Ted Cruz Grills Sam Altman, Policy Experts, And Democratic Witnesses In The Senate | 2025 Rewind

Senator Canwell. Mr. Gray, if the United States were to go forward with attempting to acquire Greenland, it would likely require the active agreement of Denmark and also the vote of the people of Greenland that this was a mutually beneficial step. Let's focus initially on the first part. From the perspective of Denmark, what are the benefits to Denmark of considering this negotiation?

Well, Senator, I would say Denmark has failed, unfortunately, to provide the type of security that the alliance, that NATO, that we all need in the Greenland region, in the Arctic, for a long time. So having a US commitment to take on some of that security burden would be beneficial to Denmark based on their behavior to date. I know they've recently increased some defense spending relative to Greenland. That's great. But we have a pattern of decades of neglect. So I would think that would be to their benefit. Look, I think the larger question here, Senator, is Denmark is not going to have as a constituent part Greenland over the long term. The Greenlanders have made that clear. So the question is, what is the security architecture that's going to be in place at that ultimate point of independence? And it's not in Denmark's interest, just as it's not in our interest, to have a vacuum that is filled by China and Russia. And that's why having some sort of discussion about what comes next is so critical.

So if I'm understanding your testimony correctly, there are three principal benefits to Denmark of considering selling Greenland's territory to the United States. The first is that their existing defense obligations put significant costs on Denmark. Costs that are a real burden to the government of Denmark and the people of Denmark. The second is if the United States were to shoulder the cost of providing that defense, defense of Denmark would also significantly increase the defense and security of Denmark. And limiting the role of Russia and China in the Arctic also inures to the defense benefits of Denmark. But number three, and this is an important point you made, we are seeing a growing independence movement in Greenland. If Denmark were to negotiate today with the Trump administration to sell the territory of Greenland to the United States, it would presumably be able to negotiate some substantial sum of money. That's how we purchased Louisiana. That's how we purchased the Virgin Islands. That's how we purchased Alaska. If Denmark does nothing and Greenland declares independence, then rather than getting some substantial sum of money, Denmark gets nothing. Is that a fair summary?

I think over the ultimate time frame we're talking about, Senator, that's true because I believe we should take the Greenlanders at their word that they will be an independent country at some point. And ultimately, sir, it is not in Denmark's interest to leave a security vacuum in the high north. In addition to your point about the costs, they will suffer as much as anyone from having what I think is the 100% predictable outcome of China and Russia stepping into that vacuum if we don't have some sort of clear security architecture in place.

So, I think that's very powerful. Let's turn to the benefit to the Greenlanders. Mr. Marches, I think if this were to proceed, it would in all likelihood require a referendum of the people of Greenland making a choice. Do you want to become an American? Do you want to join the United States as a territory or in some other legal structure? There's been some chatter online about an early public poll that was done that suggested that currently Greenlanders did not want to do that. That does not strike me as terribly probative given that this is the very beginning of a discussion and any referendum would be made with the Greenlanders assessing what do we get for it? What's our benefit? How are our lives better off? So in your judgment, how would the lives of Greenlanders be better off were they to become part of America?

Senator, I mentioned in my testimony that McGill University had done a survey of the population and there were four mining. So I believe part of it is the recognition that were the United States to come in, more than likely they would provide some form of financial assistance to allow private companies to come in and mine. The vast majority, I think they said about 85% of the Inuits wanted mining with the exception of uranium. That's a separate topic. The point is, I believe once the Greenlanders recognize that the United States would come in and provide a lot of assistance, that mining jobs would be there, and that's very important for the population. There just isn't that much mining right now. And I think that if there were the prospect of financial assistance to jumpstart the mining industry, you would see more Greenlanders interested in becoming part of the United States.

Well, we see significant discussion. I sat down this past week with the ambassador from Denmark and with the ambassador representative from Greenland. And one of the things we discussed is the very significant benefits that come with American citizenship. I think for example of Puerto Rico where the people of Puerto Rico enjoy a considerable upside from their current status as an American territory. And were Greenland to agree to this acquisition, the Greenlanders would get the invaluable asset of American citizenship, but also would benefit from billions of dollars of additional investment in Greenland to develop those rare earth minerals, the vast resources they have that are not currently being developed. Tell us how would the investment increase and how would that benefit Greenland and America if Greenland's status were to change such that it were part of the United States?

Senator, the first step, as I mentioned in my testimony, would be to actually provide, I believe the USGS would be the best forum or the best agency to do this, but with the USGS's assistance, undertake a massive mineral characterization in the country. Well, first of all, that in and of itself is not a short-term process. That's probably a few years to do that. That in and of itself would provide jobs for people. Remember, there are only 56,000 people there. So you don't need that many to be happy to have the entire country be happy. So the USGS comes in, provides some assistance to map the area, to figure out which deposits are real, which deposits are not real. Once you do that, then you start getting into convincing companies to put money in, and that provides even more jobs. So I think even before you start putting a shovel in the ground to create a mine, you have, in my opinion, the potential for thousands of new jobs in a mining industry. I mean, at the end of the day, Greenland, in my opinion, can become, with obviously responsible environmental oversight, a major international producer of all types of minerals. Not to mention, as Senator Canwell said, a potentially large hydro industry. And that in of itself requires, forget about rare earth minerals, but as an example, the hydro industry would require a tremendous amount of jobs. But remember, the expertise has to be developed also. So there are potentially massive economic benefits. I believe massive potential.

