Chris Van Hollen

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Yes, that is exactly right.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I will.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, just briefly because, as I made clear, this was the very provision that Senator Barrasso this morning said that Republicans have supported, and he indicated that this was something that they wanted to see move forward. Well, that was this morning, and now it is 6 this evening, and I don't know what changed. But the language is the same as what Senator Barrasso talked about this morning. It is the same as what the Senate Appropriations Committee passed on a bipartisan basis. All of a sudden, when it comes time to actually get it done on the Senate floor--not just as part of an appropriations bill that is going to wind its way through this place for weeks or months--when it is time to actually get it done, Republicans are opposing the idea of transparency. I find that quite shameful. I understand my colleague from Oregon Senator Merkley is interested in making some points and maybe asking some questions. I yield the floor.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from California and the Senator from Rhode Island. They have well described, I think, all the inappropriate actions that have been taken by the Justice Department, including recently with respect to the Deputy Attorney General, who had been Donald Trump's personal lawyer, conducting the secret interview with the Epstein associate Maxwell. This is an important conversation to continue here on the Senate floor. We were here earlier this morning, where we discussed the very, very troubling and disturbing case of Jeffrey Epstein and the horrifying abuse of young women and girls. Those who were so terribly abused and mistreated deserve to have the full truth. They deserve to have all the facts come out, as do their loved ones, as do the American people so the American people can have some kind of confidence that the Department of Justice is presenting the American people with the truth because we need transparency in order to ensure full accountability. It used to be the case that Donald Trump and his Attorney General Pam Bondi and others in this administration said they wanted to get to the bottom of this. In fact, they said they wanted to release the Epstein files. But as we got closer to actually doing that, they suddenly decided that they did not want the public to know and that they didn't want Epstein's victims to know. So now they have decided not to be forthcoming. The obvious question is, What are they hiding? And that is why we took to the floor earlier today to say: Release the damn Epstein files. We have learned just in the last 48 hours that at some point along the way, the FBI redacted Trump's name from the Epstein files. We have learned that his name was very likely in those files. We also know that the Trump administration asked the FBI to do a search of his name in the files. We now know that his name was redacted from those files at some point along the way by the FBI. As my colleagues from Rhode Island and California were just discussing, we have also witnessed in just the last week or two the highly inappropriate action of Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to conduct a secret interview with Ghislaine Maxwell, who was Jeffrey Epstein's partner in these crimes. When he was asked at his confirmation hearing before the Senate about whether he had a continuing duty of loyalty and confidentiality to Donald Trump, his response was yes, as the former personal attorney of Donald Trump, he had an ongoing duty of loyalty and confidentiality. Clearly, that duty of loyalty and confidentiality to Donald Trump puts him in direct conflict with the interests of the truth and the people of the United States when it comes to President Trump. So it was highly inappropriate that he held that interview. As the Senator from California just pointed out, he excluded from that interview lawyers who had been working on this case for a long time. It is also a fact by at least many reports that he, Todd Blanche, has a very close, personal relationship with the lawyer for Ms. Maxwell. So this thing stinks to high heaven, and one thing they should do is immediately release the transcripts of this secret interview that was just conducted. Release the transcripts. According to all reports, they gave Ghislaine Maxwell immunity-- proffered immunity for the purpose of her testimony; nothing she said in that interview could be used against her. So release the interview transcript to the American people, because Donald Trump's personal attorney should not be the one in the room conducting an interview with somebody who might have testimony that directly incriminates Donald Trump. We have also seen just in recent days the question floated about whether the President of the United States would pardon Ghislaine Maxwell. When President Trump was asked about that possibility, he acknowledged he had that power. As I said on this floor this morning, President Trump should immediately, today, announce that he will not use his pardon power to pardon Ghislaine Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence for being a coconspirator in the abuse of young women and girls. What is clearly happening in plain view is very dangerous to our system of justice. What is clearly happening is the possibility that Ghislaine Maxwell and her lawyers are seeking a pardon in exchange for her giving the kind of testimony that would please President Trump. One of the families of one of the victims, a family from Virginia who lost their loved one to suicide in April, has said: President Trump, do not pardon Ghislaine Maxwell. And my understanding is that is clearly the sentiment of the other victims and their families. So the President should, today, announce that he will never do that. Now, earlier this morning, Senator Merkley offered a resolution and asked unanimous consent on it to release the Epstein files. And we should do that immediately. That should be done immediately. Senator Durbin and I wrote to the Attorney General last week urging her to do what she said she was going to do, which is release the files. But that was objected to on the Republican side. And I see Senator Barrasso on the floor. And when he objected to Senator Merkley this morning, this is what he said. He said: Senate Republicans included a provision to address this very issue in an appropriation bill that Democrats blocked earlier this week. This issue would have been addressed here on the U.S. Senate Floor, yet Senate Democrats came to the floor and objected to what was in this bill. Well, first of all, I should clarify the fact that it was not Senate Republicans who included that provision in the appropriations bill to require that the Justice Department retain all the records with regard to the Epstein files and that they answer certain questions regarding those files and provide those responses to Congress. It wasn't Senate Republicans. In fact, it was my amendment in the Senate Appropriations Committee on that very issue. I am glad it did pass unanimously, and momentarily I am going to ask for unanimous consent on the exact same provision that was adopted unanimously by the Senate Appropriations Committee, word for word. Now, it is true that that bill did not move forward here in the Senate. And I am not going to go on for the hours that would be required to talk about the provisions in the Commerce-Science-Justice bill. Suffice it to say that there was another issue that we discussed for about an hour the other night regarding the fact that the Trump administration decided to seize, rescind, steal--whatever you want to call it--$1.4 billion that had been set aside for a secure FBI Headquarters, and they decided to snatch that money away from the selected site and put it to another site. And my view is that, wherever the FBI builds that new headquarters, it should be a secure site. So that was a disagreement that led to the fact that that bill did not proceed at this time. We also know--and Senator Barrasso knows as well--that the appropriations bills take a very long time to wind their way through the Senate and the House, go through conference. And so, really, there is no reason to delay the provision in that bill that was unanimously adopted by the Senate Appropriations Committee and which Senator Barrasso said this morning Republicans included. Well, if it was included in that bill, we should do it right now. We should get it done right now. And I am just going to, in closing, read this resolution because it is pretty straightforward. It says: IN GENERAL.--The Attorney General shall retain, preserve, and compile any records or evidence related to--(1) any investigation, prosecution, or incarceration of Jeffrey Epstein; and (2) any service provided to victims identified in such an investigation. Pretty straightforward. Retain the records. Don't destroy any evidence. It also called for a report. Not later than 60 days after the date of enactment of this Act, the Attorney General shall submit to the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies of the Committee on Appropriations of the Senate a report that includes information on the history of the Jeffrey Epstein case, which shall include--(1) information regarding the 2008 non-prosecution agreement between Jeffrey Epstein and the Department of Justice; (2) information on victims and testimony by victims, including notification of victims under section 3771 of title 18, United States Code . . . the ``Crime Victims Rights Act''; (3) information on any investigation of a coconspirator; (4) information on any internal review or misconduct findings by the Department of Justice related to any investigation related to Jeffrey Epstein; (5) the current status of any investigation into the financial and trafficking networks of Jeffrey Epstein; (6) an intelligence assessment of the financial ties and clients of Jeffrey Epstein and any connections between Jeffrey Epstein and the United States Government or foreign governments; and (7) information on oversight failures at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York, New York. Finally-- (c) PRIVACY PROTECTION.--The Attorney General may redact the names and personally identifiable information of any victim from the report submitted to Congress under subsection (b), as necessary to protect privacy. That is it. I wanted to read it to all the Members of the Senate so everyone knows exactly what they are voting for. It is straightforward: President Trump, Attorney General Bondi, do not destroy the evidence of the Epstein files, and within 60 days present this Senate with answers to questions regarding the case. That is what this amendment does. It is exactly the same as the amendment that passed unanimously, with Republican and Democratic support, out of the Appropriations Committee, the same provision that Senator Barrasso this morning said was a Republican proposal. So I hope all the Republicans will join us in supporting this measure. And with that, Mr. President, as if in legislative session and notwithstanding rule XXII, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of my bill at the desk; further, that the bill be considered read three times and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. We, certainly, more importantly, the American people, and especially the victims deserve to know that nobody will tamper with the files between now and the moment they are released. Again, the fastest way to address this issue, to meet the concerns, to meet the terrible, terrible abuse that was visited upon these young women and girls, is simply to release the files and do it now.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Well, that is a very good point, Senator Merkley. We had a unanimous bipartisan vote in the Senate Appropriations Committee on an amendment to do exactly that--to make sure the records were preserved so nobody tried to destroy evidence--and it required an exhaustive report, detailing many of the questions that we have all raised regarding the Epstein files. As I said, the appropriations process takes a very long time to wind through the U.S. Congress, and there is no reason to wait on this. Again, if a majority of the Appropriations Committee--not just a majority--but if a unanimous vote in the Appropriations Committee took place, we could actually get this out right away, and, hopefully, the House would pass that, and then we could send it right to the President's desk.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I think that is a question for all of us to ask the FBI, and we should follow up and ask the FBI. In the meantime, though, the best way, as you pointed out and all of us have pointed out and even Attorney General Bondi at one point pointed out, is just release the damn files. That is how we would get to the bottom of all of this. And don't redact anything from the files except--except--to protect victims. But perpetrators should not have their names redacted from the files.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. The concern, of course, is that the Trump administration would be tempted to destroy these files for the purposes of getting rid of evidence. As I indicated, reports today indicate that the FBI--and, again, I don't know if they were instructed to do so. I do not know all the circumstances. What we do know are the reports from Bloomberg that Donald Trump's name was stricken from the files.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I did, indeed. This is a report that just came out. The headline is ``The FBI Redacted Trump's Name in the Epstein Files.'' It is a Bloomberg report, and it is just one more example of what appears to be an effort to cover up any role that Donald Trump may have played in these crimes. Again, we don't know, and the best way for us all to know is to support your effort here, to support our mutual efforts, which is to just release the files.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Certainly. If the President of the United States is signaling to Ghislaine Maxwell and her attorneys that he would provide a pardon without any possible reason to do so other than for her to give testimony--in this case, it would be false testimony because we know about the close association between Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein--that would clearly be witness tampering.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. The President of the United States, when asked if he could pardon Ghislaine Maxwell, said, yes, he has the power to do that pardon, to make that pardon. Her attorneys have made very clear through multiple public remarks that they would welcome that. Of course her attorneys would welcome that. She would love to get out of jail free. This is why the President, today, should make very clear that he will not pardon Ghislaine Maxwell because she was a close associate in the crimes that she and Jeffrey Epstein committed.