Mr. President, let me first of all join my colleague from Indiana in expressing my concern about where we are on taxes and spending and my hope that we get somewhere and get somewhere quickly. We have certainly brought this down to the…

Mr. President, also on two things that do not relate to my comments about the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act--I would like to say it is a great honor for me to be able to speak on the floor for the first time with the President pro…

In the response portion of the report we will file, the GAO said a third of the disasters over the last 8 years cost the Federal Government less than $10 billion. They also said the level of loss necessary to declare a disaster hasn't…

Madam President, I wish to talk about the disaster supplemental today, but before I do that, I would like to spend a minute talking about the Senator from Hawaii, Mr. Inouye. We were at the service this morning in the Rotunda of the…

We are here today in an unprecedented show of bipartisanship with this piece of legislation. H.R. 6364 is the product of both sides of the aisle working together to do what is right to honor the memory of our veterans. I especially want to…

Thank you, Chairman Capito, for yielding. I rise today in strong support of the amended version of H.R. 5817, the Eliminate Privacy Notice Confusion Act. Under current law, all financial institutions are required to provide annual privacy…

Madam President, for the last few days the Senate has worked as the Senate should work. We have had amendments. We have had both sides working to find solutions; the Defense Authorization Act, the Russia trade agreement, a bipartisan vote…

We need to expand the economic partnerships to our neighborhood. The Western Hemisphere needs more attention. Trade makes sense for America. Trade creates jobs. Trade creates opportunity. I am glad we are voting on this trade agreement…

Mr. President, I am pleased the Senate is considering a critical bill this week to establish permanent normal trade relations with Russia. I should have borrowed my friend's sign that says ``PTC Creates Jobs,'' which may very well be an…

I thank Chairwoman Capito. I would like to respond to some of the comments that have been made. First, I want to thank the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton) for their work on the privacy…

Thank you, Chairwoman Capito, for yielding. Also, I want to thank Mr. Sherman for his fine remarks. We certainly will take no offense to a recorded vote and will not oppose that. We understand and support collegiality among ourselves…

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that my defense fellow, MAJ Mark O'Neill, be allowed access to the Senate floor as long as the Defense authorization bill be considered, and I ask unanimous consent request on behalf of Senator…

One of the reasons I rarely come to the floor to make such comments is that it is so troublesome to me that we will have fact-free debates. One of the problems is that we are talking in a parallel universe. There are small businesses that…

I just want to close by inviting my colleague from New York to come to the district to see the landmarks that inspired Mark Twain to write about Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer. And you can see from those landmarks where he got the…

I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I rise in support of the Senate amendment to H.R. 2453, the Mark Twain Commemorative Coin Act. The underlying legislation, which passed the House by a vote of 408-4 on April 18 and the Senate…

Mr. President, I would like to take a few moments to share a rare piece of good news related to international religious freedom. On October 11 of last year I submitted for the Record the story of a Christian pastor in Iran who had been…

Mr. President, the No. 1 job of this Congress domestically should have been more private sector jobs. The President's long-held view of redistribution as a goal for the government is not going to accomplish that. What is going to…

On rollcall No. 584, I was inadvertently detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.'' Stated against: