Floor Statements

I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, anyone who can represent a known pathological liar like Donald Trump can have no integrity and should never be Attorney General.

We all know lawyers are supposed to represent their clients, but when you represent a client who just lies and lies and lies, pathologically, you should never be Attorney General.

The only thing today's hearing will confirm is that Todd Blanche represents one client alone, Donald Trump, and he will continue to represent that lying client when he is Attorney General. There will be no integrity. There will be no real basis of fact. He will just do whatever Trump wants. We know that.

But the central question today, at this hearing and on into the process, is not of what Trump wants but what Senate Republicans will do. Let me repeat that. The crucial question today is not what Trump wants, but what Senate Republicans will do.

Where are the Senate Republicans? Are Republicans really going to go to the mat for Blanche, after he aided Trump in his corruption every step of the way? Do Senate Republicans have no issue with Blanche masterminding Trump's MAGA slush fund, arranging Trump's sweetheart deal from the IRS, and refusing to release 3 million pages of the Epstein file? Come on, Republicans, you have no shame? Is there no bar that can block you from, prevent you from, putting a man like this as Attorney General?

Republicans have set the bar so low for our Nation's top law enforcement official that you have to dig for it. The American people don't trust Todd Blanche. Neither should Senate Republicans, plain and simple.

Now, let me talk a little bit about the SAVE Act. Republicans keep screwing around in reconciliation with Trump's voter suppression SAVE Act. Republicans should know by now that it ain't going to fly with us, with the courts, or with the American people. I will say it as many times as it takes: The SAVE Act is dead on arrival here in the Senate.

I don't care how Republicans try to package their plan to resurrect the old ghost of Jim Crowe. We will kill it.

Trump's blatant effort to strip Americans of their voting rights is withering in the courts, too. Yesterday--just yesterday--Trump lost his 14th and 15th cases trying to demand state voter rolls.

Hey, Donald, what you are doing is illegal and unconstitutional, and the courts are making that very clear.

Rightwing Republicans like the Senator from Utah can bluster all they want, but the SAVE Act is not going to become law. Trump will have to face all the voters, not just the ones he wants, in November.

And the mess the Republicans find themselves in right now won't go away until they realize just how futile this effort to disenfranchise millions of Americans is.

Instead, Trump has bragged on national TV that he plans to force a shutdown if he doesn't get his way on the SAVE Act. Trump said: Republicans have to pass SAVE, otherwise we are going to have a shutdown in November.

Hear that, Republicans? You hear that, Americans? You hear that, voters?

Trump says he is going to shut down the government to take away Americans' voting rights. Are Republicans going to go along with that?

I remind Donald again--as I did yesterday--last time you bragged about shutting down the government with Nancy and me in the Oval Office didn't come out too good for you, Donald. This one will come out even worse.

So I hope Republicans hear this. Trump says he is going to shut down the government so he can take away Americans' voting rights. How do you think that is going to go over in this country?

Democrats aren't saying we want a shutdown; Trump is. Republicans ought to do themselves a favor and bury the SAVE Act once and for all.

Now, on Iran, the hole Donald Trump keeps digging himself into has turned into a chasm. Trump continues to escalate his asinine war of whim with Iran.

Yesterday, Trump renewed his threat to bomb Iran's civilian infrastructure--something that was criticized across the board the last time he lashed out.

Democrats voted unanimously against the NDAA--unanimously--because the belief of our caucus is wide and deep: Congress cannot continue business as usual on the annual Defense bill when Trump is actively escalating one of the worst national security disasters in American history. That is what he is doing.

Trump can't launch a directionless war, defy Congress' bipartisan demands that it end, refuse to level with the American people about the cost, and then expect Democrats to follow quietly and vote all the money he wants to continue this absurdity.

We will not act like a rubberstamp when our servicemen are in harm's way abroad and Americans are getting crushed financially and at the gas pump here at home. No way. Democrats have not and will not go along with this war.

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

Mr. President, how long will Republicans let Trump's secret police continue to sow chaos and violence in our American streets?

For the second time in less than a week, ICE agents fatally shot someone, first in Texas and again in Maine yesterday.

There are still a lot of unanswered questions about these two shootings, but what little we do know is disturbing, to say the least. Both cases appear to have involved ICE agents who were not wearing body cameras--killing individuals who were not the subject of the agents' warrant.

Why were these two people shot at and killed? We don't know the answers. There are no body cameras yet. There are no body cameras as we would require. The ICE agents in Texas were also riding in unmarked vehicles. If Republicans had passed our bill, there would be body cameras, proper agent ID, warrant requirements, and other commonsense reforms, and these killings might not have happened.

