Chris Murphy

I agree with Senator Tester, I may have a question on this.

Your work really is truly inspirational and hopefully we will have, in part, a shaming affect on the United States Congress.

In many of these places you have regimes or entities, non-state actors, who are controlling large portions of territory that are in the business of destroying the historical record, destroying the cultural record.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just one question for Dr. Billington.

It is the best way that we can send a message that we still stand behind article 5.

I'd just point out the genesis of the law to just remind folks, this was bipartisan at the outset.

If we have to go other places, we should have authorizations.

An exceptional, I would argue, unprecedented letter from 47 of our colleagues to the Ayatollah himself that many of us believe will have the effect and has the intention of undermining the authority of the President.

It is pretty specific in 2001 what we were supposed to do.

But the thing is there will be another President who I may or may not trust.

Is it not true that this authorization would give the United States the ability, subject to the other restrictions in the authorization, to engage in hostilities against that organization?

I remain as frustrated as many of my colleagues with this question over these definitions.

People are saying it is sort of like, it is disdainful to say...

I do not think there has been much division on the message that we have been sending to ISIS.

I was pleased at the language in the draft from the administration defining 'associated forces,' including this limitation that it would be restricted to organizations that were actively engaged in fights against the United States.

I think the problem is in part every different member of the administration we talk to does seem to have a slightly different interpretation of what these words mean.

Those kinds of partnerships are incredibly important in Connecticut.

We were only funding about a thousand units a year with Federal money. Today I think we are on our way to funding 3,000 to 4,000 units.

It is an honor to be a member of this subcommittee, a great pleasure to be before you.

This is a transformational program. It is a relatively small investment that pays off extraordinarily down the line.

Surrounding the Israeli intervention in Gaza, there were a number of riots and attacks against Jews and against Jewish communities.

What does the United States do when a country is using an argument connected to religious freedom in order to discriminate against a minority group?

We have seen for the first time since the end of the period before World War II mob attacks on synagogues.

It is an honor to be on this subcommittee with both of your leadership.

I appreciate those comments. I think, as I mentioned, that our responsibility first is to make sure that we are building out this Choice program in a way that is true to the law.