I was commenting to Senator Barrasso and thanking him for him coming to Seattle and us having a subcommittee hearing on wildland firefighting then, after we had seen devastating fires in the same Central Washington part of our state.

I want to thank Chief Moore for being here today.

What can we do on the workforce side to make sure that we have the personnel here and ready to fight this fire season?

I want to recognize that we have a bunch of firefighters here, particularly from the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie Forest.

Senators Wyden, Risch, and I, along with others, worked hard to successfully end the practice of fire borrowing, and we must ensure that the Forest Service does not return to that practice of robbing non-fire accounts to cover fire costs.

I just want to thank Representatives DeGette, Bilirakis, Ruiz, and Cole for their work to reauthorize the Special Diabetes Program.

We need a bigger pipeline and a faster pipeline for new providers, and we also need ways to incentivize those providers to practice in rural communities.

Right now, we have a unique opportunity to capitalize on these Federal investments and to close the digital divide.

The United States has a long and proud tradition of offering immigrants a path to citizenship through military service.

Congress has a responsibility to address these challenges to ensure we retain a robust U.S. aerospace and aviation workforce now and in the future.

I too want to say thanks for the detailed district analysis that you have given each one of us.

We want to thank members of Congress who unanimously passed landmark aviation safety legislation Public Law 111-216.

Another reason why maybe it is a good idea to increase the authorization levels for section 625, because it is clear from the amount of applications that come in that we are hardly meeting the demand right now.

As a mom with a son with Down syndrome, I am extremely concerned by the continued reports of individuals with disabilities being denied an organ transplant solely based upon an individual's disability.

As I mentioned in my opening statement, I have been a long-time supporter of the Teaching Health Center GME program.

It is great to have them in DC today.

This is an historical opportunity in our Nation's history to connect all Americans, and we cannot allow permitting delays and unnecessary costs to mess it up.

We are grateful for this committee's leadership, and dismissal for more than a decade, of ALPA's dubious and misleading claims surrounding shortfalls in the Open Skies framework.