did they want to sign it 7,000 miles away? The reason is, the American people don't want it. He didn't really want anybody to know he had signed it, and they hope they can slip it through Congress at some point. But I don't believe it is going to happen. I think too many things are being raised and discussed that show we have to be careful about these trade agreements. In particular, this is one that should not pass. The White House claims that the TPP includes a side measure addressing currency manipulation, but any study reveals that it does not have any real enforcement mechanisms. The Wall Street Journal on November 5 wrote this: ``Mexico, Canada and other countries signaled they were open to the [currency] deal when they realized it [would not] include binding currency rules that could lead to trade sanctions through the TPP.'' Get that? They were objecting to this currency rule. They like to manipulate their currency, and they don't want to be subject to sanctions if they manipulate it. When they found out the truth--and the truth is that the currency manipulation language attached to TPP means nothing--then they said it was OK. So objected to addressing currency manipulation in the TPP until they found out this proposed fix meant nothing. On November 6, the Japanese Finance Minister, Mr. Taro Aso, said that ``there [will not] be any change'' in Japan's currency policy. In other words, by signing on to the TPP, after studying the agreement, Japan realized they are not going to have to change their policy. There is no teeth to the President's side-agreement. We were expecting that this currency language would be placed on the Customs bill that we would vote on tomorrow. It was passed in the Senate, and it went on the Customs bill. But when it went to the conference committee, President Obama said: No, we are not having this currency language in it. The conference committee eventually capitulated, and struck the enforceable currency provisions in their report. So we have no real enforceable mechanism now to ensure that American workers and American manufacturing are able to maintain a level playing field with our trading partners in this regard. The statement by Japan's Finance Minister caused Ford Motor Company to immediately object to and oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. They did it the day it was released. In their press release, Ford said they could not support such a deal in which currency rules fell ``outside of [the] TPP, and . . . [failed] to include dispute settlement mechanisms to ensure global rules prohibiting currency manipulation are enforced.'' They could not support it. Ford and all these companies are placed under terrific pressure to sign on to these deals. A lot of them that signed on and said they will support it don't like it, but they were basically put in a room and asked: What do you need to do? We will agree to some things if you will agree to support the deal. Many felt it was going to pass anyway, and they got a few little trinkets--a few little gifts out of the TPP that they liked out of the 5,000 pages that it consists of, and they have agreed to either be silent or support the deal. But many of these companies like Ford are very uneasy about it. So where are we today? I was very pleased that one of the strong supporters of trade in Congress--the new Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan--announced yesterday that there was not support in the House to pass the TPP now, and, in fact, he has concerns about it. He has been an advocate of these trade agreements. I have been worried about that. But I was very pleased that at least now, in the temporary situation, he has indicated that he has doubts about the agreement, it is not going to have the votes in the House. Our leadership has indicated they don't intend to bring it up immediately, either. I think that is a good decision. I believe we as a nation need to be studying how this works and studying whether these agreements are actually helping us. Or are they accelerating the decline in American manufacturing? The Bush nor the Obama White House has taken strong actions to deal with currency manipulations. This administration and its own Treasury Department continues to reassure us that they are doing everything they can to protect American manufacturing from unfair currency manipulation. However, they repeatedly rejected Congress's efforts to give the White House the tools they need to help enforce our laws. One of the best ways to do this is to give the White House the ability to implement countervailing duties, but they have opposed those efforts and steadfastly seen to it that they are not made law. Last year, in the spring, we had a month-long debate about the importance of these measures. I think a lot of our Members learned a good bit in the course of that. The Senate passed a TPP negotiating objective calling for enforceable measures in the President's trade agreement. What did the President do? He threatened to veto the Customs bill if it included the kind of currency language that I have just been describing. In fact, the White House even issued a Statement of Administration Policy--a SAP--on this question stating that ``the Administration opposes the way the [Customs] bill uses the countervailing duty process to address currency undervaluation.'' With that objection, the conferees took out the language, so the bill we will vote on tomorrow does not have the language in it that passed in the U.S. Senate with 78 votes in favor. Last year, I wrote the President and asked him a few simple questions. I believe these are simple questions that the American people are entitled to have answered by the leader of our country who is proposing and pushing the TPP. One, I asked him to state whether the TPP would increase or decrease our trade deficit. Shouldn't we know that? Our trade deficit is surging. Some try to contend that trade deficits don't matter. They do matter. They do matter if your factory is closed. Trade deficits reduce GDP. Some studies say that about one-half percent of growth in GDP has been reduced as a result of the trade deficit. It does impact America. I further asked the President, two, whether the TPP would increase or decrease the number of manufacturing jobs in the United States. Third, I asked him how the TPP would affect the average hourly wages for the American middle class. Shouldn't he tell us that? Shouldn't we be told whether wages are going to go up or down? Shouldn't we be told whether the trade deficit would increase? Shouldn't we be told whether manufacturing jobs are going to increase or decrease? What have they said? This is so clever. I think the media deserves criticism for not talking about it more. All they have ever said was that the TPP would increase jobs in the exporting industries. They don't say how many jobs are being lost when American factories are closed. In fact, the Administration used to make specific job claims, but stopped doing so once the Washington Post gave their claim that the TPP would create 600,000 jobs four Pinocchios. Let's go back to 2011, the U.S.