A joint resolution removing the deadline for the ratification of the equal rights amendment.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Madam President, I return to the floor of the Senate again today to ask that this body take immediate action--action needed--to address our Nation's massive baby formula shortage.

For months, American moms and dads have been scouring supermarkets and drugstores looking for baby formula. Anxiety-ridden parents are frantically checking online stores and pleading with family and friends, trying to figure out how to ship, purchase, and otherwise procure baby formula.

Still, some families must hospitalize their babies because they can't find formula. Yes, they are hospitalizing them for that reason alone.

Inexcusably, the crisis has only gotten worse. In May alone, reports show that the out-of-stock rate jumped from 43 percent to a staggering 73 percent nationally.

In Utah, my State--the State with the largest families, the most children per capita, and the highest birthrate in the Nation--reports show that out-of-stock rate to be as high as 88.9 percent.

Desperate parents are now resorting to places like Facebook Marketplace, buying from unknown sellers at exorbitant markups. The failure of the Biden administration's photo-op policy has not so much as put a dent--even a tiny dent--in this problem.

Now, initially, the White House said that parents should ``ask your pediatrician, who may have formula samples or possible alternatives,'' as if that were somehow a solution.

This hollow nonresponse was embarrassing enough, but, tragically, the administration's response has not improved with time, in the time that has passed since that statement was made. When the question came up again, the White House press secretary spent nearly 20 seconds flipping through a binder, only to respond with: ``I don't have anything new.''

That response is simply unacceptable. It is unacceptable for the American people generally and especially for those families dealing with this inexplicably, needlessly prolonged crisis.

By failing to act, we are leaving parents in an unimaginable situation during one of the most stressful and impactful times of life. Worse, they have received no discernible answers from their elected officials. The White House's website lays the blame solely on Abbott's plant closure in Michigan ``due to safety concerns from the FDA.''

Now, this is a very limited, narrow line of thinking. The FDA regularly recalls other food products, but none of those recalls happens to result in shortages of this magnitude or this significance with such weighty consequences on the youngest of Americans.

Look, it doesn't have to be this way. There are a lot of weighty problems that we address in the U.S. Senate that are seemingly unsolvable, intractable, or, at least, very, very difficult to solve because they involve things that very often are beyond our ability to control.

This is not one of those problems. This is within our grasp. It is within our control. In fact, the government is the problem. Government caused it, and by turning certain levers, government can relieve this problem and do so in a very short period of time. This suffering is unnecessarily being prolonged by the government itself.

So the Senate can help these families, these American families struggling with this crisis, by immediately passing my bill called the FORMULA Act.

This bill responds to the crisis in three simple ways to help solve the crisis at hand and feed American babies.

First, my bill would suspend tariff collection on currently allowed formula imports. We tax imported formula at a rate of at least 17.5 percent upon entering the United States. It can roughly double to about 35 percent, depending on the circumstances of the shipment. We can help ease the skyrocketing prices and encourage companies to import as much baby formula as possible or as much as demand within the market requires by simply suspending for a period of 6 months this tariff collection.

Look, the administration has acknowledged there are appropriate times to suspend the collection of certain taxes. For example, it is currently proposing suspending the gasoline tax for a period of 3 months. Surely, it is not the Biden White House's position that gasoline is more important than feeding infants.

Second, my bill would temporarily allow formula imports from several safe countries like those in Europe. This would enable us to access plentiful formula supplies from abroad and meet our current needs with that.

Now, allowing these imports is not going to endanger American babies. The manufacturing plants in question are already approved and are already regulated by their home countries. And the only plants that operate in countries and subject to authorities that are comparable to those imposed by our own Food and Drug Administration, these are countries from which we already import pharmaceutical products.

The fact is that parents have already begun taking matters into their own hands, often with dire consequences. We are hearing reports of parents resorting to online homemade recipes for formula that they then feed to their infants. Infant hospitalizations due to malnutrition are correspondingly increasing as a direct result of these activities and the shortages from which they stem.

Doctors have voiced their concerns that homemade formulas can lead to liver and kidney issues and, in some cases, even heart failure. Some families have tried diluting the formula that they are able to access with more water, a tactic that health experts warn can lead to brain swelling and organ failure.

Some doctors refer to this shortage as ``the worst crisis they have experienced in their careers.'' They have to place dehydrated children on IV fluids, which isn't, of course, a long-term solution; it is an acute and dire response to a life-threatening emergency brought about through an artificial government constraint on the market. These short- term consequences are scary enough. They are scary enough for the moms and dads, to say nothing of the horrors the children, the infants, experience in the process. We still don't know what the long-term effects of these might be to the babies.

Those worried about the formula quality may find solace in the fact that my bill retains the FDA's authority to recall foreign formulas in the very unlikely event that these safety issues arise. Remember, these are formulas produced in facilities in countries from which we already import pharmaceutical products based on our country's trust and confidence that their safety and quality standards are as secure as, if not more stringent than, our own.

Additionally, my bill only calls for importing formula that is lawfully marketed and approved in select foreign countries. Again, private citizens are already doing this. The law already allows the personal importation of baby formula, meaning somebody can jump online and order it on their own, and parents are voluntarily choosing to do so because they have done the research and they trust that it is safe for their baby.

They understand, as we do, that babies in France and Switzerland and of the United Kingdom are not different than babies in the United States of America. Formula that works for them, that is safe and healthy for them, is proven safe and healthy and effective for them for many, many decades is also going to work with respect to an American baby. My bill would just make this easier and more affordable for parents, you see, because to be one of those parents, you have got to have a degree of sophistication to know what you are looking for. Most people aren't really aware of the fact that they could jump online and order this.

Secondly, it is really expensive to do it. They can't buy in bulk, and it requires extra shipping and handling costs that makes this prohibitively expensive for many people, even the lucky ones who become aware that it is even an option.

So my bill isn't making something legal that is currently illegal in that respect; it is simply making it more affordable. It is making it so that we no longer limit access to these foreign formulas--foreign top-quality formulas from places like France and Switzerland and the United Kingdom. They will be available to poor and middle-class families, and not just the wealthy.

Finally, my bill would allow WIC program recipients to buy whatever brand of formula is available with WIC vouchers. My bill will allow these parents to buy from available stock and feed their children and guarantees greater flexibility.

You see, the existing formula crisis has been exacerbated by virtue of the fact that the WIC formula--the WIC beneficiaries are given a voucher. Very often, that voucher limits them to procuring only that brand of formula specified on the voucher itself, which, in many instances, might be out of stock. This would eliminate that problem.

Keeping American infants fed should be one of the least controversial proposals imaginable, especially because this is something that can be done easily. We can bring about almost immediate relief to these American parents and especially to their babies, just by not causing the problem anymore or, at least, waiting for a few months before causing this problem again.

In the meantime, the hope and the expectation is that the American formula industry can retool, revamp, and get back in the practice of producing in sufficient quantities that they will be able to meet the demand, but we need 6 months in order to do that.

American babies are going hungry and the Federal Government is the problem. The Federal Government is causing these babies to starve and otherwise suffer.

My FORMULA Act will help solve the formula crisis and ensure that American babies do not go unfed.