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, I think we can and certainly should all agree that the case of Jeffrey Epstein is deeply disturbing, with horrifying abuse of young women and girls. From the lenient plea deal he received in Florida in 2008 to the end of his case with the death in prison, survivors of his abuse have been denied a full accounting of his crimes and the justice they deserve. It is also clear that a lack of transparency and accountability and contradictory statements by the Trump administration and its officials have led to even deeper public distrust of our justice system and especially the handling of this case. After all, Trump administration officials, including Attorney General Bondi, promised transparency in this case but instead gave the American people a binder of largely already-public documents. It was a sham. Last month, the Department of Justice released a two-page memo informing the American public that the Department had completed its exhaustive review of the Epstein files and concluded that ``no further disclosure would be appropriate or warranted.'' We shouldn't be taking the word of any official in any administration on face value. The public should see these documents for themselves. People ranging from the victims to the American public believe transparency is warranted, and it is. Just 3 days after the Department of Justice memo was published, the Senate Appropriations Committee unanimously agreed to an amendment I proposed to the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies appropriations bill that would require two things. It would require the Department to retain, preserve, and compile the Epstein files and submit a report with the files to the respective subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee. I understood that earlier today, Senator Barrasso made the point that that Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations bill was on the floor and that I objected to moving forward on that bill, as I did for totally unrelated reasons. We also know that appropriations bills take a very long time to wind through the U.S. congressional process. It has to go through the House. It could be months before that provision--if it continues to be in there--sees the light of day. It shouldn't take months. We should do it now, which is why, the day after the Senate Appropriations Committee unanimously--Republicans and Democrats together--supported that provision to require the report and preserve the documents, Senator Durbin and I wrote to the Attorney General to say: Why wait? And that is the question, Mr. President--why wait? The victims, the American people--they deserve to see the files and know the full truth, and they deserve it right now. Just this morning, there was a new report in Bloomberg. The headline says ``The FBI Redacted Trump's Name in the Epstein Files.'' We have always understood that Donald Trump's name was in the files. What we are learning today, at least according to these reports, is that the FBI redacted Donald Trump's name from those files. The question is, Why? Nobody's name should be redacted from the files with respect to the perpetrators of these crimes. Clearly, in releasing files, we need to protect the names of any victims, but the perpetrators--we should know their names. They should not be redacted. What we have seen, of course, from the President is an effort to change the subject entirely, say that it was the Obama Administration that somehow invented this whole dispute and debate. But we know that is not true. We know that is not true because of what President Trump has previously said and, of course, what his Attorney General has said. It is also deeply concerning that the Deputy Attorney General of the United States of America, who previously was Donald Trump's personal lawyer, skirted all the Department of Justice protocols and went down to secretly interview Ghislaine Maxwell for hours over a couple of days. I think we should have the transcript of that interview as well. We have also heard President Trump say that he has the power to pardon Ghislaine Maxwell. Well, it is one thing to have the power; it is another thing to speculate publicly about using that power to pardon somebody who could testify in an incriminating way against all of the perpetrators. That reeks of a hint of the obstruction of justice, to signal to Ghislaine Maxwell that if she says the right things, the President of the United States could pardon her. That would be a corruption of the judicial process--a gross corruption of the judicial process. So I hope President Trump will immediately announce that he won't pardon this person, Ghislaine Maxwell, who was the associate of Jeffrey Epstein in perpetrating these crimes against young women and girls. The President of the United States should announce today that he will not do that. That is the way the President can put an end to the understandable concern that he is signaling that if she says the right thing regarding him, she will get a ``get out of jail free'' card. That would be a gross corruption of the process and of the justice system. This is why we should do now what the victims deserve and what the American public demands, which is to support the proposal put forward by the Senator from Oregon Senator Merkley. As if in legislative session and notwithstanding rule XXII, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged and the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 2557; further, that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I would.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, I want to thank the Senator from New Mexico for that. I call up my amendment No. 3115 that I offer on behalf of myself and Senators Alsobrooks, Kaine, and Warner and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, USDA has proposed a massive reorganization plan having done absolutely no due diligence. They have not talked to families or to farmers or to rural communities about it. They have not backed up their estimates of cost savings, and they have not provided the information needed to assure that this reorganization will not harm the critical work that USDA does. This amendment directs USDA to take a step back and provide a transparent, informed, carefully considered plan for any such reorganization before implementing it. In other words, look and aim before you shoot. It requires a vetted benefit-cost analysis and review of how this reorganization would impact USDA's staff expertise and ability to provide customer service. It requires a public comment process so our constituents and stakeholders can weigh in. Once USDA takes those steps, Congress can assess the need for that reorganization in fiscal year 2027. I urge a ``yes'' vote on this amendment.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, I rise today to honor J. Thomas Manger, the former chief of the U.S. Capitol Police. Chief Manger has served our country honorably in law enforcement for nearly 50 years. Throughout his career, he has strived to ensure the safety of our communities, including as chief of the Montgomery County Police in my home State. In July of 2021, Chief Manger stepped up with strength, courage, and grace on behalf of our Nation following the attack on our Capitol on January 6. As chief of the U.S. Capitol Police, Manger has demonstrated principled leadership, unwavering service, and a commitment to safeguarding members of Congress, staffers, and visitors. Following January 6, he reviewed over 100 safety recommendations, implementing many of them in an effort to improve security to protect the Capitol, the American people, and our democratic process. During his tenure, Chief Manger also worked to grow the Capitol Police force by hiring new officers, retaining current officers, and implementing policies to meet the changing demands on Capitol security. Chief Manger's storied career in law enforcement began long before his decision to come out of retirement to protect our Nation's Capital. He started with the Fairfax County Police Department as an officer and rose through the ranks. He earned the Silver Medal of Valor in 1993 and served as police chief in Fairfax from 1998 to 2004. In 2004, he began his 15-year tenure as chief of police in Montgomery County. During his term, he proposed requiring body cameras for all officers, implemented de-escalation training for officers, and received several national awards. His numerous accolades include the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence's 2007 Law Enforcement Award, the Anti-Defamation League's 2016 Gorowitz Institute Service Award, the National Immigration Forum's 2017 Keeper of the Dream Award, and the 2018 FBI National Executive Institute Penrith Award. I commend Chief Manger for his many years of service, his dedication to the safety of the public and the stability of our democratic institutions. I ask my colleagues to join me in thanking him for his extraordinary service to this institution and wishing him a well- earned, enjoyable, and fulfilling retirement.