Floor Statements

Madam President, the Senate has a duty and a responsibility to methodically review a Supreme Court nominee's record. That is why, in past years, the Senate has sent bipartisan letters-- bipartisan--to the National Archives and Presidential libraries requesting the necessary information on a nominee. Democrats and Republicans agreed that however we would ultimately vote, transparency and openness were principles we all shared.

It appears that bipartisan tradition has been tossed aside. It was fine for our Republican friends when they were in the minority and President Obama nominated candidates to the Supreme Court. But the double standard is glaring, enormous, and detrimental to America.

Now the Republican majority has cast aside Democratic wishes for openness and transparency and has made a partisan request for only a small subset of Judge Kavanaugh's records. It is such a break from precedent that we have to wonder: What are the Republicans hiding about Judge Kavanaugh's record? What are they so afraid of that they tie themselves in knots--into a pretzel--to contradict everything they stood for when they were in the minority?

Today, every Democrat on the Judiciary Committee has joined Ranking Member Feinstein in making a formal request of the National Archives to provide the exact same universe of documents provided during the confirmation of Justice Kagan. When I say the same request, I mean the exact same request.

The Judiciary Committee has updated the letter to refer to Judge Kavanaugh, but in every other way it is identical to the request that Democrats and Republicans made for Justice Kagan that Republicans insisted on when she was nominated by President Obama.

By the way, it was Senate Republicans who insisted on this standard during previous confirmations. Democrats, even though our nominee might be exposed, agreed because we believed in openness, and we are not hypocritical in saying that it is only good when we are in charge, not when you are in charge. We believe it works both ways.

Ranking Member Feinstein has made it clear that we don't need or want every single scrap of paper from Judge Kavanaugh's time as Staff Secretary, but to review none--none--of the nominee's records for most of his senior role in the White House is an act of what might be called willful opacity. That is why we are not following very sensible, bipartisan precedent now.

Judge Kavanaugh himself has said that his time as Staff Secretary was especially useful to him as a judge and that his time in the White House made him a better interpreter of statutes. I hope that the National Archives will understand the dilemma we are in and the unusual circumstance we are in, and, ultimately, I hope my Republican colleagues will understand and that both the Archives, either on its own or with Republican acquiescence, will make the right decision in the interests of transparency, consistency, and fairness. To do otherwise is to forsake the Senate's constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on this surpassingly important nomination.

Madam President, on another subject, taxes, President Trump and congressional Republicans promised working America the Moon and the stars with their tax bill. President Trump said that it would create ``a middle-class miracle'' and that everyone would get a $4,000 raise. Remember that? President Trump promised the American people that these tax cuts for the wealthy would trickle down--or torrent down--and everyone would get a $4,000 raise. If we asked Americans from one end of the country to the other to tell us by raising their

hands how many of them got a $4,000 raise, maybe the top 1 percent would--maybe the top 2 percent--but not most Americans.

Wages are virtually stagnant. The promises the President made have not materialized. And when we measure wages against costs of everyday living--in other words, buying power, how much of a raise you get versus how much things cost--the Bureau of Labor Statistics found that year over year, hourly earnings have dropped by 1 percent. In other words, the American consumer--the average middle-class person, even with this tax cut--has less buying power today than they had last year. President Trump and Republicans promised a $4,000 raise, but average hourly earnings' buying power--the ability to live a decent life--for far too many Americans has gone down. Talk about a sleight of hand. Talk about an exaggerated--if not dishonest--promise. There it is.

While average working Americans continue to struggle to keep their heads above water, corporations and the wealthy are having a bonanza thanks to the Republican tax bill. As the President himself tweeted this morning, the tax bill made the Koch brothers and almost every multimillionaire richer at a time when they are doing great. We don't begrudge that people are wealthy and doing well, but the middle class needed this tax break far more than the rich, even though the rich had political power over our Republican friends--and when the wealthiest lobbyists and big, powerful corporations say jump, our Republican friends say how high, ignoring the middle class. So in the Trump economy, big, wealthy corporations are cashing in, the top 1 percent are doing great, and American workers are falling behind.

Listen to this. Already this year, corporations have dedicated over $600 billion--now approaching $700 billion--to corporate share buybacks and debt repurchasing programs, goosing their stock price but doing little to help workers. That is a record pace. These buybacks help the CEOs and wealthy shareholders but do nothing for the middle class.

There is also a new, troubling pattern being brought to light of corporate executives selling off stocks shortly after the stock price has been inflated. So they do the buyback, then they sell the stock and cash in. Here is the pattern: The Republican tax bill gave American corporations a mammoth tax cut; American corporations use some of those newfound profits to buy back and inflate the value of their own stock; executives of those companies then turn around and sell the stock at a higher price to pad their pockets.

SEC Commissioner Robert Jackson studied nearly 400 examples of stock buybacks since the beginning of 2017 and found that after half of them--half--at least one executive sold shares within the next month. That is American taxpayer money, President Trump. That is the money you are taking from the American people and giving to the wealthiest of the American people. The Republican tax bill is robbing the American Treasury to pad the pockets of wealthy executives and the richest Americans.

Now, if that wasn't bad enough, listen to what they want to do now. It was reported in yesterday's newspaper, the administration is considering doing an end-run around Congress to give another $100 billion tax cut mainly to the wealthy by cutting taxes on capital gains. The economy is already running hot on the artificial sweetener of tax cuts and deficit spending. Another $100 billion in tax cuts for the rich isn't just more gasoline on the fire; it is an incendiary device.

At a time when the deficit is out of control, at a time when wages are flat, at a time when the wealthiest are doing better than ever, to give the top 1 percent another big advantage is outrageous. It shows the Republicans' true colors: tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, empty promises for everyone else.

Madam President, on North Korea, last night, we received news that North Korea has been continuing work at a missile facility north of its capital. Previous satellite images have shown work ongoing at two other missile sites in the country.

Clearly, North Korea is not suspending, let alone winding down, its nuclear missile programs. Yet, shortly after President Trump met with Chairman Kim in Singapore, President Trump said North Korea was ``no longer a nuclear threat'' to the United States. The juxtaposition of President Trump's rhetoric and the facts on the ground are jarring. It would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

President Trump explains out of nowhere that the nuclear threat is over, and North Korea is building more missiles that reportedly can reach all of the United States instead of just the West Coast. North Korea's nuclear program remains a grave threat to the region and the United States. President Trump can't wish it away. He can't place fantasy next to reality. North Korea will not give up its nuclear program simply because President Trump wants them to. Now, we are all rooting for diplomacy to succeed, but if President Trump is going to make progress toward the complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization of North Korea, he needs to grapple with the reality of the situation, not be in a dream world where he thinks his rhetoric is reality, when it doesn't match the dangerous reality on the ground.