Senator Kim for your helpful testimony. We'll now move to questions. Dr. Hazel, I want to start with you. What are the specific economic benefits that putting more spectrum into the commercial marketplace would produce? And how would my spectrum pipeline legislation, which requires some full power spectrum to be made available to the commercial sector, benefit everyday Americans and American businesses?

So, additional spectrum, particularly of the flexible use variety, has been found extremely important to increasing American productivity. It allows more things to be done with wireless applications and wireless networks. In fact, the reverse is also true. When we've had these delays that have come into the system, we have actually taken the vital inputs out of the sector and the progress has been stymied. So getting more spectrum into the marketplace, allowing entrepreneurs and competitors to get access to expand, that explains not only the wireless revolution that we've seen with so much changing in terms of new innovations, but it explains why going forward we have to keep our eye on the ball and make sure that there is a pipeline, there is spectrum pouring into the market to be used in efficient ways, not in the old locked-in, rigid definitions of old.

Thank you. Mr. Pearl, would you agree that making more spectrum available to the private sector would result in billions in new investment and thousands of new jobs?

Yes, absolutely. And history demonstrates that. Consistently, you make the spectrum available and, particularly as I mentioned with the example of the app economy, being first really matters in that because then you have innovators that take advantage of the capabilities that they can use in that spectrum.

And does my pipeline bill preclude the Department of Defense from accessing the spectrum it needs to accomplish critical missions, or are there ways full power commercial license use can accommodate the needs of DoD?

Your bill allows for both the possibility of exclusive use as well as shared use. In terms of DoD being able to continue to use some or most of the bands in order to maintain their capabilities, it absolutely creates that opening.

Now, Mr. Pearl, we've also heard concerns that reinstating auction authority could hinder President Trump's initiative to create an American Iron Dome. I am a strong and passionate supporter of missile defense and have been advocating for an American Iron Dome for some time. Based on your experience at both the National Security Council and in the FCC auction room, do you believe those concerns are well-founded, that having an auction would prevent missile defense here at home?

No, absolutely not. As long as we have the proper interagency process and we make sure that the engineers work together, we can absolutely ensure we have Iron Dome as well as increased commercial use.

And could an Iron Dome system coexist with commercial 5G use subject to geographical or location carveouts like in the ambit process?

That potentially it could. We do have some cases of countries that are using Iron Dome, like the Czech Republic, that are using it quite close to 5G systems. So that's one possibility. And there are some other ways that you could design Iron Dome so that you could have potential coexistence.

So, we're told by some in the Defense Department that if any of the vast spectrum that they currently have use of goes to the private sector, it will harm the military's ability to defend our nation. The facts make that claim highly dubious. Right now, today, about 50 nations across the globe operate commercial licensed 5G networks in the 3.3 to 3.45 gigahertz band. To take an example close to home, Mexico's 5G networks operate on frequencies between 3.35 and 3.45 GHz at full power less than 30 miles away from Fort Bliss in Texas, where the US operates ground-based radar systems in the lower third band. Likewise, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines also have 5G networks that operate between the 3.3 and the 3.45 gigahertz band. Now, given the fact that in much of the rest of the world there are commercial players operating in those bands, is it credible that our military cannot operate in the Pacific and we cannot operate if the commercial sector is operating in those bands?

As long as the process is done responsibly, absolutely not. It will not harm the military.

Let me ask you finally, what would the consequences to national security be if China wins the race for 5G and 6G? And if the global telecommunication network is Huawei and Chinese-based, is that good or bad for national security? And if bad, how bad?

It's catastrophic for national security as well as for both DoD and the intelligence community because we will not have access to advanced, trusted, secure technology. It's true that the US will still ban Huawei, but the rest of the world will use Huawei. It will become more advanced, and it's not only telecommunications networks which are obviously very important. But the plan the PRC has with Huawei is to leverage its control over telecom up the technology stack to be able to control other technologies. So I would say it's absolutely catastrophic risk.

Well, and soldiers use cell phones.

Yes, absolutely. And that's something that we've discovered in Ukraine is that a lot of these mobile technologies can be incredibly valuable. They've been used to triangulate drone attacks. They've been used to create accurate geographic maps of the combat zones. So we're already seeing how these cell phones and mobile technology are critical.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and again, thanks for this hearing. I actually, first, Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding this hearing. I'm glad I sat through the whole thing. It was extremely enlightening. And I know in the Senate you're supposed to abide by the rules that even though a point has been made, it hasn't been made by everybody. I will break that tradition and thank the four of you for your testimony. I thought the exchange was fantastic. We learned a lot. And with that, I yield my time.

Very good. You may win the prize for brevity. I must say I'm not sure you're going to make it as a senator. I'm not going to follow that line. There are several things I want to revisit. There was a claim mentioned earlier that it would take 20 years to develop advanced sharing technologies. Mr. Pearl, did it take 20 years to develop the ambit process?