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Madam President, reserving the right to object--and I object to the end request, but I want to begin on a point of agreement, which is, other than the final request made by the good Senator from Kansas, I agree with everything he said. As he said, we have four appropriations bills bundled together here-- proposed to be bundled together here: Military Construction and Veterans; Agriculture; Leg Branch; and the Commerce, Justice, Science bill. And I have the privilege of working with Chairman Moran on what we call the CJS bill, and it makes very important targeted investments in a whole range of areas that he described. And, of course, one of the areas of jurisdiction of this subcommittee is the Department of Justice and the FBI. And, in my view, we absolutely have an obligation to make sure we address the needs and the mission of the men and women of the FBI, that we provide the resources to carry out that mission, and that we make sure that they are safe in conducting that mission. And I am here on the floor objecting to this request today because, just a short time ago, the Trump administration took $1.4 billion that this Congress had set aside on a bipartisan basis and proposed that, instead of going to a site for a new headquarters that had met the security requirements and that had gone through a competition, the administration proposed to effectively rescind those funds and use them for a different purpose, without presenting a plan as to how their alternative would meet the security requirements for the men and women of the FBI. I am not going to repeat the whole history over many, many years that this Senate has gone through with respect to ensuring that the men and women of the FBI have a new headquarters that is fit for the purpose and meets the security requirements. I will only point out that the FBI, in making the determination with respect to where they had planned to go before the Trump administration's intervention said this: Because of the symbolic nature of the client mission and performance of functions critical to the security of the United States, a Facility Security Level 5 designation was selected for this campus. In all the work that this Senate has done and all the work to date at the FBI, it has been determined that, wherever the FBI makes its new home and new headquarters, it has to meet the level 5 security requirements because of the special mission of those men and women and because, I think, all of us want to make sure that they are protected in the greatest degree that we can make sure their security is protected. So in the Appropriations Committee, I worked on an amendment that would have said that the FBI has to move its new headquarters to the place that had already won the competition, that had already been selected, and one of the reasons is the level 5 security requirement. I am not asking that in the amendment that I proposed for the floor today. I asked for something very straightforward. I proposed an amendment that simply says that wherever the FBI chooses to make its new headquarters, it has to meet the level 5 security requirements that it, itself, has laid out as necessary to defend the safety of the men and women who do that important work. That is an amendment that we should include in this bill, and that is why I am here right now objecting to the proposal that is being put forward, because while we put an even stronger version of that amendment at one point in our bill in the Appropriations Committee, that action was then reversed. And so now I am proposing that we just put the other alternative forward. And, again, based on the consistent position taken by the FBI, taken by Members of the Senate, that level 5 security requirement is important, and wherever they go, they should be able to do a study. They should be able to conduct a study before they move people into a new headquarters, before they put people at risk, to show that that new place--wherever it may be--is fit for purpose and meets those security requirements. That is a simple request that I would have thought all of us could stand behind: making sure that the new headquarters of the men and women of the FBI meets the security requirements that we and they have set out. And so that is why I reserve the right to object, and I will now ask the Senator to modify his request so that my amendment No. 3126 be included in the list of amendments in the managers' package to be adopted en bloc.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, reserving the right to object. I just want to take a few moments to respond to the Senator from Kansas. First of all, I do think it is the business of the subcommittee that oversees the Department of Justice and the FBI to ensure that the men and women of the FBI have a headquarters--wherever it is--that meets the security standards that they have set out for themselves for their own protection. I also agree with the Senator from Kansas in that we should and do work together on a bipartisan basis on the Appropriations Committee and that we should do that as a separate branch of government than the executive branch. The only reason we are here is that the President of the United States decided to seize funds that had been set aside by this committee on a bipartisan basis and others and use them for another purpose. This is a moment, actually, where, if the Senate were adhering to its traditions of bipartisanship, it would stand up together against the President of the United States. But that is not what we are witnessing on so many of these appropriations bills. What happened in this case was the President of the United States interfered with the process. I did offer an amendment in the Senate Appropriations Committee. It was actually adopted on a majority basis. It was an amendment not only to ensure that the FBI would go to a level 5 security facility, but it was an amendment that said it should go to the one that was selected after a long process. After that was adopted on a bipartisan basis, our Republican colleagues on the committee said that all of the work that we had done on the bill--all of the work the Senator from Kansas is talking about when it comes to the NSF, when it comes to NASA, when it comes to NOAA--that we were not going to let all of that good work go forward if that amendment to ensure the security of the FBI facility at the selected site were attached. I have never seen anything like it in Congress. Even before I got here, I, too, was a student of Congress and loved the process. What happened was, after that amendment got on in the Appropriations Committee on a bipartisan basis, our Republican colleagues said: We don't want that so badly that we are now going to undo that entire