S Hrg 116–297 CONTINUITY OF SENATE OPERATIONS AND REMOTE VOTING IN TIMES OF CRISIS ROUNDTABLE BEFORE THE PERMANENT SUBCOMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATIONS OF THE COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION APRIL 30 2020 Available via the World Wide Web http www govinfo gov Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs CONTINUITY OF SENATE OPERATIONS AND REMOTE VOTING IN TIMES OF CRISIS S Hrg 116–297 CONTINUITY OF SENATE OPERATIONS AND REMOTE VOTING IN TIMES OF CRISIS ROUNDTABLE BEFORE THE PERMANENT SUBCOMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATIONS OF THE COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION APRIL 30 2020 Available via the World Wide Web http www govinfo gov Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs U S GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 40–791 PDF WASHINGTON 2020 COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS RON JOHNSON Wisconsin Chairman ROB PORTMAN Ohio GARY C PETERS Michigan RAND PAUL Kentucky THOMAS R CARPER Delaware JAMES LANKFORD Oklahoma MAGGIE HASSAN New Hampshire MITT ROMNEY Utah KAMALA D HARRIS California RICK SCOTT Florida KYRSTEN SINEMA Arizona MICHAEL B ENZI Wyoming JACKY ROSEN Nevada JOSH HAWLEY Missouri GABRIELLE D’ADAMO SINGER Staff Director DAVID M WEINBERG Minority Staff Director LAURA W KILBRIDE Chief Clerk THOMAS SPINO Hearing Clerk PERMANENT SUBCOMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATIONS ROB PORTMAN Ohio Chairman RAND PAUL Kentucky THOMAS R CARPER Delaware JAMES LANKFORD Oklahoma MAGGIE HASSAN New Hampshire MITT ROMNEY Utah KAMALA D HARRIS California JOSH HAWLEY Missouri JACKY ROSEN Nevada ANDREW DOCKHAM Staff Director and Chief Counsel AMANDA NEELY Deputy Chief Counsel JOHN KILVINGTON Minority Staff Director KATE KIELCESKI Chief Clerk II CONTENTS Opening statements Senator Portman Senator Carper Senator Romney Senator Hawley Senator Lankford Prepared statements Senator Portman Senator Carper Page 1 3 5 5 24 35 37 WITNESSES THURSDAY APRIL 30 2020 Martin B Gold Partner Capitol Counsel LLC Lorelei Kelly Director of Congressional Modernization Beeck Center for Social Impact and Innovation Georgetown University Joshua C Huder Ph D Senior Fellow Government Affairs Institute Georgetown University ALPHABETICAL LIST OF 6 8 10 WITNESSES Gold Martin B Testimony Prepared statement Huder Joshua C Ph D Testimony Prepared statement Kelly Lorelei Testimony Prepared statement 6 39 10 55 8 50 APPENDIX Staff Memorandum Statement submitted by Seth Barrett Tillman III 61 90 ROUNDTABLE CONTINUITY OF SENATE OPERATIONS AND REMOTE VOTING IN TIMES OF CRISIS THURSDAY APRIL 30 2020 U S SENATE PERMANENT SUBCOMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATIONS OF THE COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS Washington DC The Subcommittee met by video conference pursuant to notice at 9 04 a m Hon Rob Portman Chairman of the Subcommittee presiding Present Senators Portman Lankford Romney Hawley and Carper OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN PORTMAN1 Chairman PORTMAN Good morning This roundtable will now come to order I hope everyone is staying safe and healthy during these unprecedented times It is certainly an unusual time Overnight this coronavirus seems to have changed our basic way of life in so many ways Businesses are shuttered and millions of Americans are teleworking for the first time churches and schools are closed Health care workers are working around the clock In the last 5 weeks based on the numbers I saw this morning it looks like nearly 30 million Americans have filed for unemployment Most believe we are already approaching the highest percentage of unemployment since the Great Depression Now more than ever Americans need to know that their leaders are working for them and that they have a voice as we work to navigate in this pandemic In a world where it is no longer safe to be within 6 feet of each other Congress has to learn how to adapt This is not the first time we have needed to ensure the continuity of Congress by the way For example with the nuclear threat during the Cold War the U S Government actually constructed a large bunker for Congress should we be required to meet outside of Washington However this may be the first time in the modern era when it is not a physical meeting location at risk but rather elected officials themselves and others we would be in contact with We are a Subcommittee of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee HSGAC which has jurisdiction over 1 The prepared statement of Senator Portman appears in the Appendix on page 35 1 2 congressional organization It is appropriate that we look at this issue of how to govern during these sorts of times From that perspective and while we wait for guidance from the Rules Committee on how to conduct more formal hearings remotely today’s discussion is an attempt to move Congress forward in times of crisis when we cannot meet in person It seems fitting that our topic for today should be remote proceedings in Congress including remote voting Today our gathering itself is really part of our case This is as I understand it the first time we have been able to do this in the U S Congress certainly in the Senate We want to show that it is possible to have a hearing without physically being in a hearing room We are told this is a first for the U S Senate In my view remote congressional proceedings should never be the norm It should be limited to times of true nationwide emergencies and only when it is not feasible for Senators to be in the same place Any authorization to proceed remotely whether it is Committee meetings debates or votes should be limited in duration and any extension of such an order should require a vote by the entire Senate Our goal should be to bring both our country and our Congress back to work in person as soon as it is safely possible But there are times when that is not possible These principles are outlined in the bipartisan remote voting resolution that I introduced with Senator Dick Durbin last month Specifically the resolution allows the Majority and Minority Leaders to jointly agree to put in place a temporary voting arrangement for remote voting in times of an extraordinary crisis But after 30 days Senators would have to vote to continue to allow that remote voting otherwise the temporary mandate would expire Today our Subcommittee is releasing a report containing both a legal analysis and technical security recommendations for remote voting and remote governing Legally the Supreme Court has made it clear that the Constitution allows the U S Senate to make its own rules The Court has a long history of giving deference to Congress in determining its processes and procedures when it comes to issues surrounding voting Based on our legal analysis we expect remote proceedings to enjoy the same deference I also believe that the Founders would be supportive of the legislative branch being heard during emergencies We need to address the technical issues of course that surround remote proceedings In my view Senators should be required to authenticate their identity and verify their vote through an encrypted platform for remote voting There are several off-the-shelf solutions for that that the Senate could use to create a secure and reliable voting platform We have worked with a lot of outside experts and we will hear about some of that today We do not need to reinvent the wheel I urge people to review this report which I believe puts to rest many of the concerns I have heard raised about temporarily authorizing the Senate to proceed remotely in times of crisis We very much look forward to hearing from our witnesses today about these issues The Senate would not be the first legislative body to work remotely Several States have decided to continue legislative business 3 in the past month including allowing members to vote remotely Across the Atlantic the European Union EU has implemented a remote voting system for its legislative body while the Parliament of the United Kingdom UK is beginning to experiment with holding virtual proceedings While a lot is uncertain about when life will return to normal one thing should be clear Congress should be able to continue to represent the American people—to do its job—even in times of crisis I want to thank Senator Carper for working with me on this event today but also on this broader issue of remote governing I appreciate him working so closely together in a bipartisan way to make sure that Congress can continue to operate and provide needed support for all Americans With that I turn to Senator Carper for his opening remarks OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR CARPER1 Senator CARPER Thanks Mr Chairman I want to thank you for your leadership on this issue This is an extremely important topic as we know I am pleased that we are able to have this discussion even as we continue to work together remotely I wanted to come on and say I am sitting here in my pajamas Actually I am not but this is the first time I have put on a tie in quite a while and it was hard to find in my closet but I finally have I am glad to be here with all of you My service on this Committee Mr Chairman started less than a year before the attacks on September 11 2001 less than one year before those attacks As our colleagues and many members of our staffs will recall one of the planes hijacked that morning was likely headed for the U S Capitol In the wake of that tragic day in our Nation’s history we started a conversation about issues like how to assemble Congress in a secure remote location in the event that we could not meet in Washington D C Mr Chairman I seem to recall discussion about the Greenbrier like a special underground facility at the Greenbrier in West Virginia There were also tough conversations about how to reconstitute Congress in the event of significant vacancies in the House and the Senate It was a scary and challenging time The new challenges that we face today as a result of Coronavirus disease COVID–19 are no less scary and no less challenging As COVID–19 deaths throughout our country continue to grow it is essential that those of us serving in the Congress are able to respond quickly and effectively to the events of this day Our top priority right now should be to do all we can to provide support to first responders health professionals businesses and State and local governments many of whom are stressed almost to the breaking point by the toll this virus has taken With that thought in mind I believe this is a good time to restart those sobering discussions from almost 20 years ago and begin to figure out how we can make sure this Congress and future Congresses are able to function during a major crisis that might make it difficult for us to assemble in Washington D C 1 The prepared statement of Senator Carper appears in the Appendix on page 37 4 Whenever I am confronted with a difficult policy decision like this one I am reminded of three adages The first one is ‘‘If it ain’t broke don’t fix it ’’ As we look at the rules governing emergency operations in the Senate I have asked myself ‘‘Well are they broken ’’ I suppose one could point to the fact that we have been able—with strong bipartisan support—to enact trillions of dollars in spending to fund badly needed programs in recent weeks and argue that things are working just fine At the same time though much more needs to be done and divisions are starting to show as we debate from afar and in the media about what to do next and when It may be that unanimous consent UC is no longer an option however inaction is not an option either If a remote voting system for the Senate allows us to move to the next stage in our response to COVID–19 we need to consider it But as we consider some of the changes that have been proposed to the Senate recently I am reminded of a second adage and that is ‘‘Do no harm ’’ We should not allow any remote voting system established to deal with the impact of COVID–19 to be abused to further unrelated partisan goals It would be truly unfortunate if a system we set up to allow us to deal with this virus were also used in the coming months for example to confirm controversial nominees Potentially even worse than that though would be future Senate Majority Leaders using remote voting ever more frequently in future years to conduct routine Senate business so that members can remain in their home States rather than returning to Washington to do our Nation’s business Just about every significant legislative success that I have been a part of as a member of this body—and some of them with you Mr Chairman—has come out of personal relationships that I have been fortunate to develop with our colleagues during our time in Washington and through face-to-face discussions and negotiations in the Capitol and in our offices Losing those relationships and the ability to work closely with our colleagues could well mean losing forever the Senate as we have known it in the past and likely accelerate all of the negativity and the partisanship that has made Congress so unpopular with voters in recent years Let me close