A Vote for the Constitution

March 15, 2019

This week, the Senate passed a resolution of disapproval for President Trump’s emergency declaration for funding for a border wall.

Now, I wholeheartedly and unequivocally support building a wall on our southern border. I agree with the President that there is a crisis unfolding on our border that is endangering men, women, and children, and the surrounding communities; and I agree that it is of the utmost importance to secure our border.

But what I do disagree with is the President’s approach to try and do this. By asserting authority to spend money on objects and priorities in a manner that is not directly authorized by Congress, he is circumventing our constitutional and legal framework – the very framework by which the Founding Fathers intended to protect the American people.

It’s significant that the very first clause of the very first section of the very first article of the Constitution consists of the words “All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States which shall consist of a Senate and a House of Representatives.”

The Founding Fathers placed the legislative powers with in the federal government in the branch that would be held most accountable to the people at the most regular, routine intervals through elections.

And they very deliberately set up a system of government in which there was a “separation of powers.” So while the legislative branch would write the law, another would enforce the law, and the other would interpret the law. That system of government relied necessarily on the fact that each branch of government would operate within its domain and would jealously guard the powers reserved to it, neither exceeding the powers granted it nor accepting diminution of those powers.

Some people today believe that this system is a nice theory, but is naïve and irrelevant in our diverse and modern nation, which is now a vast global and economic power; and in which Congress can apparently no longer “get things done.”

And indeed, over the past decades, Congress unfortunately chosen to relinquish the power –and hard work – of accountable legislating by ceding much of that power to the executive branch.

And so many believe that we have no choice but to accept – and even encourage – a system of government in which Congress is relegates itself to the back seat of passing law, and in which the we further centralize power in the federal government and particularly in the Executive branch.

But this view gets things exactly backwards. It is the advocates of executive overreach and judicial supremacy who are naïve.

Instead of uniting us behind our ideological and regional differences, centralization of power instead is strangling Washington and toxifying our political discourse. And further, by pulling power into Washington to the less accountable branch of government, we empower and enrich the political and corporate classes at the expense of the working and middle classes.

Centralization is not unity – it’s surrender. Surrender to exactly the kind of monarchical and abusive sort of government that our Founding Fathers were trying to protect us from.

So while political elites may try to assure us otherwise, the Constitution is all process. The whole point is process, so that it protects the American people.

Moreover, the Constitution doesn’t resolve our political differences, and it isn’t meant to. But it does lay out the processes by which we are supposed to resolve them. Brushing that process aside does not override our disagreements, but intensifies and escalates them, ratcheting up our politics into an all-consuming war of outrage and contempt.

When Congress adopted the National Emergencies Act in 1976, it said that the President may declare an emergency with almost no standards. And while at first they included provisions that would allow them to unilaterally could veto the president’s actions, they eventually removed them and instead replaced them with “resolutions of disapproval” that are subject to presidential veto – effectively ceding its power the executive branch once again. And this is precisely the problem.

That’s why I voted in favor of the resolution of disapproval this week; and that’s why I introduced legislation to reform the National Emergencies Act.

Executive overreach – and abdication of Congress’s constitutional powers – is neither a Republican nor Democratic issue; neither a liberal nor a conservative one. It’s an American one. And I will continue to devoting my time and efforts in Congress to addressing it.

Make the Department of Justice Accountable Again

March 8, 2019

“The prosecutor,” Justice Robert Jackson once said, “has more control over life, liberty, and reputation than any other person in America.” That statement is just as true today as it was when Justice Jackson first uttered it in 1940, but federal prosecutors are actually some of the most unaccountable federal officials in the country today.

The problem traces to a loophole in the Inspector General Act of 1978 which refers all allegations of Department of Justice lawyer misconduct to the DOJ’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) and the DOJ inspector general.

For virtually every other federal employee, allegations of official misconduct are reported to the respective inspector general of the federal agency. So if a Environmental Protection Agency official is accused of harassing a farmer, that allegation would go to the EPA inspector general. If a Labor Department official is accused of harassing a manufacturer, that allegation would go to the Labor Department inspector general. But if a federal prosecutor is accused of abusing his authority over a suspect, that allegation is sent to the DOJ’s OPR, not the DOJ inspector general.

