Richard Blumenthal

Shouldn't we be cautious about legislating in an area where circumstances are changing?

I think the trend is heading in the right direction.

Why not encourage law enforcers to use those existing laws more aggressively and effectively?

If existing law, let alone new law, is unenforced, it is dead lettered, it is useless.

The great enemy of constructive change has been overreaching.

Which is what we should be doing here, and I believe we will do it. Loretta Lynch has a stellar record. She served with incredible distinction during her time as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York. I suggest to my…

I have no personal complaints about them.

What frightens me more so than anything else in talking to our partners in Amtrak and others is that individual that may be carrying a backpack or device of some type to create harm.

I want to follow up on some of the questions that I heard Senator Booker ask about surface transportation.

The success of this very, very important national priority depends on having the best and the brightest.

I think all of us would agree.

What can be changed in those procurement policies, which have so handicapped other branches of government as well in similarly urgent tasks?

I think we have an obligation to compel the relevant agencies, principally OPM and anybody else concerned, to do better and to do more and to do it more quickly so that you can succeed in this task.

The Federal Government is failing you.

I want to shift a little bit in terms of modernization to one of the key challenges in my view, although it may not involve hardware in the most direct sense, and that is the downsizing of our force and how we develop and retain the key…

So in a perfect world, I would eliminate the consent decree. Sadly, we do not live in that perfect world.

Thank you, Senator Lee.

I do not want to be too harsh, but it is inadequate.

I want to thank you both for your very dedicated work, and I appreciate the opportunity to work with both of you.

As you well know, these collisions on tracks at rail grade crossings happen actually once every 3 hours, believe it or not, 2,000 every year across the country, causing more than 700 injuries and more than 230 deaths.

I hope that you will take a close look at some of these issues.

What assurances can you give me that small businesses are able to compete for military contracts?

The chairman of this committee, Senator McCain, and I have successfully worked for the Clay Hunt Suicide Prevention for American Veterans Act (SAV), the suicide prevention bill, for our veterans which is promising as a first step, just a…

The impact of sequestration will cut back that ability--our ability, the amount of mil-to-mil training capacity.

The solution isn't going to be exclusively military, although law enforcement is a part of it.