Mr Chairman if I can by acknowledging that there are more than a few tough questions that we will need to confront as we try to decide what course to follow with respect to this issue Helping us on that journey is my third and final adage of the morning and that is ‘‘Find out what works and do more of that ’’ After all our country is not alone in grappling with this global outbreak We would be wise to look closely at how other countries and legislative bodies are dealing with these same issues including a number of States that are taking bold steps and see what lessons we can learn from their experiences Thank you again Mr Chairman Sorry for the technical difficulties I think we have worked our way through them I want to thank our staffs for all the work that they have put into getting us together to have this conversation To our witnesses let me welcome each of you I think our witnesses are Martin Gold Joshua Huder and Lorelei Kelly It sounds 5 like a good Irish lass there But we are happy to welcome all of you We look forward to hearing from you and to a productive and timely conversation on a topic that needs to be addressed at this critical time in our Nation’s history Mr Chairman I think I might have seen at least one other Member of our Committee I think it is Senator Mitt Romney who has joined us and there may be some others It is good to be with all of you I look forward to being with you in person next week Chairman PORTMAN Thank you Senator Carper I am looking forward to being back with you as well I know that Senator Romney has joined us Senator Romney without giving you any notice would you like to make any opening comments We may have other colleagues who will join us I think there were three or four others who were interested in joining us later But Senator Romney anything for the good of the order before we get started OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR ROMNEY Senator ROMNEY Mr Chairman thank you and Mr Ranking Member it is good to see you and to see Marty Gold on the line as well I look forward to hearing from him and the other panelists I think it is an important topic Several weeks ago almost 2 months ago I raised with leadership the possibility that we might need to vote remotely and it was suggested that that was an idea for another time and I am glad this is that other time I wish you the very best in the process I clearly think that we have to have a provision of this nature in place and for me the biggest issue is making sure that a true emergency was taking place as opposed to this becoming a political tool that could be used by perhaps a Majority or Minority Leader to accomplish something that the membership at large was not in favor of We have seen the emergency designation used by the President in a way that some of us thought was excessive and I think being able to define what is a true emergency and what would require remote voting would be something that we would need to pay attention to With that thank you for convening this hearing and I look forward to hearing from the panelists Chairman PORTMAN Senator Hawley has also joined us Senator Hawley are you able to join us Can we see if we can hear your audio Senator HAWLEY How about this Mr Chairman Can you hear me now Chairman PORTMAN You sound great OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR HAWLEY Senator HAWLEY OK great Thank you My video is not working but I am able to see you and able to hear the audio and I will just second your remarks Mr Chairman Thank you for holding this timely hearing on this very timely subject It is an unprecedented moment in our Nation’s history and I think we have to consider responsible reasonable options to make sure that we can continue to do our work no matter what the physical circumstances are 6 Thank you for pursuing this hearing so we can explore these possibilities and I look forward to hearing from the witnesses Chairman PORTMAN Great Thank you Senator Hawley I see that Senator Lankford has now joined us as well Senator Lankford do you have any opening comments We are just getting started We are about to go to the witnesses I wondered if you had anything for us at the outset Senator LANKFORD Thank you No I am glad to be able to join you I just look forward to the witnesses’ testimony and giving me a chance to be able to listen in from there Chairman PORTMAN Great Thank you Senator I do not know if any other Senators are on If you are please speak up now No response OK We will turn to our witnesses The first witness has been referenced Martin Gold is a partner at Capitol Counsel LLC In my view he literally wrote the book that is considered the foremost authority on Senate rules and procedures It is called ‘‘Senate Practice and Procedure ’’ and his expertise is renowned in terms of how the Senate can and should operate based on his extensive background in the Senate We also are pleased to have with us Lorelei Kelly Ms Kelly is a Fellow at the Beeck Center for Social Impact and Innovation at Georgetown University She leads their Resilient Democracy Coalition which has been at the forefront of looking at ways data and technology can be used to modernize Congress We thank you very much for joining us I know you are out West This is early for you Thank you for finding a way to be with us Finally we have Joshua Huder with us Joshua is a senior fellow at the Government Affairs Institute at Georgetown University Dr Huder holds a Ph D in political science and focuses his research and teaching on congressional procedure and politics Having read his testimony you will see he has a lot of interesting points to make dealing with some of the potential concerns that Senator Carper raised I would ask you each to keep your opening statements to 5 minutes We will submit your full written testimony for the record of course and we will post it on the Subcommittee’s website Mr Gold we will start with you Mr GOLD Can you hear me Mr Chairman Chairman PORTMAN I can hear you well TESTIMONY OF MARTIN B GOLD 1 PARTNER CAPITOL COUNSEL LLC Mr GOLD Thank you very much Mr Chairman good morning Good morning Senator Carper and other Members of the Subcommittee Thank you for your invitation Senate leaders have worked thoughtfully to mitigate the impact of the coronavirus on the chamber The question is Is there more that the Senate can do to retain its deliberative character while protecting its membership and staff 1 The prepared statement of Mr Gold appears in the Appendix on page 39 7 Proposals like yours Mr Chairman have been made to use technology to augment or replace customary operations Assuming that those ideas are technologically feasible are they constitutional The core issue arises from the mandate that a majority of each House constitutes a quorum to do business Your remote voting resolution stipulates that participation by a majority of Senators in a virtual vote satisfies this requirement I believe that is correct While Congress’ power of self-governance is not absolute it is very ample The Supreme Court addressed this point in United States v Ballin which was litigation involving an 1890 House rule that altered how quorums were determined Later in 1890 Congress passed tariff legislation to increase tariffs on certain goods Mr Ballin was an importer so he sued contending that the legislation was infirm because a quorum of one House was not present—the House of Representatives The case involved the juxtaposition of two constitutional provisions the quorum requirement and the rulemaking power Justice David Brewer in the Ballin Court explained that Congress may not govern itself in a way that violates constitutional restraints or fundamental rights but otherwise would write rules to suit its needs It was up to the House to decide how to ascertain a quorum said Brewer He proclaimed judicial deference to the rulemaking authority saying that within the limitations suggested it was ‘‘absolute and beyond the challenge of any other body or tribunal ’’ So the Supreme Court upheld the statute In the 2014 Noel Canning case the Supreme Court unanimously invalidated three recess appointments made between pro forma sessions Again the issue was judicial deference Citing Ballin Justice Stephen Breyer wrote ‘‘The standard we apply today is consistent with the Constitution’s broad delegation of authority to the Senate to determine how and when to conduct its business ’’ Please consider the purpose of the quorum requirement itself The Framers looked at other options but settled on a majority believing it fostered broad representative participation in Congress’ work As George Mason of Virginia said ‘‘In this extended country embracing so great a diversity of interests it would be dangerous to the distant parts to allow a small number of members of the two Houses to make laws ’’ Remote voting and virtual proceedings fully serve the quorum objective Would the courts invalidate legislation by applying a requirement for a physical meeting if Congress declares it is unsafe to convene one As Justice Robert Jackson once observed it is useful to temper ‘‘doctrinaire logic with a little practical wisdom ’’ Failure to do so he said could convert the Constitution into a ‘‘suicide pact ’’ If the Senate authorizes virtual proceedings it must either amend or override some existing Senate rules specifying either that such proceedings satisfy the rules or that exception is made to them The Senate must also consider precedents or orders that operate notwithstanding contradictory language in the rules so as to avoid an inadvertent impact on them Mr Chairman the Senate could adopt a standing order that would temporarily override the rules without amending rules text That is something you can do if you are worried about the implica- 8 tions of amending the text That is exactly what the Senate did in 2013 with S Res 15 which was a standing order to reduce postcloture time on certain nominations That standing order expired at the end of the Congress Virtual proceedings are not a substitute for normal Senate The opportunity for Senators to interact with each other with party leaders and with staff is diminished if committees the cloakrooms and the floor do not function customarily Moreover Senators have the right to debate and the right to amend Neither of those rights is vindicated by a process that allows for remote voting without virtual proceedings It may be necessary to implement things in phases like the British Parliament in this case beginning with remote voting However as soon as possible proceedings should replicate the Senate floor Virtual operations are suboptimal but even worse would be a Senate that needs unanimous consent to legislate while in pro forma sessions or one that must convene in hazardous conditions if there is an objection or a quorum call Finally some procedures explicitly refer to the need to prevail with 60 votes In-person sessions with many absentees will have the distorting effect of making those thresholds crippling I appreciate the opportunity to share these perspectives with you Chairman PORTMAN I really appreciate your insights Ms Kelly we will now turn to you for your opening statement TESTIMONY OF LORELEI KELLY 1 DIRECTOR OF CONGRESSIONAL MODERNIZATION BEECK CENTER FOR SOCIAL IMPACT AND INNOVATION GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY Ms KELLY Senators thank you for the opportunity to testify My name is Lorelei Kelly and I work on congressional modernization at the Beeck Center for Social Impact and Innovation at Georgetown We are at a pivotal moment in our democracy The urgency to restore a functional legislature increases with every moment Will Congress join the rest of society not to mention several other legislatures here in the United States and around the world and let the technology enable us to carry on with the vital operations of the first branch Will we maintain the promise set forth in Article I of our Constitution Or will we let more and more time slip away as unprecedented taxpayer dollars are spent as checks and balances go awry and as Americans far and wide look to congressional leaders to inform us unify us and to help push through this crisis Let us choose the first option If you remember anything from this testimony about continuity of the Senate and remote participation let it be that we can do this Indeed we are doing it right now here today It is hard but we are watching it happen The more apt question for you is How do you want to operate existing technology Like this video conference roundtable today millions of Americans are moving their work and their relationships to online video 1 The prepared statement of Ms Kelly appears in the Appendix on page 50 9 platforms You can be sure that this workspace will be different than what you are used to in the Senate chamber You can still get a lot done and we know some things already For example glitches are inevitable Lagging will happen We need to figure out how to multitask How do you signal or raise your hand How are you supposed to communicate in confidence with your staff Figuring out how to answer these questions is now our challenge Some of them like authentication methods for remote voting