process. That is not bipartisanship--and we know why that happened too. It didn't happen because members of the Senate Appropriations Committee-- Republicans and Democrats--didn't think that it was the right thing to do to preserve what we had set out before and make sure that the men and women had a level 5 security headquarters. We did it because the President of the United States was going to throw a fit if that provision stayed on. That is why people reversed the position. So I say to my friend from Kansas: We should do our work on a bipartisan basis, and we shouldn't make our decisions out of fear about what somebody in the White House is going to do, because that--that-- distorts the entire process here in the U.S. Senate. I believe that, if we set this aside for now, we will, I hope, be able to get it back on track in September. I hope we will return to what has been that bipartisan tradition and not allow the executive to come in and undo work that has been done on a bipartisan basis. This is not about picking the location in this amendment. This is simply about making sure that the men and women of the FBI have a building that is secure. I will just end with this: The last time the Trump administration was in the White House, they also played with this whole issue. They said they wanted to construct a new headquarters on the site of the current FBI building, the Hoover building. Then they submitted to Congress a 25-page prospectus that they said would meet the security requirements of the men and women of the FBI. Guess what. The inspector general of the Department of Justice and the inspector general of GSA said that the work they showed did not meet those security requirements. It did not meet those security requirements. We should make sure wherever they go--Maryland, Virginia, Washington--that the congressional directive, that FBI directive, for the purposes that I set out at the beginning because of the kind of work the FBI does--we need to honor that. That is what this amendment does. That is what it did when it was first adopted by the Appropriations Committee on a bipartisan basis before everyone ran the other way because they were going to make the White House mad. So I object.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, I want to start by thanking the chair of the Appropriations Committee. And I see the vice chair of the Appropriations Committee is here on the Senate floor, Senator Murray. I want to thank them for the work that we did together. The Senator from Maine described very well the important initiatives and funding that are contained in the Commerce-Justice-Science bill, CJS bill. For all those important purposes, I agree. I would ask why our Republican colleagues are saying that they won't let this package go through if it includes a provision that requires that wherever the FBI moves its new headquarters, that it meets the security requirements that we have set out for the men and women of the FBI. I appreciate the fact that the Senator from Maine talks about how I can offer an amendment on the Senate floor. I offered an amendment in committee to, essentially, accomplish this purpose. In fact, it went even further. It not only said you had to meet the level 5 security requirement, but you had to do it by selecting the place that had already been established to meet that purpose. The amendment passed through the democratic process in the Appropriations Committee. It passed. Apparently, there was such great concern down at the White House--I don't even know who exactly. I have been asking for a long time for a discussion on the merits of this: Who is it that is actually objecting to the provision that requires that the FBI headquarters building, wherever it is, meets level 5 security? Who is objecting to this? That amendment passed, and then all of a sudden, it was undone. That democratic process was undone by another vote when it became clear that the White House wanted to have a different outcome. So I just say to my colleagues again: If we are going to be true to article I, if we are going to work together as colleagues to do the work of the Congress, we need to make independent decisions among ourselves and not be so easily turned around by the dictates of the person at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue. It is no secret to anybody here that that is what is happening on so many occasions, on so many issues during this appropriations process. I hope that will change. I hope it will change in the coming weeks and the coming months. I hope the Senate can get back to operating as an independent branch of government, along with the House, because if that doesn't happen, we are going to continue to be able to see the executive branch interfere in the independent decision of Members of this body and reverse decisions that were made in a democratic process. I yield the floor.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, I will be very brief because we have covered a lot of territory here. I hope we can get to the place where we make decisions in this Senate, in this Congress, on their own merits, among ourselves, without direct intrusion by the President of the United States. That, unfortunately, is what we witnessed in the Appropriations Committee process. We would be in a very different place here on the floor today if we hadn't seen the effort to overturn a decision the committee had made on a majority vote with respect to the security of the men and women of the FBI. It would have been a very different situation. So, again, let's dedicate ourselves to making sure that as we move forward, we do so as Senators--Republican and Democratic Senators--and not essentially take direction from the President of the United States who is trying very hard to interfere with this process. I yield the floor.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, on this day 60 years ago, President Lyndon Baines Johnson signed the law that created Medicare and Medicaid, protecting the health and well-being of hundreds of millions of American families. Those were our predecessors here on the floor of the U.S. Senate, and they passed that bill by the overwhelming vote--at least by today's standards--of 68 to 21, with support from Senators of both parties. And they did that because they understood how vital access to affordable healthcare is for all Americans. It was 15 years ago that Democrats and President Obama built on that legacy with the Affordable Care Act, which expanded Medicaid and delivered affordable healthcare to 45 million more Americans. Taken together, Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act are three parts of one promise, a promise of health and a measure of economic security for seniors, for people with disabilities, for the most vulnerable Americans, and for Americans working hard paycheck to paycheck. So 60 years ago, one Senator explained that the promise of Medicare and Medicaid meant this: We do not intend to kick you out on the street. We are going to see you through. You are not going to become forgotten people. That is how one Senator explained his vote to make sure we provided coverage under Medicare and Medicaid. Well, 3 weeks ago on the Senate floor, President Trump, with allies among the Republican Senators, forgot about those people, those people for whom that law was passed 60 years ago today. Because 3 weeks ago, right here on the Senate floor, Republicans passed what Donald Trump calls the Big Beautiful Bill. It certainly is beautiful if you are a billionaire or a very wealthy person. For everybody else, it is an ugly betrayal. Because that bill, passed about 3 weeks ago, here on the Senate floor, slashed Medicaid. It cut into the Affordable Care