vote: vote: the presiding officer: are there any senators in the chamber wishing to vote or change their vote? if not, the yeas are 56, the nays are 38. the nomination is confirmed. the senator from missouri. mr. blunt: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that with respect to the mcfarland nomination, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the president be immediately notified of the senate's action. the presiding officer: without objection. the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion: we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the nomination of anuraag singhal of florida to be united states district judge for the southern district of florida, signed by 17 senators. the presiding officer: by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. the question is, is it the sense of the senate that debate on the nomination of anuraag singhal of florida to be united states district judge for the southern district of florida shall be brought to a close? the yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. the clerk will call the roll. vote: vote: vote: vote: the presiding officer: are there any senators in the chamber wishing to vote or to change their vote? if not, the yeas are 76. the nays are 18. the motion is confirmed. the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: the judiciary, anuraag singhal of florida to be united states district judge for the southern district of florida. mr. thune: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority whip. mr. thune: i ask notwithstanding the plow visions of rule 223. at 4:00 p.m. the senate vote on the motions to invoke cloture filed on monday's session of the senate. if cloture is invoked the senate vote on confirmation of 465 and the nominations at a time to be determined by the majority leader in consultation with the democrat leader, if confirmed the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the president be immediately notified of the senate's action. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. thune: mr. president, i have four requests for committees to meet during today's session of the senate. they have the approval of the majority and minority leaders. the presiding officer: noted. mr. scott: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. scott: today we come together to honor the courage of our brave men and women in uniform, our heroes and to remember the victims of the tragic terrorist attack that took place at naval air station pensacola on the morning of friday, december 6. i would like to thank my colleagues, senator rubio, perdue, isakson, shelby and jones for standing with me today as we honor the sacrifice and memory of the three victims and their families. airman mohammed hiphon known as mo to friends and family. 19 years old if st. petersburg, florida. a great athlete who loved to make others live. joshua caleb watson of alabama, a 23-year-old natural born leader and selfless volunteer who lifted others up. joshua died a hero after giving first responders information on the shooter's location while he was mortally wounded. and airman apprentice cameron scott walters of richmond hill, georgia, just 21 years old with a contagious smile whose dream was to serve his country. our sailors and law enforcement officials showed heroism and bravery in the face of evil as they ran towards the shooter that day saving lives. and first responders who came to the swift aid of those in need. i'd like to thank each one of them. today the state of florida stands united around the community of pensacola and the families of the victims as we pray for healing. i join my colleagues as we do everything we can to prevent future terrorist attacks. as if in legislative session, i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to the consideration of senate resolution 457 submitted earlier today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: senate resolution 457 condemning the terrorist attack at naval air station pensacola on friday, december 6, 2019, honoring the members of the navy who lost their lives in the attack and expressing support and prayers for all individuals affected by the attack. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding to the measure? without objection, the senate will proceed. mr. scott: i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. scott: i yield the floor to senator rubio. mr. rubio: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. rubio: i want to thank my colleague senator scott for offering this and all of our colleagues and of course all the senators who voted for it unanimously. my colleague if florida has already mentioned the three names of those in the service of our country who lost their lives in pensacola. i'll talk about them more in a moment. i do want to say a couple of things. first pensacola really is one of the hidden gems of the state that senator scott and i represent. and to understand pensacola, to understand it's not just a city in which a naval facility is located, the navy is very much part of the fiber of that community. i would almost equate it to a college town's relationship with a university. that's how much of its identity this naval air station is. so this attack wasn't just an attack on this facility. but it was an attack on the heart and soul of pensacola as a community. and i had an opportunity to visit in the aftermath of the attack, i was saddened by the loss of life and the impact, number one the way the community responded and second, by some of the stories i hope we'll learn more about as the information comes out of extraordinary bravery, not just