No. I think that was a matter of the study was done in about six months and it was completed within 12 to 18 months if I'm remembering correctly.

Mr. Clark, are geographic carveouts another way to share?

Yes sir, they are. Absolutely. And on the point about 20 years, I was just saying it would take 20 years potentially to upgrade all the systems with the new technology. The new technology would be available more quickly obviously.

And was the ambit process successful in enabling DoD and commercial 5G coexistence?

It did. Yes, sir.

Some of my colleagues have also discussed low power spectrum sharing or CBRS. Mr. Pearl, do you think CBRS is a panacea or do we also need full power spectrum?

We need full power spectrum as well. CBRS was the first really serious effort to do dynamic spectrum sharing in a band where it was really difficult. But you need both those high power uses to really utilize the ability to penetrate buildings, walls, to really have the capital investment that the carriers need in order to offer a lot of those services. So you need those high power services, you need low power services which we have in six gigahertz and elsewhere. Both are important. Absolutely.

Dr. Hazlet, I've heard concerns that CBRS has been underutilized because providers lack the certainty they need to invest in their CBRS spectrum. Do you share these concerns?

Well, there are some problems as the FCC is acknowledging and it's gone back to try to see how it can fix it. The claims were that that was the solution, that was going to really have what is called sharing. I'll just mention the fact that all spectrum is shared. What's called exclusive use is not exclusive at all. You have networks in the United States with 100 million subscribers and they share these aggregations of bandwidth. In fact, there's all kinds of models that have developed between firms, between providers, when you do get the incentives to come together and make deals. In terms of people coming in from the private sector dealing with government assignments, the fact is that paying to share, in other words paying to separate the allocations between the new users and the existing users, that's a very effective form of sharing. So it's really not just science. It's incentives to come together. That's why things like overlays are so important. It's why a better system of audits, which has been talked about, this has been suggested 25 years ago to the FCC, to in fact have by auction or assignment have private firms come in and actually audit spectrum that's being used by government agencies to see if there are opportunities there for sharing. But maybe it's money coming to the agency in an improved version of the spectrum relocation process to get that out there.

Mr. Clark, we heard from my colleague Senator Fischer that a pipeline bill would require exclusive licensed use and vacating or clearing DoD out of bands. Now, as you know, the Spectrum Pipeline Act that I've authored requires a pipeline of full power, not exclusive use, and does not identify any specific bands. Mr. Clark, is there anything in that bill that is inconsistent with your testimony or Senator Fischer's concerns?

No, in theory, it isn't. And I think the challenge will be implementation because depending on how much your target is to try to clear, it may prove difficult to be able to work out an arrangement so that the commercial and military users can both employ that spectrum, and the auction may not be affordable or attractive from the commercial company's perspective because the geographic patchwork they may end up with or the spectrum sharing requirements are going to be such that maybe it makes it too expensive for them to pursue.

So Mr. Pearl, we had an exchange with Senator Fischer and Mr. Clark where they were discussing the theory that China's public push to lead in wireless technology is just a mind game, that they're somehow baiting the United States with ambitious plans and they're secretly holding back trying to trick us into giving up spectrum to the commercial sector. I find that a particularly odd conspiracy theory given the actual facts of what we know. First of all, we know that Huawei and other Chinese manufacturers are actively and successfully pushing worldwide adoption of Chinese 6G equipment standards. That wouldn't be possible without China having made its spectrum available for commercial use. Secondly, China has aggressively targeted our telecommunications industry, has tapped the phones of top officials, including President Trump and Vice President Vance, and has prompted this committee to fully fund a multi-billion dollar rip and replace program to remove Chinese equipment from American networks. Mr. Pearl, would American national and economic security be harmed if Chinese firms like Huawei and ZTE set the global standard for 6G network equipment via this first mover advantage? And how would that affect the global competitiveness of US companies?

It would have a great deal of harm and I would echo my agreement that I don't think this is a disinformation campaign. I fought the battle against Huawei and ZTE for almost two years. In order for their businesses to be able to sell equipment outside of China, they need to be able to use these bands inside of China and get those economies of scale. But if they're successful in terms of setting the global standard, that means that the US will have a siloed market with a few of its allies and partners where we'll have much worse technology, much worse networks. We'll just have an inferior ecosystem. Ultimately, that means that we're going to be put at a military disadvantage because, as others have commented, in a battle the electromagnetic domain can be absolutely decisive. We just won't have the technology to prevail in that case.

Well, I want to thank all the witnesses for very helpful testimony. Senators will have until the close of business on Wednesday, February 26th to submit questions for the record, and then the witnesses will have until the close of business on Wednesday, March 12th to respond to those questions. And with that, that concludes. Thank you, Chief.

Mrs. Ellinger, I'm going to start with you. Thank you for coming and telling us about your son, Jake. As a father, my heart breaks for you. You've gone through a nightmare that every parent, every grandparent is terrified of experiencing. You've done an enormous amount in Texas to help prevent more tragic deaths. What advice can you give to parents who might want to make a difference preventing future fentanyl poisonings?