and encryption are already in practice in other countries We can do this even while we are dispersed across the country I am talking with you today from the cab of a pick-up truck with a hot spot on a farm in San Juan County New Mexico Your excellent staff helped me make this work They can help the entire Senate It is also important to remember that the Senate has adapted in a crisis before To be sure today’s challenge is not a technical one It is an emotional and intellectual one We require a change of heart and change is hard But the good news is that there is a lot of heart to share So many people love and admire this institution We all want it to be better than ever on the other side of this pandemic and we all stand ready to help Most of us in this roundtable probably remember Senate Life Before BlackBerry LBB This was when a staffer could lose a Senator on a site visit That does not happen anymore because mobile connectivity in most of the work flow is a norm I was a congressional fellow in 2001 and I was working on the Hill through September 11th and the anthrax attacks I will never forget the experience of my friend on Senator Domenici’s staff Her Hart Building desk was sprayed with foam in an attempt to neutralize any possible contamination The offices were evacuated in mid-October They had no access to important documents to each other to files or to their workplace Then they could not return until January of the next year Four months went by while they worked in makeshift spaces near Union Station or in hideaways in the Capitol Senate staff was strewn everywhere and at that time connectivity was maybe 10 percent of what it is today This experience accelerated mobile adaptation I am not excusing the lack of a continuity plan at that time We needed one then and we need one now But this time around we are so much more capable If I could flip a Senate master switch tonight I am sure that this chamber would race up the learning curve If you give them permission your colleagues and staff will rise to this occasion This chamber has nearly 4 000 employees Many of them are young and accustomed to technology integrated throughout their lives Remote voting in an emergency is vital But so is the deliberative process Let us use this time to reimagine how committees operate Start with field hearings Their rules are not bound by geography in the first place Before we catch our breath we will have built the foundations of a 21st century institution Just think of how better informed we could be with remote technology capacity in the Senate Imagine the realtime situational awareness we could have if local first responders medical professionals cashiers teachers health care 10 workers could fill your Committee panels during this pandemic With this roundtable today we are on the right track Finally although temporary remote voting and online deliberations are now imperative know that they will never take the place of in-person convening Like all of our most important life experiences relationships leverage technology not the other way around More than anything else the Senate is about human relationships and those ties will remain top priority They will remain paramount I have confidence in this abiding truth and in your leadership on this and I stand ready to help Thank you for having me here today Chairman PORTMAN Thank you Ms Kelly Very well done I like your studio the cab of a pick-up truck Perfect Dr Huder we will now hear from you TESTIMONY OF JOSHUA C HUDER PH D 1 SENIOR FELLOW GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS INSTITUTE GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY Mr HUDER Chairman Portman Ranking Member Carper and Members of the Subcommittee thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today My name is Joshua Huder I am a senior fellow at the Government Affairs Institute at Georgetown University where I teach and research congressional operation We gather today in a virtual forum at an unprecedented moment in American history Now more than at possibly any other time the American people are relying on Congress to guide us through this pandemic Rising to that challenge will require Congress to adopt some new and creative processes to continue its operation I want to make three points about remote voting as a possible alternative First it is imperative Congress adopt methods for absent members to participate in drafting debating and passing legislation to address the COVID–19 pandemic as well as processes to formally and publicly oversee their implementation and execution Second remote voting may be necessary but it also poses serious institutional consequences It should therefore remain strictly and narrowly limited to emergency situations only and not adopted as part of the regular proceedings Finally I will highlight what I view as some of the best alternatives to address the current situation The COVID–19 pandemic has disrupted and will continue to disrupt normal congressional operation and it is critical that Congress creates committee and floor processes to fulfill its constitutional role and responsibilities If Congress does not it risks abdicating that authority It would delay congressional responses to the pandemic omit important sources of information from the policymaking process and limit oversight As trillions of dollars are doled out at record pace Members of Congress are in many ways the best situated to understand the response’s successes failures and needs Convening to debate and 1 The prepared statement of Dr Huder appears in the Appendix on page 55 11 oversee these programs is critical to ensure the programs Congress creates are executed as the Congress intends Congress’ role in our political system cannot be substituted or replicated in this way Effectively addressing this crisis will require the input of every Representative and Senator and that means ensuring the representational link between constituents and government is not disrupted However Congress should also be wary of the potential damage remote legislating could inflict This roundtable’s primary focus is remote voting but functionally it is a discussion of remote legislating and legislating incorporates a much broader set of activities than a simple vote It involves deliberating in committee rooms members’ offices hallways and the chamber floors It involves coordinating action building relationships and forming alliances Congress is not merely an institution of disconnected representatives voting independently on separate matters It involves much more than just voting Remote legislating distances members from this process and physical distance also entails informational distance In this sense remote legislating creates several problems The gulf between rank-and-file members and the substance of legislating would only get larger Today members are blocked from offering amendments giant omnibus packages reduce individual influence and scrutiny and less room exists for Senators and Representatives to craft and negotiate major deals Remote legislating would only worsen this problem enabling chamber leaders to negotiate in secret and keep rank-and-file in the dark Also it could possibly worsen polarization by reducing member interaction Even in one of the most polarized periods in American politics members from radically divergent ideological backgrounds foster fruitful political relationships through personal interaction This highlights the importance and value of the Capitol Seemingly trivial personal connections can and have influenced the entire chamber Congress has always been substantially shaped by the interaction of its members and convening online reduces opportunities for members to form those important relationships Physical barriers between members only increase reliance on party leaders to facilitate lawmaking which limits the political and policy possibilities and increases the divide between the parties Limiting these procedures to emergency situations would protect members from individual influence As alternatives to regular proceedings I believe some of the best approaches in State legislatures and elsewhere blends an in-person participation component with streamed proceedings and proxy voting This offers two advantages The first is that it is quick It can be implemented through chamber rules and simple changes to existing procedures Second it safeguards against permanent remote voting which I see as a danger Institutional consequences should remain limited to emergencies only and proxy voting offers the best alternative to safeguard its limited use Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today I look forward to your questions Chairman PORTMAN Dr Huder thank you very much 12 We will now go to Members’ questions and each Member will have 7 minutes to ask questions We will have a second round or even a third round if there is interest Again I want to thank all three witnesses for their testimony Your expertise is really helpful right now as we look at this I would like to make one general observation and then ask a couple of questions Marty you said it is not a good thing that Congress cannot convene but it is even worse if the Senate cannot operate during emergencies—in other words if the legislative branch’s voice is not heard That is kind of how I come at this I have been promoting this for over 25 years now going back to House legislation when I was in the House of Representatives For me this is not about this pandemic This is a broader question Ms Kelly you mentioned this This is also about the possibility of a terrorist attack or other reasons that Congress would not be able to meet This is something that I think should be looked at strictly in terms of the pandemic but the general concern that there are times when Congress either cannot physically or should not be gathering To the point about relationships interactions and the preference of being in-person again I do not disagree with that I think it is good for in-person I do think it is kind of interesting to hear some people say that Congress has all these personal relationships and that helps As they would say it provides the ability to get more done in a bipartisan way We have lost a lot of that in Congress and I can say that as someone who was in the House for 12 years and now has been in the Senate for over 10 years This is unfortunately a place where bipartisanship is more difficult not easier Senator Carper’s relationship that he talked about earlier with me and mine with him I think have been helpful to us working together We do a lot of bipartisan work together as I do with other members But it is possible that actually remote interaction on a more normal basis could help that as well To give you an example we are typically off about one-third of the year One-third of the year Congress is not in session even under normal circumstances I would ask my colleagues do you ever interact with your colleagues on your side of the aisle much less colleagues on the other side of the aisle during that period The answer is probably never or rarely We really do not get together We are also only usually in session Monday afternoon until Thursday afternoon and so the rest of the week we have very little interaction with our colleagues Some of us take great pride in our ability to get things done on a bipartisan basis and believe that is the most important part of the job to achieve things for the people we represent which by definition have to be bipartisan to get through But I do not think that remote interaction whether it is the process of legislating or even the interactions you have in a remote roundtable such as this necessarily take away from that In fact Ms Kelly you kind of spoke about this—that there is an opportunity here actually to increase interaction with members particularly during those times when we are not in session which when you add it all up is really the majority of the days of the year we are not in session I would just put that out there as my general observation 13 On questions I think Marty you did a good job talking about the constitutional issues and I appreciate that I think you are correct I do believe that great deference is given to the Senate to come up with its own rules as it should be The one you did not mention I do not think at least extensively was this issue about the enrolled bill rule and how that would affect the Supreme Court’s review of laws passed through remote voting This enrolled bill rule is a Supreme Court doctrine that says the courts should not look past the enrollment bill once the congressional leadership has signed off to determine whether Congress passed a law according to proper procedure Once it is enrolled that becomes the legislative branch’s legislation it sends to the President Could you speak to that for a moment Mr GOLD There are several doctrines that the Supreme Court has observed in one form or another to speak to the question of judicial deference to Congress For example the Ballin case did not rely on the enrolled bill doctrine Nevertheless the enrolled bill doctrine that you have just properly depicted Senator that says that if you have the leaders