Madam President, finally, on 3D guns, in a short time, just a minute or two from now, I will be joining several of my colleagues to talk about an issue we have been worried about for quite a while--ghost guns. Over the past several years, 3D printing technology has advanced to the point where anyone with an internet connection is now able to print guns at home.

A court order has barred companies from posting plans to print guns, but a few weeks ago, inexplicably, the Trump administration settled with gun activists to allow them to post detailed instructions, plans, files, and 3D drawings of weapons on the internet, and this starts tomorrow. So, starting tomorrow, all you need is a little money--a couple hundred bucks--and you can download a print from the internet to make a gun at home. No background check, no criminal history check, no certification that the person isn't adjudicated mentally ill or has the intent to harm. Even terrorists could avail themselves of this technology to print an unlimited amount of home weapons. According to the New York Post, more than 1,000 people have downloaded plans to make AR-style, 3D-printed guns, and the ban hasn't even been lifted yet.

The idea of these print-on-command ghost guns is as scary as they sound. We should be doing everything in our power to make sure this doesn't happen. These guns can go through metal detectors, stadiums, and airports: No metal; they are made of plastic only.

Out of the blue this morning, President Trump tweeted he was looking into the matter, months after his own administration caused the problem by settling with gun activists and allowing it to happen. From 2010 to 2017, you couldn't do this. There was an international agreement. The Trump administration, because gun activists were pushing, said go ahead and do it.

Now, a day before this happens, President Trump is saying he will look into the matter--although he said he would consult the NRA. Hardly the great advocates of gun safety in America. I wish President Trump had looked into this matter months ago--or even last week--and urged the Justice Department and the State Department not to reach the settlement in the first place. It is another example--of so many--of the President showing up on the scene a day late and a dollar short to address a problem his own administration has created. The President's tweet this morning gets to the basic incompetence of this administration: The left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing, and it has real important consequences for the safety of the American people.

I look forward to joining my colleagues to talk more about this issue and what Congress can do about it.

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, on Friday, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Chuck Grassley, sent a letter to the George W. Bush Library requesting only a small portion of Judge Kavanaugh's records. Traditionally, letters from the Senate Judiciary Committee requesting the records for a Supreme Court nominee have been bipartisan and complete. When Democrats were in the majority, we joined with the Republican minority to request all--not some, all--of Elena Kagan's White House documents. When Democrats were in the majority, we joined with the Republican minority to request all--not some--of Judge Sotomayor's documents. At Republicans' insistence, that included documents from 30 years ago, when she served as a board member of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, because they had questions about her views on certain of those issues. It was a request that we thought stretched a little far, but we went along for the sake of transparency and openness. So this idea that it should be only the legal records is totally undone and gainsaid by what they requested of Judge Sotomayor.

Now the Republicans are in the majority, and the shoe is on the other foot. Chairman Grassley, unfortunately, has broken with all precedent and refused Democratic requests for Judge Kavanaugh's full record. He sent a letter to the Archivist at 5 p.m. Friday--that is usually a time when people do things they don't want people to catch wind of--making such a request.

My Republican colleagues know that this was wrong. That is why they sent it so late on a Friday, hoping to bury it. This letter makes it clear that Republicans intend to block the Senate and the American people from access to the bulk of Judge Kavanaugh's White House records.

So the question looms: What are they hiding? What are they afraid of? Why wouldn't they grant the kind of openness to records that America prides itself on? Why wouldn't they grant a request for openness of records when we are going to vote on someone who will have huge power over the lives of average Americans for a whole generation? Why shouldn't we see what that record is about before we vote?

In this letter, Senate Republicans are requesting only documents from 2 of the 5 years that Judge Kavanaugh was in the White House--only documents from his time in the White House Counsel's office, not as Staff Secretary. But Staff Secretary was the most senior job in the White House the nominee held. In Judge Kavanaugh's own words, the position of Staff Secretary was hugely influential in his career. He worked there during a time of great controversy.

Over the weekend, the New York Times reported, for instance, that as Staff Secretary, Brett Kavanaugh likely oversaw President Bush's controversial signing statements on torture. By his own account, he was involved in President Bush's decision to select a Supreme Court Justice. Why the heck that is not relevant to choosing him as a Supreme Court Justice is beyond explanation. They can't give an explanation; they just want to rush it through.

There is no good reason to argue that Judge Kavanaugh's time as Staff Secretary isn't relevant to understanding what kind of Justice he might be. Yet, Senate Republicans requested none--absolutely none--of the records from this period in Kavanaugh's career. What are they hiding?

Worse yet, here is what we learned Friday, amazingly: The documents we are going to receive are being screened by a partisan lawyer with ties to President Trump and Steve Bannon. That is right. The lawyer who is going over these documents, who is screening them, not only has ties to President Trump but also to Steve Bannon, one of the most partisan people this administration has ever seen.

My Republican friends are checking all the boxes on the obstruction list--hiding documents, collaborating with political operative lawyers, and then causing the process to slow down so that there is as little time for the American people to review the documents as possible. A bipartisan letter should have been sent 2 weeks ago.

When Democrats were in charge, that is what we did. We didn't tell the Republican minority: You can have this request and not that. Senator Grassley says: Well, there was never a White House Counsel, a White House Secretary. What is the difference?

As Republicans, they requested Judge Sotomayor's records for the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund 30 years earlier. We didn't say: That is a difference. Every request was granted. Why are they not being granted now? They are hiding something is what many people would say.

I hope my colleagues will bring these political games to an end, for the sake of our country, for the sake of comity, and for the sake of bipartisanship. Our Republican friends talk a game of bipartisanship but never seem to act it out. And they invoke a double standard: What was good for them when they were in the minority is not good for us while we are in the minority.

The Senate and the American people deserve access to the full records from the man who has been nominated to a lifetime appointment in such a powerful position as Justice of the Supreme Court. I hope my colleagues on the Republican side will bring these games to an end.

Mr. President, on Britt Grant, the new nominee for the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals--Britt Grant, throughout her career, has expressed views far outside the mainstream. When you read this list, you will say: How did they come up with someone so on the fringe? She is not someone who is a mainstream conservative, but way out there.