Look, there is a reason why we see this crisis here, but not in any of our neighbor countries, not in any of our peer countries. No, the crisis exists here because this is a feature of U.S. law. We can fix this problem. We can help solve this crisis today. We can make sure Americans babies' cries do not go unanswered. We can and must pass my FORMULA Act.

So, as if in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 372, S. 4261; that the bill be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I appreciate the insight and the always thoughtful counsel of my distinguished friend and colleague, the Senator from Pennsylvania. I always enjoy working with

him. He is a voice of reason and is a delight to work with.

I do feel compelled to respond to a few of his points. Now, yes, it is true, there are ambitious plans to fly formula over. They used the Defense Production Act to do that, to have the government to act. And the ambitious plans that he describes have yet to materialize. What we have to look at is the bottles that are available now, that have been flown over now, that are here now as a result of that program, is about 13 million bottles. Do you know what the average daily consumption of formula is in America? Nine million. So this buys us a day and a half of formula--a day and a half--and it is still not solving the problem. So that is not a solution.

As to the objection related to the FDA's regs, he points to the safety concerns and highlights a few adverse incident reports not necessarily linked to the formula itself but things that people experienced as they were switching formulas. A lot of the symptoms that he described--all of them, in fact, as I understand it--including lethargy, diarrhea, and some of those have been linked to babies switching formula. So, yes, when a baby switches formula, whether it is from one American brand to another or an American brand to a European brand, it is not uncommon during this transition period for babies to react that way.

Now, I wish--we wish--that it wasn't necessary for them to switch to begin with. This was unnecessary to make them switch. In fact, another point that I need to refute that he made at the outset about formula being responsible for the contamination, for the food-borne illness, it was, in fact, not the formula itself that caused it. In fact, an FDA investigation revealed that it wasn't the formula. It was a source of bottled water that had itself been contaminated, and it was that bottled water that the parents were mixing with the formula that turned out to be contaminated, by no fault of their own but also by no fault of the manufacturer. So we have got to keep straight exactly what happened here and what didn't happen.

Finally, with regard to the safety risks, I understand this, and it is important that we be safe in doing this. We have to remember these are countries from which we currently import pharmaceutical products because we trust that their equivalent of the FDA is safe and is effective. So if we don't trust them with respect to baby formula, I would submit that we shouldn't trust them elsewhere. But in fact, we can trust them in these areas. None of those adverse incident reports that were reported, to my knowledge, have been linked to a defect or a contamination in the formula itself.

Finally, it is important to remember that we have a massive health crisis faced by these babies who are unable to get formula. Children are being hospitalized because they are dehydrated. These can have lasting consequences. They are occurring at a time when the baby's brain development is on a very critical timeline. You don't want to interrupt that. You don't want a supply chain disruption to lead to a disruption in the baby's developmental growth.

So it is unfortunate that my friend and distinguished colleague, the Senator from Pennsylvania, has objected to this very reasonable, rational, sensible response that lists the government's impediments. I wish this were not the case because this would deliver meaningful reform, unlike the 13 million bottles--the day and a half's worth of formula that has been brought over to date through the Defense Production Act efforts that he described--this would actually solve the problem. And it would solve it for at least 6 months, long enough for our domestic production capabilities to resume.

So it is unfortunate. I wish that were not the case. But in the spirit of comity and compromise, I will modify my request.

Again, the FORMULA Act would have included these three legs, a regulatory component lifting the regulatory restrictions, an import tariff restriction, and also lifting some restrictions in the WIC Program.

So I am going to counteroffer with another amendment that would remove the waiver of the FDA regulations for the imported formula. That, after all, is the concern he expressed, and so that should allow us to deal with it. It would keep the tariff and the WIC waivers from the FORMULA Act intact and therefore shouldn't raise any concerns not addressed by my friend and distinguished colleague.

And so, Mr. President, as if in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 372, S. 4261; further, I ask that the Lee substitute amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I find this, too, unfortunate. I wish we could adopt all three of these reforms; again, we have a regulatory reform, an import tax reform, and a WIC reform. He has now expressed objections to the regulatory reform and the WIC reform.

So, in the spirit of comity and cooperation and compromise, I would like to modify again, and I will take out the WIC restrictions--the WIC component of the bill--and leave only the tariff waiver. That, at least, would remove some of the protectionist problems that we have got in place that is currently prohibiting people from being able to import this stuff, leaving it available really only to wealthy, well-connected parents who know how to find this stuff and can pay the higher price for it. This would at least allow people to buy it in stores if we could lift that restriction and do so in larger quantities while adhering to the labeling and other regulatory requirements.

So, Mr. President, as if in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 372, S. 4261; further, I ask that the Lee substitute amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I find it most unfortunate that, as American babies are starving and are literally being admitted to hospitals for dehydration and malnutrition because of a

government-created problem, we can't get to a solution here.

I am determined to find one, and I am determined not to take no for an answer. We have to get to yes on that. To that end, I would like to modify my last request and shorten it down from 180 days--a 6-month suspension--to a 90-day suspension. This is the exact timeframe that mirrors the Biden administration's proposed time window for gas tax alleviation. The President has raised this and has asked us to act on that immediately. Look, I happen to think baby formula is a whole lot more important and urgent than gasoline. We can at least do this. So I am going to modify my request to move it down to just 90 days. We should be able to do that for 90 days. I am certain that we can.

Mr. President, as if in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 372, S. 4261; further, that the Lee substitute amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I appreciate the thoughts expressed by my friend and distinguished colleague, the Senator from Pennsylvania. I share this concern and this desire to see this worked out and worked out on a bipartisan basis. I think it is important.

It is true that people have been working on it. They have been working on it now for the better part of a month and a half. Yet nothing has happened. Now, I understand that Rome wasn't built in a day. Significant legislative reforms are not usually enacted very quickly. Well, they are in some places, and we are experiencing some of that this week, but that is a different issue altogether. I understand that it takes time, on many occasions, to develop a legislative solution. This is not one of those issues. This is just not that complicated.

I appreciate the fact that people are considering it. I appreciate the fact that my friend and colleague, the Senator from Pennsylvania, is willing to try to clear this on the Democratic side. I hope and expect that one of the four alternatives that I have proposed today-- each in the spirit of comity and compromise and as something that should be acceptable to both political parties--has got to get there.

There are issues on which we are always going to struggle to find solutions. This one isn't hard. We can do this. We can fix this. American babies are going hungry because of the mismanagement within our country.

Yes, I share the Senator's belief that we have got to hold the FDA accountable, but I feel like we are in the same position as the unarmed English bobby--but with the FDA lately. The unarmed English bobby, being unarmed and upon seeing the commission of a crime, shouts, in a charming British accent, ``Stop or I will yell `stop' again.'' We need to actually do something to force this issue because people are going hungry--babies are going hungry--and there are dire, long-lasting consequences.

I hope and expect that we will solve this before the end of the week. This issue is not going away, and neither am I.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I have come to the floor to speak in support of the Postal Service Reform Act, which is now pending before the Senate.

The mission of the U.S. Postal Service since the Continental Congress appointed Benjamin Franklin as our Nation's first Postmaster General in 1775 has been to ``bind the Nation together.''

So it sounds kind of like a pretty quaint, outdated idea, but it is actually serious; it is actually statutory.

And 39 U.S.C. tasks the Postal Service with binding our Nation together by delivering all of our mail to every American promptly, reliably, and efficiently, no matter where we live.