--South Korean Free Trade Agreement. I voted for it. South Koreans are good people. They are allies of ours. We do business with them. I signed on to that agreement. When the President signed it, he stated to the American people it would increase our exports by $10 billion a year. We have had a chance to look at that. How has that promise come out? Have we increased our exports? Well, we did increase our exports. It was eight-tenths of $1 billion last year. I think we will be a little over $1 billion this year--not 10, 1. What about Korean exports to the United States? How did that come out? They increased annually $12 billion a year. What about our trade deficit from 2010 through 2015? The trade deficit with South Korea increased 260 percent. Are these trade agreements effective? Are they helping America? Are they fulfilling the promises being made for them? I don't think so. The President has repeatedly rejected bipartisan efforts to put protections in for American workers. He clearly did not follow Congress's negotiating objectives. He has ignored an issue which the Senate overwhelmingly approved, and he failed to negotiate enforceable currency protections for American workers. American manufacturers cannot wait longer. It is time to give them the tools they need, a fair ability to compete, and a level playing field. The Customs bill that is before us is a step in the right direction. It ensures the Commerce Department and Customs and Border Protection share information more efficiently. It gives the Customs and Border Protection new tools to identify and stop illegal trading practices. It provides early notification of trade surges, which helps ensure stable prices of goods here at home, but it is important to note the Customs bill is not a perfect solution. There is still work to be done. As I noted, Paul Volcker pointed out, all of these agreements can be eliminated overnight through currency manipulation. We can pass this Customs legislation and send it to the President, but we must realize that the protections created in this legislation, the new tools that are provided to CBP, can be made irrelevant by our competitors that manipulate exchange rates to benefit their exports. We have that problem now in China, Japan, South Korea, and other countries. I am not going to be satisfied until the President signs legislation granting the Commerce Department real powers to protect American workers and American manufacturing from these devastating market manipulations. Our government does not offer such subsidies to American manufacturers. There are other subsidies, too, that foreign countries offer that we don't offer. These subsidies and currency manipulations are forbidden by international trading standards, but they go on anyway, and nothing is done about it. We must not allow other countries to take advantage of us any longer. I will note some of the quotes that we heard about this subject, but no action of significance has been taken. On September 3, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew in an interview on CNBC said, ``[China has] to understand, and I make this point to them quite clearly, that there's an economic and political reality to things like exchange rates.'' He is talking about currency exchange rates. There is a political reality there. In other words, Mr. Lew, who should be doing something effective besides just talking, acknowledges that currency rates have real impact on Americans. He goes on to say: They need to understand that they signal their intentions by the actions they take and the way they announce them. And they have to be very clear that they're continuing to move in a positive direction. And we're going to hold them accountable. We haven't been holding them accountable. Mr. Lew continues: ``I think that we have been very clear for a very long time with China, how they manage their exchange rate is a matter of great concern to us and that they need to be willing to let market forces drive the value up, not just drive it down.'' That is true, but they are not doing it, and China is going to continue to manipulate their exports until some action is taken to stop them. He said in his interview: I think it is something we will discuss at the G-20, is any temptation to slip into what might look like a competitive devaluation. It's both unfair and it ultimately leads to a worse global economy. I think there is some truth to that. He is acknowledging that there is a problem. What he is saying is our response to devaluation--it is unfortunate if we are put in a position where we devalue, where Korea devalues, where Vietnam devalues, where other countries in the world devalue. That is a currency war and that is not helpful. What needs to happen is we need to push back against countries that are improperly devaluing and stop that and try to create a currency system worldwide that serves our Nation in an effective way. It is part of the whole economic future of America. Every business journalist is talking about this. They have different views about what ought to be done, if anything, but everybody talks about the impact. This is T. Rowe Price. They did their fall 2015 Economic Outlook Report. To be sure, the U.S. economy remains the world's largest and most innovative. But this summer's dramatic plunge in China's stock market and the unexpected devaluation of its currency quickly reverberated around the globe--triggering market volatility, dimming growth prospects for certain industries and the countries, and exacerbating pressure on emerging markets. I don't think anybody would dispute that. That is common business knowledge. T. Rowe Price's Outlook Report says: The devaluation, along with the government's unsuccessful intervention in its plunging stock market, also undermined confidence in China's leadership and, most important, in its ability to manage the transition of its economy from one led by investment and exports to one more driven by domestic services and consumption. This is where we are. We need to get this ship on the right path, and we need to not adopt the TPP. We need to use the leverage we have as the greatest market in the world that all these countries want access to. We have the leverage. They have more to fear from a trade war than we do. We must put an end to it because we owe it to this country. The day we can give away more and more jobs and assume that this has no negative impact on the American economy is over. Wages are down in this country. The percentage of Americans of working age actually working today is the lowest we have had in nearly 40 years. We have had a tremendous drop in the percentage of males from 24 to 55, high working years, who are actually working in jobs today. It is a troublesome trend. We need to reverse that. We need to put people to work and get them off welfare. We need to put them in good job training programs to help them take jobs that already exist in the country. We can't afford to bring in hundreds of thousands and millions of people from abroad to take jobs. Our people should be trained and be taken. That is so basic as to be without dispute, it seems to me. I think the Customs bill that we consider tomorrow is worthy of our support. In the long run, I do believe that if we don't confront the trading issues that are facing America, we will regret it, and we will continue to see adverse economic consequences for the citizens we represent. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, today I wish to recognize the life of Michael Wermuth of Birmingham, AL. Michael Anthony Wermuth was born in Birmingham, AL, in 1946, was commissioned in the U.S. Army upon graduating from the University of Alabama, earned his law degree from the University of Alabama School of Law, and practiced law in Mobile, AL, as a partner of the firm Wilkins, Druhan & Wermuth. While in Mobile, Mike became involved in local politics and worked on the senatorial campaign of ADM Jeremiah A. Denton. Upon Admiral Denton's election to the Senate, Mike and his family moved to Washington where he served as Senator Denton's chief counsel and legislative director from 1980 to 1987. After his time in the U.S. Senate, Mike served in the Department of Justice as a legislative counsel for civil rights and was Deputy Assistant Attorney General for legislative affairs. In 1989, he was named Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for drug enforcement policy and was instrumental in the implementation of President George H.W. Bush's national drug control strategy that was highly effective in reducing drug use and importation. After 30 years of service, Mike retired as a colonel in the Army Reserves. That same year, he joined the RAND Corporation as the director of its homeland security program and was the executive director of a Federal advisory panel on terrorism. During his time at RAND, he worked on a variety of issues including infrastructure protection, emergency preparedness, risk management, border control, and intelligence. After leaving RAND in 2010, Mike continued his work as a consultant there and served as an adjunct faculty member at the Texas A&M University Bush School of Government and Public Service. He taught graduate level online courses in homeland security defense. His influence in terrorism defense strategy was vast, and his enduring legacy will be his dedication to the stewardship of the next generation of policymakers. I knew Mike for many years. In Mobile, we served in the same Army Reserve center. He was a conscientious and superior officer with a steady sense of duty and love of country. As a top member of Senator Denton's staff, he was dedicated, loyal, and effective. He was tireless in his work to advance the agenda in which Senator Denton so deeply believed. I can say his support and that of Senator Denton was critical to my appointment as U.S. attorney. In the U.S. Army, the U.S. Senate, the Department of Justice, the RAND Corporation, and as a teacher and lawyer, Mike always excelled. Discipline, work, loyalty, and patriotism were his hallmarks. He was indeed a talented American patriot. Michael passed away on November 1, 2015. He is survived by his wonderful wife of 35 years, Fran; his children, Ken and Heather; and numerous other family members. His partner throughout, Fran is highly accomplished in her own right having served in top positions within the U.S. Marshals Service. Our sympathy is extended to her, the family, and friends upon his passing.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, the Senator----

Mr. SESSIONS. The Senator is a great friend, and we have a couple of good battles going on right now where we stand shoulder to shoulder, but for the most part the area that was approved for production was shut down when the problem with Deepwater Horizon was fixed rather than expanding that into Florida where the Florida waters, which Senator Nelson has been an effective advocate for, would not allowing drilling there. I do believe we have a situation where we have agreed and proved that this kind of problem would not occur now. I do believe there is a tremendous advantage for America, and we can have an advantage of low energy for American workers, for our jobs, and that way we will not send money abroad. I thank Senator Nelson for his good comments. He is highly informed on this issue. It is a pleasure to serve with him.

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

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, on Wednesday of this week, in the dead of the night--at least here--the President intends to have his trade representative sign the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a massive trade agreement, for our Pacific trading partners. It is the product of fast- track, a procedure that cleared the Senate. Presumably at some point, it will then be advanced to the Congress for approval. The advancement will be the result of the President filing implementing legislation that will move the agreement forward. Even though the President regards this deal as one of his signature accomplishments, he is not making the trip. Instead, he has deputized Trade Representative Michael Froman to sign the agreement in New Zealand on behalf of the United States. New Zealand is a long way away. We haven't had much talk about this event. The reason is that the American people are very uneasy about it. The American people are not happy with this agreement. The American people, I believe, fully oppose it and would oppose it even more so if they knew more about it, and they will learn more about it. So I think there has been an effort not to talk about it, to keep the language low, and to see if it can't be brought up some way and passed. I think that would be a mistake. This trade agreement is 5,554 pages long and stacks 3 feet high on my desk, so I would like to point my colleagues to examples of what the deal will do. The American Automobile Policy Council recently issued a report which stated that the TPP would threaten 90,000 American automotive jobs because of its failure to include strong currency protections. This is just one of the problems we have. It has to be dealt with. Currency manipulation is exceedingly dangerous. It has very large impacts, and on a $20,000, $30,000, $40,000 automobile, we are talking about thousands of dollars difference through currency. American industries across the board are beginning to oppose TPP. Many believe that all of the businesses are for it. But that is not the case. Many American manufacturers would see their future even more problematic under the TPP. Ford released a statement opposing the deal. They argued that the TPP is not adequately open and does not adequately open foreign markets to U.S. goods. We are going to further open our markets to foreign goods, but we are not going to make the kind of progress that must be made to help our exports, which is why we are told this agreement should pass--because it is going to open up markets for us. Ford says no. Last week Ford announced they were leaving the Japanese market--Japan being the key country in this agreement--because they say that Japan has nontariff barriers that have limited their ability to sell cars in Japan. For example, in 2015, Ford sold fewer than 5,000 cars in Japan. Ford is an international manufacturer. They sell large numbers of automobiles in Europe, in Mexico, in South America, but they cannot penetrate the Japanese market. Hyundai, a superb South Korean manufacturer, also not too long ago gave up trying to sell automobiles in Japan. It is not tariffs; it is nontariff factors, constructed by Japan, that make this happen. Given this evidence, one would hope that the United States would be able to negotiate a deal that would support American manufacturing and American workers, but that is not the case with the TPP. This is the World Bank's evaluation. The World Bank has concluded that Japan would see an extra economic growth of 2.7 percent by 2030 while the United States can expect only four-tenths of 1 percent of additional economic growth. The White House's own study--a study they cite with pride, although they omit many of the facts that are set forth in that report-- conducted by the Peterson Institute for International Economics claimed that TPP will decrease the growth of manufacturing in the United States by 20 percent by 2030. In other words, without this deal, manufacturing in the United States would grow 20 percent more than if we signed the TPP. Is this good for America? Manufacturing jobs are high-paying jobs. Manufacturing jobs demand resources from the community, and all kinds of people support those manufacturing jobs. The products that Americans manufacture are sold in the United States, around the world, and money is brought home, and it