As solicitor general, she defended a law that made it illegal for doctors to perform an abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy and assisted on an amicus brief arguing that defining marriage as between a man and a woman does not violate the Constitution's guarantee of equal protection.

She worked on a brief for the Supreme Court that defended a Georgia prosecutor's decision to strike Black jurors based on their race. She led Georgia's challenge to DACA, even though 85, 90 percent of all Americans are for DACA.

Before becoming Georgia's solicitor general, she argued against the Affordable Care Act, assisted on an amicus brief defending Indiana's defunding of Planned Parenthood, urged the Supreme Court to gut the Voting Rights

Act, and argued to strike down the Affordable Care Act's contraception coverage mandate.

So from reproductive rights to civil rights to gun safety, name a partisan legal case from the past 5 years, and there is a good chance that Britt Grant has been involved, taking up a fringe legal argument-- way out of the American mainstream--to weaken well-established rights and overturn precedent in pursuit of an ideological objective.

I would also like to bring to my colleagues' attention that in speeches and in handwritten notes--even with this extreme record--Judge Brett Kavanaugh has repeatedly praised Britt Grant's record. In fact, Kavanaugh called Britt Grant ``a superb solicitor general of Georgia.'' That is someone with these extreme views.

Judge Kavanaugh's ringing endorsement of Britt Grant's record may serve as a window into his own judicial philosophy. It makes you wonder: What, exactly, does Judge Kavanaugh agree with her on so that he would call her so many laudatory things?

Does he agree with Britt Grant that a woman's constitutional, guaranteed freedom to make her own reproductive choices should be curtailed, even though an overwhelming majority of Americans support Roe? Does he believe, like Britt Grant, that States should be able to define marriage as only between a man and a woman, even though the Supreme Court has declared things the other way? Does he believe, like Britt Grant, that insurers shouldn't have to provide contraceptive coverage?

Britt Grant is the kind of lawyer Judge Kavanaugh, in his own words, considers ``superb.'' Maybe that is why they both ended up on the same short list of 25 potential out-of-the-mainstream court nominees--out of the mainstream because they were vetted by the Heritage Foundation, which believes that the government should not be involved in healthcare, and by the Federalist Society, whose leader's goal is to repeal Roe v. Wade, even though 71 percent of Americans are against that repeal.

Whether you are a Democrat or a Republican or Independent, you should want a better process for choosing judges. The American people deserve judges from the legal mainstream who will interpret the law rather than make it, who will respect and defer to precedent unless there is a darn good reason not to--not just folks picked off some list prevetted by extreme conservative groups that don't represent what a majority of Americans think, and they probably don't even represent what a majority of Republicans think. But the Republican majority has been advancing an assembly line of nakedly partisan, ideological judges like Britt Grant. That Judge Kavanaugh has praised her record so roundly is concerning.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, both parties used to agree that the thorough review of a Supreme Court nominee's record was essential to fulfilling our constitutional advice and consent obligations as Senators.

When Elena Kagan was nominated 8 years ago, even though Democrats were in the majority and Republicans were in the minority, Chairman Leahy joined with Republicans to request all of Elena Kagan's records from her time in the White House. Now the shoe is on the other foot. We are in the minority; they are in the majority. But rather than applying the previous, bipartisan standard, the Republican majority is refusing to join with Democrats in requesting Brett Kavanaugh's complete record.

At issue is Brett Kavanaugh's time as Staff Secretary in the Bush White House. Republicans argue we don't need to see papers from that part of his career; Democrats argue we most certainly do. Republicans are being hypocritical and sophistic.

In both cases, we said that we needed all of the papers. Why? Because this is such an important job, and we ought to see the complete record of whoever the nominee is.

Now they are saying: Well, counsel is OK, but Staff Secretary isn't, and Kagan wasn't a Staff Secretary. So what? So what?

The relevant standard is all of the records, no matter what jobs they had, and Republicans are trying to come up with a difference for reasons that people are asking why. Are they hiding something? Is Kavanaugh hiding something? What did he do when he was Staff Secretary that he doesn't want the American public to see?

The Republicans say that the job of Staff Secretary wasn't so important, merely a paper pusher. Bull. The Senate doesn't need to see anything from that period, they say, because the job was unimportant. Second, they say that his years as a judge should preclude him from having to provide paperwork from his earlier work as a top White House official.

The Republicans keep moving the goalposts. They keep changing the standards to suit their needs to accomplish their goal--a hard-right, anti-middle-class, anti-choice, anti-healthcare Supreme Court. That is their goal. They can't accomplish it here; they can't accomplish it in the House; they can't even accomplish it with President Trump because those are elected branches of government, and the public pushes back. But with judges, they can, so they keep moving the goalposts and changing the rules time and again.

Their arguments don't withstand scrutiny. Let's take the first one: The job of Staff Secretary wasn't so important. That is a laugher. Brett Kavanaugh himself has said that ``my three years as Staff Secretary for President Bush--were the most interesting and in many ways among the most instructive.'' If he feels they were most instructive, why shouldn't the American people see what instructed him? By his own account, during his time in the White House and as Staff Secretary, Judge Kavanaugh attended meetings with world leaders from the Pope to Vladimir Putin. He participated ``in the process of putting legislation together,'' and he talked to the President of the United States about how he should pick someone for the Supreme Court. In fact, Judge Kavanaugh said his time as Staff Secretary made him a ``better interpreter of statutes.''

Over and over again, Judge Kavanaugh has said that this was an important position and it critically informed who he is as a judge and who he will be, should he be confirmed--I hope he isn't--to the Supreme Court. So the argument the Republicans have made that Staff Secretary isn't an important job is virtually laughable and a coverup for their fear of letting all the records out.

The second argument we are hearing is that it is gratuitous and unreasonable to ask for documents from Brett Kavanaugh's career before he became a judge. Well, they have amnesia on the other side. Nine years ago, when this body was considering the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, Senate Republicans on the Judiciary Committee requested all of the paperwork from her tenure at the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund.

Sotomayor was a judge for 15 years--3 longer than Judge Kavanaugh-- and still Republicans, just 9 years ago, said they needed ``minutes from the board meetings'' that Justice Sotomayor attended as far back as 29 years before her confirmation hearings. Here is what Senator Sessions said in 2009:

The [Puerto Rican legal defense fund] documents may provide

insight into [Sotomayor's] judicial approach. . . . The

American people have a right to know this important

information about President Obama's nominee.