the first responders but others who happened to be there at that time who exhibited extraordinary stories of heroism in the face of evil in this terror attack, people who rushed into the building when gunshots were coming from, instead of run away as most people would do. i point out some of the things -- ensign watson that was mentioned earlier, cleb watson -- caleb watson happened to be the officer on deck at the time of the shooting and ran towards the shooting. he was yelling for people to get out of the way. he actually proceeded to tackle the killer here and fought him in an attempt to disarm him all while being shot at least five separate times. he was wounded but he nevertheless happened to make his way out, flagged first responders and be able to give an accurate description of the shooter that ultimately allowed him to be neutralized. airman haham, his family moved to st. petersburg from new orleans after hurricane katrina. his assistant principal called him, quote, the perfect one because he was a good student, a track star and a basketball player. this is a quote from the assistant principal. he would walk into any room and it would light up. he had this magnetic personality, big smile and people would always gravitate towards him. his commanding officer told his father that it was his son, mohammad who also bravely attempted to take down the gunman and lost his life. then there's cameron walters of georgia who's described as an amazing guy, always had something good to say to everybody and was always smiling. the morning of the shooting, airman walters was randomly assigned to watch duty in that building, building 633. he'd only been stationed in pensacola for two weeks before this attack. again, i want to thank senator scott, my colleague from florida for offering this. it ensures not only will we not forget the heros who sacrificed their lives protecting their feal low navy members as the tragedy unfolded but also reminds us of the obligation we have to get to the bottom of how this happened, why this happened so it may never ever happen anywhere again. with that i yield the floor. mr. warner: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from virginia. mr. warner: rewe in a quorum call? mr. president, i rise today to draw attention to a group of veterans who served this country decades ago but who continue to suffer to this day as a result of their service. i'm talking about hundreds of thousands of veterans who were exposed to agent orange during their service. from 1962 to 1975, the united states sprayed over 20 million gallons of agent orange across vietnam, cambodia, and laos. millions of our service members, not to mention millions of vietnamese civilians were is exposed. 50 years later hundreds of thousands of vietnam era veterans are paying the price. from the start the federal government tried to slow walk attempts to cover the care these veterans earned. it wasn't until 1991 that the v.a. recognized the connection between agent orange exposure and several diseases and conditions. finally allowing these veterans to seek medical treatment from the v.a. currently the list of conditions recognized by the v.a. stands at 14, but the science tells us the list is far from complete. in 2017, then veterans affairs secretary shulkin called for three more conditions to be added to the list. bladder cancer, underactive thyroid and parkinson's-like symptoms. these weren't randomly chosen. they were conditions found by the national academy of science to be connected to agent orange exposure. the science was there, the v.a. was there, yet this white house and its o.m.b. director mick mulvaney have blocked this effort to expand the list of conditions. you know what the deciding factor was? it wasn't scientific evidence. it wasn't the advice of v.a. doctors. no. the white house decided that the cost of providing care to 83,000 veterans suffering from these conditions was just too high. for that, mr. president, this administration turned its back on 83,000 veterans who answered the call to serve. unfortunately this is just the latest example of the federal government trying to avoid paying for the care of men and women who our nation sent to war. my office hears regularly from veterans facing health problems like prostate cancer, like parkinson's and other conditions that have been linked to agent orange. time and again we hear how the v.a. tries to deny benefits on the basis of a technicality. mr. president, this is just not right. unfortunately this administration is far from the first to ignore evidence about agent orange in order to save a few bucks. i want to share a few stories from my state of virginia which more than 204,000 vietnam veterans currently call home. in many cases veterans who were exposed to agent orange have been fighting multiple administrations to get these life and death benefits, benefits that they earned by their service decades ago. one veteran, william badgett of hamilton, virginia, was exposed to vietnam during his service in the army. he was in the 101st airborne first calvary where he served as helicopter mechanic and supply sergeant. he has been diagnosed with conditions including enlarged prostate, kidney disease and hard nerves, none which are on the v.a. presumptive list. while the v.a. considers prostate cancer to be on the list, mr. badgett's enlarged process is not considered to be connected to his exposure to agent orange simply because it's not the answer. another example, sam harvey from newport news, virginia, was exposed to agent orange during the vietnam war. he served in the u.s. navy from 1966 to 1970 aboard the u.s.s. constellation. he