pours into that community to buy more products, more machines, more gasoline, more electricity, and to pay the workers who work in the plants. You have to have manufacturing in this world. A nation cannot get by without it. A nation that has the greatest economy in the world, a nation that has the greatest military in the world must maintain a manufacturing base. According to the Peterson Institute for International Economics, this 20 percent reduction in potential growth would result in around 120,000 fewer jobs than would have been created otherwise. That is a very large number--120,000 high-paying, good jobs in manufacturing plants. But that is the President's study. That is his group that they got to give the results he wanted. Trust me--and we are going to show this over time--the predictions for these trade agreements have fallen massively short of what the administration has promised. However, a more critical study by the economists at Tufts University--that prestigious university--recently found that TPP would cost up to 400,000 jobs in the United States. We are supposed to sign this deal, and it is supposed to make America better, and it is going to cost us jobs. That is what the other deals have done. I think this one is likely to do the same. I wish it weren't so. We need better trade deals. We don't need to enter into trade deals that don't protect the legitimate interest of American workers and American manufacturers. Our trading partners, good countries, good people--Japan, South Korea, Philippines, and others--are tough trading partners. They are mercantilists. They are not free traders, really. They are out to maximize their exports, and the export market they lust after the most is the U.S. market. That is where they want to export their products and bring home American dollars. We haven't done a good job of defending our interests. The United States already has trade agreements with major Asian nations. We have many of them now. How have they turned out? Shouldn't we study that? Has anyone talked about that? Have we had hearings on how well they worked out before? No. We haven't really looked into the effects of previous agreements because we don't want to talk about that. What we want to say in the Senate and the House of Representatives is that trade deals are good. If anybody has a trade deal, be for it. That is not a sound way to proceed. South Korea is a good ally of the United States. It is a good country, but they are tough competitors. Our trade deficit with South Korea last year from January through November was $26 billion, and by the end of the year, that country alone will be about $28-plus billion. They have not published numbers yet, but estimates suggest that the 2015 trade deficit will be 15 percent higher than the previous year-- 2014. Is that a good deal for the United States? Trade deficits reduced U.S. GDP, as products that Americans consume are made abroad instead of produced here as part of our gross domestic product. It is not good for economic growth. Our growth fell way below expectations--0.7 percent--in the fourth quarter of this year, and every dollar of trade deficit subtracts from our GDP. Some think we could be heading into a recession. Many people are seriously discussing this. Who knows what will happen? We are not in a booming economy; there is absolutely no doubt about it. Wages are down. Job prospects are down. We have the lowest percentage of Americans in their working years actually working since the 1970s. It is not a healthy environment. In 2010, President Obama promised that the South Korean trade deal-- he said this when he signed the agreement. They have been promising these kinds of things in advance. It passed, and he signed the agreement. I voted for it. I voted for most of these deals, but it is time for us to be honest about it, to evaluate how well they are actually turning out. When he signed the deal, he promised it would increase American exports to South Korea by $11 billion a year. That was nice. We would like to have seen that. However, in the 11 months of last year, the United States exported only $1.2 billion more than we did when the deal was signed 6 years ago. The year before that, it was a $0.8 billion export increase; it was not even $1 billion. What about Korean exports to the United States, what we import from Korea? Since 2010, our trade deficit with South Korea has risen nearly 260 percent, from $10.1 billion in 2010 to more than $26 billion this year. That is a very serious matter. I am very concerned about this loss of jobs. I think the American people need to know what is happening. The Transpacific Partnership Agreement not only fails to deal with manufacturing jobs in general, but it also fails to include any kind of serious measure that would address currency manipulation. During the time President Reagan was President, the economy went through a tough period, but it rebounded under his leadership. Paul Volcker and Reagan's leadership put us on a path of sound, solid growth that went all the way through the 1990s. Mr. Volcker once said a moment of currency manipulation can wipe out years of trade agreements with our trading partners. Currency is a huge thing. That is why the American Automotive Council is concerned about it, why Ford and other manufacturers care about it, and why we had a series of votes on the Senate floor to try to do something about currency. But the powers that be had the ultimate victory. We got to vote for a bill that wouldn't become law; that would push back and allow us to resist currency manipulation. We got to vote on that one, but they made sure it didn't get on the bill that is going to become law--the Trans- Pacific Partnership Agreement. It was a show vote. The President was not going to execute it, and he threatened to veto it. The Wall Street Journal, on November 5, wrote: Mexico, Canada and other countries signaled that they were open to the [currency] deal when they realized it [would not] include binding currency rules that could lead to trade sanctions through the TPP. These countries want to be able to manipulate their currency. Obviously, they agreed to go forward with the trade deal because they knew there were no binding currency rules. In fact, last year the Japanese Finance Minister, Taro Aso, said that ``there [will not] be any change'' in Japan's currency policy because of the provisions included in the TPP. Some milk toast language got in the agreement. The Senators were able to say they voted for a bill that had teeth to it, but that was in a separate bill that would not become law. My currency provisions in the bill, the language with real teeth, was stripped out during the Conference Committee because the President threatened to veto it. It is never going to become law. But the agreement included alongside the TPP is meaningless. Japan and others say it is not going to make any change in their currency policy. Japan significantly devalued the yen again recently. China devalued its currency by 6 percent last summer alone, and many expect they will devalue it even further. I have to say, it is time for the United States of America to understand something. We are the largest economy in the world. We have the greatest military in the world. We need to demand that people who sell in our markets--and whose exports to the United States are critical to their economic well-being--don't get to do this if they are not playing by the rules. They don't get to manipulate their currencies. They don't get to subsidize their manufacturing, and we are not going to allow them to use nontariff barriers to prohibit the imports