Act and, combined, cut over a trillion dollars in healthcare to fund tax breaks for billionaires and very wealthy people, taking healthcare coverage away from 10 million people--even more if you count the failure to extend the tax credits from the Affordable Care Act which will expire at the end of this year--but 10 million on the terms of that bill alone, including nearly 246,000 of my fellow Marylanders. And as others have said, this will increase the cost of healthcare for everybody else because it has a ripple effect throughout the insurance markets. When you start denying affordable healthcare to people on Medicaid, it puts upward pressure on premiums for everybody else as people go to get emergency care in hospitals and other places. Now, one of our Republican colleagues reportedly said to members of the Republican caucus: I know a lot of us are hearing from people back home about Medicaid, but they'll get over it. That was the quote from a Republican Senator. I can tell you, from talking to my constituents and hearing from my colleagues all over the country, the American people are not going to get over it. Because of this bill that was passed 3 weeks ago, millions of Americans are going to lose their coverage, not because they are ineligible but because Republicans purposefully put up all sorts of bureaucratic hurdles to assess accessing those healthcare needs. That is increasing the costs and making it harder for people to access healthcare. And because of the failure to extend the tax credits for the Affordable Care Act, a big part of those tax credits which will expire at the end of this year, another 20 million Americans will see their premiums jump an average of $700 starting in January. And in my home State of Maryland, I mentioned that about 246,000 Marylanders are going to lose access to healthcare because of the bill passed 3 weeks ago. And if we don't fix the issue of the expiring ACA tax credits by the end of the year, 70,000 Marylanders could lose their healthcare coverage altogether, and they will see their premiums increase 68 percent. As others have discussed, rural hospitals were already in a very, very tough position across the country, and now hundreds could close. We are also seeing seniors put at greater risk in nursing homes because of cutbacks on the number of nursing staff we normally require to make sure that people's elderly loved ones get the care they need and deserve, and these cuts will make families face impossible choices. Again, all of that--those cuts to Medicaid, the cuts to the Affordable Care Act--is for one purpose: to partially offset the cost of tax breaks for billionaires and wealthy people. I say ``partially offset'' because, even after cutting Medicaid, we are going to see an increase in the national debt of $3.5 trillion over the next 10 years, and that doesn't include additional interest on that debt. By cutting Medicaid so deeply, President Trump and Republicans are hurting people at every stage of life. You know, doctors take an oath to make sure they help people at every stage of life, from cradle to grave. What happened 3 weeks ago is going to hurt people from cradle to grave. For many, it will be an early death sentence by denying access to important care, including preventive care. Officially, death certificates may read ``died from late-stage cancer'' or because of an accident in a nursing home, but when you look behind that, you will find that it is because that late-stage cancer wasn't detected earlier or because the nurse who should have been there at the nursing home wasn't there. That will be as a result of the bill that passed 3 weeks ago. We believe that Donald Trump and Republican Senators know better. We certainly know that they heard from their constituents about what would happen if this bill passed. Like many, I received letters from hundreds of constituents, saying: Please don't pass this bill. I am just going to read two short excerpts from a few of my constituents. Mary, from Carroll County, said: My 52-year-old son is battling colon cancer and has to undergo chemotherapy every two weeks. He has been sick since 2019 and lost his business and cannot work. He lost everything and is living with me and on Medicaid. The chemo is enabling him to have one good week out of two. If they take his Medicaid away, it will be a death sentence. That is what Mary from Carroll County said. Frank, from Cecil County, said: PLEASE, PLEASE do not pass the budget, I have an autistic son who can only work part time at a grocery store. He is on Medicaid. If he loses his [insurance], we will not be able to cover him. Please do not let this happen. PLEASE! I received these heart-wrenching letters from many constituents, and I know that all of us in this Senate did as well. Unfortunately, we saw over 50 Senators look the other way in the face of all of those letters and, instead, vote for a bill that cut healthcare for millions of Americans in order to partially finance tax cuts for the very wealthy. We cannot allow this to continue. In fact, we need to reverse it. That is why I am joining others on the Schumer-Wyden bill to repeal the healthcare cuts that were enacted in that betrayal of a bill 3 weeks ago and to permanently extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits, which will otherwise expire at the end of this year. Again, 60 years ago, former Senators passed the Medicare and Medicaid law. They enacted that, improving the lives of millions of Americans. Three weeks ago, we saw the opposite happen--the great betrayal. We need to make sure that we reverse the damage that was done. Then we need to build a better healthcare system for every American. That is what we should be doing at this point in our history: building on the legacy of the Senators 60 years ago and building on the legacy of the Affordable Care Act. I yield the floor.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following Senators be permitted to speak prior to the scheduled rollcall vote: Senator Van Hollen for up to 10 minutes, Senator Durbin for up to 2 minutes, Senator Risch for up to 5 minutes, and Senator Sanders for up to 5 minutes.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, I rise to oppose the transfer of over $675 million of U.S. taxpayers' money to finance 1000-pound bombs and 20,000 fully automatic rifles and other offensive weapons to the Netanyahu government. The humanitarian situation in Gaza has gone from horrible to hell on earth. Yesterday, we reached the grisly marker of over 60,000 people killed in Gaza, over half of them women and children. And that number could be much higher. More than 133 people have died of starvation, over 80 of them children, most of them this month. Experts have been warning about the threat of famine in Gaza for months, ever since the Netanyahu government imposed a total blockade on all humanitarian assistance going into Gaza on March 2. This is a man-made, preventable crisis, and the solution is clear. The Netanyahu government must immediately allow the U.N.