Al Franken: “I rise today to urge my colleagues to vote against the motion to proceed to the joint resolution of disapproval of…”

“I rise today to urge my colleagues to vote against the motion to proceed to the joint resolution of disapproval of Senator Hutchison, which would repeal the FCC's net neutrality rules. As many of you know, I have repeatedly said net neutrality is the free speech issue of our time. I still believe that is the case, and I am here to state why we need to do everything we can to stop this partisan resolution in its tracks. But before I get into the reasons we should oppose this resolution, I think it is important to step back and remember what the American people expect of us. I do not need to tell anyone in this body that the approval rating of Congress is at an all-time low. Why is that? I think it has something to do with the fact that we are using our extremely limited, valuable time to debate partisan proposals like this one rather than working together to create jobs, stimulate our economy, and get Americans back to work. When this resolution of disapproval passed the House back in April, I hoped that would be the end of it. I hoped my colleagues would recognize we should let agencies do their jobs and not employ an arcane procedure to erase a rule the FCC started thinking about in 2004 under Republican chairman Michael Powell, and again in 2005 when a different Republican chairman, this time Kevin Martin, adopted a unanimous policy statement on net neutrality.…”