The Postal Service Reform Act will improve the Agency's ability to meet that requirement, including in large, geographically remote places, like Alaska, where it certainly has a significant impact on our lives.

We count on the Postal Service to deliver not only the letters and the magazines and the bills, but also necessities of life: food, medicine, business inventory, spare parts. Just about anything you could possibly think of for daily life comes to us in Alaska through the mail service.

The Postal Service is unique in its universal service obligation and the fact that it delivers both mail and packages to Americans in every community, whether you live in Key West, FL, or Utqiagvik, AK. No other Federal Agency or commercial enterprise does this.

But it is becoming more and more difficult for the Postal Service to accomplish the swift completion of their appointed rounds, as we recall.

And believe me, I certainly hear about the Postal Service's decreasing ability to provide its services promptly, reliably, and efficiently. I hear about it as soon as I get off the airplane when I get back home. I hear from individuals all over the State, telling me the concerns that they have about mail that is late or perhaps not delivered at all.

Our phones ring in our offices around the State because a small post office has been closed for a period of days because the postmaster has left, and there is no replacement available.

I hear about the long lines to pick up mail, the long lines to just even buy a stamp in some of our smaller communities that get inundated by tourists in the summer.

So we know. We hear the strains on our Postal Service. Despite postal workers' dedication, the fact of the matter is that the Agency is in trouble, and it needs the reforms that are contained in the bill that is pending before us.

While many Americans believe the Postal Service is supported by the American taxpayer, that is not the case. Congress only reimburses it for mailing audio books to the blind and ballots to overseas voters. That is it.

The Postal Service has to meet its payroll and fund retiree health benefits; maintain its facilities, equipment, and vehicles; deliver the mail to its destination on time with its own revenue from the sale of postage. But their financial instability is making those responsibilities harder and harder to fulfill.

So we are debating this legislation on the floor today to give the Postal Service the tools that it needs to be successful and to fulfill its essential mission and to hold the USPS accountable for improved performance because we all want to see that.

So this legislation that we will hopefully vote on later today is not without controversy. Reform legislation is never without controversy, but that is why I appreciate the opportunity to outline what I think are some of the positive provisions.

Importantly, the bill increases the Postal Service's accountability for on-time delivery and requires greater transparency in achieving the goal. The bill requires that mail delivery not only be prompt and economical but also consistent and reliable and provided in a manner that increases operational efficiency.

It requires the USPS to develop a new, searchable public performance dashboard that is updated weekly so both Congress and the public can keep a close eye on whether or not they are living up to our expectations.

It also requires new regular reporting to the Postal Regulatory Commission, the PRC, and to Congress on a variety of indicators, including the impacts of price changes and information about reliability, efficiency, and cost effectiveness, Postal workforce recruitment and retention, and how investments in equipment and infrastructure are impacting service.

In addition, the PRC and the Postal Service's inspector general must identify why there are inefficiencies in the collection, sorting, transportation, and delivery of large envelopes, newsletters, and magazines.

These findings will be reported to Congress and the Postmaster General. USPS would then have 6 months to put in place PRC-approved changes that will fix whatever faults may have been found.

The bill will also do what many of us have advocated for, which is reform the cost of healthcare for USPS employees and their retirees.

So it provides needed stabilization for the USPS health benefits system, and, hopefully, it will relieve the pressure on their budget and support sustainable benefits for employees and retirees. This is a key provision.

The bill also codifies an appropriations rider that has long required the USPS to integrate the delivery of letters and packages for 6-day delivery and includes a fair compromise on the attribution of costs for processing and delivering packages.

One of the--I guess--top complaints that I hear from Alaskans is that the cost of shipping via commercial package services is oftentimes more than the price of the item itself. Integrated delivery of mail and packages saves the U.S. Postal Service money by allowing it to be more efficient.

And while UPS and FedEx charge most Alaskans extra for delivering their packages, these companies then drop their packages off in Anchorage at that hub and let the Postal Service take care of what we call last mile delivery. Well, in Alaska, that often means the last several hundred miles.

Now, some are concerned that USPS subsidizes the cost of packages with revenue derived from delivering letters. But in fact, the law that we passed in 2006, the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act, forbids the Postal Service from cross-subsidizing revenue to make sure that it is competing fairly with commercial package carriers.

Current law also requires that package delivery covers all of its attributable costs, and while the Postal Regulatory Commission and the Federal courts have examined and upheld the cost attribution methodology, the Postal Service Reform Act requires yet another look, which I think is probably a fair compromise.

Importantly for Alaskans and for me, this legislation will not result in cost increases for the essential bypass mail program. This is what it says it is. It is essential. It is a program that allows rural Alaskans who live in communities that are not connected by roads--about 80 percent of our communities are in that situation--but allows them to receive pallets of food, whatever necessary mailable matter that comes from stores in Anchorage or Fairbanks, without millions of individual boxes of goods going through Postal facilities. And that benefits the consumer, and it saves the Postal Service tens of millions of dollars a year in operating costs and untold millions in facility costs.

While the Postal Service Reform Act directs the PRC to engage in another review of attributable costs, I have

been assured by both sides of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, by the PRC, and by the Postal Service that this provision will not impact bypass mail, and I certainly intend to hold them to their word.

Another concern that I want to address over this bill is allowing USPS to partner with State, local, and Tribal governments to provide nonpostal services. Now, I understand where this comes from, but this legislation specifically requires that any nonpostal services must cover their own costs without any degradation to regular Postal services.

So, in my view, if the U.S. Postal Service can help deliver additional services to the American public under these two caveats, then they should be allowed to do so.

So H.R. 3076 is a big step forward in helping the Postal Service achieve financial stability. It will enable the Agency to continue to bind the Nation together with efficient and cost-effective universal service and allow postal employees to achieve the swift completion of their appointed rounds. It is supported by a wide array of businesses, both large and small, all who rely on our Postal Service. It is supported by Postal employees, by retired Federal employees, and the Postal Service itself.

It has received overwhelming bipartisan support in the House of Representatives. I certainly hope that it will draw the same here in the Senate, and I want to commend the chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, as well as Ranking Member Portman, for the good work that they have done in bringing this bill to us today.

(Ms. ROSEN assumed the Chair.)

International Women's Day

Madam President, now, while I am still here on the floor, I want to take just a moment and acknowledge that today, March 8, marks International Women's Day.

This is a day for us to recognize the achievements and the contributions that women are making in communities across the globe, and, as an Alaskan, I am going to start local first, because I have got so many, many phenomenal women in my State who are doing incredible things, and I am exceptionally proud of them.

I was home over the weekend. We were celebrating the start of the 50th running of the Iditarod race. This is an extraordinary feat of just strength and grit and determination and resilience.

There were 49 mushers that left Willow on Sunday; 17 of those mushers who will make the trek to Nome are women--17 women. So we have got a very, very strong field, but running a race like this, where it is the musher and your team of dogs going through the wilderness of Alaska--we have got deep snow throughout. The moose are not in a very cooperative mood right now. There are dangers along the trail, and who knows what the conditions are going to be like a week from now. And so it takes an extraordinary individual.