-led distribution system to resume delivery of aid into Gaza to avert a full-blown famine. I have long said that Israel is completely justified in its war against Hamas, which murdered over 1,200 people and seized over 250 hostages on October 7. And we must not rest until every remaining hostage comes home, and there must be no more October 7s. But the Netanyahu government is not justified in imposing collective punishment against all of the people of Gaza to pay for the sins of Hamas, and yet that is what is going on as it uses food and humanitarian aid as a weapon of war. There are now a half million people facing famine-like conditions in Gaza, but they are not just numbers. Colleagues, this is an awful, awful picture, but we have to look at what is happening in Gaza. This is baby Zainab. She weighed 6.6 pounds when she was born 5 months ago. She was 4.4 pounds when she died a few days ago. Her life could have been saved with a special type of baby formula, but none of that formula can be found in Gaza. It wasn't let in. For months, the Netanyahu government has been blocking thousands of truckloads of lifesaving aid that could save babies like Zainab. And yet the Netanyahu government is denying what every human being can see, and they are denying the humanity of people suffering. Just 3 days ago, Benjamin Netanyahu said: There is no starvation in Gaza. Even Donald Trump, who has given Netanyahu a blank check, called out that lie. He said that ``there is real starvation in Gaza. You can't fake that.'' The World Food Programme says it has enough food to end the crisis, but the Netanyahu government won't let them deliver all of it. And last week, they blocked almost half of the aid convoys that the WFP requested permission to bring in. On July 27, the editorial board of Haaretz, Israel's longest running newspaper wrote simply: Gaza is starving, and Israel is responsible. This chart from the Wall Street Journal tells the story. As you can see, back here in March, the Netanyahu government imposed a total blockade for months on all food and humanitarian aid entering Gaza. After several months, they began to let a little trickle of aid in, but they did not allow the deliveries to resume through the tested distribution system that had been run by the United Nations and supported by trusted organizations like the World Food Programme. Instead, they replaced it with an organization that goes by the name of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, but there is nothing humanitarian about it. It is a shadowy private organization backed up by mercenaries and the IDF. The food distribution blocked by Israel had over 400 aid distribution points. The GHF operation has only four, and they are not always open. The operation has become a death trap. When you have 4 sites to feed 2 million people, it is not surprising that thousands of desperately hungry people are surging to get what they can. And as they surge, it is well-documented that many have been shot and killed, sometimes by GHF security contractors, more often by IDF forces. The U.N. Secretary General said: Any operation that channels desperate civilians into militarized zones is inherently unsafe. It is killing people. That should be obvious to all of us. Yet the Trump administration is using $30 million of U.S. taxpayer money to fund that deathtrap, and it is sending more taxpayer dollars to fund bombs to the Netanyahu government to continue the devastation of Gaza. Colleagues, this must end. The Netanyahu government must immediately allow tested U.N. distribution systems to resume operations and quickly surge food to starving people. It is important to note that the Netanyahu government claimed it was replacing the U.N. distribution system because Hamas was systematically diverting food intended for civilians for its own purposes. From the start, that was a pretext and a big lie. The U.N. distribution system had strong safeguards to prevent any significant diversion to Hamas, and they were working. Cindy McCain of WFP said her organization saw no evidence of any effort of Hamas to loot aid trucks. Israeli military officials told the New York Times in a story in just the last couple of weeks that there is no such proof. They said: The U.N. aid delivery system was largely effective in providing food to Gaza's desperate and hungry population. An internal U.S. Government analysis that just came out in the last few weeks found no evidence of systematic theft by Hamas. That was also the testimony of former U.S. Special Envoy for Humanitarian Issues David Satterfield. So why did Israel dismantle a system that was kind of working and replace it with one that is killing civilians as they try to get food? The simple reason is also horrifying. It is that the Israeli Government wants to use food as a weapon of war and for population control. They opened four aid sites--mostly in the south--to displace Palestinians and move more in that direction. The Israeli Government is trying to herd the Palestinian people into concentrated enclaves as a prelude to pushing them out of Gaza entirely. It is not a ``secret'' plan, colleagues; it has been right out there in the open. In fact, in February of this year, President Trump said he wanted to remove Palestinians from Gaza. And the Netanyahu government and the Prime Minister himself embraced the plan--which, by the way, had been previously proposed by members of his rightwing coalition. In fact, recently, his Heritage Minister said, as others have quoted, that the government was ``rushing toward Gaza being wiped out'' and ``driving out the population.'' Colleagues, this is part of a coordinated campaign by the Netanyahu government--a government that has declared the removal of Gaza's population as a strategic goal of the war. That is ethnic cleansing by any other name, supported by American taxpayer dollars. The extremists in the Netanyahu coalition do not just have their eyes set on Gaza. As we speak, Israeli settlers are encroaching farther and farther into the West Bank, killing more and more Palestinians who live there. It is important to note that one of the arms sales we are discussing is the transfer of 20,000 fully automatic rifles to the Israeli national police, headed by one of the most extreme members of the government, Ben-Gvir--somebody who handed out rifles to settlers a little while ago without having any idea where they were going. On top of that, back in February, President Trump suddenly revoked all U.S. sanctions against extremist settlers in the West Bank that had been put in place by the Biden administration. That sent a terrible message. In just the first 6 months of this year, we have seen the highest rate of settler attacks in years. One of those happened on July 11, when violent settlers beat to death a 20-year-old Palestinian-American citizen from Florida while he was visiting his family. His name was Sayf, and he is the seventh American citizen killed in the West Bank since January 2, 2022, and the fifth in just the last 19 months--some killed by Israeli settlers and others by Israeli security forces. Just this week, a Palestinian activist who helped make the Oscar- winning documentary ``No Other Land'' was shot and killed by a violent settler who had been sanctioned under the Biden administration--the sanctions the Trump administration withdrew. Meanwhile, on July 23, just a week ago, the Israeli Knesset approved a symbolic resolution that supported annexing the entire West Bank--a place where 2.7 million Palestinians live. Colleagues, for decades, peacemakers on both sides have hoped to make the West Bank and Gaza a foundation of a Palestinian state. We need to make sure that we don't support these efforts that undermine peace and security in the region. Children are starving before our eyes. Colleagues, if ever there was a time to act, it is now. It is overdue, but let's act now and support the resolutions put forward by Senator Sanders. I yield the floor.