Floor Statements

Madam President, because of the increase in hospitalizations because of the Delta variant of the virus, we are told that the CDC will soon be requiring, in about half the counties of the country, masks and other restrictions to prevent the spread of the virus.

They say they are doing it because of the science. We are told they will not show us the data. The very essence of science is peer review, and pity anybody who wants to analyze it. In America, the public's business ought to be public.

If we can't get this data, what the taxpayers are paying for and public policy is being made on, it seems to me that principle--that the public's business is not really public. And when people are able to cover up things and make policy decisions that are not public and transparent, it obviously brings about less accountability.

So let's have that data. We want to know why you are requiring masks again.

Madam President, today, I join my colleagues to mourn the passing of my friend, former Senator Mike Enzi.

Just a few months ago, Mike stood here in this very Chamber, on December 22, to say farewell to this institution and his colleagues. After 24 years, the people of his beloved State--serving them--he returned home to Wyoming.

To the good people of Wyoming, I thank you for sharing Mike with us for a couple of dozen years. He was a guiding light here in the U.S. Senate. He worked effectively to find common ground and bridge partisan divide for the public good.

Mike practiced, by word and by deed, the mission statement that he created for his office: Do what is right; do our best; and treat others as they wish to be treated.

In his farewell speech here on the Senate floor, he told us about the 80-percent tool as an effective way to govern. Mike was a pragmatist. He understood good laws aren't made with a sledgehammer. It takes craftsmanship, consensus, and common sense. As Mike said, focus on the 80 percent of an issue where we can find agreement and then discard the other 20 percent.

Today, as Congress seeks to reach consensus on a host of important issues, we would do well to follow Mike's advice. We need more of that bipartisan buy-in that Mike brought from his State of Wyoming to Washington, DC, and the Halls of Congress. I was honored to partner on so many bread-and-butter issues that had a direct impact on hard- working families, farmers, breadwinners, and small businesses.

As many of you know, I help on our family farm in New Hartford, IA. Mike started and ran a family-owned shoe store in Gillette, his home there in Wyoming. Meeting payroll, paying bills, and making ends meet informed in each of us a philosophy about government spending and conservative management of the taxpayers' money. As disciples of fiscal discipline, we evangelized, caucused, and fought together to hold the line on reckless spending.

Too many people in Washington forget that taxpayers' dollars don't grow on trees. It is the people's money. Mike knew how to crunch numbers and watch over the Federal purse better than all of us. He was an accountant and put his expertise to work as chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. He held the Federal bureaucracy to account and kept Congress accountable to the American people.

Reelected by wide margins, Mike relished retail politics and fought for small businesses and retailers at the policymaking tables. Barbara and I traveled to Gillette once to attend a political event with Mike and his wife Diana. The feeling in the crowd was insightful; the Enzis are beloved in Wyoming.

Mike kept in touch with the grassroots, traveling Wyoming as extensively as I travel to every corner of Iowa. However, he always made time to foster relationships with friends, former staff, and, of course, his family.

I don't often socialize in Washington, but I made an exception for my friend Mike Enzi. I joined the Enzis' weekly Tortilla Coast dinner when I could. My wife Barbara joined every chance she had, and she did it much more often than I did.

On each Senator's birthday, Mike would write a long, heartfelt birthday note with a personal P.S. I looked forward to reading his birthday wish every year and the advice--very good advice--that he included in it. There was always a piece of advice or a challenge for the year ahead.

Mike was humble. Mike was approachable. Mike was respected by all. He was a true friend of this Senate. I recall those parting words from the gentle giant of Gillette, WY: I like being a Senator, not for the title, not for the recognition, and certainly not for the publicity. I like solving Federal problems for Wyoming people. I like doing legislation.

And, of course, Mike did just that. Barbara and I extend our heartfelt sympathy to Diana and his children as well. May God bless Mike, a faithful servant of the Lord. And we saw that faithfulness to the Lord as he led the Wednesday morning Senate prayer meeting on a very regular basis. And may He bring you and your family peace and comfort, today and always

Madam President, on another note, on June 8 of this year, I sent a letter--I came to the floor, I should say instead, to speak about my oversight activities with respect to the origins of the coronavirus. As part of that oversight, on March 8 and May 26 of this year, I wrote to the Department of Health and Human Services about its oversight of grants sent to EcoHealth Alliance.