of American products. That is what we need from the leadership in this country--not an agreement that allows continued manipulation of currency and that does not deal effectively with the nontariff barriers and subsidies these countries use to take market share away from U.S. companies. What happens to an American business? U.S. Steel just closed some production and laid off 1,000 workers in Birmingham last year. Is that plant going to reopen? We would like to think so, but I doubt it. Once these American plants that get no support from their government to compete abroad are closed, they don't reopen. Our competitors know that, and they take market share. They get to sell more in the United States and bring home strong American dollars. I think it is time for us to slow down on this. We are going to continue to look at how these trade agreements have worked. I don't think they have worked very well for the American worker. They haven't done very well for American manufacturing. I think few would dispute that this Nation can be prosperous without manufacturing. One time they said you could do it with a service economy and high-tech economy. Saturday's Barron's did a report on a study that has been done about our high-tech companies, which we are so proud of and hear so much talk about. What about the job prospects they have for this year? Are they going to add more jobs to high-tech computer companies in America? No, this analysis said that the information technology companies in America would reduce employment by 330,000 people this year. I have to tell you that if we lose automobile manufacturing and steel plants, these people are not going to work in computer companies. That is one of the biggest misrepresentations I have ever heard. The facts are becoming very clear on that. Microsoft laid off over 100,000 people the year before last. We have had a continual decline in high-tech job creation. Oh yes, some plant somewhere is adding jobs, but more plants are laying off workers. There is an election going on out there. People are concerned about their future. They need to know about the trade agreement. They need to be asking their Representatives and their Presidential candidates how they feel about it. Which side are you going to be on? Let's hear the reasons why you are for or against this agreement. After they hear that, I think they will be in a better position to decide how to cast their vote. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I appreciate the leaders who have worked on this bill--Senator Murkowski and Senator Cantwell--and the good work they put into it. I have served on the Energy Committee and now serve on Environment and Public Works. Those are important committees as we wrestle with how to produce energy at lower prices that is healthy for our Nation. As we consider this Energy Policy Modernization Act, I want to focus on a critical point about public policy and what is a primary goal of the United States of America. We are in a very competitive world. Energy is a big part of how we compete on manufacturing, production, and jobs. The American people want us to focus on that. In addition, energy impacts everybody when they fill up their tank and when they drive to work. It is important when it comes to paying the electric bill or the heating bill at home. Is it expensive or inexpensive? The price of energy has a dramatic impact on the quality of life for American people to a degree that is almost impossible to ascertain. When the price of gasoline is cut in half and somebody has a long commute every day, they may have had $200 a month in gasoline bills and now it is $100. They have $100 extra in their pocket. Without taxes, without insurance, and without house payments to be paid out of that, they can use that to take care of their own personal needs--their family, their vacation, going out to eat, or just paying down that credit card that has been run up too high. For decades Republicans have called for producing more American energy. Our Democratic colleagues have attacked those proposals that would increase the supply of energy, claiming that these efforts are part of some corrupt deal with big oil companies to make them rich at the expense of the taxpayers and the American citizens. That has been the argument. You have heard it for the last 30 years. But is that the correct way to analyze the challenges we face? Is that the way to establish good, sound public policy that will produce more American energy and bring down the cost? Our Democratic colleagues objected to the Keystone Pipeline. We had a number of votes over a number of years, and finally it passed, and then the President vetoed that. What would the Keystone Pipeline do? It would produce another source of oil for the United States of America. Is that good or bad for big Texas oil companies? It is bad for those companies. It made it harder for them to get a higher price. There is another substantial competitor pouring another supply of oil into the United States. This was not a corrupt deal to try to benefit some big oil company but a way to make the supply more plentiful, to bring down the cost of energy for American people. That is what we were fighting for, and it baffled me to no end that the President finally vetoed it at the end, after the American people so clearly favored it. The Federal ban on drilling in the Gulf of Mexico--we had the Deepwater Horizon disaster in 2010. There is no doubt about that. This country really focused on it. Great effort was made to find out how it happened and how we could prevent it in the future. Eventually the Obama administration said they were reopening production in the gulf--I thought it took longer than necessary. There is now onsite, according to a government official, a cap, and if the Horizon Disaster were to occur again, that cap within matter of days could be taken out, and it would successfully have stopped that blowout as well. We didn't have it in advance. We should have had it. But that is fixed, and other things were done, and the President said we are going to open up drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. It wasn't so. They referred to it as a de facto moratorium. They still couldn't get approval, and we lost a lot of production that went to other places around the globe. More production means lower prices. More American oil means more American jobs and more revenue for the Federal and State governments that benefit from that and a smaller wealth transfer from Americans to some foreign country which may be hostile to us and from which we have to buy our oil. We should look to head in that direction. Additionally, the Obama administration recently placed a moratorium on new leases for coal mined on Federal lands. I believe the administration has bypassed Congress and the will of the American people by drafting regulations that seriously constrain the use of coal as an energy source. We just have to use coal. It is a magnificent energy source. We can do it and are doing it cleaner year after year. Closing producing coal mines reduces American energy competition and certainly increases the cost of everyday living for Americans, and it certainly causes economic dislocation where mine after mine is being closed and United Mine Workers are being laid off. I have always believed in and fought for increased energy production for the American people--not for big oil companies but because greater production brings down price. We know now that is true because we have seen a worldwide increase in supplies, which has resulted in a dramatic decrease in the price of oil--an amount below what