of the House and the Senate who are authorized to sign the bill affixing signatures to the bill then the Supreme Court or the courts generally will not look behind that to determine what kind of procedures were used or whether they were properly formatted and so forth in order to get you to the end result It very much by the way is the same thing that is the case in Senate rules Senate Rule XXVI says that if you have a quorum of a committee that has reported a piece of legislation then the Parliamentarian and the Chair will not look behind that and determine whether committee procedures were properly followed It is a sense that you should defer to the final action of the committee or in this case the final action of the chamber without going behind it to try to pick apart what might have been done getting to the end The enrolled bill doctrine is certainly one of the reasons for deference Political question doctrine is another major reason for deference The equitable discretion the idea that courts should not go in and rewrite congressional rules is a further reason for deference There are a number of different doctrines on which a court could rest in terms of deciding whether or not the rulemaking power should be invaded and my sense of it is that if Congress says A it is unsafe to meet B they have adopted a rule to operate in lieu of the actual physical meeting and C that they declare in the rule that the participation by a majority of members for example in a remote vote represents a quorum and so forth I believe that all of those doctrines in one form or another would be sufficient to create the deference you want Chairman PORTMAN Therefore the constitutionality of remote proceedings and remote voting Thank you very much I want to turn to my colleagues in a second here but Ms Kelly one issue that I think is interesting to put on the table For this roundtable we did not come up with a new system from scratch This is off-the-shelf technology that is available in the Senate 14 today so for those who raised the technological concerns just to make it clear that we are proceeding today with technology that is readily available and could be improved further as we saw earlier But any comments on that quickly Ms KELLY I think that there are any number of platforms that are off the shelf and could be configured or formatted specifically for the procedures of the House and the Senate I think that the tech industry would be glad to help work with us on the legislative status steps and look at what is needed where and how to do it This is a really hard problem but it is not an impossible one I think it would be a great endeavor to work together with the tech industry to bring D C and California at long last together in a common goal Yes I agree with you Chairman PORTMAN Great Thanks Ms Kelly I now turn to Senator Carper Senator CARPER Ms Kelly let me ask you a question The pickup truck that you are sitting in is that your truck Ms KELLY This is a 1998 Dodge truck that is used for hauling out here on this farm It is my sister’s truck Senator CARPER No kidding I am at my home in Delaware and in the garage of our house is a 2001 Chrysler Town Country minivan The next time I do one of these I am going to do it from there Ms KELLY It is very cozy and I have a hot spot here I am having the full rural broadband experience out here on the farm Laughter That is another conversation but it is a thing Senator CARPER I thank each of you for your testimony When you gave your testimony were you giving it extemporaneously Were you reading How were you doing that Ms KELLY This is something I will be happy to share I found a teleprompter that is a sort of open source and available online I will send it It is called ‘‘CuePrompter com ’’ and I cut-and-pasted into the box and it turns it into this beautiful scroll and you can control the speed Then you can start and stop it I am glad that it looked like I knew what I was doing Laughter I tried a couple of times and I guess it worked so thank you Senator CARPER Mr Chairman and colleagues I want to say if we get nothing else out of this I think we have just gotten a mother lode right here Thank you I am reminded of something as I approached this hearing that Joe Biden who was elected seven times to the U S Senate before becoming Vice President I am reminded of something that he used to say and he still says He says ‘‘All politics is personal ’’ He adds to that a P S ‘‘All diplomacy is personal ’’ I would be inclined to agree with both of those observations Let me ask if I could for each of you one or two points where you think you agree with the other panelists Do you want to go first Ms Kelly Ms KELLY I think that the most important—and I am not a constitutional lawyer I did work on the Hill But I think that what I heard both my fellow panelists say is that the sort of legacy of the past and the rules and the quorum and the 200-some-year-old traditions are not hard and fast obstacles in the place of moving 15 forward and adapting We have needed to do this for some time and now we just need to do it more urgently than ever before But this has always been possible and now it is mandatory Senator CARPER Let me ask you Dr Huder what do you think a point or two where the three of you agree Mr HUDER I think clearly we all agree that some process needs to be created We need some way for the Senate to convene This is a great example of the possibilities that are out there for Congress to maintain its constitutional role and function within the legislative process but also in overseeing responses to this Second I think that we all agree that there is little substitute for the in-person nature and the personal relationships that make the Senate what the Senate is More than any other legislative body in the world the Senate is very much driven by its personal relationships and its social interaction I think that removing that or severely limiting it would be something that we would all lament Senator CARPER All right Thank you Marty Gold Mr GOLD Thank you Senator I absolutely agree with Dr Huder’s statement about the importance of personal interaction in the Senate Not only what he said in his oral statement but in his written submission as well he made a very strong point about that I do not think there is anybody who really thinks that remote participation is a substitute for the actual Senate Senator Portman made a comment in his opening remarks and it is really embraced in the resolution that he offered with Senator Durbin about limiting circumstances so that you do not resort to this on a basis other than in emergency conditions If you begin from the premise that there is no substitute for the actual Senate and that the best thing you are doing is working in a suboptimal circumstance to do the best you can in circumstances where it is physically dangerous to convene then you build guardrails around what you do so that you do not use this on too casual a basis The proposal that Senator Portman and Senator Durbin have introduced also one for example that Senator Paul introduced has that characteristic or those characteristics On what basis do you initiate it On what basis do you continue it On what basis do you sunset it On what basis do you renew it In other words the point is if this were a substitute for the actual Senate—which Dr Huder has made a very clear point that it is not and I agree—you would not worry about those things so much If it is not a substitute for the actual Senate then you have to build in the protections and the guardrails which these resolutions that I have seen so far absolutely do Senator CARPER All right Thanks Let me turn back to Dr Huder again for a moment Dr Huder you have noted that remote participation could further concentrate power in the hands of congressional leadership You have also argued that if members want to hold leadership accountable to quote you I think you said they ‘‘need to at a minimum be physically present ’’ 16 Two questions One can you expand on the ways in which remote voting and participation could empower leadership at the expense of other members Mr HUDER Yes One of the ways that remote voting empowers leaders is that they will be the ones who are in the Capitol itself Even with any remote voting process there are going to be people that are going to have to be in the chambers to make the rules motions and procedures that are going to be necessary to pass law If lawmakers are not there then they are significantly removed from the information process of lawmaking That creates a situation where if they are not there to learn the information through first or secondhand experience it is going to be much harder for them to get involved in the lawmaking process to understand what is going to happen what negotiations are going on and what policy provisions are in play If they are not there there is a transfer of power that leaders have more leeway to move Senator CARPER Thank you A related question Dr Huder if I could In your view would remote participation allow for regular members to make contributions to the substance of legislation Or would they likely be limited on a practical level simply voting yes or no Mr HUDER They are absolutely limited They would not be present and it is unclear—maybe there is a process or a technology that could make them a little more remotely enabled if you will to make a motion or a point of order or offer an amendment or whatever it may be But it is going to be very difficult for them to participate as they would if they were in the chamber Legislating is a lot more than simply voting yes or no In order to stop a bad idea you have to prevent it from getting to the vote That is just one example of many where being in person really is not a substitute for voting remotely Senator CARPER All right Thank you Thank you all very much Chairman PORTMAN Thank you Senator Carper I believe Senator Romney is up next Senator Romney are you on No response Chairman PORTMAN All right Let us turn to Senator Lankford Are you on I know you had another call No response Senator Hawley are you available Senator HAWLEY Yes I am Mr Chairman Thank you very much Chairman PORTMAN Great Senator HAWLEY Thank you again for doing this Thanks to all the witnesses for being here Mr Gold could I just start with you and could we go back for a moment to the British Parliament We know that the British Parliament is moving toward a virtual parliament and I wonder what are some lessons do you think that the U S Congress could learn from the British experience thus far Mr GOLD The British experience thus far has involved the use of remote proceedings on something that was quite suited to those remote proceedings and that was Prime Ministers’ questions Now they did a hybrid proceeding in the House of Commons so they 17 had some members there although a significant majority of the members were not present But nevertheless Prime Ministers’ questions was the kind of thing that was not unduly complex to do by a remote proceeding mechanism So that is what they did The idea was that they would begin with that and phase in other aspects of the legislative procedures of the House of Commons as it became apparent that those things were technologically feasible and could be managed That was actually the point I wanted to make in the statement that I made which is that it is not necessarily necessary for Congress to do everything it ought to do all at the same time because there may be proceedings that can be attuned to a remote voting or remote participation process more easily than other proceedings The fact that you cannot do everything at once does not mean that you should not start someplace and then proceed on from there It is also the reason that I said that maybe we should take some care in terms of amending Senate rules which have a more permanent character and look to the possibility of perhaps a standing order that allows things to be done on a more experimental basis with a sunset clause in that standing order so that if things are not properly accomplished then the rules do not have to be amended again in order to take care of something This is obviously an experiment like the British Parliament is an experiment I would caution not to go too deeply into the experiment all at once Do it in the phases that can be managed like the parliament has done and to consider doing it on a temporary basis until one has a clearer picture of what ought to be done on a more permanent basis Senator HAWLEY I am intrigued by your point just now that the British Parliament’s experience with Prime Ministers’ questions in adopting virtual proceedings for some of its work not necessarily all of its work it raises the possibility in my mind which is what I think you are suggesting that one way for the U S Congress to proceed is to stagger our workload as it were We do not have to go virtual for everything Of course we do not have to do everything all at once I wonder if you could just say a little bit more about what sort of congressional proceedings you think are particularly good places to start in terms of working virtually implementing these virtual technologies If we were