And to know the strength of women, as they have taken on the Iditarod--when award-winning or world-renowned winner Susan Butcher first won that race--she has won that race four times--but when she ran it about three decades ago, there was a popular bumper sticker that was going around the State at the time. It was, ``Alaska, where men are men and women win the Iditarod.'' We were pretty proud of Susan Butcher. We are hoping that our women do well and all of our mushers do well.

But like these female mushers who are racing, women leaders are virtually in every field, from healthcare to resource development, to fishing, to our universities, and everything in between, and many of us are very proud to know that they have become somewhat household names, some of them.

This year, we were able to celebrate Emma Broyles, a young woman from Anchorage, 20 years old. She became the first Alaskan and the first Korean American to ever be crowned Miss America in the 100-year history of that event. So we are very proud of her. I was able to celebrate with her this weekend at the Iditarod itself.

Another young woman that we have celebrated this past year is Lydia Jacoby. Lydia is from Seward, AK, and at 17, she competed in her first Olympics. She brought home the gold medal for this country, winning the 100-meter breaststroke race. So we were all eyes on Lydia. So proud of her.

And there are so many who deserve our thanks and our gratitude. I always like to give a shout-out to an exceptional leader in our State, who has provided critical leadership and guidance throughout the pandemic, Dr. Anne Zink.

It is so important to know that it is not necessarily finishing at the end of a race or a crown or a medal. It is just the endurance that goes with the day-to-day completion of your work.

I was on the floor just last month to recognize the work of Native civil rights advocate Elizabeth Peratrovich, who pushed the Territory of Alaska, our legislature at the time, to pass the first antidiscrimination act in the Nation. We did this in 1945. We are so proud of how she, as a Native woman leader, made our State and our Nation a more inclusive and more representative democracy.

So, today, on International Women's Day, it gives us an opportunity to recognize the impressive feats that women have taken on and have accomplished. It is a day to thank women for their daily contributions--again, both big, where they win the awards and they make the headlines, but also for those day-to-day contributions that they make to raising healthy, strong children, to being the fabric in the family, to being that contributor in the workplace.

But this isn't a day that we just look back and recognize those who have made great accomplishments. It is also a day that we look ahead at the work that we have to do to continue to advance equality and justice for all women.

Just down the hallway from here in the Rotunda is the Portrait Monument. We all see it; we walk by it; and maybe we don't even notice it anymore but take a look at it next time. We know the pioneering women who are represented on it: Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Susan B. Anthony.

But we need to look at it more carefully, and we need to remember there is a fourth bust that Adelaide Johnson did not sculpt, and the base of the monument is also unfinished. It is a reflection of the unfinished struggle for women's rights and equality.

So for all the progress that we have made, and we know it has been considerable, Madam President, as you are sitting in that chair and this woman from Alaska is addressing you--we have made great progress, but the struggle is unfinished.

The data documents the gaps in gender equality in our country, and too many women feel it firsthand in their daily lives. So on International Women's Day, I also want to remind the Senate of a couple important ways that we can help further women's rights.

And I am pleased that my colleague Senator Cardin is on the floor at this moment because we have been working together. We have been working together to try to do this unfinished business when it comes to ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment, to ensure women's equality is expressly recognized in our Constitution.

Three-quarters of the States have now ratified that amendment. Alaska did it back in 1972, Virginia most recently in 2020. I am hopeful that its time has come.

And to help facilitate that, Senator Cardin and I have introduced a resolution to remove the arbitrary ratification deadline from the ERA so it can finally take effect. I think the Senate needs to take this resolution up and pass it like the House of Representatives did last year.

Another step--a critical step--that we must take now is the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act to help ensure that there is a path to justice for survivors of interpersonal violence.

I was very proud to introduce the new VAWA bill with Senator Durbin, Senator Ernst, and Senator Feinstein last month. I am pleased--so pleased--that we have 22 total cosponsors, 11 from each party.

Our bipartisan bill modernizes the nearly three decades' old Violence Against Women Act, and it reauthorizes important programs that provide services to survivors. It directs resources to prevent further violence and hold perpetrators accountable for their

actions. And it takes needed and important steps to address domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking.

I mentioned dating violence. We have a provision that I have included and we have named after an Alaskan victim of dating violence, and that is Breanna Moore.

We focused on improving access to medical forensics for victims of violence, including through training for medical professionals that will allow them to provide evidence-based and trauma-informed care.

We have a strong Tribal title in this VAWA bill. It builds on VAWA 2013 by closing the gaps in the law to protect Native people. The Tribal title also includes an Alaska pilot program which provides a targeted solution to help empower Tribes in a way that recognizes the unique and complex jurisdictional landscape that we have in my State. It is a recognition that Tribes are valuable partners. They are critical partners that can play a larger role in providing public safety while reducing the burden on my State.

As I have said many times before, there should be nothing--nothing-- partisan about keeping people safe from violence. And our VAWA reauthorization is a result of many years of hard work and negotiations by advocates and stakeholders alike. I hope that we can consider this and pass this very, very soon.

I recognize the great work of Senator Ernst on our side and Senator Durbin and Senator Feinstein on the other side of the aisle. It has been an effort that is timely, is needed, and is necessary.

So I am happy to be able to recognize, for just a few moments on this International Women's Day--as we celebrate the many, many incredible women in our lives and in our country, we also recognize that our work for true equality remains unfinished, but we have got some good paths forward if we can just try.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, on June 12, a bipartisan group of 20 Senators announced an agreement on legislation to protect our children and communities from the epidemic of gun violence. In the days since then, this bipartisan group, led by Senators Murphy, Cornyn, Sinema, Tillis, and others, have worked to move this agreement forward.

We took a test vote last night--our first Senate floor vote on the package. It was a strong bipartisan rollcall. Let's be clear: This bill is a compromise. In a 50/50 Senate, we expect nothing less.

It doesn't accomplish everything I want. It certainly doesn't accomplish everything which the Republican colleagues who voted for it want either, but the reforms and investments made in this bill represent an important step toward making our Nation safer.

It won't end gun violence, but it will help to reduce the number of shootings and killings which number 100 Americans each day, and it will end, perhaps, guns as the leading cause of death among our children.

Let me highlight a few important provisions: $250 million in grants for community violence intervention programs which have shown great promise in communities in my State. This

would double the current annual Justice Department funding for these programs. The bill makes dramatic investments in mental health infrastructure, providing billions of dollars in school and community mental health grants and behavioral health clinics. It gives an additional $28 million to fund the trauma support in school program at HHS. This is a program that Senator Capito--Republican of West Virginia--and I created in 2018 to help break the cycle of trauma and violence.

The bill also provides three-quarters of $1 billion in Byrne/JAG grants to help States administer crisis intervention programs like the extreme risk protection order laws in Illinois and 18 other States.

The bill takes significant steps toward closing the boyfriend loophole: keeping guns out of the hands of dating partners who have been convicted of domestic violence offenses.

It creates a new Federal offense for the crimes of straw purchasing and gun trafficking. This will crack down on the illicit flow of guns into cities like Chicago.

Again, this bill is a compromise. There are provisions I would rather change and some I would rather do without; but, overall, it marks the most significant gun violence reduction legislation in nearly three decades. I commend the bipartisan effort that led us to this point, and we should pass this bill without delay.

I want to call particular attention to two sections of this bill that I mentioned.