anyone may have expected. This price collapse affects Americans at the gas pump every day. Gas prices are the lowest they have been since 2008. The national average as of last week was $1.84. This is half of what it was a few months ago. This has been my goal and the goal of my Republican colleagues and a lot of Members on both sides of the aisle. In addition, we have increased oil production throughout the country with new fracking technologies. We have had battle after battle over that, but we have never had water supplies that have been impacted adversely by fracking. It is a highly efficient technology. It also helped collapse the price of oil. We have had good, bipartisan support for efficiency breakthroughs over the years. They have caused us to have a car that uses a little less gas, houses that are more efficient, and other energy sources that are more efficient. As a result, we have needed less oil. That also helps increase the supply as the demand increases. That has been a positive step toward seeing the collapse in prices. If Big Oil were so powerful, how is it that the price of oil has gone from $140 a barrel to $30 a barrel? They dictate the price. They can set the price at whatever they want it to be. Not if the supply starts coming in in large numbers. The prices begin to decline. It was at $140 a barrel, and now it is at $30, $35 a barrel. The energy industry supports 9.8 million U.S. jobs, which represents 8 percent of the U.S. economy. Low energy costs are critical to advance American manufacturing. Without affordable, efficient, and reliable energy sources, American companies cannot supply their factories and employees with the kind of production we want to see. In a recent investment report, Standard & Poors wrote that affordable energy is critical to give U.S. manufacturers ``a competitive edge over overseas competitors.'' We have lower energy prices than Europe, Japan, and South Korea. That is an advantage. We want to keep that advantage. We need more American jobs, not fewer. We need to see fewer offshore incidents than we have seen. We need to have some onshoring, some return of manufacturing to America. If we can keep our energy prices low, that is a way our businesses can take advantage of that and expand their production of various products, many of which can be sold around the world. The President's agenda, which he has carried on since the beginning, has had the effect of really helping foreign countries by keeping our prices higher than they should be and blocking reasonable efforts to add more production in America. Instead of American energy being promoted at home and abroad, Iran is able to export oil more freely, thanks to the President's flawed nuclear deal. Instead of promoting the general welfare of the United States, the President has limited the production of domestic oil, further increasing costs for consumers. Regulators have delayed American production many times. These are important dynamics, along with nuclear power. I believe this is a very valuable part of the American energy production. I have been a strong advocate of nuclear power for years, and Republicans have too. It is a direct competitor to Big Oil, to carbon fuel, and we need more of that. So I think we need to remember that. Yes, wind and solar are getting more competitive, but it still remains for the most part more expensive in most places in the country. I hope it will continue to drop in price. Maybe it will. But I can't imagine we will see dramatic decreases any time soon. If we were to shift America immediately to a total solar and wind power system, prices would go through the roof. It would hammer Americans far more than we have ever seen before. I think this bill has many good qualities. It helps improve efficiency and innovation, and maybe we can build on it in a way that will bring America to the point where we can produce more American supply, keep prices down, help revitalize our manufacturing base, and put this country in a position to compete far more effectively in the world marketplace. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the senior Senator from Alaska for her leadership and comments on this bill, and I will have thoughts on that subject as we go forward. We have had some good things happen in energy, and we need to keep having that happen. Energy serves the American people. A low cost of energy is a blessing, a high cost of energy is a detriment to working families. I truly believe we need to make clear to the American people that those of us, like the Senator from Alaska who fought to increase production of energy, have done so not to provide a profit to private companies but to have created a situation in which the price of energy would decline. We have had a large surge in energy, and sure enough the prices have declined. I think that is a good thing.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I wish to share some thoughts tonight, before we go out, about the trade issue this Nation is facing, and it is a highly significant issue. The President is expected to sign the Trans-Pacific Partnership on February 4. It is a historic event. It cannot become law of the United States of America. It is detrimental to this economy. It is particularly detrimental to people who go to work every day and would like more jobs. They would like higher paying jobs and better benefits. It is detrimental to that, and we are going to establish that point. We have a Presidential campaign going on today and people need to talk about it. The American people need to know where their candidates stand on it. Well, let me share a few thoughts tonight and begin this discussion. The President is expected to sign the agreement on February 4. He negotiated this agreement with 11 different countries in the Pacific region. At some point he will implement legislation and then Congress will vote on whether to go forward. The legislation is part of the fast-track process, so it will not be filibustered. The bill will come up on a simple majority vote. No amendments will be allowed. It will simply be an up-or-down vote. What is happening in the world trade market today? On Monday, January 25 of this week, Ford announced that they were leaving the Japanese and Indonesian markets. Indonesia and Japan are good friends of ours. They are good countries, but they are tough trading partners. Why did Ford leave Japan? They sell automobiles all over the world. They sell them in Europe, Mexico, and South America. Why are they not able to compete in Japan? What did Ford say? They said that nontariff barriers have prevented them from selling cars in the market. In 2015, Ford sold less than 5,000 cars in Japan, representing six-tenths of 1 percent of the Japanese automobile market. In fact, only 6 percent of the automobiles sold in Japan are manufactured outside of Japan. It is not a question of tariffs. That is not the problem in dealing with Japan and importing cars into Japan. The Japanese have erected substantial nontariff barriers. In fact, Hyundai, a very fine South Korean automobile company in my state, attempted to sell in Japan for some time, and they recently gave up. What is the policy of Japan? The truth is Japan talks about free trade, but like most of our Asian allies and trading competitors, they are mercantile. The essence of having a successful mercantile economy is to export more and import less. This is the reality we are dealing with. The people who are and have been negotiating our trade agreements don't seem to understand this or don't care. In fact, they basically say: Well, if someone sells a product cheaper here, we don't