to stagger our workload in the face of an extended emergency like this pandemic what might that look like Where would you counsel us to begin Mr GOLD The Portman and Durbin resolution begins with voting and so the premise is that members have been informed about the content of legislation but they want to have an ability to express themselves on the record as to their position on that legislation as opposed to saying something can only pass by unanimous consent or a voice vote or their individual opinions are not expressed It seems to me that if you could find the kind of secure platforms that Senator Portman was talking about in his opening Statement that might be a place to begin Now Dr Huder has talked about the difficulty of the give-andtake on the floor somebody wants to offer an amendment somebody wants to make a point of order somebody wants to put a 18 quorum call in—all of those things that we are accustomed to in the normal operation of the Senate I made the statement that ultimately I thought that the Senate should embrace as much of that as possible because the legislative process is more than voting If you begin with remote voting and say well at least in that sense members have had the opportunity to express themselves in a meaningful way on the passage or defeat of a proposal whether it is the final passage of the legislation or an amendment to the legislation whatever the vote may be if you begin there I do think that is a place to start and I think that that is attuned to technology If you can establish that the technology is available to begin to mimic as closely as you can floor proceedings then the greater degree that you can expand this to look like the normal Senate the better understanding probably that at no point will it actually look like the normal Senate Senator HAWLEY Dr Huder let me just turn to you if I could On the point on voting could you just give us a word about any security concerns with setting up a remote voting system that you are aware of that you might have Talk us through that Mr HUDER Senator Hawley I am not a technology expert and I also do not know the platforms that are out there so this is really not my forte to discuss the security issues My understanding is that in many of the State legislatures they are doing this through other forms of technology either through some face-to-face communication with a proxy that is in the chamber or taking a picture of a vote or a paper vote and sending it to a proxy in the chamber But in terms of actually voting through technology I would not be the person I believe Ms Kelly would probably have a better answer Senator HAWLEY Can I just ask you on the State legislatures Dr Huder do you have any assessment yet of the different approaches that the State legislatures who are experimenting with remote proceedings how those are going or any assessment of their various approaches and what you think of them what you think is promising what you think is not so promising Mr HUDER Yes I think that there are several State legislatures that everybody is in this in the very beginning we are all kind of experimenting with it and places like Pennsylvania and Oklahoma were a couple instances that I highlighted because I thought it brought an interesting and novel approach to a very difficult problem given this pandemic They are doing a sort of proxy and remote participation component where members can participate or at least watch a live stream while voting when necessary I think the concern comes when you start to bring in more controversial measures and there is disagreement within the ranks I think that many State legislators were expressing some concerns that as the process becomes more unwieldy and more controversy arises that it may become more difficult to enact or execute the processes that they have been using Senator HAWLEY Very good Thank you very much Thanks to all the witnesses and thank you Mr Chairman Chairman PORTMAN Thank you Senator Hawley Senator Lankford when you are available—I know you are on another call—just chime in We would love to hear from you 19 Let me if I could back up a little bit to the general premise here that we believe that the legislative branch ought to be able to express itself at all times including times of emergencies when we cannot gather or should not gather Again this does not relate just to the pandemic but for me I think about this in terms of as was noted earlier during the Cold War we had a bunker set up on a mountaintop in West Virginia somewhere for fear we could not gather Certainly during 9 11 we saw this happen where it was viewed to be unsafe to be in the Capitol immediately after the attacks of 9 11 We have had a concern in our country for some time about bioterrorism and bioterrorism is not a natural virus but it has some similar aspects to it and the inability potentially for us to gather But to me this is about continuity As I said earlier it is also about the fact that in the Constitution and among our Founders there was a sense that we are the people’s voice We are the ones representing our individual constituents in our districts and our States and that we should be heard particularly during times of national emergencies or as is the case now at a time when we are making huge decisions on behalf of our country at a time when our economy is in free fall and we have a serious health crisis that is affecting so many Americans having already resulted in so many fatalities as many as we had in the entire Vietnam War just in the last 3 months This is a time when we should be heard and so that is my premise to this I had a question for you Dr Huder I agree that when we can meet we should meet and I think many of your observations are in theory maybe more applicable than they are in practice in terms of how Congress operates I wish there was more personal interaction and I certainly try to practice that but that can be done remotely as well particularly as I said earlier most of the year most days of the year we are actually not in session But to say that there would be a concentration of power and leadership in relation to remote voting I think belies the reality of what we have seen in the last couple of weeks Congress passed legislation last week that provided over half a trillion dollars of your tax dollars and all of our constituents’ tax dollars to address this pandemic Think about that over half a trillion dollars As you know normally we have significant heartburn and debate over $100 million here $100 million there We are talking about hundreds of billions with a ‘‘B ’’ As someone once said a million here a million there it begins to add up Now it is a billion here a billion there it begins to add up or even a trillion here a trillion there Yet because of I think the necessity for us to act and the inability for us to gather there was significant concentration of power in those who were working on this in Washington and this was the Republican leadership and the Democrat leadership But there was no input from members There was no debate There were no amendments There was no vote I think the notion that somehow remote voting leads to more concentration I think at least in the experience that I have had in this particular pandemic and my sense as to how this could work in the future should God forbid there be an attack on our country as there was on 9 11 or some other way that we were not able to gath- 20 er my concern is that people would not have their representatives being heard So whether it is voting which is the ultimate sacred responsibility or whether it is all of the processes that lead up to that including hearings like this one including the opportunity to have debate offer amendments to be heard it seems to me that that would help to ensure that democracy small ‘‘D ’’ is exercised What am I missing What are your thoughts on that Mr HUDER Mr Chairman I think you are exactly right that Congress needs to be voting at this moment and they need to be signing on the record or disagreeing on the record with the decisions that are being made and the types of policies that are being passed I think that is critical I think it also highlights the importance and concerns with remote voting When we are discussing massive trillion-dollar or halftrillion-dollar response packages the type of speed necessary to pass these packages in a timely manner is going to necessitate circumventing normal legislative procedures where you have committee hearings vetting the proposals and the policies you have oversight hearings The necessity of getting something out quickly means that you are going to have to obscure some of the deliberative processes that are normal to the legislative process The concern comes when you start to turn to more routine legislation that Congress will need to be adopting later on this year For example the National Defense Authorization Act will be something that Congress may need to pass as this pandemic continues or appropriations bills or a continuing resolution of some sort and it may need to be addressed while the pandemic still rages on My concern is that remote voting comes to limit the deliberation that you would see on some of the very important matters that Congress will have to adopt that are not emergency response packages This is why I believe that your resolution and many of the other things that would enable remote voting and remote participation are absolutely critical at this moment There are also some long-term concerns that may limit the deliberation that would otherwise exist on very important legislation Chairman PORTMAN Getting back to what Mr Gold said earlier on which is that the best would be if we could be together—and I could not agree with that more—but our worst is that we have a situation where we cannot gather and our voices are not heard As a practical matter as a professor who studies political science and particularly the U S Congress and our processes and procedures a lot of this has to do with balance of power The Constitution was set up to ensure that the legislative branch the executive branch and the judicial branch had this delicate balance and that there was deference where appropriate but not overreach Without the legislative branch being able to convene and to be able to speak obviously power then shifts to the other branches particularly to the executive branch which I think is counter to what the Founders intended and goes back to this notion that we are asked to represent our States our districts I thank you for that My time has expired We will turn to Senator Carper I do have some questions on the technical aspects on this that I will come back to Ms Kelly Senator Carper 21 Senator CARPER Thanks Mr Chairman One of the most valuable expenditures of my own time in the Senate has been actually not necessarily the time we have spent in a committee hearing or on the Senate floor voting although those can be very helpful Some of the most valuable time I have had in terms of building relationships is when we have traveled together on the congressional delegation trips I know Senator Portman has been on any number of those I have had the pleasure of being on some of them too as has he I am going to think out loud here for a minute which is a scary proposition but the idea of—as I said earlier let us find out what works do more of that find out what does not work do less of that There are other countries other States around the United States who have been experimenting in this arena for a while Just like the way that States are taking a different approach to opening up coming back to normal we are going to find out from the States what worked and what does not work I wonder how we would go about finding out around this country and around the world what works and what does not work It would be interesting I think for us to hear from parts of the world as well and maybe to hear from some of the places whether it is States or another country where they have tried this and failed miserably and we will see what we can learn from both of them This might be a stretch but the idea of where we could put on an airplane folks from the Senate who would have some expertise in this area maybe let them go visit a couple of countries together and they will learn something from those countries but also have a chance to get to know each other better and to build some of the bonds that I think are helpful to getting things done I just want to lay that out there off the top of my head It may be a good idea it may not be But it might work on a couple different levels Much of my success what success I have enjoyed in the last almost 20 years but much of it has been the result of forging relationships with people on the other side of the aisle and building trust through interpersonal interaction James Lankford is on this call and he is going to be joining us again shortly One of those examples for me was Tom Coburn a Republican from Oklahoma a successful businessperson a doctor obstetrician a House Member and a Senator We built over the years a close bond which made the rest of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs I think to look back and he