I hope our Republican colleagues are listening. If they had passed our reforms, these killings might not have happened. With those reforms, we would have at least had a better idea as to what exactly happened so that we could have avoided further killings in the future. Instead, Republicans poured tens of billions of dollars into Trump's rogue Agencies with no strings attached--no strings attached. While every other police department in America has rules, our Republican colleagues and Trump said: No rules. Do whatever you want. And look at the results. Look at what has happened.

It is dangerous to give ICE agents free rein when we expect every other law enforcement agency in the country to follow basic codes of conduct. Allowing unidentified Federal agents to roam through American streets, to

kick down people's doors without a warrant, to shoot people dead in the street without any--any--provocation, as it might well have been here, is an invitation for state-sanctioned violence, not an immigration policy.

I am calling on the Trump administration to release all information related to these two shootings, and we need to conduct independent investigations of each.

The American people need to know how and why this chaos is spreading through their streets. Republicans who refuse to go along with real reforms of ICE--reforms that we see in every police department in the country--should pivot, change their minds, realize these shootings were just awful and work with us to reform this rogue Agency. The American people need to know, of course, how and why this chaos is spreading through their streets, and we need a complete investigation that is independent.

Now, Mr. President, on Iran and the NDAA, when all the Trump administration can say about his disastrous war with Iran is that Vietnam was worse--a point Trump made yesterday--he reveals the scale of his failure. This is what Donald Trump said. The only thing he can say is that Vietnam was worse.

Oh my God, a war that killed close to 50,000 Americans, a war that lasted almost a decade, a war that ripped America apart in ways that took decades to recover is what he compares Iran to? Oh my God.

Trump's supposed cease-fire deal has completely collapsed. Our troops are coming under attack. The Strait of Hormuz is a minefield, and gas prices are going back up. Donald Trump is totally out of his depth. In fact, Donald Trump is drowning in the Strait of Hormuz because he has no plan. He had no plan when he got America into this war, and he has no plan on how to get us out. Trump started the war without authorization, without a strategy, without an exit.

The reason that we have war powers acts is to force an administration to think through the consequences of going to war ahead of time. Trump, of course, didn't listen. Finally, after weeks, bipartisan majorities in both Chambers of Congress voted to end it. We had tried and tried. Finally, enough Republicans joined us, but Donald Trump ignored them.

Now the White House has formally notified Congress that hostilities have resumed; that American strikes are underway again; and that our forces remain positioned for more. Yet Republicans want the Senate to take up the NDAA--the Defense bill--as though none of this is happening, as though Congress can debate the Nation's central national security bill while ignoring the Nation's most urgent national security crisis. We cannot.

I will be voting no.

The President is waging an unauthorized war in defying bipartisan majorities in Congress and in refusing to level with the American people about the cost, the mission, or the endgame. The NDAA cannot become a permission slip for that recklessness that we see occurring in Iran. Donald Trump does not get to drag the American people deeper into a war he cannot explain and does not know how to end and then demand Congress look the other way.

Donald Trump and the administration have no authorization, no strategy, no peace, no blank check. Therefore, a day after the President told Congress that his war is back on, I am a no--a strong no--on the NDAA.

Mr. President, on this Trump election task force--it just gets crazier and crazier with this administration. Yesterday, the White House announced that Trump and his election task force will reveal intelligence reports that supposedly corroborate his baseless lies about the 2020 election. Give me a break.

Donald, start focusing on lowering Americans' costs, not on your conspiracy theory that the 2020 elections were stolen from you. You don't have proof. You haven't come up with proof for 6 years because there is no proof, Donald Trump. You haven't come up with the proof because it isn't there. There is no proof.

Trump should get off all of this nonsense, all of this wishful thinking, all of this lunacy and focus on what people actually care about--their higher costs. If Trump thought about November 2026 half as much as he thinks about 2020, maybe his party wouldn't be scrambling right now.

Apparently, Trump also plans to say that Senators Ossoff and Warnock were illegitimate because of election fraud. How desperate can Trump get? He is flailing. His effort to overturn what happened in 2020 is a mission impossible. He ought to wake up, smell the coffee, and abandon this frivolous, ludicrous, diversionary effort. Trump's obvious desperation might be amusing if it weren't so dangerous. Without question, it is part of Trump's effort to subvert the 2026 midterm elections.

The whole reason Republicans are in their current mess is that Trump refuses to drop his radical SAVE Act--to strip millions of Americans of their voting rights. Trump has made clear, once again, who plans to force a shutdown--Donald Trump; yes, Donald Trump. Yesterday, Trump said Republicans have to get rid of the filibuster and pass the SAVE Act ``otherwise we're going to have a shutdown.'' That is what he said yesterday.

So, Americans, hear this: If there is a shutdown, it is on Donald Trump's back.

Donald, do you remember the last time you demanded a shutdown when Nancy and I were in your office? It didn't work out too well for you then, and it won't work out too well for you now.

America, hear this: If there is a shutdown, it is on Donald Trump's back.