Guess what. Senator Leahy, then chairman, joined Sessions in requesting those documents. Democrats have been very open about their nominees--our nominees--and we have let the full records come out. We are not afraid of who they are. But when the Republicans are in charge, they come up with all of these elliptical, sophistic, and fundamentally hypocritical arguments about why that record shouldn't be made available. We have never heard those from Democrats. It is just unfair.

So when my friends from the other side say that we don't need all of Kavanaugh's documents because White House Staff Secretary isn't an important job, we ask: Isn't it a more important job than being part of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, from which you demanded records? Of course it is.

It seems each time Democrats demonstrate that our request is 100 percent consistent with the Senate's bipartisan precedents, we hear some new, strained, contorted rationalization from Senate Republicans as to why a new, partisan approach is called for now and why the Senate should avert its gaze from Judge Kavanaugh's work as one of the most senior officials in the White House. Republicans keep moving the goalposts in what I can only characterize as a flimsy and transparent attempt to mask their own hypocrisy.

Again, there is an obvious, looming question: What are Republicans trying to hide in Judge Kavanaugh's record? What don't they want the public to see? Why are they making such hypocrites of themselves in coming up with these solipsistic arguments that when they were in the minority and President Obama nominated people, they should get all the records, but not now?

If there is nothing to hide for Judge Kavanaugh, then let the sunlight shine. Let the records come out.

My Republican friends seem to think that some Democrats have announced their opposition to Judge Kavanaugh, and that means the full Senate doesn't deserve to have access to his records. Frankly, it is rich to hear this from the Republican leader. People are rolling their eyes. He refused to consider any nominee by President Obama--it didn't matter who it was--mere hours after we received the news of Justice Scalia's death. It was one of the most shameful chapters in the Senate. I know there is gloating on the hard right: Wasn't that a brilliant move?

It is going to go down in history as one of the low points of the Senate, and Senator McConnell will have to bear that on his shoulders. I say that even though he is my friend.

I say to my Republican colleagues: This is not about Democrats. This is not about individual Senators and how they might vote. It is about the American people. We have an open government. The American people deserve a chance to hear the full record, make their judgments, and let their elected representatives know now, before the nominee is voted on and in November.

When Elena Kagan's documents were requested by the Senate, they were almost immediately posted online for everyone to see, and they are still there. You can look them up. This isn't about how some of my Democratic colleagues may vote on Judge Kavanaugh; this is about hiding critical information about a Supreme Court nominee from the American people.

This is simple. Senate Democrats are following a bipartisan precedent; Senate Republicans are not. Republicans are playing a partisan game in hopes of withholding and hiding relevant information from the Senate and the public.

I will make one final plea to my colleagues on the other side, who seem to think the whole thing is just a political game and that there is nothing deep or sincere about the foundation of this Republic. This is not a game. This is a nomination for a lifetime appointment to a seat on the Supreme Court of the United States. It is one of the most important votes any of us will ever cast. The American people expect and deserve that the Senate take its constitutional duty seriously. I hope our Republican colleagues will stop their partisan, self-serving games and let the Senate do its job.

Healthcare

Madam President, on healthcare, a year ago this week, the Senate defeated a partisan attempt by President Trump and Senate Republicans to repeal the healthcare law. Since that ignominious defeat, where John McCain showed such courage and looked so much better than so many of my other colleagues across the aisle in what they are doing now, the Trump administration and congressional Republicans have sabotaged our healthcare system, raising costs on American families, driving up premiums, reducing the quality of care. For what reason? There seems to be hardly any reason, other than political spite.

President Trump is an expert on political spite. We all know that. Our Republican colleagues just march blithely behind him. They hate the Affordable Care Act so much that they are willing to take a torch to our healthcare system, even though it hurts millions of average Americans.

The Trump administration is trying to gut protections for Americans with preexisting conditions through the courts. The administration has directed the Justice Department not to defend the constitutionality of preexisting conditions and at the same time is pushing Judge Kavanaugh onto the Bench.

Remember, President Trump said that his ``judicial appointments would do the right thing, unlike Judge Roberts on health care.'' Make no mistake about it, America, Judge Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court puts the future of protections for preexisting conditions in the spotlight.

I would like every Republican Senator to go home and defend that. Go home and defend that they want to repeal protections for preexisting conditions; go home and defend that they want to put on the Bench a nominee who is likely to do so because President Trump said so.

In a recent Kaiser poll, voters ranked continuing preexisting conditions as the most important healthcare issue in the upcoming campaign. By 58 to 27, voters said that since President Trump and congressional Republicans have made changes in the law, they are now responsible for any problems with our healthcare system moving forward.

Almost a year after the Republican healthcare bill went down, those numbers should be a stark warning to my Republican colleagues. The American people do not want endless political sabotage. They want lower costs, better quality, more stability, and, above all, they want to keep the protections for Americans with preexisting conditions.

Republicans go down the road of sabotage at their own peril. I urge my colleagues, instead, to join Democrats in defending preexisting conditions in court, as Senator Manchin, Senator Casey--who has been such a leader on healthcare, whom we will hear from in a minute--and other Democrats have asked us to do.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I thank my friend and colleague from Vermont for yielding and my colleague from Alaska, as well, for allowing me to interrupt their very important and bipartisan debate.

Nomination of Brett Kavanaugh

Mr. President, 8 years ago, when Elena Kagan was nominated to the Supreme Court, Senate Republicans said: We must get all of her documents from the Clinton Library and have enough time to analyze them so that we can determine whether she should be a Justice. The Republican leadership did not say some of the documents; they did not say a subset of the documents; they did not say the documents for just one administrative job; they said all of her documents.

I showed this letter yesterday to my friend who is now the chairman of the Judiciary, Senator Grassley. He said it is totally different. He is a man of integrity, but I know there are times he gets twisted by his leadership and the President to do things that aren't consistent, and this is one of them.

The Republicans didn't ask only for certain documents. They asked for all, and we are asking for all. This is one of the most important positions in the world and certainly in America. Shouldn't we know everything? It is not just some of the stuff and some of the stuff that the White House wants us to know--but everything.

Our friends on the other side of the aisle demanded all of the documents for Justice Kagan. The Democrats agreed. It was the right thing to do. And because Elena Kagan had nothing to hide, she went happily forward and said: Go right ahead. Now Republicans ought to do the same thing for Judge Kavanaugh, particularly if he has nothing to hide.