The first thing I would say is talk to your kids about drugs. Use the word fentanyl. Don't be afraid to talk about it. Share statistics. Explain how dangerous it is compared to when we were growing up. Also, I would say for kids that might have a lot of pressure on them, our kids in our society have a higher rate of anxiety than ever before. Take the stigma away. It's okay if you need help, like if you feel like you need some counseling or whatever that is, it's okay to ask for some help and do not turn to a counterfeit drug to try to make you feel better.

An illustration that a DEA agent told me in Texas of just the potency of fentanyl is he took a Sweet'N Low packet, said tear it open and empty the contents out so that there's nothing in it, and then he said stick your finger inside the packet and remove your finger and you have a couple of little tiny specks of Sweet'N Low. Exactly. That's enough fentanyl to kill you. I can tell you I've done that with our girls and tried to convey the point, but you're terrified that a teenager, a young adult at one party, somebody gives them some stupid pill and that's their last moment on earth. Through your hard work, the Texas Penal Code now criminalizes the delivery or manufacture of fentanyl that results in death. And the code requires medical examiners to properly classify fentanyl poisoning deaths. As you noted, over 60 drug peddlers have already been charged in Texas with murder since the law went into effect. Have you spoken with others in Texas about what these changes have meant to them when the tragedy of fentanyl poisoning occurs, and what have they told you?

Yes. I mean, unfortunately, I've made a lot of new friends because of this tragedy. Pain is a really strong motivator. Anytime there is a fentanyl death, you know, whatever the seven degrees of separation, somebody will ask me, can you talk to this person? They just lost their child to fentanyl. And I'm like, absolutely. Send me their phone number. I can literally pull up my phone and just type in fentanyl and 30 names of people I never knew before come up in my phone. They're extremely thankful. It's a very motivated group of people, as you can imagine. Parents that have lost their children are probably one of the most motivated groups of people. There's also just in Austin alone, there's a group called Angel Moms, and there's probably 60 of these mothers who have lost their children to fentanyl, and that's in Austin, Texas only.

Wow. In the video you played, you said that you were unable to determine who sold the drugs to your son, Jake. In the last Congress, I passed legislation called the Tran Act to help improve the technology for detecting and identifying fentanyl and other related drugs. And Senator Canwell and I are now working on new legislation in this space. How important is it for families to have the technology in place to track the origins and pathways that these drugs travel into the country?

I think it's extremely important. I mean, yes, shockingly, the DEA could not open Jake's phone to retrieve any information to find anyone responsible. My understanding is that these young adults are buying these counterfeit pills thinking they're getting one thing and getting killed through social media platforms like Snapchat and things like that. So I know that's how they're coming through. And then I also know that they are also being delivered through ride share apps. So there is definitely a problem between all of the different social media and technology applications that these young adults use and have their hands on, not understanding the dangers of them.

Yeah. The record illegal immigration flows during the Biden administration have clearly taken a toll on the Coast Guard's counterdrug mission. So I'm going to submit to the hearing record a DHS Office of Inspector General report entitled 'The Coast Guard faces challenges interdicting non-commercial vessels smuggling drugs into the United States.' This report notes that the Coast Guard did not meet its cocaine interdiction goals because it did not have enough cutters available to perform the counterdrug mission. Those cutters had been diverted to interdict illegal immigrants. The DHS estimated that the Coast Guard could have interdicted up to an additional 89 metric tons of cocaine had those cutters been performing the counterdrug mission. And without objection, so ordered, entered into the record. And with that, I recognize Senator.

Thank you very much for your participation. I'll also, I caught myself a moment ago getting excited as well, but I'll remind the audience, as Chairman Grassley said, we need to conduct this hearing with decorum so that we can remain efficient. So I'd ask for your help and participation in that. And with that, I'll send it over to Senator Cruz.

Anti-semitism is evil. It is wrong. And it is flourishing with the acquiescence and in many cases active participation of students, of faculty, of administrators, and government officials. And sadly, the Democrat party has a deep and pervasive problem confronting this evil. For the last two years, in the wake of October 7th, this committee held zero hearings on anti-semitism in the United States, despite the fact that Republicans repeatedly called for it. The acts of violence. Prior to October 7th, 3,669 anti-semitic incidents occurred in the United States. Following October 7th, in less than 3 months, that number spiked to over 5,000. In 2024, that number skyrocketed to 10,050 anti-semitic incidents. This problem is particularly acute on our college campuses. Columbia University was a major epicenter where they encouraged, tolerated, and celebrated this vicious and vile anti-semitism. Rabbi Eli Buechler emailed every Jewish student on campus and said, quote, 'The events of the last few days have made it clear that Columbia University's public safety cannot guarantee Jewish students' safety in the face of extreme anti-semitism and anarchy. I would strongly recommend you return home.' This is the rabbi at the university saying your school will not protect your safety. And Columbia didn't do a damn thing about it. And I'll tell you what, the rabbi wasn't crazy. Here is one picture taken on the campus of Columbia. In the back are Jewish students waving American flags and Israeli flags. In the front is a Columbia student wearing a mask because these cowards are oh so brave, they cover their faces, holding a handwritten sign that says 'Al Qassam's next targets.' Al Qassam is the military branch of Hamas. Understand what this student is saying. She is calling for the murder of her Jewish classmates. And by the way, this student, the internet being what it is, she's been identified now on the internet. This is not a Palestinian who's subject to oppression. This is a rich blonde girl from Atlanta whose parents are multi-millionaire real estate developers and they got so proud, I'm sending my child to an Ivy League education where she'll be indoctrinated to dress up and advocate Hamas murdering Jewish students because they are Jews. Now if you agree that is evil and vile, let me ask you something. Where are the Democrats? Not a one is here. And it's because the Democrat party has decided the pro-Hamas wing of the party is more important than protecting Jewish students in America. And if you don't believe me, maybe you'll believe Chuck Schumer. No, that's the wrong one. I don't know. No, it's not. Chuck Schumer texting with Columbia said the following. On January 4th, then president of Columbia Shafik explained to Shipman and her fellow co-chair David Greenwald that she had met with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer who advised Shafik that universities' political problems about anti-semitism are really only among Republicans. We the Democrats, we don't care about this anti-semitism stuff.