This matters for two reasons. First of all, the OPR reports to the attorney general while the inspector general is independent of DOJ authority. This means that whatever allegations the attorney general doesn’t want to be investigated, won’t be investigated, or at least not investigated well. The entire point of passing the Inspector General Act was to create an independent watchdog to hold federal officials accountable free of pressure from executive branch political appointees.

The second reason not sending lawyer misconduct allegations to the inspector general matters is because the OPR is under no obligation to make its findings public. The DOJ inspector general is required by law to release a report on the allegations it receives including findings of fact, analysis, and conclusions. The OPR isn’t obligated to report anything. It is free to sweep any allegation under the rug as if it never happened.

This isn’t good enough. Federal prosecutors have far too much power in our system to be this unaccountable. They need to be properly policed by the DOJ inspector general.

That is why Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), and Marco Rubio (R-FL) and I have introduced the Inspector General Access Act of 2019, a bill that eliminates the loophole giving the DOJ OPR exclusive jurisdiction over DOJ lawyer misconduct and fully empowers the DOJ inspector general to investigate all allegations of professional misconduct against department lawyers.

This legislation will not end prosecutorial misconduct by federal prosecutors, but it will greatly increase the chance that victims of prosecutorial abuse will get justice.

Against Religious Tests

March 1, 2019

This week the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to advance the nomination of Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs Administrator Neomi Rao to be a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. This was a huge win for conservatives.

Rao is a founding director of the Center for the Study of the Administrative State at George Mason University's Antonin Scalia Law School and has written extensively about the problems inherent in the modern administrative state.

But before this week’s vote, my colleague Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) asked Rao, during her confirmation hearing, “Do you believe gay relationships are immoral?” He further pressed, “Do you believe they’re a sin?”

This was deeply inappropriate. A United States Senator, in a public hearing, was cross-examining a nominee on her religious beliefs in order to determine her fitness for public office.

Disturbingly, this has not been an isolated trend. Nomination hearings in the Senate have become a blood-sport, and unfortunately, nominees’ religious beliefs have been a prime target.

Just this past December, judicial nominee Brian Buescher was questioned about his membership in the Knights of Columbus, a charitable Catholic organization. Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI) cited the organization’s opposition to same-sex marriage, asking, “If confirmed, do you intend to end your membership with this organization to avoid any appearance of bias?” Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) similarly asked, “Were you aware that the Knights of Columbus opposed a woman’s right to choose when you joined the organization?”

In September 2017, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL) grilled a Seventh Circuit nominee on her religious beliefs.

In June 2017, Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT) asked OMB Director Russell Vought whether he believed that “people who are not Christians are going to be condemned.” He later stated he would vote against his nomination because Vought was not “what this country is supposed to be about.”

These strange inquisitions have nothing to do with these nominees’ competency, patriotism, or ability to serve Americans of different faiths equally. And indeed, they are flatly inconsistent with the spirit—if not the letter—two of the most fundamental tenets of our constitutional republic—that is, religious freedom.

The language the Framers inserted into the Constitution was unequivocal: “No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” As an original provision of the Constitution, predating even the Bill of Rights, and applying equally to all religious adherents, it is one of our strongest bulwarks for religious freedom – and it ought to be upheld. The First Amendment also guarantees individuals the right to the free exercise of religion.

But the extreme progressive wing of the Democratic party apparently thinks otherwise. Instead, they have sought to expose nominees’ religious beliefs as somehow qualifiers, or disqualifiers, for holding public office. In doing so, they have inevitably subjected these upright citizens to shame, ridicule, and scorn on the basis of their beliefs – all the while imposing their own secular, progressive creed. And as we have seen, this creed has proven that is capable of both triumphalism and intolerance.

This is wildly unacceptable. The government does not – and should not – have any jurisdiction over people’s most personal and deeply held convictions.

But thankfully, there is a way out of this vicious cycle of religious intolerance – and that is to respect the constitutional rights of all of our citizens, regardless of their religious beliefs. Because religious freedom puts all Americans on the same footing, helping them to stand upright and honest before the law.