was diagnosed with aggressive prostate cancer. yet, despite prostate cancer being on the presumptive list he struggled to get v.a. approval for the treatment he needs. finally i want to talk about dorman watts from north chesterfield, virginia, a vietnam veteran who has struggled for years to get the disability rating from the v.a. that would qualify him for the comprehensive health care from the v.a. he has prostate cancer and heart disease and is currently undergoing radiation treatment from a private provider. mr. president, this is unacceptable. that's why i'm glad the congress included important accountability measures as part of the defense appropriations legislation we passed this week. finally, after years of reluctance, years of ignoring the science, these veterans are going to get some of the answers about the conditions that have resulted from their service. mr. president, there's more than enough evidence to expand the list of agent orange-related conditions. we should be thanking these veterans for their service, not nickel and diming them. i urge my colleagues to listen to the veterans in their states and i urge the white house to let the v.a. provide these veterans with the benefits they've earned. thank you, mr. president, and i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: quorum call: a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. cornyn: mr. president, following the longest government shutdown in history earlier this year, it seemed to be a bipartisan consensus that we need to get back on track with the regular appropriations process. both parties knew there was a funding crisis at stake this fall if we couldn't come together r together and -- come together and reach a compromise so this summer that's what we did, or at least we thought we did. at the time we reached an agreement that set top-line funding levels for defense and nondefense spending. there was an agreement not to have poison pill riders and we got it done in august with time to spare. it wasn't perfect. no negotiated product ever is, but we knew this agreement would provide us the time and the space and the framework to get the appropriations process back on track and leave room for a necessary debate on government spending habits. as our national deficit continues to grow that could not be more critical. i actually remember a time when concerns about deficit and debt was a bipartisan concern, but apparently not currently. but before we hit the first funding deadline, our democratic colleagues backed out of the commitment that they made in august of 2019. the open debate we hoped for didn't happen. we were forced to pass two short-term funding bills known as continuing resolutions and now here we are just days away from the current continuing resolution's expiration reading the text of these funding bills that total nearly $1.4 trillion. we're reading these for the first time. when it comes to the appropriations process, i've learned from experience you're never going to be 100% happy. that's just the nature of compromise. you've got to weigh the good, the bad, and the ugly and decide how the scales tip. there's certainly a lot of calculating when it comes to these appropriation bills, but let me start with the good. i think the national security appropriations package goes a long way to rebilling our military, providing them the resources they need to maintain readiness and provide our armed forces with the resources they need to face growing threats around the world from adversaries like russia and china to rogue regimes like north korea and iran, our military must be ready to counter a deverge enter range of threats. we will continue to invest in our military by providing a nearly $20 billion increase over last year's defending funding levels. it will provide funds to both modernize and grow our aging fleet so we can continue to send our troops around the world where they are needed. one of the major challenges we face is the development of new technology by our adversaries. we cannot have our enemies deploying hypersonic glide vehicles, artificial intelligence and missile defense systems that rival or perhaps surpass our own. that would be destabilizing, that would produce a miscalculation, which would be dangerous. this bill sends funding to the research and development of new technologies so we can stay on the leading edge. we should not be satisfied with anything other than america being in the lead when it comes to our national security. and i'm glad this package also includes a number of provisions that support our men and women in uniform, including a 3.1% pay increase, which is the largest in a decade. above all, this defense funding answers our commander's request for steady and predictable funding so they can address and plan for the threats of today and prepare for those we will face tomorrow. in addition to strengthening our national security, this package will also make our communities safer here at home. it sends vital funding to the department of justice law enforcement grant programs and invests $1.4 billion in the border wall system on the southwest border. as a border state senator, i can tell you the border patrol, who i consider the experts when it comes to border security, say there are three components to border security, there's physical infrastructure, there's technology, and then personnel, the boots on the ground, and this appropriation bill invests $1.4 billion in this system that includes a border wall. and despite concerted attempts from our democratic colleagues, the president's authority is to transfer funds that he deems necessary for border