Vote the presiding officer on is this vote, the yeas are 52, the nays are 40, the nomination is confirmed. Under the previous order, the negotiation to reconsider is considered laid considered and laid upon the table and the president will be immediately notified of the senates action. The clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. The clerk cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22, do hereby bring to a close debate on the nomination of wendy welcomes berger, of florida, to be United States district judge for the middle district of florida. The presiding officer by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. The question is, is it the sense of the senate that the nomination of wendy welcomes berger, of florida, to be United States district judge for the middle district of florida . The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. The clerk will call the roll. Vote the presiding officer on this vote the yeas are 55. The nays are 37. The motion is agreed to. The clerk will report the nomination. The clerk nomination, the judiciary, William WilliamsWendy Williams berger of florida to be United States district judge for the middle district of florida. The presiding officer by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call the clerk will report the motion. The clerk we the undersigned senators in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate do hereby move to bring to a close the nomination of brian c. Buescher of nebraska to be United States district judge for the district of nebraska. The presiding officer by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. The question is it the sense of the senate that debate on the nomination of brian c. Buescher of nebraska to be United States district judge for the district of nebraska shall be brought to a close. The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. The clerk will call the roll. Vote vote vote the presiding officer have all senators voted . Any senator wish to change this vote . The yeas are 52. The nays are 39. The motion is agreed to. The clerk will report the nomination. The clerk the judiciary, brian c. Buescher of nebraska to be United States district judge for the district of nebraska. A senator mr. President. The presiding officer the senator from texas. Mr. Cornyn i have 12 requests for committees to meet during todays session of the senate. They have been approved by the majority and minority leaders. The presiding officer duly noted. Mr. Cornyn mr. President , earlier this week the administration and House Democrats reached a bipartisan budget deal to deliver on the president s priorities and prevent a Funding Crisis this fall. As our armed forces continue their global engagements, this agreement importantly secures the funding necessary to maintain readiness and modernize the force. It provides increased defense spending to recover from a depressed military readiness rates of the Previous Administration and provides our men and women in uniform with the resources, equipment, and training they need in order to defend our freedoms. I know congress deals with a lot of different topics and all of them by and large are important. But there is nothing more important nor is there anything more quintessentially a federal government responsibility than National Security. All other consideration aside, if this bipartisan budget deal did nothing more than fully fund our National Security efforts, i would support it. But importantly, it also keeps other important elements of the congressional consensus intact. Things like the hyde amendment, which, as the presiding officer knows since the late 1970s has insured that no taxpayer dollars can be used to fund abortions. In addition this agreement prevents our democratic colleagues from trying to allow President Trump from using funds to strengthen border security. Secretary mnuchin negotiated a tough deal, one that excludes radical leftwing poison pills, a difficult task in these times to be sure. We know they wanted to use policy riders, nearly 30 of them and counting, to try to implement elements of the Green New Deal to undo the president s regulatory reforms or to rewrite our immigration laws through the back door. Earlier this year their farleft policy riders led to the longest Government Shutdown in history and almost prevented the enactment of bipartisan border supplemental funding. I saw the devastating impact that shutdown had on dedicated Public Servants across the country, but especially in texas. This agreement will prevent another senseless shutdown and ensure that the trains of government run on time. To be sure, no bipartisan agreement is ever perfect. Thats the definition of a negotiation. Both sides give a little. Its the nature of compromise, which is a necessary part of effective governing. Theres no doubt that there are other priorities that i would have liked to have seen included in the deal. I wish we had done something to reform our entitlement programs which will continue to outpace inflation and increase our national deficit. Some day were going to have to deal with our deficits and debt, and i just hope its not during the time of a national emergency. But as a practical matter, Speaker Pelosi wasnt going to agree with such farreaching reforms in the context of this spending deal and debt limit provision. But thankfully the