passed away a month or so ago but it was the interpersonal interactions that we had that enabled us to develop a trust to lead Efforts like that to overcome partisan divides I think are more important now than ever A question of Ms Kelly if I could and then a question of Dr Huder if I could Ms Kelly do you have any recommendation based on your work for sustaining personal relationships between legislators even in a remote setting Ms KELLY Yes thank you for that question Actually I have been involved with a couple of what we called ‘‘mock hearings ’’ and we used Zoom to mimic some of the basic functions of a hearing We in the second one had a member of the U K Parliament present She was so generous so happy to help and so interested in what was going on in the United States as well 22 The good news is that there are two websites that have a continually updated scroll of what is going on in State legislatures in the United States The National Conference of State Legislatures has a whole COVID–19 banner and continuity of government is one of the boxes they have checked You can go there and see continually what States are doing Just from your membership on your Committee—California Kentucky Oklahoma Utah—they have all taken steps or they are all doing something and they have done it differently It is really interesting to go through and they are linked right to the legislative language In terms of international progress forward on this the International Parliamentary Union IPU which has an entire section that looks at information technology IT in legislatures and it has for many years has a legislative data and transparency conference in the U S Capitol every year that all the Congress nerds go to those people who keep things running behind the scenes I think we can take real confidence knowing that the institution of Congress has made great strides in the last 10 years Congress is a mostly machine-readable organization now There are treasure troves of data that are structured and made available online now A lot of what we are talking about here has the foundation in place To your point about global parliamentarians and members of other legislatures as you said that I thought of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization NATO Parliamentary Assembly which is one of these groups that started during the Cold War to bring legislators together The U S Congress used to have a much more robust international program also that was run out of the Library of Congress that could be brought back The foundations are there I was a national security staffer on the Hill and worked a lot on NATO and it seems to me that right now for many reasons including information weaponization that the technological and the technical architecture of legislative bodies should be considered critical infrastructure and should be looked at through a security framework and certainly continuity of government brings it into stark relief But for a lot of different reasons including security continuity and access these are issues that so many countries are facing Even though parliaments are very different than Congress part of the problem is Congress cannot be a parliament and that is one of the reasons it gets stuck when you try to force things down on it But the truth is a lot of these technologies that we are talking about have already not only been piloted but metabolized into systems of governing We can take a lot of confidence in that they will share it with us For that question it is important and I can share those links with you how to get informed daily on it Senator CARPER Thanks so much Mr Chairman I have a related question for Dr Huder but I would be happy to yield at this point to one of our colleagues if one of our colleagues is waiting to speak Chairman PORTMAN Senator Carper go ahead with your question Senator CARPER All right Thank you A similar kind of question Dr Huder if I could How would a move to remote participation impact the social aspect of congres- 23 sional work and the opportunity to build or at least try to build bipartisan coalitions Mr HUDER I think one of the problems with remote participation is typically you only call or reach out in instances where you already know somebody I do not randomly call strangers for example I meet people and then we exchange numbers and then we build a relationship where phone calls and text messages and interaction can be done I just see it as a difficult layer to the process So much of Congress is face-to-face interaction It is members bonding over their dogs It is members talking to one another in the hallway or in the elevator I find that hard to replace in the remote voting setting I think that is one of the parts that makes it very difficult is that if you do not have the opportunity for a space for members of different parties to co-exist you kind of lose many of those informal touches so to speak that build those relationships There has been a lot of anecdotal evidence about how air travel for example and the changing congressional calendar have reshaped the way that Members of Congress interact and who they work with Whether that is part of a broader political divide that is probably partly the case but it is also partly the case that Members of Congress just do not socialize as much because they do not live in D C They do not have common social circles or their kids do not go to the same school anymore A lot of these sort of informal social connections were many of the political connections that formed bridges across the aisle and remote legislating as a permanent sense would I think damage an already damaged situation in that particular circumstance While it is necessary I do not think it is a long-term solution Senator CARPER All right Ted Kennedy told me a story early on in my time in the Senate about how the Senate on certain days of the week during the summer would have picnic dinners out on The Mall with their colleagues and families Ted Stevens told a great story once that I have often shared with others—I will not go into it now—about the fact that he car-pooled early in his time in the Senate with three other Senators—two Democrats two Republicans They lived in I think Northern Virginia Just the ability to work together across the aisle just from car-pooling was pretty extraordinary Thank you very much Chairman PORTMAN Thank you Senator Carper I have some technology questions but I am compelled to comment again I wish Congress operated more the way Dr Huder explained There is unfortunately not as much interaction as there was when I first got elected back in the 1990s in the House Certainly I lament that but I do not know that remote voting is going to make it any worse at a time when we cannot otherwise gather In fact I think just the opposite it gives us the opportunity to come together which I think Senator Carper would agree it has been a month now since we have had any bipartisan interaction of any sort unless members have reached out as I have with Senator Carper and some other distinct colleagues but there has been no interaction That is the reality It may not be the theory but that is the practical reality 24 One this is to be used for emergencies only not to be used as a regular procedure of course But two I think it actually has opportunities remote interaction to enhance rather than limit the interactions we have with our colleagues I think it is a matter of using technology as so many people are today Probably half the people I represent in the State of Ohio are working remotely today in whole or in part they are teleworking they are on conference calls with their colleagues but they are interacting with them At a time like this when we cannot be together I certainly think it is appropriate for Congress not just to vote remotely but also have more interaction remotely and I think the technology is there and it is very possible Ms Kelly I keep telling you I am going to come to you on technology and I am going to dig into this issue and drill a little deeper But I see that my colleague Senator Lankford has rejoined us and I am going to give him the opportunity now to ask questions and I will come back to you Senator Lankford OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LANKFORD Senator LANKFORD Great Thanks Senator Portman I appreciate that and I appreciate the dialogue that we have to be able to be here in this back-and-forth time period This is exceptionally helpful It is exceptionally important for us to be able to talk through how we maintain this All of us are interacting with constituents It is almost like a live hearing at this point for me Senator Portman because I had to step out into the hallway to be able to visit with a constituent Literally during this time period I was stepping into the hallway because I was also connecting with a group from the panhandle of my State listening to some questions that they had and then coming right back to this hearing This is more real life happening for us as we are multitasking away from the Hill as well as being back all connected on it But I do want to ask some specific questions though For Marty Gold there has been a longstanding requirement for wet signatures for things for the Parliamentarian and some process things like that that require physical presence In your advice how many things would have to be dealt with for dropping a bill for doing an amendment on a bill for engagement on any kind of changes that would really have to have pretty dramatic changes in our back-of-house operation for how we actually implement bills and vote on them Mr GOLD Senator thank you for that question You are exactly correct When we start to think about this just from the perspective of remote voting and then we begin to extend it beyond that to all of the rest of the Senate operations that are connected with having a bill become a law we find all manner of rules precedents orders and practices that are implicated in this Somebody is going to have to take a very good inventory of all of that to determine what has to be done in each case to make sure that you have checked a necessary box so you can get the final point of the enrollment of a bill and tell the courts that they ought to be deferring to Congress because the bill has been properly enrolled and all of the necessary steps have been taken to lead to that moment 25 This is exactly the reason why I do not think that the Senate should be going about amending its rules without having given a lot of study to that question But for the same reason I do not think the Senate needs to paralyze itself understanding that all those things are out there In other words you can figure out what it is that you can do at the moment and figure out how to put a standing order into effect and ask the Parliamentarian what the Parliamentarian believes are necessary boxes to check to make that work see how it works let it sunset or let it be renewed as the case may dictate and then in the meantime determine what it is that you need to do on a permanent basis I will say this Nothing distorts the situation more than Congress being absent That is the biggest thing Dr Huder made the point about how this empowers the leadership against the individual member I agree with that I will also say it empowers the individual member against the leadership If you have to get unanimous consent to pass something in a pro forma session and somebody objects where are you Or if you try to have a pro forma session and do some business and somebody puts a quorum call in and you have not got members around where are you Or the point I was making in my Statement about the fact that many of the Senate procedures require 60-vote thresholds to get you from Point A to Point B like the cloture rule or budget waivers or many many other things if you are talking about 60 out of 100 Senators that is one thing If you are talking about 60 out of 75 or 80 Senators because you have a lot of people absent that is another thing Senator Portman talked about the absence of Congress and the distortion that creates relative to the power of the executive branch and its relationship to the Congress The one thing that we know for sure—or there are two things that we know for sure This is suboptimal and you have to see what boxes need to be checked Then write procedures that allow them to be checked That is one thing you know for sure But the other thing you know for sure is that nothing distorts the situation more including all the personal relationships we have been talking about than for Congress to be completely absent Senator LANKFORD One of the grand challenges that we have is there is a perspective that if only we would allow Congress to be able to make a big Zoom call and be able to vote yes or no then this solves the voting issue One of the things that you bring up there that I want to be able to bring up as well is this issue there is a lot of back-of-the-house that has to be done and it has to be done legally and appropriately that cannot cleanly be done by everybody connecting online and just saying ‘‘aye’’ or ‘‘nay ’’ That is something we are going to be able to work through the process on One of the