Unless Trump changes his course, realizes the SAVE Act cannot pass, and starts working on more productive things, we could be headed for another Trump shutdown.

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, my prayers and those of my family are with Senator Graham's family, staff, and friends after his sudden, sudden passing yesterday. We see the white roses on his desk, and we think of Lindsey.

Senator Graham devoted much of his life to public service--first in the military and then in Congress, where he represented South Carolina for more than three decades. To the very end, Senator Graham's life was defined by public service. He was an important Member of this institution and a crucial voice for his constituents in South Carolina.

For all of our many and vehement disagreements, Senator Graham and I still found ways to work together. One of the first things we did together was travel to China. We both believed that China was manipulating its currency, hurting American exports, hurting American jobs, and together we hammered away at that issue.

At first, neither the left nor the right believed us. Amazingly enough, both the New York Times, a liberal publication, and the Wall Street Journal, a conservative publication, said there is no such thing as currency manipulation, but Graham and I proved to be correct, and we took some real efforts over the next few years to stop that manipulation and the outflow of American jobs.

We worked together and hashed out a framework for commonsense, comprehensive immigration reform--the so-called Gang of Eight led by myself and Senator McCain and with Lindsey Graham as a key member. We worked hard. We didn't agree on everything in our bipartisan immigration proposal, but we agreed it was worth trying because doing nothing was worse. We also found common ground in our effort to aid Ukraine after the Russian invasion.

I know that if Senator Graham were here in the Chamber today, he would also join me in urging the Senate to support Ukraine and strengthen sanctions on Russia. I urge Senator Thune in honor of Lindsey to put the Russia sanctions bill on the floor immediately. It will pass overwhelmingly and help our allies in Ukraine.

Not seeing eye to eye is no reason to be blind to the way forward. Lindsey could understand that. Every Senator ought to do the same.

Mr. President, now, on the shutdown: Well, somehow, Republicans are even in a bigger mess now than when they left Washington 2 weeks ago. It was hard to make things even worse, especially while we were on the July 4 recess, but they did. Donald Trump is the mastermind at making things worse and worse and worse.

Just this morning, Donald Trump told ``FOX & Friends":

Republicans have to [terminate the filibuster]. It's so

insane. Otherwise, we're gonna have a shutdown in September.

The Trump shutdown--he is bragging about it; he is predicting it. Republicans have to terminate the filibuster, or we will have a shutdown in September, says Donald Trump.

So it is clear. It is very clear. I know the Senator from Wyoming talks about Democrats wanting a shutdown. Well, he ought to listen to Donald Trump. He is the one who wants it. It is clear, if we head toward a shutdown in September, it will be Trump who is responsible. He is telling the American people he wants a shutdown.

Oh, Donald, do you remember the last time you called for a shutdown, when you challenged Nancy Pelosi and I in the Oval Office and told us you wanted a shutdown? Donald, it didn't work out too well for you then. It won't work out well for you now either.

And to all the Republican Senators, including my good friend from Wyoming, who keep insisting that Democrats are hell-bent on shutting down the government, well, they ought to listen to what their own President is saying. Democrats aren't saying we want a shutdown; Trump is. Donald Trump is saying the quiet part out loud. He has no issue with shutting down the Federal Government to force through his radical agenda.

If Republicans want to clean up their mess, it will require working with Democrats, not seeing us as partisan foes but as fellow Americans. Instead, what are Republicans doing? They are advancing a lopsided, partisan spending bill that would supersize the budget for Trump's disastrous war with Iran without providing cost relief to working families or reining in Donald Trump's corruption. That is unacceptable.

Let's put Republican accusations to rest. Democrats want to fund the government and avoid a shutdown and pass strong, bipartisan appropriations bills that improve people's lives. Democrats believe our budget ought to help families make ends meet. Democrats want a budget that invests in bringing down American costs, not one that burns taxpayer dollars on Donald Trump's reckless war.

Republicans have plenty of time to drop their ``my way or the highway'' partisan game. Most Republicans know how ridiculous the SAVE Act is, how unconstitutional it probably is. But Trump is still insisting on it because he thinks it is the only way he can win an election is by fixing it, by eliminating tens of millions of people from the voter rolls. And so he says: Unless I get my way--a little temper tantrum here, Donald--I am going to shut down the government. It is something that the American people can see through in a minute, as they can see through the very unpopular SAVE Act.

If Republicans follow Trump over the cliff and insist that the government shut down if they don't get their way, it will be Donald Trump's disaster.

Mr. President, on the Blanche nomination, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has spent this confirmation fight doing what he has always done for his client--his No. 1 client--Donald Trump: denying the obvious, defending the indefensible, and lying under oath.