For the last week, Senator Feinstein has been ready to jointly request the same documents of Judge Kavanaugh that Republicans demanded of Justice Kagan, but our Republican colleagues are dragging their feet and refusing to agree. They are the reason this whole activity has been slowed down. It is not Democratic obstruction. It is the Democrats' desire for transparency and openness that the Republicans are blocking. They are being the obstructionists.

The Republicans' rationale is--they are downplaying Judge Kavanaugh's role as White House Staff Secretary. They argue that we don't need to see documents from that part of his career, although they have no argument against it. They think we don't need them. We think we do. Why not show them to us?

Here is what Judge Kavanaugh himself has said. He said that ``my 3 years as Staff Secretary for President Bush--were the most interesting and in many ways the most instructive.''

Kavanaugh himself said that the very documents we want to see and Republicans are blocking us from seeing are the most instructive. Shouldn't the American people see the writings of what their own nominee calls the most instructive?

As Staff Secretary, Kavanaugh said he ``participated in the process of putting together legislation.'' He drafted and revised Executive orders. He consulted on judicial nominations, including the replacement of Chief Justice Rehnquist. Isn't that something we want to know--what his thoughts were about who should be a Justice? Wouldn't that really inform us of what kind of Justice he might be?

He was one of the most senior officials in the Bush White House, 1 of only 17 out of hundreds of Presidential aides who were paid the maximum White House salary. I am sure he deserved it. That is not the issue. The issue is that he was an extremely high-ranking official there. This is not looking at when he was some clerk. It was a major, defining part of his career.

So here we go. Once again, Republicans are against transparency and are against the full record for one of the world's most powerful positions, which will last a lifetime. All of this stonewalling on getting Judge Kavanaugh's records from his time as Staff Secretary raises these looming questions: What are Judge Kavanaugh and the Republicans hiding? Why are Republicans hiding his full record from the Senate and the American people? What don't they want us to see? What don't they want the American people to see? Is there something there so damning that it might defeat Judge Kavanaugh's nomination? If there is, we are entitled to see it. If there is not, then what is the problem with moving forward?

Just last week, we saw our Republican colleagues defeat a judicial nomination based on something that nominee wrote in college. Are they really going to turn right around and say that the nominee for the highest Court in the land doesn't need to release documents that he wrote far later in his career when his views were far more formed?

This is about transparency. This is about making sure the Senate does its job in the right, complete, and open way. Democrats have made a completely reasonable request for documents--the same request we agreed to when the shoe was on the other foot. We are being consistent. Our Republican colleagues are being hypocritical. What was good for them in the minority when President Obama nominated someone is good for us in the minority when President Trump nominates someone. I will repeat the old saying from the Farmers' Almanac and elsewhere: What is good for the goose is good for the gander. It applies so, so well in this situation.

Our request is eminently reasonable. The quickest way to get this nomination moving forward is to get the documents and records, and it is for Leader McConnell and Chairman Grassley to agree to our request.

Mr. President, parenthetically, just today, we saw that the White House doctored the transcript and, supposedly, the tape of what Mr. Putin said right after the President and he met. It was sort of like an autocratic country, a nondemocracy. That is what dictators do; they change the facts and change the record. Are our Republican colleagues-- so many of them who have stood for transparency--going to join this coverup of records and truth because they don't like the results? That is not America. That is not the America the American people know and love.

Farmer Bailout

Mr. President, on the farmer bailout, yesterday, President Trump announced a $12 billion bailout for farmers who have been hurt by the President's economic policies. Obviously, the farmers are hurting or the President wouldn't have done this.

The drawbacks of this particular policy aside, the bailout is another example of the President chasing his own tail. It is becoming a leitmotif in this administration: President Trump's impulsiveness and incompetence, his lack of thoroughness and study of an issue, lead him to act impulsively. He creates a massive problem, and then he is forced to hastily contrive a way to make it look as if he is saving the day.

The irony of this policy should not be lost on anyone. The President's bailout is like a Soviet-style program in which the government props up an entire sector of the economy. That characterization is one that I spoke of this morning to several colleagues, and I have now been told one of my Republican colleagues used the same characterization--Soviet-style program. The Freedom Caucus, the Koch brothers--this is not what even the hard right in America stands for.

Knowing this administration, they will design a bailout to help only massive agribusinesses that will use the money for stock buybacks. Knowing this administration, family farmers are likely to be left to suffer.

It was not so long ago that our Republican friends complained bitterly about picking winners and losers in the market. What is the President doing here? He is picking winners and losers.

The President's policies have hurt scores of Americans. He proposes a massive bailout in this case but tries to slash health insurance for tens of millions of middle-class Americans. He pushes a bailout in this case, but his budgets continue to decimate infrastructure, education, healthcare, environmental protection, and more. I would say that is picking winners and losers.

The President's bailout is another example of President Trump lighting the fire and grabbing the nearest thing off the shelf to douse it and then patting himself on the back as to what a great guy he has been. It is not good policy, it is not good politics, and it is incredibly telling of this administration's failure to anticipate the consequences of its decisions.

One more point: If you talk to our farmers, they would rather have long-term contracts and good markets. A bailout and storing all these agricultural products on the shelves will lower prices and cause the people we sell to overseas to find other suppliers and sign contracts with them. In the long term, it is going to make things worse.

Where does the bailout stop? What about people who use steel and aluminum? What about other goods that have been targeted by our foreign competitors? Are they going to get bailouts too? Is it going to go up from $12 billion to $50 billion to $100 billion? Amazingly, are our Republican colleagues--this is so against their principles--going to go along? We shall see.

Russia

Mr. President, there is one more point on Russia. After President Trump's inexplicable behavior in Helsinki last week, many of us were forced to wonder whether President Putin had something on President Trump because his behavior was so obsequious in front of Putin.

Well, now it seems it is not just a few Democrats who are wondering. Yesterday's Quinnipiac poll showed that 51 percent of Americans believe that the Russian Government has compromising information about President Trump. That is astounding. Our leading enemy has information, compromising information, and then our President acts obsequiously. Whoa, where are we in this country?

Let me repeat that poll. A majority of Americans believe the Russian Government has something on President Trump. That is astounding. The fact that millions of Americans are wondering if our President is compromised by our leading adversary is a message to the White House: America wants you to be tough with President Putin.