One is to stop straw purchases. Straw purchases are when a person with a clean criminal record or with no criminal record goes to buy a gun for the sole purpose of giving it to another individual who has a criminal record and couldn't legally purchase a gun himself. That happens. It happened last year in Chicago. There was a straw purchase of a gun, and the gun was handed to a felon who turned around and used it to kill a Chicago policewoman named Ella French.

Ella French was 29 years old. She was a remarkable young woman. She had a great future ahead of her. She was, unfortunately, shot--gunned down--with a straw purchase gun. The same gun was used against her partner in his police vehicle. He lost his sight in one eye. He survived. But that just shows you that these straw purchase guns are being used by people against police and innocent people on a regular basis.

Straw purchasing--buying a gun with a clean record to hand over to someone who has a felony conviction--should be treated as a serious violent crime. This bill does that.

The second thing that we desperately need is to deal with counseling. Now, I know there is a traditional political argument where Republicans say: Guns are not the problem--it is mental health or other issues--and Democrats say: It is guns, and if you don't include guns in the package, you are not going to get the job done.

In my view, it includes both. You have to believe if half of the gun deaths in America each day are suicides, that the people who are the victims of those suicides needed, at least at some point in their lives, mental counseling. This bill provides counseling, and I hope it comes in the nick of time for people to turn their lives around and to restore hope in their futures so that they don't resort to the desperate decision toward suicide. Mental counseling, for them, is important.

Secondly, of course, we read about the mass shooters in theaters and in supermarkets and in schools, and we realize that they, too, should have been counseled at some point in the hopes that you could try to divert them from this vicious path that they are about to follow. That is an important issue.

The third group is one that I am more familiar with. They are those people who are involved in gun violence in our cities like Chicago and St. Louis and in so many other cities. These are young people who have diverted their lives away from what we consider to be normal because of a traumatic experience.

Now, trauma is more than physical trauma. It can involve types of posttraumatic stress that really lead to fight-or-flight syndromes and an involvement in gangs and the use of guns without having the feeling of guilt toward anyone you hurt.

These people need help. If we can reach them at an early age in schools, we might be able to turn their lives around. If we don't try, unfortunately, the violence will only continue on our streets. This bill that we are considering--this community safety bill that we are considering--provides resources to school districts to counsel young people.

I think it is long overdue and is desperately needed, not just for those who have been through serious trauma in their lives, but for those facing other mental challenges. Our kids who have gone back to school after COVID may need a helping hand and someone they can counsel with. This bill starts providing those valuable resources. I believe it will make an important difference in the future of our country.

Inflation

On another topic, Mr. President, ``inflation'' is the word on everyone's mind. We see proof of it plastered on gas stations throughout the country and in the aisles of our grocery stores. Too many families are struggling to pay bills. Just last week, the Federal Reserve launched its most forceful broadside against inflation, the largest increase in interest rates in nearly 30 years.

As lawmakers, we owe the American people an honest, sober assessment of how we can start to bring down prices and help alleviate stress at the checkout lane; but, sadly, the inflation conversation has been twisted with dishonesty and deflection by some political critics.

Instead of passing legislation to help reduce the cost of essential goods and services like prescription drugs and childcare, many are pointing the finger of blame at the Biden administration as if he invented inflation or isn't doing his best to end it. Despite the fact that it was former President Trump who urged the Federal Reserve to keep the money printer running at the start of the pandemic and that the Republicans oppose a bill that would prevent big oil companies from price gouging, we see arguments that are made totally on a political level.

The bad-faith arguments we have heard from across the aisle ignore the essential truth: Inflation is not just an American problem; it is a global problem. It is happening in advanced economies like in the UK and France. That is largely due to disruptions in the supply chain.

The phrase ``supply chain'' didn't mean much to America a few months ago, but now, we know it is an important part of our challenge. This began 2 years ago with the pandemic, and it has been aggravated by Vladimir Putin's barbaric invasion of Ukraine. It has caused the cost of everything from food to energy to spike.

In the words of one conservative commentator at the Wall Street Journal:

War in Ukraine Fans the Flames of Global Inflation.

Immigration

Mr. President, it is crucial to recognize the United States can't solve these global drivers of inflation on our own, but there is one driver of inflation that is within our control: labor shortages. We have twice as many jobs that need to be filled in this country as unemployed people to fill them.

What can we do?

The chart tells you part of the story. This chart indicates that, under the policies of the previous administration and due to the COVID- 19 pandemic, as well as lengthy backlogs, America has experienced a marked decline in immigration that has had a direct and detrimental impact on working families.

According to EconoFact:

[N]et migration to the United States . . . has

significantly declined over the last five years due to

policies of the Trump administration, processing backlogs,

the pandemic, and other factors. This slowdown has

implications for the number of workers available and for

fiscal sustainability.

By the end of 2021, there were 2 million fewer working-age immigrants in America than there would have been if the pre-2020 migration trends had continued.

Now, perhaps your first instinct is, Well, that is a good thing; that means more jobs for American workers.

But the reality is not that at all. This decline in immigration is hurting working Americans and is contributing to inflation. There are a number of industries in America that rely on foreign-born labor to provide affordable goods and services to our country--industries like construction, agriculture, transportation, to name just a few.

Consider the healthcare industry. Nursing homes depend on a reliable supply of immigrant workers to provide care to the elderly and disabled, but since 2019, nursing homes have lost more than 15 percent of their workforce. Today, nearly every nursing home in the country--99 percent, according to the Wall Street Journal--is experiencing staffing shortages. As a result, many of them have had to limit the number of new clients they accept.

In the words of one leader in the industry:

We're just looking for people to fill the roles that we

need. And time and again, we find it is the immigrant

population that tends to respond to us.

So it is our grandparents who end up paying the price for the shortage of working-age immigrants, and they are not alone.

If you are in the market for a new home, you may have noticed prices are prohibitively high, and these skyrocketing costs aren't just hurting potential home buyers; they are hurting renters as well. The cost of rent is actually outpacing inflation in America.

One obvious way to bring housing costs back down to earth is by expanding the supply of homes in America. There are plenty of homebuilders who are willing to help fill the void, but they have got a problem: not enough workers.

Down in Dallas, TX, one homebuilder named Joshua Correa has been forced to delay home construction projects for months because he can't hire field crews.

In his own words:

Immigration is very important for our workforce in the

United States . . . We're feeling [the shortage of workers] .

. . and if we're feeling it at the end of the day as builders

and developers, the consumer pays the price.

From building new homes to providing healthcare in our homes, we rely on immigrants to fill critical roles; and in the absence of immigrant workers, we as customers end up paying higher prices.

If we want to solve America's worker shortage, we need to drastically increase the number of immigrants we welcome into this country. Don't just take it from me. The CEO of the Chamber of Commerce of America has called for doubling the number of legal immigrants into this country.

In her words:

If we can alleviate the worker shortage, it might be the

fastest thing [we can] do to impact inflation.

And that is just a short-term benefit for fixing America's broken immigration system. In the long term, comprehensive immigration reform would drive America's economic growth for years to come.