The Department sent millions of dollars to EcoHealth. That group then subawarded hundreds of thousands of dollars of that taxpayer money to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Reports have indicated that $600,000 to $826,000 was sent to the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

So, folks, what we have here is taxpayer money that was sent to the communist Chinese Government. That is a pretty scary proposition. When we send taxpayers' money to the Chinese Government, if there is no oversight done on that money, then we really don't have any idea how it is used. Just look at the news about China kicking the French out of the Wuhan laboratory.

China can't be trusted, period. But I am not sure bureaucrats share that same view. I am talking about bureaucrats of our government. To illustrate, Dr. Anthony Fauci has said that Chinese scientists are trustworthy; that ``we [really] always trust the grantee to do what they say.''

As a threshold matter, if a government worker doesn't show at least a little bit of skepticism about how a grant recipient is using the taxpayers' money, they aren't doing their job. That skepticism is healthy, and it is basic good government to question the recipient to make sure that they are doing what they are supposed to do with our money.

Dr. Fauci has also stated that the National Institutes of Health ``has not ever and does not now fund gain-of-function research in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.'' That is a pretty confident statement.

When my colleague Senator Paul questioned Dr. Fauci on his position with respect to gain-of-function research, that same Dr. Fauci called my colleague a liar. Well, the way I see it, the only way that Dr. Fauci and the government can be so confident that no gain-of-function research was done is if they performed the proper oversight of the American taxpayers' money sent to China.

In both my letters to the Department of Health and Human Services, I asked that very question. So far, the Department of Health and Human Services has failed to answer the question.

On June 10 of this year at the Senate Finance Committee hearing, I asked Secretary Becerra what, if any, oversight was done. He didn't give me an answer. I asked again in a followup question for the record--still no response, even though all these people that come before a committee for nomination approval always say: We will answer your letters; we will answer the phone; we will testify. But no answer to that question yet.

The Director of the National Institutes of Health, Dr. Francis Collins, has also been silent on what, if any, oversight was done on the grants to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Dr. Fauci has been silent on what, if any, oversight he did.

This is a simple and very important question for the government to answer. In other words, as you heard me say a few minutes ago, the public's business ought to be public. And without that sort of transparency, we don't have accountability, and we are entitled to have accountability on this kind of money.

The more that they deny the U.S. Congress an answer, the more it looks like these bureaucrats don't give a lick about the American people: the people they work for, the people who pay their salary.

Dr. Fauci is all over television and radio. You name it, he is on it. But, apparently, he and his counterparts can't find enough time to answer this very simple question: Did you do any oversight of the taxpayers' money you sent to EcoHealth, money that you knew was going to the communist Chinese Government? If so, please explain; if not, why not?

This should not be a difficult question to answer. Either you did or you didn't, and, either way, the American people deserve an explanation. And if they didn't do any oversight, then how can they confidently say the money wasn't used for gain-of-function research or other bad conduct?

We have lost over 600,000 Americans, and this body has spent trillions of dollars to support our economy and fight the virus. Congress and the American people have an absolute right to know what Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins did to oversee this money. Enough with the games. Just answer the question.

I understand that the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General is doing an audit of what, if any, oversight was done. They are supposed to be taking a deep dive on the grants, the cooperative arrangements, and other relationships the government had with EcoHealth Alliance.

The audit isn't just focused on what the National Institutes of Health did or didn't do to monitor the grants. The scope also includes what EcoHealth did or didn't do to manage the funds in accordance with Federal requirements. And the scope of that review, at least right now, is from 2014 to 2021.

I expect the inspector general to be aggressive and unrelenting in getting the records, the emails, and the memos; run the transcribed interviews and question everyone up the leadership chain; leave no stone unturned; and make as much as possible public.

If punches are pulled, then this IG audit will be a waste of everybody's time and taxpayers' money. The inspector general has a tremendous responsibility to get this job done right.

Mr. President, I intend to object to any unanimous consent request relating to the nomination of Helaine Ann Greenfeld, to be an Assistant Attorney General at the Department of Justice, PN459, and Christopher H. Schroeder, to be an Assistant Attorney General at the Department of Justice, PN370.