Miss Leuen, am I the only person that has noticed that these anti-Israel, pro-Hamas, anti-Semitic protests, the tents all match?

No, you are not the only one to have noticed. Is it clear that there is significant money funding these attacks on Jewish students and attacks on America? It is clear that there is coordination and there must be some common funding.

In the last two years under the Biden Justice Department, are you aware of any investigation to follow the money behind these protests?

I am not.

Are you aware of anyone who has been indicted for funding these protests?

I am not.

Are you aware of any university that has had their Title Six federal funds cut off because they've tolerated, welcomed, celebrated, and as Senator Holly put out, had their own officials cheering on anti-semitism, as even one university lost their funding?

I am not aware of any university having actually lost their funding. And I'll point out also some of the defenders say free speech, free speech.

You're right. You have a free speech right as an American citizen to say vile, hateful, bigoted things. Let me ask you something. If a university student went into the public square, dressed up in a Klan outfit, burned a cross, and said we should murder African-American students, do you have any doubt the university would expel that student?

I am fairly certain that the universities would take action and ensure that their policies, they should expel them.

If they're foreign students, they should be deported. And mark my words, if you are horrified at the anti-semitism, you will see the Trump Department of Justice follow the money, prosecute the people who are paying for this, prosecute those engaged in violence, and cut off the money from universities that are tolerating and celebrating this. That is the rule of law. And ask yourself, why did the Biden Justice Department do absolutely nothing about this horror that is unfolding? Thank you, Senator Cruz. Senator Whitehouse, the floor is yours.

Thank you. Just for the record, let me start with just a simple question, which is can travelers trust Boeing? 346 people died in the two 737 Max 8 crashes. We are extremely fortunate that no one died in the door plug incident. Since 2018, Boeing's mistakes have caused many people to question whether Boeing is still capable of making safe aircraft. Mr. Ortberg, what can you say here to the millions who will board a Boeing plane this year? To the millions who will put their children on the plane. I and I suspect every member of this panel fly Boeing planes every single week. What can you say to the flying public as to why they should trust that a Boeing plane is safe?

Senator, Boeing aircraft, 737 Max airplanes, take off and land every two seconds of the day. Safely take off and land every two seconds of the day. I'm not denying the horrible incidents that you've outlined. We need to take immediate action and we are taking action to make sure those accidents never happen again. My family flies on those aircraft as well. It's critically important that we rebuild trust and the only way we're going to do that is by building high-quality airplanes, having the metrics out of our quality system that show that we're making improvements. I want everybody to know the entire Boeing team is absolutely committed to building the highest quality aircraft in the world. Air travel is the safest mode of transportation and we need to continue that and continue to learn if there are incidents so that these don't turn into tragic accidents in the future.

As I mentioned, the NTSB's investigation of the Alaska Airlines door plug incident revealed that it was caused by manufacturing errors at Boeing. Mr. Ortberg, you joined Boeing more than 7 months after the door plug incident. What went wrong with the door plug? And what specifically has Boeing done to correct this safety lapse?

Senator, first of all, it is unacceptable that an aircraft left our factory without that door plug properly installed. Let me just make that perfectly clear. That can never happen again. One of the things, there's currently an NTSB investigation as you're aware on that. We're not waiting for the NTSB to finish their investigation. We've taken immediate action. One of the first actions was to work with our airline customers and the FAA to go inspect all the aircraft out in the field. And we've done that and ensured that there are no other instances of a door plug not being installed properly in the field. The second thing that we did is we found that the proper paperwork was not completed when the door plug was removed in our factory. We've gone through extensive retraining of our workforce to make sure they understand that that violated our policy and that they have to complete the proper paperwork. We've eliminated, reduced the number of people who can actually do the modifications for the door plug so that in the future we have fewer people that are allowed to even touch and remove the door plugs. In addition, one of the contributing factors is we identified that the door plug needed to be removed in order to do some repairs on the aircraft that were a result of defects in the fuselage. Those defects come from our fuselage supplier, Spirit AeroSystems in Wichita. The airplane moved down our factory line too far after we identified those defects, which contributed to the risk of the door plug not being properly installed. So we have made changes to our process, pushed all those defects back up to Spirit AeroSystems. So we're not bringing those into our factories. And so far, sir, we've seen a 56% reduction in defects coming out of Spirit. So that's going to help us significantly. We've also implemented a move-ready safety process. So the airplane cannot move down the production floor if equipment is not installed or rework has not been accomplished. If the aircraft has equipment not installed, we go through a safety risk assessment and look at the risk of moving the aircraft. We've done that 800 times. And I can tell you of the 800 times, 200 times we've not moved the aircraft. We've held the aircraft because moving it would incur risk to the production system. We've also seen a 50% reduction in work that has traveled down the factory floor. We continue to work on improving those numbers. Those are one of the KPI indicators that we're using with the FAA. So we've made drastic changes to our internal process to ensure that this will never happen again.