According to the Economic Policy Institute, undocumented immigrants already pay nearly $12 billion in State and local taxes annually, but many of them are not on the books. By providing them with a path to legal status, we can double the amount of Federal tax revenue our Nation collects from this group. That is money that will fund the construction of roads and bridges and which will make Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid payments. That is especially important when you consider the growing number of senior citizens in America who rely on these programs. By the end of this decade, more than a fifth of our population will be over the age of 65. These Americans need a reliable, working-age tax base to support them.

A path to legal status for undocumented immigrants also would boost our Nation's GDP by more than $1 trillion over the next 10 years and create hundreds of thousands of jobs.

Passing immigration reform will also help keep America on the cutting edge of innovation. Despite our former President's destructive immigration policies, America is still one of the top destinations in the world for innovators and entrepreneurs. In fact, more than half of our Nation's billion-dollar startups were founded by an immigrant. Let me repeat that. More than half of our Nation's billion-dollar startups were founded by immigrants. Every day that we fail to enact immigration reform, we are allowing a generation of potential innovators and skilled workers to fall through the cracks.

I want to briefly share the story of one amazing person who almost fell through the cracks. His name is Dr. Alfredo Quinones, but he is more commonly known as Dr. Q. Today, Dr. Q--listen to this--is the chair of neurologic surgery at the Mayo Clinic.

Decades ago, when he first arrived in the United States as a teenager, he was an undocumented farmworker. He earned little more than $3 an hour picking crops in the San Joaquin Valley in California. Eventually, he began working as a welder for a railroad. One day, he suffered a bad injury after falling into an empty petroleum tank. When he woke up in the hospital, Dr. Q decided to pursue his passion.

He enrolled in the University of California at Berkeley and wrote his honor's thesis on neuroscience. That caught the attention of admissions officers at Harvard Medical School, where he was accepted as a student. He studied hard and discovered his calling: neurosurgery. Today, he removes about 250 brain tumors every year. Outside of the OR, Dr. Q devotes countless hours to pioneering research. He has a very modest goal--curing cancer--and is exploring novel methods, like using human fat cells to fight brain cancer.

How many other Dr. Qs are out there, hiding in the shadows of our immigration system? Isn't it time we found out?

In the meantime, I would like to pose a simpler question to my Republican colleagues: If you are genuinely interested in addressing inflation, will you help us move forward on this issue before the election?

Your willingness to work on immigration reform will reveal the answer. It is one of the most consequential steps we can take to combat inflation.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I come to the floor today to talk about this Joe Biden-caused economic crisis that is impacting our country.

Last week, Joe Biden said his spending is ``changing people's lives.'' Well, for once, I am in complete agreement with Joe Biden because I have been traveling the State of Wyoming this past weekend, talking to a lot of people, and Joe Biden's policies have been changing people's lives. Joe Biden's inflation is changing people's lives for the worst. It is costing American families about $5,000 more this year than it did last year just to break even. Joe Biden's inflation is driving families to the breaking point. Right now, working families all across this country are hoping for a summer break. This year's summer break might just break working families.

Inflation remains at a 40-year high. Prices are going up everywhere-- gas station, grocery store, and even paying rent. Household staples like ground beef and chicken--highest prices ever. Inflation for eating at a restaurant--highest ever recorded. Families are paying $100 a week more than they did just a year ago just to stay afloat.

According to a study from the University of Michigan, this is the biggest decline in disposable income since Herbert Hoover was President--Joe Biden; Herbert Hoover. Families' savings accounts are depleted. We now have the lowest savings rate since the great recession. Household debt is breaking records. Families are being forced to cut back in ways they didn't think possible.

The fastest inflation of all, of course, has been on energy. Overall, inflation has been nearly 9 percent, but inflation for gasoline under Joe Biden is more than double--over 100 percent. The price of a gallon of gas has more than doubled since Joe Biden walked into the Oval Office. High energy costs mean high costs for everything else. High gas prices mean it is harder to get goods to the market. Diesel prices are also at record highs. Americans depend on farmers, and farmers depend on diesel. That is just a fact of life. That is why America needs energy now more than ever, in spite of the policies of Joe Biden.

Rather than producing more energy, what does Joe Biden do? He is producing one excuse after another. He

continues to tighten the stranglehold on American energy, making it harder and harder to produce American energy, which is making American energy even more expensive.

Last week, Joe Biden, President of the United States, sent a threatening letter to American energy companies. Now, he claims he wants more energy, but his actions speak much louder than the words he writes or speaks because Joe Biden has done just about everything possible to keep American energy buried in the ground. He has blocked so many different ways to get American energy out of the ground and to refineries and to export or to production. In fact, his Secretary of the Interior explicitly made that a campaign promise when she was running for Congress. The Secretary of the Interior--confirmed by the Democrats, opposed by me--promised to keep American energy in the ground. Well, that is exactly what Joe Biden is doing and having her do.

By one estimate, Joe Biden has taken more than 100 actions, since he has been President, restricting American energy. It all started his first day in office. In the first few hours as President, Joe Biden killed the Keystone XL Pipeline--killed it flat--and then bragged about it. The Keystone Pipeline would have meant 800,000 barrels of oil delivered to this country each and every day, coming in from Canada.

But that wasn't enough, no. A few days later, Joe Biden made another announcement of his anti-American energy policy. He announced he was going to put a pause on all new oil and gas leases on Federal land. Bragging about Keystone, announcing a pause on leases on Federal land, and now here we are after 17 months in office--none. But Barack Obama by this time had done 44 Federal energy leases. Not a single one by Joe Biden--no, not one.

He has also shut down energy exploration near the Arctic. All you need to do is talk to the senior Senator, whom I share time with on the Energy Committee, Senator Murkowski, about what is going on there, and she will tell you how Joe Biden has shut down energy in the Arctic. He has kept more than 4,300 drilling applications collecting dust on his desk.

His energy agenda is far, far to the left of any previous American President. His energy agenda, amazingly, is far to the left of Hillary Clinton's agenda when she was running in 2016--further to the left than Hillary. This is the most anti-American energy agenda in American history, and Joe Biden owns it.

When he says he wants us to produce more, no one believes him. No one believes this President. You look at any poll numbers--people do not believe Joe Biden when he speaks, and people have stopped listening to him. The American people believe with their own two eyes and their empty wallets. They drive by the gas station, look at the price up there, and say: It is only going up.

If you want to know what Joe Biden really thinks, just look at what he does; just listen to the people he has surrounded himself with. His anointed climate spokesman--and I mean anointed--is one John Kerry.

John Kerry said last week: ``We absolutely don't'' need more oil, gas, and coal--``absolutely don't'' need. That is the position of this administration and the President of the United States. He is happy with high prices. John Kerry thinks we can just get rid of fossil fuels immediately.

These people are living a fairy tale. They are in a cocoon of self- delusion. That is what is going on at this White House. Joe Biden's fantasy of ending oil and gas is just that--a fantasy.

He wants every American in an electric vehicle. There are not enough batteries; don't have enough charging stations; don't have enough of these vehicles. Even the Secretary of Transportation--he bought one of these. He bought it from Mexico, according to the news reports, and it got recalled, along with 49,000 other electric vehicles, because the battery didn't work. The battery was not reliable. Pete Buttigieg-- Mayor Pete--went from filling potholes in a small town in Indiana to becoming the world's highest paid salesman of electric vehicles, but yet his own one failed him.