Last week, at the Senate Judiciary Committee's executive business meeting, I noted my intent to vote for both nominees but object to any unanimous consent request for their confirmation. Ms. Greenfeld will lead the Justice Department's Office of Legislative Affairs and Mr. Schroeder will lead the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel. Both of these components are at the heart of my congressional oversight requests and the Department's failure to respond. I have made this decision clearly not on the basis of their credentials but on the basis of the Justice Department's failure to respond to congressional oversight requests.

To date, the Justice Department has failed to provide a full and complete response to any of my oversight requests. I said the same thing when I objected to any unanimous consent request relating to the Kenneth Polite nomination on June 22, 2021. Nothing has changed.

For example, on July 15, 2021, my staff had yet another call with the Justice Department's Office of Legislative Affairs, the very office Ms. Greenfeld will be in charge of. On that call, the Department wanted to know why I had a hold on Mr. Polite and whether they could do anything to change my mind. My staff made clear to the Department that the issues before them are quite simple: Attorney General Garland must respond to my oversight letters and records requests.

The Department asked for that call with my staff, and the Department did not provide my staff a substantive update on any of my oversight requests. It is absurd for the Department to schedule a call relating to my hold on Mr. Polite, which was done due to the Department's consistent failure to respond to my oversight requests, and then have no updates relating to any of my oversight requests.

As one of many examples of unanswered questions and requests, on February 3, 2021, and March 9, 2021, Senator Johnson and I requested information from the Justice Department relating to Nicholas McQuaid. Mr. McQuaid was Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division, the position Mr. Polite now holds. In those letters, we raised concerns about potential conflicts of interest in light of the fact that Mr. McQuaid was employed at Latham & Watkins until January 20, 2021, and worked with Christopher Clark, whom Hunter Biden reportedly hired to work on his Federal criminal case.

This arrangement presents an ongoing potential conflict of interest given the fact Mr. McQuaid is still employed at the Criminal Division as the Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General. A core function of congressional oversight is to ensure that governmental departments and agencies are free of conflicts of interest. That is especially so with the Justice Department and FBI. If conflicts infect them, those investigations and prosecutions--the very purpose of the Department's existence--could be undermined.

As a part of my oversight, I have requested a recusal memo for Mr. McQuaid. I have also requested to know, as a threshold issue, whether one even exists.

Attorney General Garland has failed to answer and provide the requested records. I have noted to the Department that in 2016, I received from the Department Andrew McCabe's recusal memo to illustrate precedent exists for such a production to Congress. Still, the Justice Department refuses to provide the same for Mr. McQuaid.

On the July 15, 2021, call with my staff, they again raised my questions about Mr. McQuaid. The Department was unable to provide any legitimate basis upon which it could not answer my questions and again failed to provide any update on the Department's response.

As I have noted before with respect to the Federal Government's failure to respond to legitimate congressional oversight requests, there is nothing more eroding of public faith than an unresponsive executive branch that believes it only answers to the President and not the U.S. Congress and, perhaps most importantly, ``We the People.''

This administration's continued, ongoing, and blatant lack of cooperation has again forced my hand.

Thus, unfortunately, I must object to any consideration of these nominees. My objection is not intended to question the credentials of Ms. Greenfeld and Mr. Schroeder in any way. The executive branch must recognize that it has an ongoing obligation to respond to congressional inquiries in a timely and reasonable manner.

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

Mr. President, many bills get introduced in the Senate and don't seem to go anyplace. The reason is that they are meant to be simply messaging documents, making a statement, telling people what you believe, not necessarily with the motive of passing a piece of legislation.

Now, I usually do not care to comment on these bills. It is simply not worth the time. But when I see the combination of false information spread in messaging bills that could negatively impact my State, I must set the record straight, and that is why I am here.

Several colleagues just introduced a bill to repeal the renewable fuel standard. I have been a proud advocate for renewable energy. Iowa is the leader in both wind and renewable fuels. When it comes to the renewable fuel standard, it is hard to argue that there has ever been a more successful clean-fuel policy implemented across the world. Between 2008 and 2020, the use of biofuels under the renewable fuel standard resulted in a savings of 980 million metric tons of carbon dioxide. That is the equivalent of removing over 200 million cars from the road for 1 year. The renewable fuel standard makes gasoline more affordable. It generates good-paying jobs. It reduces oil imports and reduces our country's greenhouse gas emissions.

