Floor Statements

Mr. President, as in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 299, the Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans Act, and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; that the bill be considered read a third time and passed, and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. President, the House of Representatives has already passed this bill unanimously, 382 to 0. The bill is fully paid for, and it is long past time that we do the right thing. We have to right this wrong and help these veterans.

The only thing standing in the way of this bill to help the Vietnam veterans is the U.S. Senate, and that is shameful. We have just days before the Congress is finished. Our blue water veterans are waiting for us, their families are waiting for us, and some of them are dying waiting for us.

These patriotic Americans went to Vietnam. They risked their lives. They were exposed to the chemical, Agent Orange, which we now know is highly toxic. Some of them were exposed on the ground, some while patrolling the rivers, and some were exposed while stationed on ships off the Vietnamese coast. These are called our blue water Navy vets.

Now, all these years later, Agent Orange has made many of them sick and they are severely ill. There have been four different health studies by the CDC about the detrimental effects of Agent Orange exposure, and the blue water Navy veterans have been shown to suffer those exact diseases at the same rate as the other exposed veterans, but some of my colleagues are wrongly insisting on a fifth study.

We do not have another year to wait. Some of our veterans will not last that long. Many blue water veterans have already passed away from the disease associated with Agent Orange exposure.

The 1991 bill to provide coverage for veterans exposed to Agent Orange didn't discriminate between those who served offshore and those who served on rivers or on the ground. Yet due to a decision by a VA bureaucrat in 2002, the coverage for those who served offshore was wiped out. It doesn't make any sense, and we must help all of our veterans.

It would be tragic; it would be an absolute failure of this institution if we did not respond to this call for help from our veterans community. I urge my colleagues to reconsider their choice to block this legislation. The bill has had multiple hearings. It has gone through multiple drafts over the years. It has been subject to numerous studies.

I have a letter right here to the CBO from the Military-Veterans Advocacy association, literally going through each of the arguments that Senator Enzi just made to explain why those aren't true.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this letter be printed in the Record.

I hope all of us can come together to do the right thing by our veterans to make sure they get the coverage that they need and to stand by them in their greatest time of need.

I yield the floor to my colleague.

Mr. President, I rise to strongly oppose the nomination of Thomas Farr to the Federal bench, and I urge my colleagues to join me in voting against him.

The right to vote is sacred and a precious human right, but it has been under attack, and that is unconscionable and wrong.

This nominee represents yet another threat to the basic premise of one person, one vote because, throughout his career, he has worked to make it harder for Black Americans to vote. That is not who we are as a country, and this nominee does not deserve the privilege of a lifetime appointment on the Federal bench.

Over and over again, on the most serious and consequential questions related to our sacred right to vote, Mr. Farr has been on the wrong side of the issue.

Listen to his record: Mr. Farr defended in court a gerrymandered congressional map that was so blatantly racist that our Federal Court of Appeals judge ordered it to be redrawn. Mr. Farr defended in court State laws that were so obviously designed to suppress the Black vote that a Federal Court of Appeals ordered them to be struck down. He wasn't just a cheerleader for these discriminatory laws; he was the actual architect. He was their defender in court. He did everything he could to keep them in place.

That is why millions of Americans all over the country, including so many men and women of color, the NAACP, and the Congressional Black Caucus, are so outraged by this nomination. They are right to be so because this nomination is an insult.

This seat is the longest judicial vacancy in the country, but it did not have to be that way. Just a few years ago, a highly qualified nominee was picked to fill the seat, but she didn't even have a hearing, let alone a vote. So then another highly qualified nominee was picked to fill the seat, and she didn't receive a hearing either--or a basic vote. Now we have another nominee for the same exact seat, but this time my colleagues are practically tripping over themselves to rush him through the Senate at full speed, to push him across the finish line before the end of the year, and to hand him a lifetime appointment to the Court.

I urge my colleagues to reject this bad choice. Let's find someone better, who isn't so obviously biased on questions related to race. If his record of discrimination and bias alone isn't enough to convince you, then think about this: We cannot ignore the fact that this nomination is coming at a moment when so many Black Americans are still experiencing blatant and racist disenfranchisement every time they try to exercise their constitutional right to vote. Just look at the voter suppression that happened in Florida and in Georgia this month in their elections for Governor.

We have already seen terrible decisions from the Federal bench that have rolled back voting rights, such as when the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act. This body has done nothing to address this egregious decision, and we should not be complicit in further eroding this precious right.

Now we want to confirm another man to the Federal judiciary who has spent his entire legal career fighting to make it harder for Black Americans to vote. What kind of awful message are we sending to our country?

We must reject this nominee. We must stand up to discrimination and racism in all its forms, not reinforce them, not encourage them.

I urge my colleagues to do the right thing and vote no.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, today and these past several weeks have been deeply painful for many in this country. Today it is a painful day for millions of women all across the country who are rightly worried about losing their basic civil rights. It is a painful day for the brave and courageous survivors who have had to relive their trauma and, in some cases, have found the courage to tell their story for the very first time.