Okay. Final question. I'm sure you're aware that whistleblowers and others, including Ethiopian authorities, have suggested manufacturing errors, particularly with electrical wiring, contributed to the Max crashes. Mr. Ortberg, is this an issue you've discussed with Boeing employees since joining the company? And if so, what is your opinion on whether there were also manufacturing defects that may have led to the sensor defect?

Senator Cruz, obviously that happened before I joined the Boeing company. My understanding was that the cause of the crash was the MCAS design and those design changes. The MCAS has been redesigned and design changes have been incorporated in all aircraft. I'm not aware of any electrical wiring issues associated with that, but I'd be glad to look into that and get back with you.

So just to be clear, your testimony is you have not had conversations with Boeing employees about whether there were electrical issues that also contributed to that crash.

Not specifically. No.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you very much. And I want to thank each of the witnesses for being here on what is a very interesting topic, an important topic, and complex topic. There are very real and complicated issues and countervailing arguments on both sides. I think there is widespread agreement on locking the clock. But where to lock it? The reason we're holding these hearings is because these are real arguments and they have real impacts on people. Let me start on the health side. Dr. Johnson, can you expand on the impact sleep deprivation has on our overall health, on our minds, our moods, and especially on young children for whom we know sleep is so vital?

Thank you for asking about that. Sleep has different aspects. One is just how much we sleep, but it's the quality of sleep and then the timing of sleep. Any disturbance in that can affect how we do. We know that kids, even if over a whole week they get enough sleep, if they don't get enough during the week and catch up on the weekend, they still don't do as well. Sleep and our circadian rhythms really regulate every aspect of our body, our metabolism, they affect how we think about things. They affect our choices of food. You're more likely to grab a celery stick when you've got enough sleep, but grab that bagel or that candy bar when you're sleep deprived. Athletic performance we know is better when people are asleep. Academic success in school. And then mental health has some of the most deep connections to sleep health. That's why even though people feel better when they see light, it's that timing of light and our circadian rhythms that is so deeply intertwined that if we can improve sleep, if we can improve those rhythms, we see lower rates of depression overall. We see lower rates of suicide. That's what the data shows. There was just a new study that came out just last week showing 6% higher rates of depression when the sun rises are set later, when we lose that critical morning light. This gets exponentially worse in the winter when you lose the light in the morning. Texas and the southern states actually lose that morning light for a longer period because of the curve of the earth. The more even days you get three to four months with it being dark after 8 am, and some of the darkest places in the country are actually in western Texas if we were to go to permanent daylight savings time. That's why in 1974 a lot of the push to end our experiment with daylight savings time was actually pushed by states like Florida and Texas and the southern states.

Can you also explain why consistent sleep patterns are important for teen brain development and mental health?

Yes. So again, this goes back to our circadian rhythms. When our circadian rhythms are working well, they help us anticipate our day. What I mean by that is we have certain times when our body wants to go to sleep. Teenagers, their natural rhythm is later. If any of you have been around a teenager, you can't just say go to bed. They're like I'm wide awake. We have what we call a forbidden zone. Their alertness is skyrocketing in that time before bed. So they can't get to sleep on time, but if our social schedule is set an hour earlier, which is what daylight savings time does, they don't have that opportunity to get the amount of sleep they need. They tend to switch back and forth on weekends. That switching affects us. That then affects how our brain functions. We know more and more about sleep being important for clearing toxins from our brain, which sets us up for things like dementia, Parkinson's disease. I just came back from a neuro conference with data pointing to the connections there. Our metabolism gets off, so we're more likely to gain weight. Again, even if people do exercise more, we see like 10% higher rates of obesity in places where the sun sets later. So sleep is so critically important for our metabolic health, our overall health, our mental health, how our brain functions, which affects the safety issues. The highway study found a higher risk of vehicle crashes even though it was light later. The effect of sleep is more powerful than almost anything else. And by aligning with the sun, we can really help that.

So, let's talk a little bit about the idea of states' rights. I've heard from groups on both sides of this issue that want either permanent standard time or permanent daylight savings time. Almost everyone agrees that changing the clock twice a year doesn't make sense. Mr. Yates, in your opening statement, you said that setting the clock is fundamentally a states' rights issue. Why do you think that decision should be left to the states?