The messaging coming from the bill rehashes the same talking points about ethanol that Big Oil has trotted out for the past decades. So, once again, Big Oil raises its ugly head.

Of course, Big Oil's talking points have been completely debunked by the latest science and even our nonpartisan research from the Congressional Budget Office. And Congress depends a great deal upon the research done by the Congressional Budget Office, a nonpartisan group of professional people that study things a long time before they release their information.

Now, my pro-oil colleagues say that the renewable fuel standard causes food and feed prices to rise. However, in 2014, the CBO looked at this issue and the impact on food prices if the renewable fuel standard was fully repealed. The Congressional Budget Office concluded that American food prices would be just one-quarter of 1 percent higher if the renewable fuel standard was kept in place versus a total repeal. Out of a $100 grocery bill, the impact is no more than a quarter. But when you consider that there is a savings of $5 every time you fill up your gas tank due to the renewable fuel standard, consumers save money overall with the renewable fuel standard in place.

My colleagues who introduced this messaging legislation also claimed, falsely, that corn ethanol achieves little to no reduction in greenhouse gases. Now, this must be the most ridiculous assertion made against ethanol. I would like to invite my colleagues to visit Iowa to see how far ethanol has come in reducing emissions.

The most recent research from Harvard shows that corn ethanol greenhouse gas emissions are 46 percent lower than gasoline. Research by the U.S. Department of Agriculture found the reduction in CO2 could reach 71 percent by next year if farmers follow best practices.

At a time when the Nation is working to reduce fossil fuel consumption and protect our environment, why would my colleagues introduce a bill that would increase our dependence upon foreign oil and, at the same time, increase greenhouse gas emissions? And some of these people on this bill have the most pure environmental record in the U.S. Senate.

Renewable fuels like ethanol have a 40-year track record of making fuel more affordable and vehicles more efficient. To limit this consumer choice at the pump is completely irresponsible. Attempts to limit consumer choice, which are driven by big oil interests, must be defeated.

The United States should continue to build on the progress of the renewable fuel standard and bring policy to the table that reduces greenhouse gas emissions and brings jobs to rural America.

Let me end with a history of the RFS because this legislation is a story of irony if you consider how we got to the renewable fuel standard in the first place. You see, Big Oil wanted it. Why did they want it? Well, a lot of States where they had smog had what we call the oxygenate requirement. It was required in the Clean Air Acts that Congress has passed over the decades. In order to meet that standard, Big Oil would add what they call MTBE, a product made out of petroleum that they added to their gasoline to meet the oxygenate standards, to reduce smog.

After a long period of time, people realized that the MTBE was poisoning groundwater in California--maybe other places as well, but I remember mostly the conflict being in California--and they were being sued. So by 2005, Big Oil decided they didn't want to be sued, and what could they do to get out of it? Well, the RFS was the answer.

I was chairman of the Finance Committee at the time. They came to us with the ideas of the RFS, and it fit into a lot of things that we from agricultural interests were trying to accomplish as well. So the renewable fuel standard was written in cooperation with Big Oil--the first time in three decades that Big Oil had any interest in working with ethanol industry. Then, what, after 3 or 4 years of working with us, they have been attacking the RFS since then.

This piece of legislation I am speaking about today is just one more example of Big Oil trying to attack ethanol. And I gave all the facts about ethanol being good for the consumer, good for the environment, and good for less reliance on foreign countries for our energy sources. In fact, everything about ethanol is good, good, good.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, to finance their big spending agenda, President Biden and Members of his party in Congress have called for over $3 trillion in new taxes.

This group claims that these tax hikes are targeted solely to the very wealthy. However, deep down, embedded in their tax-hike proposal, is a direct attack on family farms and resulting ruination of rural communities.

If Democrats get their way, family farms would be decimated through the enactment of a second death tax that operates on top of the existing estate tax. This second death tax would subject the paper gains of business and investment assets to tax upon transfer to the next generation. At the same time, the current long-term capital gains rate would be nearly doubled.

Now, as a result, decades of paper gains in farmland and other property could be subject to capital gains taxes at a rate as high as 43.4 percent.