Make CBO Show Their Work

February 1, 2019

In 2009, when Congress was debating the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act the Congressional Budget Office estimated that, if the stimulus became law, 8.4 million new jobs would be created by 2012 and unemployment would fall from 9 percent to 6.0 percent.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act did become law, and the federal government did spend almost $900 billion on solar panels, home weatherization, and bullet trains to nowhere, but none of the CBO’s economic predictions became true. Instead of falling by 3 points to 6 percent, unemployment fell by less than half that (1.2 points) to 7.8 percent. And instead of creating 8 million new jobs by 2012, the stimulus managed far less than that at just 2.6 million new jobs.

What went so wrong?

The short is answer is we don’t know because the Congressional Budget Office never showed the public the economic models they were using to make their economic forecasts.

This is simply not acceptable.

Congress does need a scorekeeper to provide budgetary estimates for the policy changes it considers. But at a bare minimum, that scorekeeper should be forced to show how its models work. Currently the CBO doesn't have to do that. It's a "black box," a secret formula even Congress can't be allowed to see, yet which the House and Senate must treat as if they were handed down on stone tablets at Mt. Sinai.

It's an indefensible situation.

That is why I introduced the CBO Show Your Work Act of 2019. This bill would require the CBO to publish its data, models, and all details of computation used in its cost analysis and scoring. CBO would keep its role as official scorekeeper of congressional budget proposals – but now the public and the economic community would be able to see what's going on in all those spreadsheets and algorithms.

This legislation would hold CBO to the same standard the American Economic Association's "Data Availability Policy" sets for all academic economists: requiring all paper authors to ensure their data "are readily available to any researcher for purposes of replication."

Policymakers need data and data analysis to do their jobs. But to do their jobs well, they need the best analysis. And centuries of practical experience tell us that transparency and replicability are essential to the pursuit and acquisition of knowledge. There is simply no serious argument for insulating the most influential economic modelers in the United States from the academic standards that govern everyone else.

We can do better as a Congress and a nation. We are never going to agree on what the best healthcare, tax, or energy policies should be. But when we make our arguments about the costs and benefits of our preferred policies, we should at least be willing to explain how and why our policies would work.

Making the CBO show its own work would be a great first step.

Let’s Start Working to End This Shutdown

January 18, 2019

This coming Monday will mark the 31st day of this partial government shutdown, the longest shutdown in our nation’s history. Families are going without paychecks, businesses are losing revenue, and the brave men and women who protect our country—including those at the border and in the waters surrounding our nation—are not getting the support they need to keep us safe.

This needs to end, and it needs to end as soon as possible.

Unfortunately, zero progress is being made to resolve this impasse here in Washington. In fact, no work towards finding a solution is being done at all.

Democrats are refusing even to meet with President Trump to discuss a compromise. And in the Senate, we are not debating or voting on possible solutions.

This is wrong. Congress is failing the American people. We should be debating and voting on these issues every day of this shutdown. We are elected to represent our constituents in setting policy for the federal government. We aren’t doing that. Instead we are all just sitting around waiting for some game-changing event to set things in motion. But what if that event takes weeks to arrive? Or months?

Some say we should just pass a short-term continuing resolution now and then begin negotiations over how to manage the migrant crisis at our southern border. But this is not a viable solution. There is no guarantee President Trump would sign such a short-term bill. And even if he did, we would be right back in a shutdown after the short-term funding window had passed.

Instead of kicking the can down the road, or waiting for one side to cave, we should begin the hard work of governing now.

Let’s bring a spending bill to the floor—one that reopens the government and provides the funds and statutory changes desperately needed to secure our border. If the Democrats want to filibuster a bill that funds more immigration judges, funds more medical personnel, funds more beds for migrants, and yes, adds to our existing 650 miles of border wall, let’s get them on record as doing so.

Democrats could even offer amendments of their own to the funding bill. Do the Democrats want to have votes on creating a legal status for immigrants brought to this country illegally as children, on abolishing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or on granting amnesty to the over 11 million illegal immigrants in the country today? If so—and if considering such measures would help us bring an end to the shutdown—then let’s vote!

These are important policy issues, and the American people deserve to know where their senators stand, especially considering that so many of them are running for president. Sometimes there is a good reason to cast a vote even if you are not sure a bill is going to become law.

Sometimes setting the record straight as to who is where on each important issue is helpful; it moves the legislative process forward.