Thank you for the question, Senator. The main reason is geography. We live on this big round ball and the sun is moving. The difference in where each state is makes a big difference in how the sunrise and sunset time applies. So to say that there is one solution that is exactly right for Texas and the exact same solution is right for Georgia is, what I would posit, overreach by the federal government. I might even go back to the example that is often cited about when the time change happened in the 70s. To give a little context to why that was such a failure, it's often cited that people didn't like it because there were children that were put at risk in the dark waiting for school. It turns out a lot of that is apocryphal, as we've heard pedestrians are much safer with more light later in the day. But the thing that is interesting about that time change was, and this shows you how different politics was back in those days, that law was signed into law on December 15th, 1973, right in the middle of Watergate. You could say that maybe it was a distraction from other things that were going on. It was enacted on December 15th on a Saturday. It took place on January 6th, 1974, about 3 weeks later. So you can imagine the worst Monday of the year already is the one after the holiday break where you have to go back to school and everything. To have an extra hour of sleep robbed away right before that, you can understand why it was so unpopular and why it was repealed two months after Nixon resigned office. So it clearly doesn't work for the federal government to come and say this is a mandate of exactly what we should do for all of the country all at the same time. But it is the place of the commerce committee to say we need a well-regulated time system. So it makes sense to get rid of the clock changing and if we give two years to the states to be able to say so that all of these arguments can be hashed out, and they're all valid arguments, but they can be hashed out in the geography of the place where it would actually apply and they would have time to plan and figure out what is the appropriate time for school to start to take in this evidence from neurologists and what is the best time for all of the businesses to operate.

So maybe if we had more daylight, the Watergate break-in doesn't happen and history would be different. Dr. Johnson, you seem to disagree with having states decide on how they should lock the clock. In your judgment, why do you think that would be the wrong approach?

So time is a measure. Congress has control over setting measures. I think of my husband. He likes to make a joke. He's 6'6" in the morning and 6'5" in the afternoon. We don't change the length of a foot on his daily pattern of his height. Time is supposed to say how the sun is moving through the sky. So if we set it to a standard time of the sun being closer to overhead at noon, that's something we can go by. But states then can decide how they want to set their social schedules. So instead of tricking people into, you all have to get up early no matter what, let's have each state decide when they want their schools to start, when businesses want to start, but let's fix a measure of time that actually has a meaning where the sun is overhead, and then adjust the social schedule around it. And that is definitely something the state should decide on.

Thank you to each of the witnesses. Let me start with a question to the league. As I mentioned in my opening statement, Congress passed the Sports Broadcasting Act in 1961 to allow leagues to negotiate sports media deals on behalf of all teams as opposed to on a team-by-team basis. Congress granted this antitrust exemption with the intention of benefiting sports fans. How does the SBA actually benefit fans of your sport? Whether it's from greater access to games or improved revenue sharing to make for more competitive balance or something else entirely.

Thank you. As you stated, Chairman, the SBA allows us to pool broadcast rights, which has created a fan-friendly, market-efficient practice that's resulted in more output at games as opposed to less. One concrete example from Major League Baseball's perspective is this pooling allowed us to create MLB Advanced Media where all the clubs together pooled their digital media rights that allowed us to innovate and revolutionize the viewing experience. We were the first league to be able to stream games at all via the internet, first to computers, then to mobile devices, eventually right to the TV. So we think that's been a really big benefit of being able to take all the resources of the league together to create a product as opposed to each individual club having to manage apps across multiple operating systems and multiple devices. That's a hard thing to do on a small basis. You really need that economy of scale. So we appreciate the ability to do that. And while the sports leagues are each comprised of 30 or in some cases 32 different teams that compete with each other on the field, it is important that we act as a single operating entity and that's why you're able to have three of us here to have this discussion instead of needing to have 90.

Thank you, Chairman. We think that we do honor the intention of the Sports Broadcasting Act. There is a public service in the way we've organized our media rights as I mentioned. In our most recent national deals, which is a product of what the Sports Broadcasting Act was intended to do on a national basis, we were able to license a record number of over-the-air telecasts, free over-the-air telecasts. That benefits all teams in terms of exposure because the games are available in every market. But also by being able to license games on a league-wide national basis, the revenue is shared equally by each team. So the point you made about revenue sharing, all teams benefit from those national distribution deals equally. Also, to echo what Mr. Gersh said, we're able to innovate by doing things that require scale at the league level. Our league pass product, which is our out-of-market subscription service, offers fans approximately 14 different feeds of every game: different camera angles, different languages, different stats feeds for analytics, fantasy feeds, celebrity co-viewing experiences. Those things are really only achievable by pooling and doing things on a collective basis.

It's a great question, Senator, and I think that I would echo much of what Mr. Gersh and Mr. Koenig said. One thing that I would add of substance in terms of what the Sports Broadcasting Act was intended to do was it was intended to make games available to fans of greater accessibility at a lesser cost. That is exactly what it does. If you had in our case 32 teams or 25 in the US out there negotiating their own deals in every television market, you would have a complete fragmentation of their rights. A fan who wanted to watch all of the games would be buying from so many different packages which the costs would be through the roof. What this has allowed us to do, the respective leagues, is to provide the greatest access to fans in the most affordable way possible. That is I think the main intention of the Broadcast Act where it's been extremely successful.

So, the FCC's cable era regulations set regulatory conditions, including rules around operating within a designated market area, as well as syndicated exclusivity rules, which can lead to blackouts. Streaming platforms aren't bound by these rules, but blackouts still take place on streaming platforms. Why is that the case? And do leagues specifically require streaming platforms to blackout games for out of market fans?