Given inflation as well as the escalating value of farmland over the past several decades, some Iowa farms could easily generate a half-a- million-dollar tax bill or even more based upon land values alone. And those land values have gone up as a result of inflation and nothing else.

Moreover, according to an analysis by KPMG, family farms captured both by this new death tax and the existing estate tax could see tax rates exceeding 66 percent.

Now, it is pretty simple. That is not taxation; that is confiscation.

Proponents claim this new tax--or you might say this new confiscation--is needed to close a loophole that allows the appreciation in value of property over one's lifetime to go untaxed, but death isn't a loophole, and it shouldn't be a taxable event.

In fact, rather than solving a problem, this proposal would resurrect failed policy from a decade past.

As part of the Tax Reform Act of 1976, Congress experimented with a similar attempt to subject paper gains in inherited assets to tax. This change was immediately met with outcries from farmers, ranchers, and small business owners, resulting in its repeal in a few years.

In fact, it is such a complicated process, it is probably impossible to administer such a tax; at least that was the main point made in the late 1970s against that 1976 legislation.

Now, as problematic as this change was for farmers in 1976, what Democrats have in store would actually be far worse. Where in 1976 no tax was due until an asset was eventually sold by an heir, current proposals could result in a tax bill due in the year of that person's death.

As is often said, and with a lot of truth to it, farmers are land rich and cash poor. This means it is unlikely for a decedent's estate to have cash on hand to satisfy a six-figure tax bill. Now, as a result, all or portions of a family farm might have to be sold to satisfy an oversized tax bill.

This would endanger the continuation of family farms from one generation to the next, and it would devastate rural communities along with it because, you see, most people, if you invest in farmland, you don't invest today because you are going to sell it tomorrow; you invest in it to work it and you work it for a generation and you pass it on to the next generation.

Now, we had one recent study that found subjecting paper gains to a tax at death could cost as much as 80,000 jobs each year over the next decade.

So I say to my Democratic colleagues, pursue this policy at your own peril. I assure you, farmers, ranchers, and small business owners are paying close attention. If you aren't, you better.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, today I come to the floor to discuss an issue that I have raised during the course of multiple Republican and Democrat administrations. This is a problem that crosses political boundaries, whether you have a Republican or Democrat President. That issue is responding to legitimate and valid congressional oversight requests.

In my time as a public servant, I have seen my fair share of unresponsive government, sometimes downright obstructive government. I have seen it rear its ugly head from decade to decade. There is nothing more eroding to public faith than an unresponsive executive branch that believes that it only answers to the President and not to the U.S Congress and perhaps, most importantly, we the people.

Based on my interactions with the Biden administration's Justice Department and its component Agencies--specifically, the FBI--the current officials in charge of those Agencies are, at best, unresponsive public servants. That goes all the way to the top, to the President, because the buck stops there.

As I say to many nominees, either you are going to run your Department or the Department runs you. Right now, it looks like the Justice Department is running the Attorney General's office, and that is a great big shame.

I voted to confirm the Attorney General. I had high hopes he would follow through on his public statements of ridding the Department of political infection. Instead, I fear he has taken the Justice Department to new politically charged heights.

To date, I haven't received a full or complete response to a single oversight request from the Justice Department. As one example, on February 3 of this year and March 9 of this year, Senator Johnson and I asked the Department about Nicholas McQuaid. Mr. McQuaid is the Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division, of which Mr. Polite will be taking his place upon confirmation.

McQuaid was employed by a law firm until January 20 of this year and worked with Christopher Clark, whom Hunter Biden reportedly hired to work on his Federal criminal case.

This arrangement poses a clear potential conflict.

A core function of congressional oversight is to ensure that governmental Departments and Agencies are free of conflicts of interest. That is especially so with the Justice Department and the FBI. If conflict infects them, those investigations and prosecutions, the very purpose of the Department's existence, could be undermined.

So I have requested a recusal memo for McQuaid. I have also requested to know, as a threshold issue, whether one even exists. Attorney General Garland won't answer.

Now, can you believe that? Here we have a Federal criminal case that implicates the President's son, and the Attorney General won't even answer Congress as to whether or not an employee of his Department who has an apparent conflict is recused from that matter?

It certainly looks like the Garland Justice Department is doing all that it can to protect the President's son.