It is of course entirely possible that the first government funding bill passed by the Republican-controlled Senate wouldn’t pass the Democratic-controlled House. Even if it didn’t, this exercise would at least help us see where each member stands on each issue considered. That understanding would help us move forward and do the hard work of voting, compromising, and reopening the government.

This shutdown most likely isn’t going to end with a total victory for either one side or the other. The federal government should not be the vehicle for partisan vanity projects. We do have a crisis on our southern border. Our law-enforcement resources are being overwhelmed by the volume of migrants illegally crossing the border. We need a solution. The House and Senate need to get off the sidelines and start the hard work of ending this shutdown.

Let’s End Government Shutdowns for Good

January 11, 2019

It should never have come to this. Today is the 21st day of the government shutdown, tying the record for the longest federal government shutdown in history. And there is no sign that the shutdown will end.

This shutdown is bad for federal workers who will be missing their first paycheck today. It is bad for federal contractors that do business with the federal government. And it is bad for everyone who has to deal with the uncertainty of whether or not government agencies will be providing the services they are charged to deliver.

This particular shutdown is also bad for our national security since everyone agrees that more resources are needed on our southern border to help address what even The Washington Post has admitted is a “crisis” on our southern border.

The number of migrants flooding into our country at our southern border to claim asylum has simply overwhelmed our law enforcement capabilities. We need more Border Patrol agents. We need more emergency medical technicians. We need more immigration judges. And, yes, we need more wall.

Building wall is a proven strategy to lower border crossings. President Clinton built hundreds of miles of wall on the southern border. So did President Bush. So did President Obama. Walls work.

We should have voted on a Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill that funded these border security priorities months ago. We should have voted on a bill to fund the Agriculture Department and the Internal Revenue Service. But we didn’t.

Instead we abandoned our job to pass individual appropriations bills and instead waited until the last minute to pass a Continuing Resolution that would have kept the full government funded, but only through February 8.

This governing-by-cliff has unfortunately become the status quo in Washington. The fact is, Congress has not completed all twelve regular appropriations bills by the October 1st deadline since 1997, and between 1985 and 1997, this important budget marker has only been met twice.

Instead we’ve been governed by a quilt work of Continuing Resolutions, Omnibuses, and rushed budget agreements, many of which are held until the last minute so lawmakers are unable to read their contents in full. The result is instability and unpredictability not only in our government organizations, but also for the many families and businesses that interact with the federal government.

We should end government shutdowns for good. That is why I co-sponsored Sen. Rob Portman’s (R-OH) End Government Shutdowns Act this week. The bill would create an automatic CR for any regular appropriations bill not completed before existing spending authority ran out. Spending would then continue at existing levels for the first 120 days before reducing across the board by 1% for every 90 days after that. All discretionary spending would be treated equally; no partisan carve-outs and no exceptions.

This legislation is a necessary balance between incentivizing good budgeting habits while also discouraging last-minute, haphazard stopgap funding measures. And most importantly to the families of Americans, it provides stability and predictability by ending government shutdowns forever.

Towards A Better Land Deal in Utah

December 21, 2018

This Wednesday, a group of legislators tried to sneak legislation expanding the federal government’s control of Utah past the United States Senate. The 680-page bill was not made public until 10 am Wednesday morning, and less than 12 hours later, these legislators were trying to force final passage through the Senate through unanimous consent, without any debate or amendment.

I objected.

This bill would have had a big impact on the state of Utah, creating 1.3 million acres of wilderness - about half of that in Utah - and permanently reauthorizing the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). That would have made any reform of that flawed program impossible.

Coming from a state where two-thirds of the land is owned by the federal government, where we can’t do anything without leave from the federal government, that would have hurt.

When the federal government owns large amounts of land in your state it means your schools are underfunded; fire, search, and rescue are underfunded; local government is underfunded. That underfunding results from the fact that most of the land is owned by the federal government. You can’t tax that land. You receive pennies on the dollar for a program called Payment in Lieu of Taxes. Most of the land cannot be developed privately. Most of the land cannot be taxed by the states and localities.

Now make no mistake. I’m not talking about developing our National Parks. We don’t want to set up an oil drilling rig under the Delicate Arch. Of the 33.3 million acres owned by the federal government in Utah, just 12 million of them are parks, forests, wilderness, or recreation areas. The vast majority of the rest of federal land could be developed, taxed, and used to create revenue. But right now that land that is excessively restricted and environmentally degraded as a result of poor federal land management policies. And many of these degrading policies are linked to the LWCF.