Thank you. I think the result of the question you're asking is the way our rights are currently split up between the league and the clubs at the current time. Each club has the right to distribute throughout their entire home television territory. So when they do their deals in their market, they're on cable TV that we the league can't then offer the games in their own market. So for our streaming product, we black out in Houston because the Astros are exploiting the rights there. However, as I mentioned in my testimony also, we now are at the moment where 29 of our clubs have their own direct to consumer service. So you can now in pretty much every territory, if you want to watch the games via streaming, you can go buy that service. And if you want to watch all the other games out of market, you can buy MLB.tv. And then those two services complement each other so that it does cover the whole landscape. So I think it's less of a legislative issue and just the way that our rights are currently divided between the league and the club.

Similarly with the NBA, we have three different types of game distribution packages. We have a national package, local packages, and out of market. A fan anywhere in the country can access every game played by his or her favorite team or any other team in the league through a subscription to one or more of these packages. That's the business reality. There's no mandate that games be blacked out. National games, for example, aren't blacked out. But a fan in any market in Houston, for example, can buy the Rockets games locally from the RSN that's operated by the Astros and the Rockets collectively. And they can watch games of the other teams through buying our league pass out-of-market package and obviously can access the national games. I would say that on the local front, because of some of the issues facing cable with cord cutting, the repositioning of regional sports networks, and just carriage disputes, more and more of our teams, 21 of our 29 domestic teams, have games on broadcast television. It's almost the reverse. I remember in 1992 when the Cable Act was passed and there was a study about migration from broadcast to cable. You actually referred to that in your opening statement. Now there seems to be a trend. We had last season 570 games on broadcast television, the most in 20 years. So we are very concerned with accessibility, but any fan can subscribe to services or get them for free in the case of many local national telecasts to any game that he or she wants.

The NHL is similarly set up as the other two leagues in that we have local rights, we have national rights, and we have out of market rights. The local rights in terms of being blacked out is structured exactly the same. You have to think of it as if you live in the local market, you get the benefit of getting your team's games without having to buy the out-of-market package or anything like that. You get that benefit usually depending on the circumstance. Most of the games are available on either broadcast or major cable television. That being said, if I'm being completely candid, as Mr. Bergmeier said about Commissioner Manfred, everybody's looking at the future of the models right now. The models are in a state of flux and whether streaming results in blackouts or blackouts not happening in the future is something that may be addressed by the leagues over the next 5 to 10 years. But it is at this point the current model that has worked and has worked very well. But as we continue to have flux in the system, we're going to have to continue to evaluate.

Thank you, Senator Klobuchar. You know, Senator Klobuchar asked whether AI will lead us to heaven or hell. It reminded me of a famous observation by Yale law professor Grant Gilmore that in heaven there is no law and the lion will lie down with the lamb. In hell, there is nothing but law and due process is meticulously observed. Let me ask you this, and this is to each of the four witnesses. In the race for AI, who's winning, America or China? If the answer is America, how close is China to us? And what do we do to make sure the answer remains America will win? Mr. Altman, we'll start with you.

I'll answer in the realm of chips. I would say America is ahead in chips today. We have the best AI accelerators in the world. I think China, although they have restrictions given their ability to use advanced technologies, the one thing that's very important for us all to remember is there are multiple ways to do things. Having the best chips is great, but even if you don't have the best chips, you can get a lot done. So this conversation about how far behind China is, they are certainly catching up because there are many ways to do things. I think relative to what we can do, I will continue to say really ensure that our spirit of innovation is allowed to work and that is having very supportive government policies to do that, having very consistent policies, and allowing us to do what we do best which is innovate at every layer of the stack.

I'll speak to it from the physical infrastructure and software stack to deliver that. America is ahead, but it is the Achilles heel from the perspective of the ability to build very large solutions to the computing infrastructure component of this. That is an area that we're going to struggle with from a permitting and building large projects to be able to deliver the power to allow those building artificial intelligence to continue to move as fast as they can in the race that we're in.

I think the United States has a lead today in what is a close race and a race that will likely remain close. The number one factor that will define whether the United States or China wins this race is whose technology is most broadly adopted in the rest of the world. This is a global market and it will be defined as technology markets typically are by network effects. 18% of the people in the world live in China. 4% live in the United States. 78% live somewhere else. The lesson from Huawei and 5G is whoever gets there first will be difficult to supplant. We need to export with the right kinds of controls. We need to win the trust of the rest of the world. We need to have the financial architecture that gets not only to the countries that are industrialized but the nations say across Africa where typically China and Huawei have done so well.

So some of my colleagues have made reference to standards as something that is desirable and I will say standards is often code word for regulations and indeed the EU stifling standards concerning the internet is what killed tech in Europe. We are seeing now state legislators mimicking the EU such as California's SB 1047 which thankfully was overwhelmingly defeated but would have created essentially a California DMV for AI model registration. How harmful would it be to winning the race for AI if America goes down the road of the EU and creates a heavy-handed prior approval government regulatory process for AI?

So if each of you could briefly answer that question because my time's expired, I want to be respectful of that.