Privacy Policy

Thank you for visiting this website. Protecting the personal privacy of individuals who use the Internet is a priority, and we appreciate the opportunity to describe to you the policies we have put in place to safeguard the privacy of individuals who visit our website. If you have questions or concerns about our Internet privacy policy, or any other issues involving the Internet, we want to hear about them and hope you will contact us, by electronic mail, telephone, or mail, to let us know your opinions.

The basic Internet privacy policy is simple: this web site collects no personal information about you when you visit the site unless you choose to provide that information to us during your visit so that we can contact you about an issue you have raised or help you with a problem. Let us describe more specifically the type of information that may be gathered when you visit our website and how that information is handled. 

Information Collected and Stored Automatically 

The U.S. Senate collects aggregate data about visits to Senate websites, such as statistics that show which parts of each website were visited the most. The following information is also collected when you visit any U.S. Senate website: the domain from which you access the Senate website, the date and time of your visit, the pages you visit, and the address of the website, if any, that provided the link from which you reached the Senate site. This information is gathered only for the purpose of enabling us to improve the online service we provide to visitors to Senate websites. 

No individual identifying or personal information 

No individual identifying or personal information (such as your name) is automatically gathered when you visit any Senate website. To learn more about the Senate's Internet security and privacy policy online, please go to this address: http://www.senate.gov/security.html. 

If You Send Us Personal Information 

This website is set up not to collect any personal information about you when you visit the site unless you choose to provide that information to us. Information provided will be treated confidentially by me and my staff. 

If you are requesting help with a casework matter, it also may be necessary for my office to share the information you provide with the government agency from which you are requesting assistance, in order to respond to your request. Other than when needed to perform constituent casework at your request, or in the course of an authorized law enforcement investigation or emergency posing an imminent risk to public safety, my office will share no personal information communicated through my web site with any outside organization or individual.

My office tabulates comments received through my website concerning legislation and government policy issues so that I will be fully informed about the views of constituents. From time to time, I come across a comment made by a constituent, or a situation described by a constituent, in an e-mail message (as well as postal mail, phone calls, and faxes) that I feel makes a point of such general interest that I would like to refer to it in a speech, or include it in the Congressional Record, or make some other use of it, either in connection with debate in the Senate or by sharing it with the relevant government agency. My staff makes every effort in such cases to contact the author first. If you intend your message to be confidential, and would prefer that it not be used in such a way, please feel free to advise me of your preference in the message, so I can be sure to respect your wishes and see that your views are held entirely within my office.

The information you provide us will be released to law enforcement agencies if threatening or other potentially unlawful communications are made.

Links to Other Sites

This web site has links to other useful sites on the Internet, including sites of other government agencies. If you follow any link that takes you to a location that does not include 'senate.gov' in the address, you will have left the Senate web server and you will need to refer to that site's own privacy policy. 

Related Links:

U.S. Senate's Internet security and privacy policy
http://www.senate.gov/security.html