Let me remind the Attorney General that I was the one who led a transcribed interview with President Trump's son. For all of the grief that Trump and his family got from the Democrats, at least that family showed up and answered the questions of legitimate congressional oversight.

Early on in the Attorney General's tenure, I instructed my oversight staff to work diligently and, of course, in good faith with their counterparts at the Justice Department. My staff have done the phone calls. They have had the meetings. They have sent emails, many of which go unanswered. My staff has done this all in good faith.

At my level, I have made every effort to get the Attorney General on the phone to discuss my oversight requests. It took him 2 months to get on the phone with me for a one-on-one call. I found out just the other week that Attorney General Garland's staff never told him of my request to speak with him. This omission is a dereliction of duty by the Department staff, to keep something like that from the Attorney General. Like I said, either you run the Department, or the Department runs you.

This type of unresponsive conduct has consequences. These consequences might not be immediate, but eventually, as I have seen over the years, ultimately the consequences arrive. The more their government tries to hide from them, the more the American people lose faith in government institutions. With such bad government conduct, I don't blame the people for losing faith. The fault is with the government, not the American people. After all, we work for the American people; they don't work for us. It is sad to say, but many in Washington, DC, don't understand that very fundamental precept of our constitutional Republic.

My fellow Senators, this type of conduct from the Biden administration and the Justice Department is unacceptable. But it isn't just this administration or this Justice Department; it is something I have seen too long under both Republican and Democratic Presidents, and it will have long-term consequences for the integrity of our governmental institutions.

In light of the Department's consistent failure to respond to my oversight requests, I will object to any unanimous consent request that Kenneth Polite be confirmed as Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division. I do not do so on the basis of his credentials, which I don't question; I do it as a message to the Attorney General that he needs to improve DOJ's interaction with the Congress.

Mr. President, on another matter, we will soon be voting on the Victims of Crime Act. I was an original cosponsor of that act when the Senate Judiciary Committee developed the legislation years ago. I appreciate the opportunity to work with Senators Durbin, Graham, and other Judiciary Committee colleagues this year on amendments to this landmark law.

The principle behind this statute is very simple. It is that fines and penalties collected by the Department of Justice from those who are convicted of committing Federal crimes should be used to help those who are victims of the crimes.

Because the fund relies solely upon fines and other assessments paid by Federal criminals, not from the taxpayers, it does not add to the deficit. So any of these expenditures are very fiscally responsible.

The money in this fund helps at least 6,800 local organizations, examples like rape crisis centers and child advocacy centers. So this money provides needed services to millions of crime victims across the country each year. The fund supports crisis hotline counseling or medical care or other services to these crime survivors, but it also does things like providing lost wages, courtroom advocacy, temporary housing, and there are a lot of other services that come from this money.

Since its enactment, billions of dollars have flowed through the Crime Victims Fund to our States and our communities to help support victim assistance programs. More than three decades after its inception, the fund is still working, but deposits into the fund have declined significantly in recent years. So obviously the continuation of some of these programs is less effective or even in doubt when the money available for them is not certain to be there. This is an issue of why this bill is before us, the VOCA Fix Act. This bill would resolve this problem of not enough money going into the fund.

Why is the money not going into the fund? The issue stems from Federal prosecutors' increasing reliance upon no- or deferred- prosecution agreements rather than upon conviction. The money collected by the Department of Justice in these settlement agreements, then, is not attributed to the Crime Victims Fund the same way as if it had gone through the court process and people had been convicted.

Among other provisions, the bill makes a deposits fix to preserve the Crime Victims Fund; in other words, to overcome the fact that these no- or deferred-prosecution agreements--that money doesn't now go into those funds. It requires that the money from the no- or deferred- prosecution agreements must go into the fund rather than the General Fund. The bill also changes the match requirements for State and local grant programs that rely on this statute.

Providing this fix will enable crime survivors in my State of Iowa and across the Nation to continue to have these services available in their communities. I encourage my colleagues to support the legislation

Mr. President, the last point I want to make is a very short one.

According to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, the definition of ``filibustering'' is this: ``Filibustering includes any use of dilatory or obstructive tactics to block a measure by preventing it from coming to a vote.''

