Richard Blumenthal

Will you commit to this committee to investigate reported efforts by the White House to 'enlist senior members of the intelligence community to push back against suggestions that Trump associates were in frequent contact with Russian…

Are you aware of any past action or statements by the President perceived by senior intelligence officials as a threat to the independence of U.S. intelligence agencies?

Will you commit to the committee to review and turn over to the Special Counsel any documents within the intelligence community that record the President of the United States questioning or making requests of you with regards to the FBI's…

Did the President of the United States ever urge you to publicly deny the existence of any evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia?

Do you concur with the statement of former FBI Director Corney before Congress that the FBI is investigating, 'the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government and whether there was…

I want you to give us a clear and factual understanding of exactly what took place in the reported actions of the President to obstruct the FBI's Russia investigation.

Russia has deployed two brigades of ground-launched cruise missiles that US officials say violate the INF Treaty.

Without Russia, Assad could not wantonly go on murdering his own people--through gassing, hanging, or other despicable methods.

This reprehensible activity cannot continue and this Administration must do more to make it clear to Russia that their support for Syria must end.

Russia continues to prop-up Syrian President Bashar al-Assad--a war criminal that kills and tortures his own people.

I have tirelessly advocated for maintaining Israel's qualitative military edge so that it can defend itself against any threat that may arise from Iran.

Iran's support for terrorism, ballistic missile development, and human rights violations continue.

Do you agree that we should strengthen cyber sanctions against Russia for their actions?

Do you agree that Russia must pay a price for its cyber-attacks and interference in our election?

Our electoral process is a foundational element of our country's democracy and we must do everything possible to defend the integrity of this process moving forward.

I am not asking about your conversation with the President. I do not mean to be misunderstood.

Your non-denial of the Washington Post report I think should lead to even more intensive investigation of the alleged effort by the President to enlist you in shutting down or stifling that investigation.

The American people deserve to know and that should be the job either of the intelligence committee or the judiciary committee or an independent commission which I have long advocated.

As a U.S. senator and a public official and former prosecutor and a citizen, I want to know what the Russians did to interfere with our election, what Trump campaign's collusion was there and what obstruction of justice there may have been…

I believe very strongly that there needs to be some public telling of the truth here.

There were a lot of questions unanswered, a lot of pieces missing. Certainly the revelation that Rod Rosenstein knew about Trump's plans before he wrote that memo was extremely important.

We tend to overlook the fact, all too often, that a vast number of the VA employees are veterans themselves, and they care more than anyone about keeping faith with our veterans.

Thank you all for being here and for all your tireless work for our veterans.

I think that peer support is really important, and also I think the greatest peer support is that at the VA, over one-third of the employees are veterans themselves.

The present backlog and delay is unacceptable, and I hope that you will join me in pursuing the bill.