other questions I wanted to be able to ask you was the type of bill that should be engaged because I think we all have agreement that this should be extremely limited and it should be extremely temporary We would all say hey there are moments like this that we should be able to be engaged more But we also know of moments all the way back to 1814 when the Capitol was burned down and we had to be able to move offsite for times like 9 11 we moved away times during wartime and we have had limited access This is not the first time nor will it be the last time 26 that we have had time that Congress has not been able to meet or has had to look for other places to meet or other methods to meet Part of the challenge that we would have with remote voting in particular more so than remote committee meetings like what we are doing right now or a roundtable this is relatively simple to be able to do But when you get into remote voting and such it is trying to find what bills should be appropriate to do because it is not uncommon to get into the middle of a debate you get into heated debate on the floor on an issue and suddenly there is a quorum call that just basically sets things aside so members can get a chance to talk and work out differences You cannot do that in a remote setting the same way that you do at other times Is there advice from anyone that you would be able to raise to say ‘‘In my perspective’’—and again we will have a different one but ‘‘In my perspective ’’ you would say ‘‘here is the type of vote or the type of bill that should be addressed in this type of moment and bills that should not be addressed in this type of moment ’’ Mr GOLD That is a wonderful question I think my own sense is that it is very difficult to determine that in advance because you do not understand the kind of circumstances that will apply at the moment that you have to exercise this power For example at the moment we are not having to do appropriations At the moment we are not having to deal with that Now what happens if Dr Fauci is correct and the coronavirus comes back in the fall particularly let us say during the time of the lame duck session which always happens after the election or has in recent Congresses certainly when a lot of legislation that has been left over big omnibus legislation that is left over now has to be addressed Perhaps it comes back in such a virulent form—nobody knows that now but perhaps it comes back in such a virulent form that it is obviously a health hazard for Congress to convene If you have restricted the kind of legislation that can be addressed by this mechanism you may defeat the purpose of the mechanism The purpose of the mechanism is to allow for Congress to participate for members to express themselves to represent constituents not to just have it funneled through the leadership and have it funneled by unanimous consent Some things cannot pass by unanimous consent We do not know the kind of circumstances that may necessitate for this to operate We may be in a posture—or it is set up now and then in the summer months for whatever reason it is not necessary and then the coronavirus or some mutation of the coronavirus comes back in the fall and all of a sudden it is very necessary I would not advise hamstringing the kind of legislation ahead of time Senator LANKFORD Mr Chairman I have one last question Chairman PORTMAN Absolutely Senator LANKFORD I know I am a minute over time and I appreciate that Let me give you an example of this of a type of vote that could occur As any Congress any Senate especially needs to do we have both legislation and personnel We have nominations that need to occur We are very behind on nominations right now both because we have been out of session for a month and just the slowdown in 27 the nomination process in general over the last several years Should it for instance be appropriate to say we are going to come back into session we are in remote we are going to try to get through 20 different nominations in the course of the day today in 2-hour voting blocs we are going to continue to be able to just move 24 hours a day moving through nominations even though we are not physically at that point to be able to have a moment like that Would you consider that to be appropriate Should there be appropriate guidelines or boundaries that are set for that type of voting as well Mr GOLD Senator I know that there will not be partisan agreement on this point I know that But my own sense is that that is a constitutional responsibility of the Senate It is a constitutional responsibility to deal with advice and consent to treaties and it is a constitutional responsibility to deal with legislation In other words I do not think that the constitutional responsibilities of the Senate should be hived off from one another say that these responsibilities can be addressed and those responsibilities cannot I think that you would probably be better off if you had some sort of agreement between the leadership on how you were going to exercise those responsibilities But just as I do not think that there is a particular piece of legislation that ought to be hived off I also do not think there is a Senate function that should be hived off even though for purposes of comity it is probably better off to get some kind of understanding between the leadership on what the Senate will do while it is operating in suboptimal circumstances Senator LANKFORD Great Thank you Mr Chairman thank you for allowing me to ask one last question I appreciate that Chairman PORTMAN Let me say that the other challenge we face right now where we have not been able to gather for a month is that we have nominations as Senator Lankford has talked about but specifically nominations related to COVID–19 We have executive branch nominees that are needed for a response to COVID–19 who are not controversial particularly where there would not be I do not believe much partisanship around them Yet we cannot move on them because we are not able to remote-vote or even remote-discuss As I said earlier we have not had any such sessions Let me if I could Ms Kelly ask you a couple technical questions as I said dig a little deeper here and then I am going to ask Senator Carper for his thoughts as we begin to wrap this up I know everyone has other responsibilities and we said we would get you out of here before 11 a m With regard to security what technical requirements would you think are necessary for a platform that Senators would use to vote remotely Ms KELLY I am not a computer scientists or a technical expert I have run with a lot of techies who can answer your question in great detail I do know however that our access to expertise is very significant and that a lot of the folks especially in D C who have worked on this have set up whole systems for the executive branch including the Department of Defense DOD 28 I was looking at a Research and Development RAND Corporation paper the other day on Central Intelligence Agency CIA telecommuting where they had to create some kind of a sensitive compartmented information facility SCIF in their home office I think that there are interesting ideas coming out of the House I heard one which would be to make use of the Federal Bureau of Investigation FBI local offices or military facilities in States and districts I think those are good short-term possibilities I do know also that there are real constitutional challenges in using things like a common cloud Security for Congress has to be almost a bespoke system It is probably one of the reasons why we have not built one yet It is very expensive and you can only sell one I think that is one of the challenges That does not excuse us not having moved ahead on building a modern technology system for Congress One of the places I would also refer you to as you move forward is the Select Committee on Modernization in the House That Committee has—25 percent of its members are from Washington State and there is something in the DNA or in the water in Washington State that makes it such a tech-literate civic society I think that that would be a place to turn I know that Suzan DelBene Derek Kilmer Mr Newhouse they continually brought up—because I sat through all of the hearings over the last year and a half 16 hearings This was an issue that came up continually As for security in remote voting I would suggest looking at the link that I put in my written testimony to the Parliament of Brazil which actually for years now has had a hacker lab inside the parliament which in other circumstances when there was not a pandemic has experimented throughout the chambers with methods and really got like Mr Gold was saying sort of a digital mimic of really specific functions and niche needs I think that that is the kind of thing that we can do now Maybe we need something like a chamber challenge Challenges are very typical in technology It is crowdsourcing ideas I think you could crowdsource ideas within the Senate and the House themselves and share lessons learned in some kind of a cross-chamber repository To another point that you brought up I think something that we do not know yet because it is not visible is that there is a really large sort of invisible constituency out there for explanation and collaboration and moving forward and kind of—I call it like a ‘‘maker space of modern civics ’’ is the States I did all this district research in States and districts for 18 months and I was just amazed at what citizens are coming up with in collaboration with their elected leaders certainly in Congress The Ohio State University is like the mother ship of a lot of this innovation I have partners at the Ohio State University You have Kettering in Dayton You have really amazing infrastructure already to help us sort of dig ourselves out of this civic memory hole that we have been in I would also recommend this article that is probably 8 years old now called ‘‘Interested Bystanders ’’ It was a collaboration between I think Google Civics and—I am trying to remember—an individual named Kate Krontiris who is a civic researcher It really talked about sort of the reorganization of civics and how much more sort of interpersonal and individualized people desire to inter- 29 act with their government It is really a beautiful kind of iteration of what we already have and so I want you to have courage and know that there is a lot going on out there but we have not named it yet It has everything to do with how we are going to organize ourselves now going forward to tap those resources They are there and I would be happy to share the ones I know But I think if we make a place for them to show up—so it is not just about a vote but it is about a voice That is why I think that I am so interested in the deliberative process which is how do we reimagine committees during this time and maybe we can pull some of our new best practices out and continue forward with them when we can show up in person again In any case I can find you the people to answer the very specific technical questions but I hope that you continue on with this concern for renewing civics because I think it is there Chairman PORTMAN Great Thank you Ms Kelly and I will say those people have found us and we have found them and some of them are actually associated with Georgetown University as you know Dr Huder I wrote an op-ed in the New York Times with one of those technical experts 2 days ago along with Senator Durbin We are working with outside groups that have some very strong views on this and there are different platforms We are focusing on two things really just authentication that it is the right person verifying that and this is done in financial transactions all over the world and then encryption to be sure that it cannot be hacked that it is safe We think as you said in your opening statement this is not so much a technical challenge it is you said I think an emotional and psychological challenge I think that is the issue It is just tradition It is hard to leave tradition All of us want to be together when we can be together The question is When you cannot be together how do you perform your necessary functions I would say on top of that I think technology and remote interaction can actually improve how Congress operates even outside of a crisis not for voting but just for interaction as we have done today which I think has been very positive With that I would like to turn back to Senator Carper for any additional questions and for his closing comments Again I appreciate his partnership in this venture as we have partnered on so many other things together I think this has been a very useful exercise Senator Carper Senator CARPER Mr Chairman I perked right up when Ms Kelly mentioned Ohio State University Chairman PORTMAN Yes Senator CARPER As the Chairman knows I spent 4 years there as a Navy ROTC midshipman right in the middle of the Vietnam War and have a great fondness and connections and go back there from time to time I have now one more reason to go back and Ms Kelly I think you have called Ohio State the ‘‘mother ship ’’ Folks in Ann Arbor call us different things not quite that kind But thank you for that piece