care. We will buy it. They don't worry if we can't sell products in their country. A trading agreement is a contract between two nations--we were all taught that in law school--and it should serve the interests of both parties. When a contract ceases to advantage both parties, you abandon the contract. It shouldn't be signed or it should end. What else about this agreement? It creates an international commission--a commission of the 11 or 12 countries, including the United States. The language, by definition of our own administration, is that the agreement is a living agreement. The Presiding Officer is a fine lawyer. He has worked at the court of appeals. I know a living agreement makes the hair on the back of his neck stand up. It makes you nervous. A living agreement is no agreement at all. It can just be changed. They acknowledge and repeatedly say in the fast-track documents that nations can meet and change the agreement anytime they want. They can update it for changed circumstances, which is what activist judges say when they redefine the meaning of the U.S. Constitution. They like to say that they are updating it for changed circumstances. Well, Congress is supposed to do that, it seems to me, but anyway this agreement is a living agreement. It contains 5,554 pages. It is twice the length of the Holy Scriptures. It includes section 27, which sets up an international commission with nearly unregulated power. In fact, our own U.S. Trade Representatives--our own Web site--states that the Commission is formed ``to enable the updating of the agreement as appropriate to address trade issues that emerge in the future as well as new issues that arise with the expansion of the agreement to include new countries.'' Congress would be launching such an event into the future. Well, what is our problem? Well, what is one of the major problems that we have today? It is our substantial trade deficit. One report, which I think is probably conservative, says that one-half of 1 percent of the GDP has been lost in the United States as a result of our trade deficit. That is probably an acceptable economic estimate, and that is significant. When you have 2 percent GDP, you are losing 25 percent based on the trade deficit. We have to have growth in this country, more GDP, more Americans working, more people with better jobs and better pay, and part of that is manufacturing. The final figures for 2015 are expected to show that the bilateral trade deficit with China is increased to 8 percent to a record of around $365 billion. China is not a part of these 12 nations, but it has openly been said that they could be made a part of it in the future if countries vote them in. According to the Economic Policy Institute, growing U.S. trade deficits with China through 2013 eliminated 3.2 million jobs. Is that an accurate figure? I don't know for sure, but no one disputes that trade deficits with China have cost more than 1 million jobs. When you lose 1 million jobs, people go on welfare, need unemployment compensation or retire early. All of these are damaging events to the American economy. The White House claims that this Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement--this trade agreement--is critical to limit China's economic influence. We are going to hear about that a lot. We are going to hear the national security argument. However, a new study just released this month by the World Bank shows that China will actually see an increase in export potential if the TPP is approved by Congress. It is not going to constrict China. The World Bank says it is going to increase China's ability to export. The report by the World Bank stated that the overall impact on China would be ``really negligible.'' It is not a good argument to state that it is somehow going to boost other economies in the United States as it relates to China. China is not going to be hurt by this agreement. The World Bank study further reports that Japan would see an extra economic growth of 2.7 percent by 2030 while the United States could expect only nominal growth of perhaps four-tenths of 1 percent. Robert Scott of the Economic Policy Institute states that the TPP could slow the reshoring of American jobs, especially in the automobile sector. We have had a nice development in recent years. My State has benefited so tremendously from foreign automobile investments. Instead of making automobiles in Korea, Germany, and Japan, they built plants around the country, and some were built in my home State of Alabama, and make the automobiles there. I don't think there is any doubt that this agreement could reduce job reshoring because there is a small tariff on imported automobiles and that would be eliminated so that little advantage in moving a plant to the United States would be lost. Get this. The Fact Checker at the Washington Post gave the President's claim that the Trans-Pacific Partnership would create 650,000 jobs four Pinocchios. That is a pretty bad falsehood. They ought to give it five Pinocchios. Let's talk about reality. I have talked about trade agreements. Republicans favor trade agreements. I favor trade agreements, but they have to be good agreements. You have to be careful. What about this Korea trade agreement with our friends in South Korea. They are smart negotiators. Last year our trade deficit with South Korea from January to November--we don't have the numbers for December yet--was $26 billion. Maybe the rest of the year will be about $28 to $29 billion. That would be about 15 percent higher than last year's trade deficit with South Korea. President Obama signed the agreement in 2010. When he signed it, President Obama promised that the South Korea trade deal would increase American exports to South Korea by $11 billion a year. All right. I want to be cooperative. We like our allies in South Korea, and I voted for the agreement. But what happened? Over 11 months of last year the United States exported 1.2 billion more than we did when the deal was signed in 2010--not $10 or $11 billion more, $1.2 billion. The year before that it was $0.8 billion. We haven't seen a surge of exports to South Korea. Didn't the negotiators know that? They told us differently. What about South Korea's imports to the United States--their exports to the United States; what about them? They have risen not $1 billion but instead $20 billion. Since 2010 our trade deficit with South Korea has risen nearly 260 percent, from $10 billion in 2010 to about $28 billion last year. That is a stunning development. So we are going to have to vote on this. And we have been told and we have beliefs that things are going to be better than that. It is not happening in that way. I urge us to study the facts and figures to be realistic. Trade is a good thing, and I have been a supporter. But it is not a religion with me. It is a contract. It is a deal, and deals are to serve the interests of the American people. It has not been doing so. Even the Peterson Institute, which supports these trade agreements, said there would be 120,000 fewer manufacturing jobs over the next 9 years if this agreement takes place in the United States. Mr. President, I see our leader. He has had a busy week. I appreciate the opportunity to share these remarks. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I think so. People wonder about whom we get to work for us up here and who is helping to run this government. But Mike Brumas-- 14 years at the Birmingham News. I don't think there is any doubt he was the most popular reporter in the State of Alabama for me and other people, and he was a great asset to me and to the majority leader.