president was able to secure half of the spending cuts he asked for, roughly equal to next years nondefense spending next years increase in nondefense spending. Above all, this deal carries out the most critical responsibilities of the federal government to support our National Defense and fully fund the governments operation. Again, i appreciate the president s efforts here, and particularly those in his administration who helped negotiate this bipartisan deal, particularly secretary mnuchin. And i look forward to supporting it. Mr. President , on another matter, last week the National Center for Health Statistics released preliminary data showing that Drug Overdose deaths in america declined by about 5 last year. Before anybody begins to applaud, let me point out that Drug Overdoses killed more than 70,000 americans the year before. So a 5 reduction is welcome but obviously still very alarming. This 5 decline is the First National drop in three decades, though, and for communities across the country who continue to battle the opioid epidemic, its a small indication that our efforts here in congress are having an impact. We certainly have a long fight ahead of us, but this is an encouraging sign. If you look closer, the data shows that the decline is due almost entirely to a decrease in prescription opioidrelated deaths. Those caused by other opioids, particularly fentanyl and heroin remained on thes rise. The cruel reality is that as we step up our efforts to limit prescription opioid diversion, the higher the demand for other Illegal Drugs, many of which come across our southern border. We cant limit our efforts to what can be done here at home in order for our work to be successful, in order for us to save more lives, we have to stop this poison from entering our country in the first place. I have the honor of cochairing the Senate Caucus on International Narcotics with senator Dianne Feinstein of california where were working on ways to do exactly that, to slow down the poison from coming across our borders. If you look at many of the challenges we face here at home, whether its the opioid epidemic, the humanitarian crisis at the border, the criminal gangs on our streets, much of that being directly traced to the violence that exists in Central America and mexico. This morning i had the pleasure of speaking at the Hudson Institute about my proposal to attack this crisis from every angle, an allgovernment approach, something we call the new americas recommitment to counter narcotics operations and strategy. As the presiding officer knows, we love a good acronym here in washington,d. C. , so we can simply refer to this initiative as the narcos initiative. First it takes aim at the dangerous substances that are crossing our southern border. Customs border and patrol Protection Officers are well trained to find Illegal Drugs and seize an average of 5,800 pounds of narcotics each day. 5,800 pounds of narcotics each day. By the way, mr. President , on june 16, customs and Border Protection seized 20 tons of cocaine, which is the largest seizure in the 230year history of customs and Border Protection, with an estimated street value of 1. 3 billion. So good for them. They are extremely professional and welltrained Law Enforcement officers. But as we know, many of the drugs that manage to make their way many of these drugs manage to make their way into the interior of our country and into our local communities causing untold misery and grief. Stopping their production and movement is not a fight we can win alone. It will take a bipartisan longterm commitment from the federal government as well as our foreign partners. An important step is to strengthen Law Enforcement cooperation by improving intelligence sharing and providing training for some of our foreign partners. Its an Important Force Multiplier and a necessary component to our counter narcotics effort. In addition to attacking the drugs themselves, the narcos initiative goes after the cartels and Transnational Criminal Organizations that profit from these business. These groups are what i call commodity agnostic. They really dont care who they hurt or what they apply because the only thing they care about is making money. Its not just narcotics. Its human trafficking, migrant smuggling, Money Laundering, counter fit goods, public corruption. The list of crimes is long indeed, and they do all of it. These Transnational Criminal Organizations turn an enormous profit from their corrupt dealings and then they have to launder the money that they use to finance their operation. We know that one of the most effective ways to suffocate criminal networks is to cut off the money, so thats precisely where we should aim. The Senate Judiciary committee recently passed legislation to combat Money Laundering and other illicit financing which includes a provision which i offered. It has to do with the role of remittances. According to the united nations, over 300 billion in illicit transnational crimes proceeds likely flow to the u. S. Financial system. 