As Attorney General, your No. 1 client should be the United States of America; but here, Blanche, his No. 1 client will be Donald Trump, who has no regard for our Constitution, for our values, for the rule of law, for honesty. Blanche's resume reads like a rap sheet. In his time at the Department of Justice, Blanche has helped the administration defy dozens of court orders blocking their illegal policies. Blanche continues to withhold 3 million pages of the Epstein files and lied under oath to Congress about meeting the Epstein survivors--something they deny.

Blanche was the mastermind behind and the champion of one of the most despicable acts of corruption ever in the American government: the $2 billion MAGA slush fund to give taxpayer-funded cash payouts to Trump, MAGA billionaires, and January 6 insurrectionists.

Can you imagine having this guy as Attorney General when he came up with this slush fund and propounded it? One of the most corrupt acts anyone has proposed--any Attorney General--and they want to put him in. Oh, my God.

I am pleased a Federal judge rebuked that blatantly corrupt slush fund and sweetheart immunity deal for Trump and his family, but we haven't seen the last of this administration's corruption. Blanche has devoted his career to serving Donald Trump and particularly his corrupt purposes. Blanche has gone after Trump's enemies, covered up Trump's crimes, and shielded Trump from the consequences.

Who does Trump pick in these very important law enforcement offices? People who represented him, people he knows will lie for him. If he becomes Attorney General, Blanche's letterhead might change, but his loyalty to Trump won't. Again, his No. 1 client will be Donald Trump and his lies and not the United States of America. Blanche has already made it clear we can't trust a word that comes out of his mouth. Republicans ought to remember that during the confirmation hearings.

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

Mr. President, with their dreadful, horrific Dobbs decision 4 years ago today, six far-right wing MAGA Justices broke nearly 50 years of precedent to rip the right to choose away from millions--millions--of American women.

You can sum up both the dreadful Dobbs decision and the whole far- right philosophy the same way: less freedom in your life; more government interference in your personal decisions. That is the MAGA way.

Dobbs will go down as one of the most damaging, legally dubious, and deeply out-of-touch Supreme Court decisions in American history. It is a disgrace that the Supreme Court did it. It is a disgrace on the Supreme Court itself.

Trump may not like talking about his crusade against women's reproductive rights, but he cannot hide from the pain he has inflicted on women across America. Mr. President, 20 States--20--have enacted total or near-total abortion bans, which means that nearly 40 percent of women of reproductive age live in a State with an abortion ban.

The human cost of the Republican assault on women's reproductive freedom is sickening. I have heard so many women share their stories of the horrors they have experienced in Trump's post-Roe America.

Republicans are letting women die by restricting necessary care. Some women have to travel hundreds of miles--even thousands--to get the treatment they need and deserve and are entitled to. Parents, patients, and doctors have been punished like violent criminals for lifesaving procedures that were legal just a few years ago and had been for decades before that.

The GOP is treating mifepristone like it is poison and Planned Parenthood like it is an enemy of the State. It is despicable.

Even before the Justices behind Dobbs were confirmed, anyone could see they wanted to overturn Roe. Every Republican Senator, who voted to confirm these radical Justices who stripped away these fundamental rights to choose that women have had for so long, will have to answer to the American people.

We will not--we Democrats--will not let Republicans brush their radical efforts to ban abortion under the rug. The American people know it, and we are going to keep showing the difference between the two parties on this issue when the American people are strongly on our side.

Mr. President, now Trump's visit to the Capitol. Seeing Trump come to the Capitol today to meet Senate Republicans is like watching the clown car pull up to the circus, made even more so by Trump's canceling of the bill signing, which I will talk more about in a minute.

When Trump comes to the Hill today, he will find the MAGA Senate majority in meltdown. They are one big, hot mess--that is what the Republican Senate is right now. Republicans are wringing each other's necks. They can't govern their own conference of 53 people, let alone a country of hundreds of millions.

After being doublecrossed, blindsided, and embarrassed by Trump, Senate Republicans can either keep bending the knee to the President or start demanding answers on behalf of the American people.

The reason that Republicans are such a hot mess is obvious. Trump's views are totally out of touch with the American people's views, and Republicans are afraid to tell him he is wrong.

Speak up. Stand up to Trump. Tell him what you think, Republicans. That might do your party some good. It might even do Trump some good if he would ever listen.

Americans want to know what Republicans are doing to bring down costs. Americans want to know how Trump plans to end his disastrous war with Iran. Americans want to know whether the GOP will continue going along with Trump's all-out assault on voting rights with legislation like the SAVE Act.

If my colleagues across the aisle have any sense at all, they ought to grill Trump on affordability, on his failed war with Iran, on his effort to hold American national security hostage, and all his other policies that are hurting the American people.

When they emerge from their meeting, will Republicans have told Trump the truth? Will they speak truth to power? Will they do their job? Or will they just bend in obedience to him and get more frustrated, more angry, and more ineffective than they have ever been?