Mr. SESSIONS. He really did. He was loyal to me, and I know he was loyal to you, and he shared the visions we have tried to execute. I think the size of the crowd and the enthusiastic well wishes he got were a testament to the quality of his contribution. I thank the majority leader for hosting that event.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, the bill before us today represents a colossal addition to our Nation's debt, which currently stands at $18.4 trillion. Earlier this year, the Budget Committee worked hard to develop a budget plan that would balance in the next 10 years by saving money, cutting costs, and examining inefficient programs and provisions. It was not easy to find the cuts necessary to achieve the goals laid out in that proposal. But the tax extenders bill costs are a large step away from getting our Nation back on a sound fiscal footing and accomplishing the objectives laid out in the budget plan. When the Joint Committee on Taxation, JCT, scored the bill, they found that in just the next year, it will add $157 billion to the debt, and that cost will swell to $622 billion over the next 10 years. The government will have to borrow this money; we do not have it to spend. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, CRFB, headed by Maya MacGuiness, took an independent look at these tax provisions. According to the CRFB, the United States will have to pay an additional $130 billion in interest charges over the next 10 years on the money borrowed to finance this legislation. Maya's organization makes one more important point that many here in Congress have not sufficiently considered. The $622 billion advertised cost will balloon even further to $2 trillion over the next two decades. Certainly, many of the provisions in this package are good, but President Obama and Congress need to recognize there are limits. The bill also extends costly tax credits that are scored rightly by the Congressional Budget Office as support payments, not tax deductions; and allows tax credits, earned income tax credits, for illegal aliens favored by President Obama's Executive amnesty and the additional income tax credit, which allows billions to go to illegal aliens. These provisions are unwise and need serious reform before extending. There are indeed some good provisions in this bill. Businesses across the nation will benefit by the research and development and section 179 bonus depreciation tax credits being made permanent. Many businesses in my State rely on the credits and making them permanent provides consistency for better planning. But the $611 billion cost in new expenditures and lost revenues is huge. This Congress has to know that a $2 trillion addition to the debt over the next 20 years is simply too much. This is a step away not towards fiscal responsibility. It is these kinds of rationalizations that can cause a country to go broke. For perspective, Congress struggled mightily to find $77 billion above the gas tax to pay for the 5-year highway bill. This tax package is so huge it will make the highway bill costs look insignificant. Colleagues, we cannot be in denial about how much this bill costs. We all have a strong desire for tax cuts and tax reform. I have supported such bills many times in the past, but this bill has little reform and great cost. I am disappointed that I cannot support this bill.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, today I wish to pay tribute to MG Will Hill Tankersley, a patriot and friend. General Tankersley died Saturday, November 28, 2015, at the age of 87. General Tankersley exemplified the attributes of service, loyalty, and, perhaps most precious to him, duty. He leaves behind an adoring family, generations of friends and admirers, and a legacy that will persist long after his passing. He was born February 28, 1928, to a family with deep roots in Alabama. In fact, his grandfather settled around what would become Montgomery in 1815, 4 years before Alabama achieved statehood. When only a boy, his father, Felix Marcus Tully, passed away, leaving him in the care of his mother, ``Miss Corrie'' Melton Hill. His paternal grandfather, Judge Will Hill, became a father-figure to young Will Hill, ensuring his mother and her young family were provided for and that Will Hill and his brothers received an education. Despite facing these difficult odds, Will Hill attended the Citadel and Marion Military Institute before gaining acceptance to West Point, from which he graduated in 1950. Soon after graduation, before his class had even gone through basic training, he was sent into combat in Korea, serving six campaigns as a combat infantryman. For his service, he was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal, Bronze Star, and Combat Infantry Badge. The West Point Class of 1950 has the tragic distinction of suffering through some of the heaviest wartime losses in the history of the academy; he was one of only six of his classmates in his regiment not killed, wounded, or captured. In fact, at the age of 23, then- Lieutenant Tankersley had the unfortunate distinction of being the oldest living infantry lieutenant in the 19th Infantry Regiment. It was in 1953 while stationed at Fort Benning that he met Theda Clark Ball, also of Montgomery, whom he soon married. She was the love of his life, and her special place in his heart remained after her death in 2013, after almost 60 years of marriage. Once leaving the regular Army, Will Hill returned to Montgomery and joined the investment bank Sterne Agee & Leach. His 45 years at Sterne Agee saw him rise to the top of the organization, becoming a vice president, board member, senior vice president, chairman of the executive committee of the board of directors, president of the company, and finally the vice chairman emeritus for life. He retired in October of 2003. General Tankersley's dedication to principle and sense of civic duty to his city, State, and country are well known. Among his many distinctions are Montgomery Citizen of the Year for 1992; two terms as chairman of the Montgomery Chamber of Commerce; chairman of the Montgomery Area Committee of 100; chairman of Auburn University College of Business Advisory Counsel; the distinguished alumnus from Auburn University College of Business; and Marion Military Institute Alumnus of the Year. General Tankersley also served on the board of visitors of the Air University at Maxwell Air Force Base; as president of the Montgomery Rotary Club; a member of the board of directors for the Montgomery Academy; a member of the board of directors for the Tukabatchee Area Counsel Boy Scouts of America; senior warden of St. John's Episcopal Church--having served 5 years on its vestry; one of eight directors of the Governor's Management Improvement Program for Alabama; and chairman of the Education Committee on Community Government. After Active Duty, Will Hill remained in the U.S. Army Reserve, eventually rising to the rank of major general. He served as the civilian aide to the Secretary of the Army for the State of Alabama; was nominated as the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs by President Ford, serving 3 years; was appointed during the George H.W. Bush administration as chairman of the Reserve Forces Policy Board, principal adviser to the Secretary of Defense on matters concerning the National Guard and Reserves; and was appointed in 2001 by George W. Bush as one of 11 commissioners on the American Battle Monuments Commission. General Tankersley is survived by three children: his daughter, Theda, and sons Will Hill, Jr., and David. I mentioned earlier the high value General Tankersely placed on the concept of duty and of meeting the requirements imposed upon those bound to it. He not only lived a life bound by this code but proselytized its virtues to others. In 1995, when I was attorney general of Alabama, he sent me a framed quotation of General Lee, still in my office today, which reads ``Duty is the sublimest word in the English Language.'' Accompanying this gift was an encouraging note serving as both a call to arms and an offer of his services reading in part: In the event you ever feel the urge to let bygones be bygones, to overlook the transgressions of those in public office who have violated the law, abused the public trust, and brought dishonor on Alabama and hurt its image or to believe these miscreants did not know what they were doing and shouldn't be prosecuted--call me, night or day, and I'll come to where you are and remind you of General Lee's words. The Philistines are all around us and they are many and we are few; we must keep the faith and do our duty if government of, by and for the people is to exist in our state. General Tankersley represented the best of Alabama and her values. He was a true patriot and a man of great character. He will be greatly missed.