The President will say: Oh, this is fake news. This is made up.

Well, President Trump, if Putin has nothing over you, why aren't you being tough with him? The best way to show that Putin has nothing over you is for you to stand up to him--not to be so obsequious and fawning and not to invite him here to the White House this fall.

There should be no more accepting of Putin's denials over a consensus of American intelligence, no more bending over backward to avoid criticizing Putin for interfering in our election, and no more one-on- one meetings with Putin where no one else--not the intelligence community, not our military leaders, not the Congress, and not the least of which, the American people know what was said or agreed to.

The writing is on the wall for the White House. This White House keeps reaching new lows. The American people, so disturbed by the President's

posture toward Russia, believe that President Trump may be compromised by our biggest enemy. I don't think that has ever happened, certainly in my memory, in my lifetime, and I can't remember an incident in history where this has happened this way.

President Trump ought to reverse course immediately. He can start by revoking his invitation to President Putin to visit the White House this fall.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, 20 years ago today, in the late afternoon, shots rang out in this building. A mentally ill individual, armed with a gun, was coming through security when he shot Capitol Police Officer Jacob Chestnut. He then approached the Capitol office of Tom DeLay and engaged Detective John Gibson, and they exchanged gunfire. Detective Gibson and Officer Chestnut lost their lives in the line of duty while protecting this building's occupants and visitors.

There is no way of knowing how many lives they saved in their sacrifice, but their families know that their sacrifice has not been forgotten by all of us here. Their memory is a blessing to their families and to all of us here who remember that awful day.

I join the distinguished Republican leader today in recognizing the anniversary of their passing as a solemn reminder of the everyday heroism practiced by the Capitol Police and their brothers and sisters in blue all across the country.

Madam President, the Senate has a constitutional duty to provide advice and consent and a special obligation to thoroughly examine Supreme Court nominations. After all, there are few positions in our government with greater importance or responsibility than a lifetime appointment on the Nation's highest Court. It is now our job to carefully, thoroughly, and methodically review the record of Judge Brett Kavanaugh, and we have quite a job ahead of us.

As a partisan political lawyer during the Clinton and Bush years, Brett Kavanaugh has a paper trail a mile long. There is no doubt the White House and Leader McConnell were aware of this history when the nomination was made. The length of Judge Kavanaugh's record, however, is no reason to shirk our responsibility as Senators to review it.

Yet the distinguished chairman of the Judiciary Committee has already suggested there is no reason to review Judge Kavanaugh's full record before proceeding with his nomination. Leader McConnell threatened to play political hardball if Democrats insisted on obtaining Judge Kavanaugh's full record. Senate Republicans are making hollow arguments and petty attempts at advancing Judge Kavanaugh's nomination with as little scrutiny as they can manage.

We have been having trouble getting an agreement with Judiciary Committee Chairman Grassley on the scope of the documents the Senate should request. Chairman Grassley has had our request for over a week. It is the same request that was made when Elena Kagan was nominated to the Supreme Court. It is the very same request that Republicans insisted on, including Senator Grassley--he was not chairman then--and Democrats agreed to when we were in charge.

Much like Judge Kavanaugh, Elena Kagan spent time in prior administrations and had a lengthy paper trail, some of which could have been labeled privileged. Did Democrats, in the majority at the time, attempt to rush her nomination through? No. Did we lean on former administrations to declare her documents privileged? No. Democrats actually joined with the Republican minority to request a full and complete accounting of Elena Kagan's record. Her former employer waived all claims of privilege.

Let me show you the letter right here that my friend Senator Leahy, then chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and Senator Jeff Sessions, then ranking member, sent to the Clinton Library. Here is the letter. What we have done is use the same letter. We are willing to issue the exact same letter, except we have put the address of the person at the Bush Library, changed the name of Kagan to Kavanaugh, and changed the name of Clinton to Bush; otherwise, it is the exact same letter.

How can our Republican colleagues resist this simple letter when it is the exact same letter they pushed for, and we acceded to, when the shoe was on the other foot?

The letter requests the entirety of Elena Kagan's record, not part of it, not a subset of it--all of it. What is good enough for Justice Kagan is good enough for Judge Kavanaugh. You could simply replace her name with Judge Kavanaugh's name throughout this letter, and the letter would be exactly applicable today. This is the standard Democrats and Republicans used to agree on, the Kagan standard--and it wasn't just Senators Leahy and Sessions.

At the time, Senator Grassley, now chairman--the burden is on him to help

us get a bipartisan letter--said: ``In order for the Senate to fulfill its constitutional duty of advise and consent, we must get all of [Elena Kagan's] documents from the Clinton Library and have enough time to analyze them so we can determine whether she should be a Justice.''

Let me read it again. This is what Chairman Grassley said--now chairman, then a member of the Judiciary Committee: ``In order for the Senate to fulfill its constitutional duty of advise and consent, we must get all of [Elena Kagan's] documents from the Clinton Library and have enough time to analyze them so we can determine whether she should be a Justice.''

Senator Grassley is a good man. Senator Grassley has a real sense of integrity and fairness. That is why so many of us are wondering why there is such a double standard right now. We hope he will join Senator Feinstein in a joint letter, just as Senator Leahy and Senator Sessions came together on such a letter a while ago.

Senator Cornyn at the time, now the No. 2 man in the Republican hierarchy here in the Senate, said: ``I think it would be a mistake to hold the hearing until we've had a chance to see [Elena Kagan's] documents and any other documents that might exist . . . [and] we've had an adequate time to review the documents.''

This happens especially when it comes to judges. The double standard of the other side is enormous. When they are in the minority, they profess strong arguments, push us to go along, and usually we do. But now that they are in the majority, it is as if there is a whole new world and what happened in the past doesn't make a darn bit of difference. That is not fair. That is not right.

We, on this side, have had enough of the other side's hypocrisy on judges. We know there is a push by the hard right to fill the bench so they can achieve their agenda, which they could never achieve--even with Republican majorities in the House, Senate, and Presidency-- through the elected bodies.

The kinds of attitudes that we have seen by the conservative Justices--which we believe Judge Kavanaugh might well accede to, and that is why we want a hearing--are not what America wants on issue after issue after issue. This is the hard right's No. 1 goal.

They embraced Donald Trump only after he agreed to a list of 25 judges that the Federalist Society and Heritage Foundation suggested; both are far away from where Americans feel on issues like healthcare, government involvement, and choice. That is when they embraced him.

