Patrick Leahy

What assurances can you give to this Committee and states like Vermont that the FDA will prioritize this food safety work in your fiscal year 2017 budget request?

I think we need to acknowledge that we cannot implement these rules without adequate funding.

I appreciate the potential value of this technology to law enforcement, I am concerned about the potential impact on the privacy rights of innocent Americans.

There have been attempts on the Senate floor to weaken the Freedom of Information Act and I have fought against that.

Sometimes the press overlooks the fact, or maybe the public overlooks the fact, the press that covers and knows these things, tends to overlook the fact that Republicans and Democrats actually do work together on a number of things in this…

For the past 2 weeks, I have fought to protect our committee's jurisdiction over what is the cornerstone transparency law, the Freedom of Information Act.

If the Senator will yield, it is not a cold. There are a few more pollens in the air that we Vermonters are not used to.

My dear friend, the senior Senator from Kansas, is going to speak next, but he has graciously allowed me to have the very few minutes I asked for, and then he will be recognized as soon as I give my statement. (The remarks of Mr. Leahy…

I would also point out that when we drafted the USA FREEDOM Act, we included a provision to allow the government to collect call detail records, CDRs, for a 180-day transition period, as it was doing pursuant to Foreign Intelligence…

It is unfortunate that we were unable to pass the USA FREEDOM Act before the June 1, 2015, sunset of sections 206 and 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act and the so-called ``lone wolf'' provision of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention…

I ask, through the Chair, if the Democratic leader will yield to me for a comment.

It is a disgrace that 52 years after Gideon and 43 after Argersinger, thousands of accused persons face the power of the State alone.

The Senate should adopt the Gideon's Promise Act proposed by Senator Leahy, providing technical assistance...

I hate to think of the number of hours and months we spent reworking it to address those exact concerns.

We urge this Congress to pass meaningful reform without delay.

Our patent system is a wonderful thing to have, and bad actors that use abusive practices, they discredit it.

My time is almost up, and if anybody wants to add anything for the record, either in agreement or disagreement to what Mr. Hadad said, please do so.

I do not share them. I think the customer stay provision is a very carefully crafted compromise among many different stakeholder groups.

Let me be clear: AIA reviews are critical elements in the overall framework of a properly functioning patent system.

Predatory conduct that takes advantage of the complexity of patent law does not serve the important goal for which our patent system was intended.

Last week, we had seven bipartisan members of this Committee that came together, and we introduced legislation to address abusive conduct in our patent system.

I assumed that was going to be your answer, but after all the time that Senator Lee and I spent on that, I am glad to have that answer.

I think we have crafted a strong and fair compromise that will address abusive conduct while preserving the strength of our patent system.

I have a little trouble hearing criticisms of the President finally acting when the Congress would not.

I think also we sometimes think we can do a one-size-fits-all.