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, it was just a few weeks ago on this Senate floor that our Republican colleagues, on a straight party-line vote, cut millions and millions of dollars--billions of dollars from investments in healthcare, like Medicaid. As a result, millions and millions of Americans are going to lose access to healthcare. And for what? All for a giant tax giveaway that disproportionately benefits the very wealthiest in America. They called it the Big Beautiful Bill. It was beautiful if you are a billionaire. For everybody else, it came at your expense in one form or another. Now here today on the floor of the Senate, we have Republicans bringing a partisan bill once again--this time to cut $9 billion in important investments, including from public radio and public television and, as my colleague Senator Murphy just indicated, from very important foreign assistance programs that are essential to American diplomacy and ultimately to American power and interests around the world. This is not ``America First''; this is ``America in retreat'' or President Trump surrendering. To add insult to injury, these cuts are coming after Republicans in this very body and the House of Representatives passed and President Trump signed into law provisions that included the very programs we are talking about cutting today. In other words, this is a total switcheroo where one day, Republicans vote for a package that includes essential investments, and the next day, they turn around on a party-line vote and erase the investments that were just signed into law. That will undermine the entire appropriations process. I have been listening to comments from some of my Republican colleagues, and they say this is about reducing the national debt. I am all for reducing our deficits and our debt. But I ask my Republican colleagues, if you really cared about fiscal responsibility and deficits and the debt, what happened 2 weeks ago on the floor of the Senate? Because Republican Senators pulled all-nighters in order to pass legislation that resulted in the largest debt increase in American history, throwing away trillions of dollars to in part pay for tax cuts for billionaires. That bill that passed the Senate just 2 weeks ago will add $4 trillion to our national debt. Why is that? Because even after they made cuts to Medicaid, which will throw millions of Americans off their healthcare, even after that, the tax cuts that disproportionately benefit wealthy people were so big that it is still going to explode the deficit by $4 trillion. Now here they come 2 weeks later to pass this rescissions bill that cuts very important services and very important components of our foreign policy for $9 billion. Mr. President, that is 0.23 of 1 percent of the debt that the Republican Senators voted to increase just 2 weeks ago. So nobody is fooling anybody when Senators come down to the floor and say ``We have got to do this because of our national debt,'' having exploded the national debt by $4 trillion just 2 weeks ago. So what does this package include? Well, it includes cuts to public radio. That includes NPR. It includes PBS. Also, public television is cut. So we explode the debt by $4 trillion 2 weeks ago, and this week, we are coming after Big Bird. That is their solution to dealing with the national debt. If you look at the cuts to public radio, they can have very harmful impacts around the country because in many rural areas especially, people do use access to public radio to get alerts about natural disasters. So this would put those communities at risk. This is part of a pattern. It is part of a pattern we are seeing in the funds being withheld by this Trump White House that we already passed. Here, we are talking about cutting funds through this partisan process, but the Trump White House is unilaterally withholding important funds for disaster relief. We learned after the tragic flooding in Texas that claimed so many lives that FEMA failed to answer nearly two-thirds of the calls on its disaster assistance line because the Trump administration had cut so much of the FEMA staff. In my State of Maryland, a number of months ago, we witnessed terrible flooding in the western part of our State. In fact, some of you may have seen the images of elementary school students being evacuated from their school on boats. Fortunately, no one died in that flood, but the damage was extensive. We are still waiting on the Trump administration to answer our State's request for some help for those families and small businesses that were hit. Now, this is a pattern that goes beyond just disaster relief. In Maryland, we have also seen cuts to FEMA programs designed to protect communities and let them have the resources to put in place protections like higher walls so that they are not victims of natural disasters. Those funds were cut. So we see those cuts to those essential programs. We are also seeing this across the board when it comes to global health. I am not going to go through all of those cuts. Some of my colleagues have identified those. I will just say that our foreign assistance is not charity. Our foreign assistance, as colleagues have said, has been an essential element of our overall foreign policy. If you talk to wise generals at the Defense Department, they will tell you that our national security and foreign policy strategy rest on three pillars: Yes, of course, defense and military power but also on diplomacy and development. So, when you make these deep cuts that are impacting diplomacy and development, including, by the way, the 1,300 patriotic State Department employees who were just fired last week-- when you do that, it is our adversaries who benefit, and it is the American people who lose, along with our allies, because those are not giveaways, those investments. You know, if your neighbor's house is on fire, you don't just sit in your house and let your neighbor's house burn. You go help them out because they are your neighbors, and it is the right thing to do, but it is also the smart thing to do because that fire may be heading to your house next. And when it comes to issues like global health and the spread of disease around the world, it is the same story: We save millions of lives, including millions of kids' lives whom we help, but we also prevent those diseases from jumping over the oceans and coming to hurt people right here in the United States of America. But this administration doesn't care. If you look at a Lancet study, they have estimated that the cuts that the Trump administration has made in the area of global health and other important investments will cost 14 million lives by the year 2030, including 4.5 million children who will die. We just saw a story in The Atlantic that revealed the Trump administration is paying to incinerate--to light on fire--500 tons of emergency nutritional biscuits that could go to feed hungry kids. So I really urge my colleagues to take a step back and not move forward with these cuts. As I said, the notion that this is somehow their contribution to reducing our national debt when they exploited our national debt by $4 trillion over 10 years just 2 weeks ago is ludicrous. But I will close, since I see the vice chair of the Appropriations Committee on the floor, with just a final point that does deserve repeating, which is that we have had a bipartisan appropriations process, and we have done our very best to preserve that tradition, but when you take an action on one day and we vote on a bipartisan basis for important American priorities, whether in public radio or in addressing global health issues--when we do that one day and the President of the United States signs that into law and then we run down here a few months later and say, ``Do you know what? We didn't mean it with respect to these programs, and we, on a partisan basis, are going to yank them away,'' that undermines trust and confidence in this entire system. So both for the American people and the important investments that we did make, which they will now lose, but also for the future of this institution and the power of the purse, I urge my colleagues to vote against this bill. I yield the floor.