There is huge pressure; I get that. We have pressure on our side too. But the double standard is so glaring, so unfair, that it is appalling.

People say: Well, on judges, it has been tit for tat. It really hasn't. It really hasn't. Leader Reid changed the rules after four vacancies existed on the DC Court of Appeals because Republicans wouldn't put them in. It was a 60-vote rule, but we kept it open for the Supreme Court. Leader McConnell changed that. Leader McConnell, unprecedentedly, let Merrick Garland stew and not have a hearing.

We understand the pressure, but it is not good for the Republicans, and it is not good for comity in this body, which we are seeking. I see the chairman of the Appropriations Committee. We are trying to get comity on appropriations. Stuff like this poisons the well. It does.

Just last week, we witnessed the firsthand importance of reviewing a nominee's full record. The White House was forced to withdraw the nomination of Ryan Bounds for a seat on the Ninth Circuit after abhorrent writings from his college newspaper came to light. If the college newspaper writings of a potential appellate judge are significant enough to disqualify him from consideration, how can my colleagues on the other side argue with a straight face that Judge Kavanaugh's record should not be fully considered before the Senate moves forward on his nomination to this Nation's highest Court--one of the most powerful institutions in the world?

There is a lot we don't know about Judge Kavanaugh. We are learning more about him each day. Just a few days ago, for example, we learned he had expressed skepticism about the Supreme Court that held President Nixon accountable. It is another example of Judge Kavanaugh expressing the view that Presidential power should be virtually unconstrained. One that is still amazing to me, and I would like to see if there is more of it in his records because it is so extreme a view, is that Judge Kavanaugh suggested a President can ignore a statute he ``deems''--his word--unconstitutional even if a court ruled it was constitutional. That is like a King, not a President. We have the rule of law here.

He said sitting Presidents should not be subject to an investigation of any kind, other than an impeachment inquiry by Congress.

Judge Kavanaugh's belief in unchallenged Presidential power is so ingrained that he has even questioned the constitutionality of what he calls the ``independent regulatory state,'' a phrase that sounds awfully familiar to the hard-right myth of a deep state.

This is a radically activist view for a judge who advertises himself as someone who will merely interpret the law as written. Congress has, by law, given certain agencies varying degrees of independence from the Executive. That started in the 1890s. That is not new, and there is an ebb and flow to it. Sometimes Congress feels the regulations have gone too far and push back; sometimes they feel they need more, and they push forward. There has been an ebb and flow in history since the 1890s, but almost no one has said--except the hard right and deep state people--that there shouldn't be regulations.

If Judge Kavanaugh has his way, agencies that have been somewhat independent with good success, such as the Social Security Administration, the SEC, the IRS, and the FBI, would be subject to vast political influence from the White House. That is exactly the opposite of what Congress has provided by law.

Senators and the public will have to make up their minds about what Judge Kavanaugh believes, and they will have to think of it in the broad, long-term context but also in the context of this President, who seems to have less respect for the rule of law, less respect for separation of power, and less respect for anyone who stands in his way than any President I have seen in my lifetime.

Everyone will have to make up their minds about that. I understand that. That is what we are here for, but it seems clear that in the context of Judge Kavanaugh's writings about the Presidency, that the statement questioning the Nixon decision reflects his actual beliefs. That is why we need to obtain, analyze, and scrutinize his record. That is our job as U.S. Senators, a job Members from both sides of the aisle used to agree on.

Madam President, finally, just a few points as I see my colleagues are waiting. I wish to make a few points on Iran and President Trump's tweets. First, it seems the President is desperate to distract the American people from last week's performance in Helsinki. He always seems to do this: He runs into trouble, and he creates a whole new firestorm somewhere else. It is his MO. It is not the way we have seen government work in the United States, but that is what he does. He is the President.

Second, the tweets suggest a pattern in President Trump's foreign policy in which the President uses heated rhetoric with foreign capitals to inflame and intensify tensions so later on the President can pretend to ride in and save the day with a more measured tone. It is sort of like a Kabuki play. It screws up our foreign policy.

We saw this play out in North Korea. President Trump repeatedly insulted Kim Jong Un on Twitter, only to declare world peace once the two of them had met. It seems as if the President's foreign policy is to commit arson so he can play the firefighter. He lights the fire and then puts it out and gives himself a huge pat on the back.

Not surprisingly, this reality TV foreign policy hasn't produced the concrete results we are all looking for and must secure. It has been 2 months since the President met with Chairman Kim. Yet we have seen little in the way of irreversible steps toward

denuclearization. We don't even have details on the agreement. Secretary Pompeo went over there and was just given the cold shoulder. Kim wouldn't meet with him and said nasty things about him. Still, the President claims--I think he is alone here--that the North Korean summit was a huge success.

Certainly, the world is a safer place without President Trump and Chairman Kim trading barbs on social media. Those tactics make America weaker. We all want diplomacy to succeed. We all want a strong deal with North Korea, but the cessation of rhetorical hostilities is no replacement for concrete, verifiable steps toward denuclearization.

The same holds true for Iran. I hope the President isn't reaching into the same old social media playbook, using rhetoric as a replacement for the hard work of diplomacy.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, on Saturday, the Senate Judiciary Committee received the completed questionnaire from Brett Kavanaugh, President Trump's nominee to the Supreme Court.

As legal minds on both sides of the aisle pore over these preliminary documents, a common thread has already emerged: Brett Kavanaugh seems to have an imperial conception of the American Presidency. He has written that a sitting President shouldn't be subject to civil or criminal investigations while in office.

In at least three separate instances, Brett Kavanaugh has shown a willingness to openly question precedent relating to Presidential power and Presidential accountability.

First, in his opinion in Seven-Sky v. Holder, Kavanaugh wrote that the President does not have to enforce the laws if he ``deems'' a statute unconstitutional, regardless of whether a court has already held it constitutional.

What the heck do we have a Supreme Court for? If the President can deem a law unconstitutional even after the courts have ruled it is and then not obey it--wow. That goes very far. I fear to think what this President, in particular, who doesn't seem to have much respect for the rule of law or people who disagree with him, will do if that becomes the law.

Second, when Brett Kavanaugh was asked which case he would choose if he could overturn precedent in any one case, he said the decision in Morrison v. Olson. That is the case that upheld the constitutionality of the independent counsel law.