I am not opposed to compromise. I am open to reforming the LWCF. If the program could be reformed so that the fund was used for states to buy land, and not the federal government, I could support that. That is how the program was originally designed. States were supposed to get 60 percent of LWCF money. Instead, states have only received 25 percent. That must change.

Also, our National Park Service is already suffering from over $10 billion worth of maintenance backlogs. The federal government should not be buying more land when it can’t properly manage the land it has now. LWCF money must first be spent on ending the existing maintenance backlog before more new land can be purchased.

But my biggest issue with the bill was that it did nothing to address the imminent threat Utah faces from unilateral executive land grabs through the Antiquities Act. I offered to drop my objection to the entire bill in exchange for adding just two-words: “or Utah.”

These two words would permanently give rural Utahns the peace of mind that the land they use for grazing, farming, hunting, shooting, and a variety of other activities couldn’t be stolen from them with the stroke of a Presidential pen. It’s the same peace of mind already enjoyed by people in Alaska and Wyoming. They already have an exemption from the Antiquities Act.

All I asked for was equal treatment for my fellow Utahns.

And that call for equality was rejected.

I will continue to work with my colleagues on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee to find an adequate compromise that best serves Utah interests, including reforms for the LWCF. As Chairman of the Subcommittee on Public Lands, securing such a deal will be my top priority.

But what I won’t do is sign off on a deal that is bad for Utah.

Utah Farmers Deserve Better Than This Farm Bill

December 14, 2018

Utah farmers and ranchers need a good farm bill. They need reforms to existing crop insurance and subsidy programs that unfairly favor large corporate farms over small family farms. They need reforms to the federal government’s grazing permit process. And they need clarity from the Environmental Protection Agency on which wetlands and waters are or are not subject to costly Clean Water Act regulations.

Unfortunately, not only did the farm bill passed by the House and Senate this week do none of those things, but it also made existing farm policy worse by making it easier for the largest farms, and even non-farmers, to get taxpayer money.

For example, the bill removed a provision from Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) that would have forbidden non-farmers from getting farm subsidies. Now distant relatives and their spouses, who don’t farm, can each collect up to $125,000 a year in government subsidies paid by taxpayers.

In 2014 Congress did end some direct payment programs to farmers, but it also created two new subsidy programs: the Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC) programs. At the time farmers could choose which of the two programs to participate in.

Under ARC, farmers get a check from the government if their revenue per acre falls below a benchmark level set by the Department of Agriculture. If prices for a commodity, like corn, are low farmers in this program get a check based on their acreage devoted to that crop.

Under PLC, farmers get a check from the government when the price of a specific crop falls below a benchmark level set by the Department of Agriculture. If the price of say corn falls below the benchmark price, farmers get a check from the government based on each unit of crop sold.

At the time these programs were created farm lobbyists promised they would reduce government subsidies to farmers. The opposite has happened. The projected cost of the two programs was supposed to be $18 billion over five years. Instead it has cost taxpayers $31 billion.

Our nations farm policies are not helping small farmers. More than 60% of farm subsidies go to the largest 10% of farms. With all these government subsidies going to the largest farms, how can the smaller farms compete?

Not only did Congress not reform these bloated programs, the new farm bill now allows farmers switch between the two programs whenever they want!

Americas farmers deserve better than the crony-capitalist farm bill Congress passed this week.

Strengthening Sovereignty Through Safe Country Agreements

December 14, 2018

We live in an interconnected world that is becoming more connected every day.

It is far easier for people in poorer countries to communicate and coordinate with their friends and relatives in richer countries now than it ever has been.

If you are a poor farmer in Guatemala or an urban laborer who can’t find a job in Honduras, odds are you know a friend or a relative in the United States who is telling you by phone or text just how much better economic conditions are here in the United States.

This is why wave after wave of migrants from Central American countries are trying to enter our country through the southern border: they believe their lives will be better if they can just get into our country and join their friends and family that are already thriving here.

And they are probably right. Their lives would be better if they made it into the United States.