Now, this is exactly what Texas Democrats are doing by fleeing their State to avoid a majority vote on an election reform bill. This group of Texas legislators flew to Washington, DC, where they are hypocritically demanding that the Senate abolish its tradition of extended debate so national legislation can be passed on the slimmest of majorities. And you can't get any slimmer than a 50-50 Senate.

The Senate majority leader called these legislators brave and courageous for their dishonest filibuster in the Texas Legislature, while they denounce the filibuster at the national level.

Texas is a very large and diverse State, but the United States is made up of 50 different States, plus territories, spread over a great distance. If the majority ought to not be allowed to rule in Texas, then how can they justify breaking the rules and traditions of the Senate to impose the will of 50 percent of the country on the other 50 percent?

So let's be very clear. As I have said before, the false, evidence- free claims of widespread voter suppression are as damaging as false claims of widespread voter fraud and thus need to stop. The reality is that each State is different, so it makes sense that States will have different voting processes.

Discrimination in voting is illegal. It is a Federal crime, and thank God it is a Federal crime. Beyond that, diversity in our Nation is a strength, not a weakness.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, before we proceed to a vote on final passage of the VOCA Fix Act, on which I teamed up with Senators Durbin, Graham, and other members of the Judiciary Committee, we first will turn to the Toomey amendment.

This amendment is loosely based on a bill introduced by Senator Toomey in 2015. That 2015 measure, entitled the ``Fairness for Victims of Crime Act,'' would have created a budgetary point of order against legislation that required the Crime Victims Fund to disburse less than the average amount collected by the Fund over the previous 3 fiscal years.

The Senate held a field hearing on this legislation, which was introduced by Senator Toomey, the same year. The Budget Committee, of which I am a member, then approved the legislation by unanimous voice vote. I still support the premise behind this bill, which is to promote fairness for crime victims and restore the original intent of the Victims of Crime Act.

Some years ago, appropriators placed an arbitrary cap on the amount of money that could flow out of the Crime Victims Fund each year. The imposition of this cap meant not only that billions of dollars accumulated, unspent, in the fund in later years, but also that this sum could be used as an offset to support other projects backed by congressional appropriators. Meanwhile, the availability of so much unspent money in the Crime Victims Fund made it an extremely tempting target for budget dealmakers. On one occasion in 2015, during the Obama administration, budget negotiators simply rescinded at least a billion dollars of the fund for a budget deal.

As noted by Senator Toomey today, the President's budget proposal for the coming fiscal year indicates that he proposes to rely on $26 billion in the Crime Victims Fund and cancellations in the Children's Health Program to offset an equivalent amount in new discretionary spending. Table S-8 to the President's budget shows that this is the intention.

Every last penny brought into the Victims of Crime Act Fund is supposed to help victims rather than serve as a funding gimmick for other projects supported by appropriators and the White House. It is for this reason that I support the Toomey amendment.

Madam President

Madam President, I have been to the floor several times with Senator Gillibrand not only to compliment her on the hard work she has put into this bill for so many years now--I think going back to 2013--but also to give my support to this effort as well. She doesn't need the compliments. She doesn't want them. But I say that she is entitled to the hard work that she has put into this bill, and it is time that we pass this legislation.

We are told that the bill will be considered by the Armed Services Committee as part of the NDAA. That is not a good reason to deny consideration as a stand-alone bill on the floor, which is what Senator Gillibrand has been to this floor numerous times to get done, and each time was objected to.

Now, the Armed Services Committee serves this Senate well for what it does on military policy, but when it comes to this particular piece of legislation, it is unfortunate that the Committee has a track record of gutting provisions that they don't like, even after the provisions receive the votes to be included.

On another issue, I want to recall what the Senate and House conferees did to a bill to prevent cuts to the Air National Guard. The provision was included in both the House and Senate NDAA but was quietly struck from the conference report. And bringing this bill separately on the floor of the U.S. Senate and getting it passed will prevent like things from happening to this sexual assault legislation.

So this legislation is needed now.

I think Senator Gillibrand has said it has 66 cosponsors, and that is exactly right, because there are far too many women and men in the Armed Forces being sexually assaulted and most never see justice. The rates of retaliation are too high, and prosecutions are too low.