Many of us did not agree with the independent counsel law, but it is telling that the first and only case Brett Kavanaugh cited when asked ``What case would you overrule, would you overturn stare decisis on?'' was a case about executive accountability.

Third and most recently, on Saturday, we learned that Brett Kavanaugh even believes that the 8-to-0 decision in United States v. Nixon may have been wrongly decided. This new revelation adds to the body of evidence that Kavanaugh believes sitting Presidents should be free from civil and criminal investigations while in office--a view, of course, that could have significant ramifications for the future of the Presidency and our democracy.

Let me ask this Senate and the American people a very important question: If Kavanaugh would have let Nixon off the hook, what is he willing to do for President Trump? Alarm bells should be going off for anyone who believes in checks and balances.

It is a fundamental principle of our democracy that no one is above the law, including the President. Our Presidents are not Kings. But Brett Kavanaugh's jurisprudence does not bode well for the future rulings on the accountability of the President, including those that may arise from Special Counsel Mueller's investigation.

Kavanaugh's views of an imperial Presidency would be alarming under any President, but it is especially alarming under President Trump, who almost daily tests the bounds of our Constitution, the separation of powers,

and the rule of law. It almost seems that anyone who criticizes him is beyond the pale, is fake, is dishonest.

As the revelation about the Nixon case shows, there is still much we don't know about Judge Kavanaugh. The Senate and the American people deserve to know where Judge Kavanaugh stands on a host of issues. After all, the Supreme Court is a lifetime appointment with enormous power-- the power to overrule the elected bodies of government.

Given that the hearing process for the Supreme Court has tended to be more of a public relations exercise for nominees rather than a legitimate examination of judicial philosophy, Judge Kavanaugh's papers might be the best and only way to judge what kind of a Justice he might be. My Republican friends understood this when it came to Justice Kagan, who had served in key positions in prior administrations, much like Judge Kavanaugh. They were then in the minority, as we are now, when Judge Kagan was nominated, but our Republican colleagues demanded the entire paper history of then-Solicitor General Kagan before moving forward with her nomination, and Democrats agreed.

In a joint letter to the director of the Clinton Library, the chairman and ranking member of the Judiciary Committee at the time-- Senator Leahy, the chairman, and Senator Jeff Sessions, now Attorney General, but then the ranking Republican on the committee--wrote that they expected ``all records containing documents written by, edited by, prepared in whole or part by, under the supervision of, or at the direction of Elena Kagan, as well as documents referencing Elena Kagan by name, initials, or title, and documents received by or sent to Elena Kagan.''

A Democratic chairman and Republican Senator Sessions, the ranking member, asked for every single document of Elena Kagan's record. Why should such a standard apply to Justice Kagan but not to Judge Kavanaugh?

I have taken the liberty of editing the letter sent by Senators Sessions and Leahy. It didn't take much work to make it directly applicable today. It is the same letter, same request, simply crossing out every time it mentions Kagan and putting in the name ``Kavanaugh.'' There was no change. It is the same standard.

I have already heard from my Republican colleagues, including Chairman Grassley, that there is no reason to review Judge Kavanaugh's full record before proceeding with his nomination.

I have had enough of the two-facedness, the total hypocrisy on judges, where somehow our Republican colleagues say it is good one way when we have a Democratic President and the opposite should take effect when we have a Republican President. That is what they are doing with the records here first of Judge Kagan and now Judge Kavanaugh.

Well, I say to my Republican colleagues, what is good for Justice Kagan--let's call it the Kagan standard--is good enough for Judge Kavanaugh--paraphrasing, of course, what is good for the goose is good for the gander.

The Senate's duty to advise and consent does not mean move as hastily as possible. For the benefit of this body, for the sake of consistency, and for the honor of this Chamber, I hope my Republican friends join Democrats in asking for and waiting for all the documents related to Judge Kavanaugh. The American people have a right to know what is there, and the Senate must have enough time to review the body of work before making an unalterable decision on a lifetime appointment to the Nation's highest Court.

Mr. President, on Russia, a week ago today, President Trump met with President Putin in Helsinki, and with the world watching, failed to show an ounce of strength in defense of American interests.

What followed was an embarrassing week of insincere walk backs and mixed messages, culminating on Friday in a bizarre invitation for President Putin to visit the White House this fall--something the President's own Director of National Intelligence, Mr. Coats, was not made aware of. It is not hyperbolic to say that last week may have been one of the worst weeks in American foreign policy in recent memory.

In the face of these stunning events, what have my Republican colleagues done to rein in the President? I am sad to report, virtually nothing. In the full week since the Helsinki summit, Republicans failed to take meaningful action to hold the President accountable for his foreign policy blunders in Finland. Republicans have offered words of rebuke, statements, disappointed tweets, but they have not backed up any of those words with the force of action.

I have seen my colleagues shrug their shoulders as if there weren't anything the U.S. Senate could do to check this President, even though they feel in their hearts, I know, that he needs checking. I mentioned several ways the Senate could grapple with and push back a bit on what President Trump has done: bring in his national security team and translator to testify before Congress, particularly so we can tell what happened in that 2 hours when Putin and Trump were alone; pass legislation to protect the special counsel and legislation to harden our election infrastructure because we risk Russia's interference again; implement sanctions against Russia; demand that Russia hand over the 12 Russians indicted for election interference and more.

If my Republican friends were serious about doing something to redirect our posture toward Russia, we should have seen some movement by now on one or more of these things, but we are stuck in the mud. Even though there is bipartisan condemnation for the President's behavior last week, the Senate has remained virtually silent on the matter because Republicans here are unwilling, maybe afraid, to confront the President, even though they know what he did was so wrong.

At the end of last week, the Republican majority blocked a bipartisan resolution--a modest one from Senators Flake and Coons, one a Republican, one a Democrat--that sought to hold Russia accountable. It didn't have many teeth, but still the Republicans objected.

Are my Republican friends ever willing to push back against this President, not just in words but in deeds, or are they too afraid of the political consequences? Are they willing to put country over party at this crucial time? It seems not, at least so far.

I know many of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle were deeply disturbed by the President's inexplicable behavior in Helsinki. I say to them, America needs you now. We need you to stand up, step up to the plate, and do something about it.

Frankly, if we don't do something real, President Trump--I know him-- will conclude he doesn't need to change his behavior, and, as a result, Republicans will be complicit in enabling the President to continue down the disastrous course he has set.

I yield the floor.