John Thune

The United States is a leader in aerospace design and manufacturing.

The best thing that we can probably do in terms of improving the overall status and conditions for middle-class Americans in this country is to get a vibrant, growing, robust small business economy.

I think we have two kind of contrasting views about how to improve the plight of middle-class Americans in this country.

I worry that the current statutory deadline of December 2015 is unrealistic for most passenger and freight railroads.

I am particularly interested in the safety issues involved in transporting crude oil from the Bakken region.

There's a lot of pressure on the railroads, obviously, to comply with and to meet the 2015 deadline.

The railroads have run into a lot of obstacles and their efforts to meet this 2015 PTC deadline.

The railroads are so important in our part of the country.

I hope that our committee will consider this bill in the coming months.

There are a number of us on the Committee who are co-sponsoring legislation that would extend that by a reasonable amount of time.

And, you know, one way we could get fewer trains in North Dakota is to horizontally drill from South Dakota.

I noticed again that the budget this year did have the 28-percent limitation on itemized deductions that many of us think is going to negatively impact charitable giving.

We have worked together on a number of issues: digital goods, digital trade; most recently, a letter that we spearheaded, signed by 33 Senators, in support of maintaining the charitable deduction in tax reform.

I also want to welcome our new chairman and really look forward to working with him.

Every President literally since Franklin Roosevelt has had this authority, and I am glad that President Obama has chosen to request it.

I strongly support the push to get Trade Promotion Authority enacted as soon as possible.

So I guess the question is, do you envision a regulatory structure in the near future that would allow for commercial use of the slightly larger UASs so that the market potential, and I'm thinking of course with regard to agricultural…

What type of data do you expect the FAA is going to need from those six test sites to safely advance the integration process?

Unmanned aviation is undoubtedly the next significant frontier in the aviation sector.

I look forward to hearing a progress report from Administrator Huerta regarding the FAA bills mandates.

As safety regulators work through the challenges of the integration of unmanned aircraft, questions related to privacy have certainly received a lot of attention.

If the data brokers of today controlled the UASs, I would leave promptly for Canada.

Does the FAA have a mechanism in place in order to gather, store, and use the data that would be collected from these six test sites?

Well, thank you, Chairman. You have a lot of uncongested airspace in West Virginia as we do in South Dakota.

The whole world is just waiting to get at it