Now, over the past month, I have heard favorable comments about attacking this issue from President Biden. I have heard an independent commission at the Pentagon speak to it. I have heard Secretary Austin speak to it. Now, whether they specifically support this legislation or not, they at least have admitted that sexual assault in the military is a major, major problem that needs to be dealt with in some way, but I am saying it will never be dealt with until we get Senator Gillibrand's legislation passed.

More importantly, it has the votes--66 votes in the U.S. Senate, for sure, and probably more when people have to put their vote on the line to be a stand-alone piece of legislation. It is time for the legislation to finally move forward, and I would urge my colleagues to allow it to proceed.

But as has happened before, we found out today is not that day. But that day should have been years ago, considering this problem is getting worse from year to year and, more importantly, the fact that it is such a big problem, and retaliation is such a big problem that you don't even get accurate statistics on the number of people that have been sexually assaulted, because they know if they go forward and report it, they will be retaliated against. It is a situation that we have dealt with for too long without the solutions that have been promised working, and so the only way to solve this problem is with Senator Gillibrand's legislation.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, why is there such an increase in violent crimes in American cities?

In New York City, the murder rate is up 37 percent from 2 years ago; in Atlanta, 53 percent from 2019. In Portland, OR, murders have increased over 500 percent.

So everybody is asking: What is going on?

Well, if you were to ask President Biden, he would say the usual rhetoric about how we need more gun control. The White House recently put out a so-called strategy to reduce crimes.

What is the first thing that the President wants to do about this issue? Go after rogue gun dealers. Well, we all know gun dealers must follow the law, like doing background checks. We all agree on that. But I don't think anyone truly believes that legal gun dealers are responsible for the sudden spike in violent crime, including our own Department of Justice.

Referring to a Department of Justice 2019 report, inmates who committed a gun crime most likely got their weapons from the black market--no background checks there. In fact, according to this report, only about 1 in 50 Federal inmates got a gun from a legal firearms dealer.

Speaking of which, if Democrats really want to protect Americans from illegal gun sales, they should support my bill, the Protecting Communities and Preserving the Second Amendment Act, which would actually do that.

But getting back to the recent crime wave, the real problem is what everyone knows but many of my friends on the left dare not say. The real problem is that for the past 14 months, police officers across the country have been vilified for doing their job, which has led to many of those same police leaving their job. In addition, liberal communities--and everybody knows most of our big cities of America are run by Democratic mayors--reduced the police forces and even reduced prosecutions. The result is that in San Francisco, for example, as you see on television, shoplifting appears to be a way of life.

Some police have pulled back from making sure that we are all safe because in too many cities, elected officials don't have their backs.

Last year, Attorney General Barr enacted Operation Legend, which paired Federal law enforcement officers up with local police in nine cities where crimes were soaring. This led to the arrest of 6,000 violent criminals by the end of last year, including hundreds of murderers.

Now, does this White House have the will to support law enforcement so the police can make our streets safer? Does the President have their backs?

Recently, the President's spokesperson said it was the Republicans who wanted to defund the police, not the Democrats. And that is just plain untrue and everybody knows it. What they were trying to say is that Republicans didn't support the Democrats' irresponsible spending bill back in March.

That is not defunding the police. That is just being fiscally responsible. It is not Republicans who say things like: ``No more policing, incarceration, or militarization. It can't be reformed,'' or words like ``defunding the police means defunding the police.''

Let me give you another example. The push to take resources away from law enforcement is alive and well over in the House. A couple of weeks ago, the Senate passed three bills that would support police. The first one is the Protecting America's First Responders Act. That bill makes sure seriously injured first responders or their widows and children get the benefits that they are entitled to.

The second bill, the COPS Counseling Act, creates a zone of privacy for police officers so that they can have counseling sessions for traumatic experiences and protect their privacy.

A third bill, the Jaime Zapata and Victor Avila Federal Officers Protection Act, makes it clear that killing a law enforcement officer overseas is a crime in the United States.

The Senate passed these bills because when it comes to law enforcement, we have their backs.

But right now, Democratic leadership in the House is preventing a vote on these bills. Why? I don't know. They are bipartisan bills that should easily pass with resounding support. If you are with me on funding the police, I know you will support these bills. If the President wants to reduce crime, he should tell our police: Go out there. Patrol our streets. We have your back.

I yield the floor.

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