Press Releases

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) wrote to Education Secretary Betsy DeVos yesterday to highlight misleading science materials sent by the Heartland Institute, a group with a long record of climate denial, to more than 300,000 public school science teachers in Hawai‘i and across the country. Heartland’s 11-minute DVD and 135-page book, which are made to look like...

WASHINGTON, D.C.- Senators Mazie K. Hirono and Brian Schatz urged federal appropriators in a bipartisan letter to increase federal funding for the Impact Aid Program in the Fiscal Year (FY) 2018 budget. “Impact Aid funds a range of programs, including efforts to retain highly qualified teachers, adequate technology, facilities renovation, and maintenance of transportation fleets. For many districts, this funding represents the very lifeblood that allows their school system to...

HONOLULU – U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), co-chair of the Senate Climate Action Task Force, released the following statement on President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement.“We are appalled and disappointed, but we are not deterred. Entering a formal withdrawal would take nearly four years to complete which means climate change is on the ballot for every election until we reverse this immoral action.“The future is with clean energy....

WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Senators Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), Al Franken (D-Minn.), Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) called on the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to prioritize an investigation into the reported cyberattacks on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).Following increased media coverage of the FCC’s net neutrality proceeding, the Commission reported that it was the victim of distributed denial-of-service-attacks (DDos),...

WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, denounced President Donald Trump’s budget proposal and immediately labeled it “dead on arrival.”  The Trump Administration’s plan would make severe cuts to critical programs that help struggling families get by in order to fund tax breaks for the rich. “President Trump’s budget proposal is not just radical, it’s...

WASHINGTON – Following the Federal Communications Commission’s vote to begin the process to repeal the strong net neutrality rules that have been in place since 2015, U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), lead Democrat on the Senate Subcommittee on Communications, Technology, Innovation, and the Internet, released the following statement. “While Chairman Pai seems to have made his decision to get rid of these rules before starting the proceedings in earnest, he has an...

WASHINGTON – Following one of the largest global cyberattacks in history, U.S. Senators Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i),  Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), and Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) and U.S. Representatives Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) and Blake Farenthold (R-Texas) introduced the Protecting our Ability To Counter Hacking (PATCH) Act, bipartisan legislation that adds transparency and accountability to the U.S. government process for retaining or disclosing vulnerabilities in technology products, services,...

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i) released the following statement on U.S. Senator Mazie K. Hirono’s (D-Hawai‘i) recent announcement. “I join all of Hawai‘i in wishing Senator Hirono a rapid recovery. Mazie's courage and fortitude are matched only by her love for our State and people. I look forward to continuing to work together with Mazie on the issues that reflect our Hawai‘i values and priorities.”  ###

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i) accepted the Peter Benchley Ocean Award for excellence in policy at a ceremony last night. The award recognized the senator’s work to expand the Papah?naumoku?kea Marine National Monument, which is the largest permanent conservation area in the world.“In Hawai‘i, the ocean is a treasure,” Senator Schatz said in his acceptance speech. “It is the source of good things—the waves we ride, the...

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc.), Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) wrote to President Donald Trump to urge him to nominate leaders for more than 100 senior State Department positions that are currently unfilled but that are critical to an effective U.S. foreign policy. “We need a fully staffed and funded State Department to protect U.S....

Washington – U.S. Senator Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, today asked Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman, Ajit Pai, to explain in more detail the nature of a reported cyberattack on May 8, including how it impacted the public’s ability to comment on a proposal to roll back net neutrality protections. In their letter, the senators asked Chairman Pai if the FCC was prepared to defend against such distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks,...

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i) released the following statement after the House of Representatives passed the American Health Care Act in a strictly partisan vote. “House Republicans rammed through a bill that would strip at least 24 million Americans of their health care and raise the costs for those with pre-existing conditions. It’s shameful and immoral. But it can stop here. The Senate has the opportunity to walk away from Trumpcare and instead...

WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Senators Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), Ben Cardin (D-Md.), John Thune (R-S.D.), and Mark Warner (D-Va.) introduced the Creating Opportunities Now for Necessary and Effective Care Technologies (CONNECT) for Health Act of 2017, bipartisan legislation that would expand telehealth services in Medicare, improve care outcomes, make it easier for patients to connect with their health care providers, and help cut costs for...

WASHINGTON – Last night, congressional appropriators released a bipartisan spending deal that will increase federal funding for critical programs that benefit Hawai‘i for fiscal year 2017.  U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, successfully advanced Hawai‘i’s priorities during committee consideration, which are now reflected in the final deal. “Despite the proposed cuts and threats of a government shutdown...

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), the top Democrat on the Senate Subcommittee on Communications, Technology, Innovation, and the Internet, released the following statement in response to Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Ajit Pai’s net neutrality proposal.“FCC Chairman Ajit Pai is making a mistake. His proposal would take away the American people’s access to a free and open internet and give control to big corporations,” said...

HONOLULU – Leaders on the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation and the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology which exercise legislative jurisdiction in their respective chambers over the National Weather Service (NWS) today, issued the following statements on the announcement last night that President Donald Trump has signed into law H.R. 353, the Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation Act of 2017. The bill includes sweeping reforms to federal...

HONOLULU – U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, announced today that Hawai‘i will receive more than $1 million to address significant public health concerns and promote healthy behaviors. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services awarded $1,092,341 to the Hawai‘i State Department of Health's Healthy Hawai‘i Initiative, which works to prevent chronic disease and promote healthy living in the state....

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i), Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) today are demanding answers from United Airlines following the forcible removal of a ticketed passenger on Flight 3411 from Chicago, Illinois to Louisville, Kentucky.“Consumer trust and confidence are critical to ensure this industry continues to thrive, and we hope United Airlines will work diligently to immediately address this incident and make...

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i) released the following statement on the U.S. military strike in Syria. “The Assad regime’s use of chemical weapons is abhorrent, but a military response is not the answer.  The president has failed to articulate a strategy to end the Syrian civil war.  A one-off strike may satisfy our desire to hold Assad accountable, but it risks deeper escalation without any sense of direction or objective.  And unless...

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai‘i) released the following statement after Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) moved to change longstanding Senate rules to confirm Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court. “Today will go down in history as the day Republicans deepened the divides in the Senate, the Supreme Court, and the country. Instead of changing the nominee to reach bipartisan consensus, Republicans chose to change the rules. In doing so, they...