300 billion in i illicit proceeds. The provision included in remittances requires the treasury to submit an analysis of the use of remittances by drug kingpins and crime syndicates and develop a strategy to be able to prevent them from using that remittance system in order to launder proceeds from criminal enterprises. Its also time for us to reevaluate our current strategy and determine how to update the Bank Secrecy Act which was enacted more than 50 years ago and is the primary Money Laundering law regulating financial institutions. In addition to fueling violence and instability, the conditions in Central America serve as a push factor. We all, as human beings, understand people fleeing violence and poverty. So encouraging those countries to provide safety and stability for their own people so people can stay in their homes and live their life ought to be one of the things that we do. Otherwise these push factors encourage migrants to take the same routes used by cartels and criminal organizations to reach the United States. And as we know, some of them simply dont make it. They die in the process. Young girls and women are routinely sexually assaulted. Its a miserable, miserable alternative to staying at home and living in safety and security. Of course we know all this has contributed to the humanitarian crisis at our southern border, and we all know but have not yet had the political will to do, which is to reform our broken laws and prevent these smugglers and criminal organizations from gaming our immigration system. I know the presiding officer was at the border earlier this week. Ive tried to figure out how do we crack this nut, how do we take this polarized environment and provide the tools necessary to begin to staunch the flow of humanity coming across our border being tracted both by the easy access to the United States through our broken laws, but also the push factors like violence and poverty coming from their countries. Well, im working with a democratic colleague of mine from laredo, texas, Henry Cuellar and introduced the humane act to fix the broken asylum system in a way that would give legitimate as see lies an opportunity to see their case on a timely basis in front of an immigration judge but it would also make sure the conditions of their custody while theyre here in the United States is something we can be proud of. Specifically what this bill does is it closes a loophole in the law known as the flores settlement, which is often used by smugglers to gain entry into the United States. It would streamline the processing of migrants and improve standard of care for individuals in custody, as i said. If we want to restore law and order and make it sustainable, we need to look at ways to invest in Economic Development to help these countries build stronger economies. But i share some of the concerns expressed by the president and others. We need some metrics. We need a strategy. We need reliable foreign partners that can work with us. The one effort i can think of where we actually were successful working with foreign partners and strong leaders to really affect a dramatic change is the nation of colombia, socalled plan colombia. But obviously mexico and the region is much more complex and plan colombia doesnt easily fit on top of that region. But the concept, i think, is a sound one, where we come together in a bipartisan basis, develop a strategy, help train our foreign partners and seek out strong leaders that can help us work through these challenges because theres a multiplicity of challenges, as i indicated. One of the things that would help is to ratify the new and improved nafta, known as the north American Free trade agreement, or the usmca. Obviously a Strong Economy in mexico means people dont have to come to the United States in order to provide for their family. The International TradeCommission Analysis of the agreement Shows Positive indicators for north american workers, farmers, ranchers and businesses, many jobs depend on trade with mexico. Thats an indication of how important this is. We can strengthen privatepublic partnerships in other ways to help add to the effort to provide for investment and a Clean Environment and a positive relationship with our our colleagues in mexico. One example is the north American Development bank. For every one nad n. A. D. Bank dollar, it uses 20 in infrastructure investment. Ive introduced legislation with senator feinstein of california that would authorize the Treasury Department to increase n. A. D. Cappal specifically related to port infrastructure. We know the ports of entry are not only avenues of commercial trade and traffic but a lot of the high end or expensive or Illegal Drugs come through the smuggled ports of entry. We need to modernize those ports of entry, we need to expand the infrastructure and make sure they are adequately staffed not only to facility the flow of legitimate trade and travel but also to stop these drugs that come through the ports of entry. So, mr. President , i just wanted to say a few words about this narcos initiative. I believe that we do need an all of government approach that would address the broad range of problems across Central America and mexico, including the Transnational Criminal Organizations themselves and the products and services they provide as well as the corruption they fuel and the means to which they stay in business. But were going to need responsible partners in this effort. As our own experience with nation building in the middle east has demonstrated, we cant want something for them that they dont want for themselves. And so thats why its so important to have a clear understanding about what the strategy, what the goals are,