of information I have been jotting down Mr Chairman colleagues and to the witnesses I have been jotting down every now and then when someone says something that I think is especially relevant or im- 30 portant and I want to mention some of those as we wrap up here One of the things I jotted down is the technology that we are talking about should not be used routinely necessarily particularly when we are voting but if we used it basically in emergencies and to at least make sure to do it with that in mind I also wrote down that the idea here is to enhance interpersonal relationships not to diminish them I mentioned earlier Vice President Biden’s admonition that all politics is personal all diplomacy is personal I think that is true The idea as we embrace the technologies that we are talking about is to do so in a way that enhances interpersonal relations and interaction One other comment I wrote down was ‘‘extremely limited’’ and the word ‘‘temporary ’’ I wrote down that nothing distorts the process more than for Congress to be completely absent and I would certainly agree with this Another comment for the purpose of that comment is to enhance the ability of Congress to enhance the ability of Congress to participate not to diminish it I am going to ask in closing for each of our witnesses to give us one or two bullet points very short admonitions of maybe what to do and not to do as we prepare to wrap up But this has been fascinating and Mr Chairman you are known by all of us as a very thoughtful reasonable and nonpartisan Member of the Senate who focuses on getting things done and who is not unwilling to take on difficult issues and this is not an easy one either Maybe I could wrap it up and ask each of our witnesses—and we will start with Marty Gold if you will—just one or two things that you would like to leave us with When we were in our training courses going through the preflight or flyover missions happened to be in classes for those purposes at some point in a lecture or presentation to us as ensigns and midshipmen they would come to a point that was a really relevant point that was going to be on the test if you will they would stomp their feet But we are not going to know today if you were stomping your feet but if you were give us a couple of foot stompers as we prepare to close out things if you do not remember anything else remember this Ms Kelly would you start us off please You are there in the pick-up Ms KELLY In the pick-up yes Senator CARPER What is the area New Mexico Ms KELLY I am in the Four Corners in New Mexico This is where I am from This is where I grew up Senator CARPER Oh wow Ms KELLY But I made it to D C My thoughts as you were talking are that this is a crisis but it is also a tremendous long-term opportunity What I would suggest is let us ask the tech industry for help Let us ask them to—like we did in the 1930s and 1940s put aside these immediate short-term profits and go for an Eyes on the Prize movement forward a meta challenge for all of us but especially for the technology industry I like to call this sort of a moment that we have an Article I renaissance We could come out of this with a renewed understanding of how important the first branch of government is The first branch of government owns the real estate of democracy It really does far more than the execu- 31 tive We can do this We have the bone structure A lot of it is just rethinking it and bringing it into the modern era This has been true for decades at this point so I do not want to lose that I know we are in a crisis but we have already got momentum the fact that we have this continuity working group together it has this great group of people working here on this panel today people who have thought about these challenges already and can bring their skills to bear right now Let us not forget that this is our moment to have this renaissance in Article I and to move forward into the 21st century at long last as a much improved democratic system Senator CARPER Your words Ms Kelly remind me of something that Albert Einstein used to say ‘‘In adversity lies opportunity ’’ Ms KELLY That is right Senator CARPER There is plenty of adversity here so there has to be some opportunity as well I think it was Rahm Emanuel who came up with it saying ‘‘Never waste a good crisis ’’ Ms KELLY That is true too Laughter Senator CARPER Those words of wisdom come to mind at this time So thanks so much Ms KELLY Yes Senator CARPER Dr Huder please Mr HUDER I want to thank the Chairman and Ranking Member for gathering us together today We are in a very difficult moment right now as a country and this is a very important issue how Congress continues to function when health risks emerge and it literally cannot convene under normal circumstances Holding this hearing is in many ways a validation that it can work it can continue to operate in these difficult moments and it is important that we continue to draw attention to the ways that Congress can continue to operate Senator CARPER All right Thank you Marty Gold please Mr GOLD Thank you Senator I would emphasize the importance of being willing to experiment with new things The Senate is a venerable institution The Senate changes very slowly as you know The ‘‘Continuing Body’’ does not tend to adapt itself much to new circumstances and so forth But I am reminded of the television in the Senate and the controversy that that caused when it first came up It was originally proposed by Senator Mansfield for use in the Nixon impeachment trial that never happened It was adopted for one moment in 1974 when the Senate swore in Nelson Rockefeller as Vice President and then the place was dark again for more than a decade The House of Representatives put in television in 1979 and when Senator Baker my old boss became Majority Leader of the Senate he proposed it in 1981 and boy was that resisted It was resisted for 5 years past the time that he actually served in office until finally in 1986 Senator Dole and Senator Robert C Byrd the two Leaders at the time put in the television in the Senate resolution and then on an experimental basis It was only after it was in effect for several months that the Senate finally decided to proceed with it To tell you the truth that entire experience the decade between Mansfield’s proposal and the final implementation of television is very much emblematic of the Senate It moves slowly 32 But if the Senate had not been willing to experiment with that think of where we would be today where the public would regard the Senate I think as an artifact of the Constitution rather than a central part of the government The Senate needs to experiment with this and I would very much encourage it along the lines of the commentary that has been made this morning Senator CARPER Thank you Thank you all Mr Chairman if I could I would like close on a humorous note We have legislative correspondence as my colleagues know each of us has legislative correspondence we respond to to the people who contact our offices It used to be we would reply to mail that we would get and I am a welcome advocate in making use of the U S Postal Service USPS I think my colleagues especially in rural parts of our country inaudible But I asked my mail team the so-called mail team—and it is comprised of four women Their supervisor is this fellow named Kevin and Kevin has come to describe these four women as the ‘‘ladies of the quill ’’ The ladies of the quill it turns out use modern technology to respond not so much to the mail we get like they used to about 20 years ago but for every email we receive inaudible Last month inaudible for every letter that we get—and there are something like 500 emails for every one letter In fact the people who contacted me all due respect to the Postal Service now it is important to support the Postal Service they are not doing that through snail mail They are doing it through email We have changed very much the way we communicate with our constituents In fact we communicate inaudible better for them and maybe even do their jobs more effectively I want to close by saying when I first got here to the Senate I had somebody say well we inaudible The world changes and we need to be able to change with it My hope is that as we go down this path we do so in a way that inaudible it has been a real comfort and I think maybe if we are smart about it inaudible I just want to thank our friend and colleague Rob Portman in particular inaudible for bringing this together and bringing in inaudible It is great to see all of you inaudible Chairman PORTMAN Thank you Senator Carper I appreciate it To the point of things are changing we had another Facebook live town hall yesterday We have done one every week during this month-long absence from Washington And that is where people are They are online The interaction we are talking about with Members of Congress that could be enhanced through technology in my view even outside of a crisis also relates to our constituents of course and our ability to communicate with them could be enhanced through not just remote voting and remote governance but remote participation as we have had today First of all I want to thank all of our witnesses This has been a tremendous opportunity to glean from your expertise your knowledge and your backgrounds To Marty Gold thank you As usual you have your foot firmly planted on the traditions of the Senate but also how to move forward and make the Senate more effective As you said it moves slowly but we have made a lot of 33 changes You were not around before the filibuster but think what a big change that has resulted in Ms Kelly thank you very much for your focus on the technological opportunities here Dr Huder thank you very much for your willingness to share with us some of your concerns about the need for us to do this in a way that results in more not less interaction so that we are not going further down this track of Congress being polarized I think those were very good points I thought the opening statements were great but also as I told you you will have the opportunity to make a longer statement for the record which you will have online By the way to that point I would urge everyone who is watching today or listening today check out the report 1 This is a bipartisan Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations PSI report As Senator Carper will tell you we try to do things together and we have come up with a consensus document that I think is very helpful When you think about this issue broadly you will see a lot of the issues we discussed today outlined and additional issues as well You can find it on hsgac senate gov ‘‘HSGAC’’ is the name of the Committee That is H–S–G–A–C dot Senate dot gov So hsgac senate gov Go to the PSI link That is the Subcommittee that we are in currently So hsgac senate gov and then the PSI link to find the report Senator Carper thank you again for being a great partner today and showing how we can function even during a national crisis I look forward to the time when both of us can be back together in the hearing room and working on our other PSI projects as we have many that are in the works Meanwhile I think this was a very successful experiment and it is an example of what can happen It is really a Senate first and I hope it will be one that other committees and subcommittees will look at as an example of what we can do even at a time when we are not able to gather physically I also want to thank the Senate staff who made this possible Karl Jackson and the Senate Recording Studio team thank you all very much Thanks for dealing with our challenges as we have worked through this the last couple weeks As I said this technology is off-the-shelf Senate technology so it is available to others but it is one that we had to perfect and we thank you for your work on that I also want to thank all the other staff who have been so helpful Dan Muchow—we heard from Dan earlier—has been terrific Kate Kielceski—she is not going to cut me off because I am only going to say nice things about her But seriously Kate has done a great job in monitoring this today Also of course our team—Amanda Neely Sam Mulopulos Andy Dockham John Yaros and others— we want to thank you Senator Carper and I appreciate all of you helping to make this happen This is an opportunity for us to show what can be done through technology and specifically today to get more information out there about remote voting and I think we have come up with actually some very good principles that ought 1 The memorandum referenced by Senator Portman appears in the Appendix on page 61 34 to apply not just in this situation—as Mr Gold has said this may be replicated down the line sadly—but in all situations to have that tool in the toolbox in case it is needed to ensure that the legislative branch the Article I branch as was said the first branch has the ability to continue to express itself Thank you again Thank you Senator Carper and all the witnesses and I look forward to seeing you all in person soon This roundtable is adjourned Whereupon at 11 03 a m the Subcommittee was adjourned 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