The Biden administration is convinced they are making an ``incredible transition.'' This isn't science; this is science fiction.

Last week, Joe Biden's Press Secretary was asked why the President wasn't going to ``drill more here at home.'' After all, that is what the American people are calling for. That is what the economists say is a problem. Why aren't you drilling more at home? She says: Oh, ``[w]e don't need to do that.'' They don't seem to care how high energy prices go, what the cost of gasoline is, because they live in a pure level of electric vehicles.

Earlier today, the President requested a pause on the gas tax until right before the election. This is the tax that funds our Federal roads and bridges. As a former member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, I know how important the highway trust fund is. It helps repair roads, bridges, and builds highways. Joe Biden doesn't seem to care about that part of it. He said: Oh, let's just call a pause of 18\1/2\ cents a gallon. It is a gimmick. It is a gimmick that won't have very much effect on gas prices because gas prices would still be double what they were when Joe Biden took office even if you take off 18\1/2\ cents.

Let me remind the American public that today gasoline prices on average are $4.95 a gallon. It is more than double what it was the day he took office. We are up about $2.50 for each and every gallon, and Joe Biden thinks: Well, you remove 18 cents, and we will call it good. What a fantasy.

Democrat economist Larry Summers has called this idea by the President of the United States--and let me point out that Larry Summers was Bill Clinton's Secretary of Treasury, economic adviser to Barack Obama, and president of Harvard University, and he says that what Joe Biden is doing--he called it ``shortsighted, ineffective, goofy and gimmicky.'' That is about what we are getting from this President of the United States--goofiness and gimmicks.

Back in 2008, even President Obama said the idea was a gimmick. He ought to have credibility with the Democrats. You would think Joe Biden might have listened to him; he was his Vice President. President Obama said: This idea isn't ``designed to get you through the summer, it's designed to get them through an election.''

What about the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi? She is a big Joe Biden fan. This is what she said of the idea. The thing the President proposed today, she said, is ``very showbiz''--``very showbiz.'' She said: It looks like you are doing something, ``[b]ut it is not necessarily landing in the pocket of the consumer.''

So Joe Biden wants to look busy. It is not what the American people are seeing, and in so many ways, they have tuned him out. The American people see the price of gasoline. They see it every time they drive by a gas station. At the same time, Senate Democrats want to raise taxes on American energy. That is what we hear from the Senate Democrats.

What is your solution?

Well, we are going to raise taxes on American energy.

Oh, sounds good.

Higher taxes mean higher prices--it is that simple. Higher taxes on producers of oil and gas ultimately get passed on to the consumers. I am not sure what people don't understand about that.

Nancy Pelosi admitted that as well. A few months ago, she admitted that ``a tax on production . . . the consumers [will] pay for that.''

Look, Democrats are so desperate to try to do something, throwing one Hail Mary pass after another, they are now denying the laws of supply and demand. The Senate Democrats act like these prices come out of thin air. Prices are the result of supply and demand. Right now, the supply is too low to meet the demand of the American people. If you want lower prices, you have to increase the supply, and we can do that by producing American energy.

High energy costs are driving up inflation all across the country. It is triggering a cascade of crises. The stock market is down 20 percent. Seniors and retirees are watching their savings evaporate, melt away.

Last week, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates for the third time since March. Each increase has been larger than the last one. This latest increase is the largest increase in the Fed rate in 30 years.

Oh, there is no question this is going to slow down the economy. So why is

the Federal Reserve doing something that is going to slow down the economy? Well, there is one reason: inflation under Joe Biden and the big-spending Democrats. That is the reason inflation is running rampant. There were trillions of dollars thrown onto the fire of inflation--inflation denied by the President, ignored by the President, dismissed by the President for month after month after month, and now the American people are living with inflation they cannot escape.

So the Federal Reserve has only one choice. It is throwing on the emergency brake. It may still be too late to prevent a crash. The economy is barreling toward recession. Economists on both sides of the aisle say that, and Joe Biden the other day said, oh, he wasn't worried about that coming along.

A recession is a complete halt to economic growth for half a year. If you have a recession, you still have higher prices with lower economic growth. We would still have higher prices, and people won't have the money to pay them.

Right now, the Federal Reserve is taking desperate measures to counteract what Democrats have done. As a result, mortgage rates have already doubled this year. Mortgage applications have been cut dramatically. Older Americans are delaying their dreams of retirement. Younger Americans are giving up on their dreams of owning a home.

It is no wonder consumer confidence in Joe Biden in the Nation right now is at an alltime low. Joe Biden, who earlier had been compared to Herbert Hoover in terms of what people are saying about both of them, has an even lower approval rating on inflation than did Jimmy Carter.

Joe Biden wants to blame everybody but himself. Yet the American people are right when they point the finger and blame Joe Biden. With record inflation, record debt, and looming recession, now is not the time to do what the Democrats want to do, which is raise taxes. Democrats need to reverse course, stop the reckless spending, and above all, unleash American energy.

Joe Biden should rip up his letter to energy companies and get to work: hold energy lease sales, approve the 4,300 drilling applications still sitting in limbo in the Biden White House, approve more pipelines, speed up the approval process. The American people, right now, are feeling stuck and stressed and squeezed, and the best this President can do is say: Let's take a holiday from gas taxes for 3 months--when prices are up over $2.60 a gallon from the day he took office. And he wants to alleviate 18 cents of the pain.

It is time for the Democrats to reverse course. We will see if Joe Biden listens. The Democrats are refusing to listen. Americans are paying a very high price today, and the Democrats, across the board, are going to pay a very high price in November when people go to the polls.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, first, let me thank Senator Murkowski for her leadership on behalf of women's issues here in the U.S. Senate. I join her in calling for the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women's Act. I am glad that she mentioned that. I join her as her partner in the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment. We have to pass a resolution here extending the date. Senator Murkowski has been a leader on all these issues.

During Women's History Month, I am using this time to point out the progress we have made. Senator Murkowski mentioned that we have made tremendous progress on behalf of gender equality in the United States, but we still have a path in front of us. I was pleased to see Senator Murkowski point out the challenges that still exist and the reason why we need to be active in regard to gender equity issues, including the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act and the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment. So I thank her for her leadership, and I am glad to be her partner on many of these issues.

So today, we can celebrate the progress that has been made and call attention to the obstacles that exist. Throughout our Nation's history, generations of women have won hard-fought battles in pushing closer and closer toward securing full citizenship and all that entails.

Our Nation today is stronger from this progress, reaching new milestones in gender equality. President Biden announced earlier this month his historic selection of Judge Jackson to fill the role of the retiring Supreme Court Justice Breyer on the highest Court in our land. Judge Jackson would be the first Black woman to serve on the Court and only the fifth woman to serve as a Justice of the total of 115 who have served on the Supreme Court throughout our history.

I was pleased, along with Senator Van Hollen, to recommend Lydia Griggsby to serve on the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland. She is the first Black female judge to serve in the State of Maryland.

Yes, we have a lot to celebrate during Women's History Month here in March.

During President Biden's recent State of the Union Address, which I attended, I was struck by the image of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Vice President Kamala Harris flanking President Biden. Vice President Harris is our first woman and first woman of color to hold the second highest office in the land. Though they undoubtedly both experienced significant challenges and obstacles on their career path due to their gender, they are now serving in two of the highest ranking offices in our government.