Unfortunately, we cannot just let in every person in the world who believes their life would be better if they were in the United States. According to Gallup more than 150 million adults worldwide would leave their current country and move to the United States if they could.

Not only does our country not have the infrastructure to accommodate 150 million more people overnight, our country is already more divided than it has been in recent memory and the vast majority of American people either want less immigration (29%) or about the same (44%). Only a small minority, just 24% of Americans, wants more immigration.

Of course, the United States should continue to take in refugees and those seeking asylum. But wanting a job and better economic opportunities is not a legal basis for an asylum claim. To secure asylum, a migrant must prove that, if returned to their home country, they would be persecuted due to their race, religion, nationality, political affiliation, or social group.

According to the Department of Homeland Security, less than 10% of the Central American migrants who come to the United States with caravans meet this standard and are eventually awarded asylum status.

But over 80% of Central American migrants who reach our border with Mexico do meet the much lower “credible fear” standard administered by the Border Patrol, who then releases them into the country. The vast majority of migrants released into the United States in this manner either fail to ever officially apply for asylum, or stop showing up to court when it becomes evident they will ultimately lose their asylum claim.

This is unacceptable. When a large group of people disregard the law of the country they are entering there’s a well-founded fear they will disregard our other laws as well.

What the United States needs to help address the problem is a safe third country agreement with Mexico similar to the existing safe third country agreement the United States already has with Canada. Under a safe third country agreement, migrants seeking asylum must make their claim in the first country of arrival, not whatever country they want to move to the most.

Alternatively, President Trump has been working on an agreement with the Mexican government that would allow Central Americans to apply for asylum in the United States, but instead of being released into our country while their claim was adjudicated, they would stay in Mexico until a final judgement was rendered.

If we can implement either of these policies and thus end the current catch and release status quo, fewer migrants will make the dangerous trip north to the United States and our national sovereignty will be much stronger.

Don’t Believe the Fake News about President Trump’s First Step Act

December 7, 2018

Some in the media hate President Trump so much they will make up anything to stop his agenda. Take a recent Weekly Standard article, which claims that the President Trump-endorsed First Step Act contained a “loophole” which allows federal prison wardens to release dangerous criminals. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Section 102(g)(1)(D)(ii) of The First Step Act clearly states that in order to be eligible for early release a warden must determine that a “prisoner would not be a danger to society if transferred to prerelease custody or supervised release” and that “the prisoner is unlikely to recidivate.”

Asked to justify how it could claim The First Step Act allows dangerous criminals to be released from prison when the actual text of the bill forbids doing exactly that, The Weekly Standard did add a “clarification” to the story noting that the bill disallows exactly what the story claims it allows. But The Weekly Standard failed to correct the rest of the column which is every bit as much of a fiction as the first paragraph.

According to the column, the “House passed its conservative version of criminal justice reform weeks ago” but someone just recently “slipped [the loophole] quietly into the bill.” “Backers of the bill haven’t commented on the loophole,” the publication muses, “and may not have learned of it.”

This narrative is complete and total fiction. Here are the facts. The House of Representatives passed The First Step Act this May by a vote of 360 to 59. Just two Republicans voted against the bill. It included the same provision to which The Weekly Standard now objects. This provision is not a “loophole” that was “slipped” into the bill. It is how the recidivism reduction program, a program that 226 House Republicans voted for, was designed to work.

To the extent that “backers of the bill haven’t commented” on a supposed loophole, that is because no such loophole exists! It is true that separate sentencing reform provisions were added to The First Step Act in the Senate. But those sentencing reform provisions did not touch or alter the recidivism reduction part of The First Step Act in any way.

If opponents of criminal justice reform don’t like the recidivism reduction that 226 House Republicans voted for, then they should make an honest and factual case against it. And if criminal justice reform opponents don’t like the sentencing reforms added to The First Step Act, then they should make an honest and factual case against those reforms.

But opponents shouldn’t fabricate a narrative about some “loophole” being slipped into the Senate version of an otherwise conservative House-passed criminal justice reform bill. The reality is that The First Step Act is good conservative common-sense reform that is modeled after existing successful reforms in conservative states like Georgia and Texas.

We have two more legislative weeks left in the year. Let’s bring The First Step Act to the Senate floor and get President Trump’s agenda done.