security remain in tact. now, the domestic spending bill takes strides to address some other challenges. it allows us to bolster our fight against the opioid epidemic, expand mental health access, and improve our crumbling transportation infrastructure. it includes $400 million for farmers and ranchers in texas and elsewhere affected by drought, trade wars and low commodity prices. it would send an additional half a billion dollars to the army corps of engineers for infrastructure projects here at home. with less than a year till the next election, it would provide more than $400 million in additional funds to safeguard our election systems so that voters can head to the polls with the confidence that their vote will be counted correctly. as we continue to bring down health care costs for the american people by providing them more choice and competition for their premium dollar, this legislation permanently repeals some of the three most oppressive obamacare taxes that were burdening american families. the premium tax, the cadillac tax, and the medical device tax. this bill also extends funding for critical health care programs like community health centers. this is the safety net in our health care system, the community health center, something i long supported. despite pushes from our colleagues across the aisle, appropriators also managed to fight off an electric vehicle tax credit expansion which would be nothing more than a taxpayer subsidy for wealthy americans who want to purchase electric vehicles. there are a lot of great provisions in these appropriation bills to address some of our priorities, but i remain concerned that with some of the shortcomings these could also be described as the bad part of this appropriation process. the domestic funding bill includes a range of controversial provisions that will move us further away from our goal of decreasing the national debt, it does not have offsets or pay-fors or long-needed reforms for mandatory spending programs which are the primary cause of our deficits and debt, accounting for 70% of federal spending. this bill also includes a terrible provision, which is -- is a retroactive tax on american energy companies. we did this without any sort of consideration by the committee of jurisdiction, the finance committee upon which i sit, with no opportunity to provide amendments or even to debate this massive retroactive tax, and the only choice we're given now that it's been included as a result of the negotiations among five people is the choice to vote either up or down on this massive piece of legislation. this bill also extends other tax benefits without addressing problems in the tax code which actually have a negative impact on american businesses and families. this bill would extend the national flood insurance program which is long overdue for reforms. this sidesteps the need for those reforms entirely. the program is hemorrhaging money and we need to be looking at ways to improve it instead of continuing to flush good money down the drain. as i mentioned, we started this process on a strong path with the budget agreement that was reached in august. i know i wasn't alone in thinking it would help us get the regular appropriations process back on track, but things quickly took a turn, not for the good, not for the bad, but for the ugly. our colleagues let government funding come second to their disagreements with the president. they tried to inject the poison pills that they vowed to stay clear of. rather than having an open debate and votes on spending, as we planned, the process fell to just a handful of people negotiating behind closed doors. this is reminiscent of the smoke-filled back room deals that congress has long been criticized for and we really have no alternative but to vote up or down on this massive $1.4 trillion spending package without any opportunity to debate it or more importantly to change it by offering amendments. the way i see it this has been the plan of speaker pelosi and the minority leader here in the senate all along. if you think about it, this really puts the power in their hands, which is exactly what they want, and they can extract concessions and other things that are important to them rather than allow the process to work as it was intended to do through regular order, through the regular appropriations process. this also takes power from their very own members because no democrat or republican can offer any amendment to this which can change it at all under this closed process. so this really isn't just an affront to the members of on this side of the aisle -- members on this side of the aisle, it's an affront to people on their side of the aisle who have no opportunity to offer meaningful amendments or modify the bill. our colleagues have held these appropriation process hostage over the last several months over what? i think that's an important question. as it turns out it was their obsession with .3% of our nation's budget. that's not how this process should work and it's certainly not how to make decisions that are in the best interest of the country. as further evidence of the rush to get this done without adequate consideration or debate or amendment, our house democrats even had to violate their own 72-hour posting rule for major legislation just to get this legislation done before we leave this

Related Keywords

Georgia , United States , Alabama , Missouri , Texas , Iran , Cambodia , Petersburg , Sankt Peterburg , Russia , Florida , Vietnam , Republic Of , Laos , Southern District , Virginia , Richmond Hill , Vietnamese , American , Joshua Caleb Watson , Cameron Walters , Watson Caleb ,