President Biden has appointed one of the most diverse Cabinets in history, including the first women to serve as Treasury Secretary and Director of National Intelligence.

We have a lot to celebrate on our path for gender equality in America, but we still have more that needs to be done.

At the same time, structural disadvantages and inequalities on account of gender persist across so many areas here in America. As one example, as chair of the Small Business Entrepreneurship Committee, where the Presiding Officer also serves, I have been working over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic to understand the economic effects on small businesses and to help provide needed resources. In this role, I have seen firsthand the structural disadvantages experienced by women- owned small businesses and how they have been compounded by the challenges of this pandemic. We need to take action to help in regard to that issue.

Further, the Supreme Court actions to date in cases related to reproductive freedom indicate an alarming openness to overturning the precedents that have given women control over their own bodies and futures for decades. Among many other very important reasons, full reproductive autonomy is essential in ensuring that women are able to participate fully as citizens in all facets of our democracy.

I am pleased that President Biden established the first Gender Policy Council to advance gender equity across the entire Federal Government and that the Gender Policy Council issued the first-ever national gender strategy to support the full participation of all people, including women and girls in the United States and around the world.

Yes, we have unfinished business in regard to gender equity issues. I am committed to working to advance the Equal Rights Amendment that Senator Murkowski talked about. The two of us are the lead sponsors of the resolution in this body that would remove the arbitrary time limit.

This simple amendment, the Equal Rights Amendment, first written by Alice Paul in 1923, states:

Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or

abridged by the United States or any state on account of sex.

The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate

legislation, the provisions of this article.

I can't understand any objection to including that fundamental protection in the Constitution of the United States.

As President Biden stated in his Presidential Proclamation during this Women's History Month, ``But despite the progress being made, women and girls--especially women and girls of color--still face systemic barriers to full participation and wider gaps in opportunity and equality . . . The Congress sent the Equal Rights Amendment to the States for ratification 50 years ago and it is long past time that the principle of women's equality should be enshrined in our Constitution.''

And as Senator Murkowski said, the requisite number of States have ratified the Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution. The arbitrary time limit that was put on by Congress is the only reason we haven't had a certification process.

The vast majority of Americans agree with this principle today. A 2020 AP poll found that 74 percent of Americans--74 percent--favor the Equal Rights Amendment. A second spring poll conducted by Pew found that 78 percent of respondents were in support of adding women to the Constitution. In a nation as divided as ours has become, a principle with this level of support on this important topic compels our attention and our action.

Given that so much has changed since this amendment was first written and since it was first proposed by Congress to the States, it is worth explaining some of the practical effects it

could have if formalized today. First, it would expand legal recourse against gender discrimination. Second, it would empower those of us in Congress to enact stronger laws preventing gender discrimination across a wide array of issues. Third, it would require the Supreme Court--or courts--to use a higher standard of review than is currently applied in the cases of gender discrimination.

The ratification of the ERA could be expected to have effects across such diverse areas as pay discrimination, LGBTQ rights, gender-based and domestic violence, sexual harassment, and more. This constitutional amendment would provide a firmer foundation for existing laws and create new authority for Congress to pass laws in areas in which it has historically lacked a constitutional prerogative.

Our Constitution is a framework of, by, and for the people. It must be able to evolve to meet the changing views and beliefs of the people. Already a majority of the U.S. Senate has cosponsored the bipartisan resolution that I referred to, S.J. Res. 1, that Senator Murkowski and I introduced to remove the procedural deadline that Congress once set to honor the clear will of the people and to make the legitimacy of our 28th Amendment clear beyond a doubt.

The House of Representatives has already passed this resolution twice. It is time for us to do the same. I look forward to the opportunity to bring this resolution to the floor in the coming months and would strongly urge every one of my colleagues to support that resolution. Thirty-eight States have already ratified it. Most Americans already think it is in our Constitution. Let's get that job done.

Bicentennial Birth of Harriet Tubman

Madam President, March 8, as has been pointed out, is International Women's Day. It happens during the month of March, which is Women's History Month, here in the United States.

I wish to commemorate the bicentennial birth of one of Maryland's most iconic leaders, a true American hero who has inspired global human rights' defenders, and that is Harriet Tubman.

As we close this year's chapter of Black History Month and ring in Women's History Month, what better way to celebrate these annual observances than by honoring the valor, journey, and life of Harriet Tubman and her fight for freedom, which intersects with our modern-day fight for civil rights, climate action, and environmental justice.

Harriet Tubman was born Araminta Ross in Dorchester County, MD, along our Eastern Shore, around 1822. She was the ``Moses of her people,'' personally leading at least 70 enslaved people to freedom. She is a cherished daughter of Maryland. She did this at great personal sacrifice to her own safety and freedom on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.

This year, in 2022, we observe the bicentennial of the start of her life as a key leader in the abolition and women's suffrage movements. She embodied extraordinary courage and took immeasurable risks as a soldier, spy, and conductor on the Underground Railroad, leading her family and communities to freedom. In an unjust country to her race, she was there, working for America's future and helping to liberate the enslaved people.

In Maryland, this year also marks the 5-year anniversary of the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Visitor Center, which opened its doors to the public in 2017. In its first year, it drew nearly 100,000 visitors from every State and more than 70 countries, exceeding all expectations. It is inspirational to see this visitor center and to see her journey through life and what she was able to accomplish. One person can make a difference. As Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., told us frequently, ``Each one of us in this world can make a difference.'' Harriet Tubman made such a difference throughout her lifetime.

The visitor center houses exhibit space that shares Tubman's compelling story, surrounded by landscape and waterways preserved to resemble how they would have appeared to her over 200 years ago in her early life as an enslaved child, young woman, and freedom seeker. The Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad National Monument and National Historical Park preserve these characteristics in her early home on Maryland's Eastern Shore.

The visitor center serves as an orientation center to the national monument and historical park and gateway to the larger Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad Scenic Byway, which includes the Brodess Farm, where Harriet Tubman lived as a child; Bucktown General Store, where she first stood up against the oppressors as a young girl; and other places that were part of the Underground Railroad in Dorchester, Talbot, and Caroline Counties.

I recently introduced legislation with my colleagues in the Baltimore congressional delegation, S. 3744, reauthorizing the designations of the Baltimore National Heritage Area, which encompasses listings on the Underground Railroad network.

Harriet Tubman was not only a fierce defender for freedom from slavery but also for the women's rights movement, particularly for Black women. Following her treacherous journey to freedom, Harriet Tubman spoke on the importance of women's suffrage in New York, Washington, and Boston. In 1896, she was one of the first guests to speak at the National Association of Colored Women and was hailed a strong advocate. Women secured the right to vote in 1920 with the 19th Amendment, but it wasn't until 1965 that voting rights became a reality for Black women.

Let me conclude my comments on Women's History Month by once again quoting from President Biden.

As President Biden proclaimed Women's History Month this month, he said:

As we reflect on the achievements of women and girls across

the centuries and pay tribute to the pioneers who paved the

way, let us recommit to the fight and help realize the deeply

American vision of a more equal society where every person

has a shot at pursuing the American dream. In doing so, we

will advance economic growth, our health and safety, and the

security of our Nation and the world.

I yield the floor.