It is also a painful day for men who hope to see this Senate stand on the right side of history.

Today, in just a few hours, the U.S. Senate is going to turn its back on righteousness. It is going to turn its back on fairness and reason, and, make no mistake, it is going to turn its back on women.

What we have seen over the last few weeks is an exercise of power: Who has it and who doesn't. Rather than a search for the truth, we have seen those in power ram through a nominee who is unfit to serve on the Supreme Court. Ultimately, this is about the power structure of America, but it is changing, and it is changing fast.

I want to say something right here from the Senate floor to every woman in America who is listening: I hear you. Many of my colleagues in the Senate hear you. We hear your stories. We hear your voices, and we will be certain they will not go unheard.

I have heard from constituents all across my State. I have been talking to people for the last several months, and I have been talking to people specifically about this nominee for the past several weeks. I have heard from friends who have been sexually assaulted. I have heard from friends whose daughters have been sexually assaulted. I have heard from people who are outraged about what is happening in this country right now--outraged at a process that doesn't seek the truth and doesn't seem to be fair.

Unfortunately, it is a moment when survivors are having to relive the worst moments of their lives in real time by just watching the news.

So I am going to read a little bit of information that was submitted to the Senate Judiciary Committee on September 27 by Jessica Davidson from End Rape on Campus. She writes a very heartfelt letter about her own trauma, about her own experience with sexual violence, and about the representation she provides from her organization.

She writes:

We envision a world in which each individual has an

educational experience free from violence, and until then,

that all survivors are believed, trusted, and supported. Each

year, we assist nearly 1,000 survivors and their families

directly, conduct educational campaigns, support student

activists, and to advocate for policy reform efforts that

reach millions of individuals.

She asked:

How many more viral online moments must be created before

an incredible harm and trauma we have experienced is enough

to be taken seriously when a survivor comes forward? And why

is the burden always shifted to those who have experienced

the harm?

She says an American is sexually assaulted every 98 seconds. Just imagine how many lives are being destroyed.

She says more than an estimated 17,700,000 women and 2,780,000 men have experienced an attempted or completed rape since 1998; 3 million college students will be sexually assaulted this fall alone; 18,900 military servicemembers bravely serving our country experienced sexual assault in 2014; and one in every four voters in the United States is a survivor--more than half of all voters in the United States know a survivor. Survivors make up a significant portion of each U.S. Senator's constituencies, and survivors everywhere deserve to know that if they come forward, they will be taken seriously.

I received thousands of calls, hundreds of letters, and I have read some of those letters this morning. They are so disturbing and so upsetting. I can't imagine what that must be like to deal with in this moment that we are in when you have Members of the Senate who either don't believe credible survivors or, if they do believe them, they don't care.

For every survivor out there who feels she is not being heard, not being listened to, not being believed, I want you to know there are those of us here who do believe you, who have heard you, and who will fight for you. Your voices are being heard, and they do matter. Your willingness to protest, to stand tall, to speak out, and to speak clearly over these last few weeks has been extraordinary. It has been powerful. It has been meaningful. It has made a difference.

So do not fear that what you have done was a waste of time. Do not fear that speaking out doesn't matter because it does. The energy and inspiration you have created is going to drive this movement forward.

I also want to talk a little bit about why Brett Kavanaugh should not be serving on the Supreme Court, why he doesn't deserve this seat, and I want to talk a lot about his record and what we know about Brett Kavanaugh as an individual.

Over these last few weeks, we have learned a lot about this nominee, even before we found out that more than one woman had accused Judge Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her. His judicial record was already clear, and many of us made our decisions to oppose Judge Kavanaugh based on that record--that judicial record and statements alone. That was the first reason I opposed him--because I have no doubt he will undermine women's rights on the Supreme Court.

I will say more about his judicial record in a moment, but what we all saw and heard over the last few weeks isn't something that you can actually discern from a judicial record. More than one woman has come forward with sworn statements under penalty of perjury, saying Brett Kavanaugh committed acts of sexual misconduct against them. One of them, Dr. Blasey Ford, even bravely testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. She was under oath, and she relived one of the worst moments of her life on national television. She was credible. I believed her.

When my colleagues asked her what she remembered most clearly, her strongest memory was the laughter. She said that ``indelible in the hippocampus is the laughter--the laugh, the uproarious laughter between the two, and their having fun at my expense.''

She said: ``They were laughing with each other.'' She said: ``I was, you know, underneath one of them while the two laughed, two friend--two friends having a really good time with one another.''

She was direct, and she did not evade any questions. She did not duck or dodge like someone who was trying to hide the truth.

When my colleagues asked her with what degree of certainty did she believe Brett Kavanaugh assaulted her, she said: ``One hundred percent.''

When I was watching her testimony sitting there in the room, there were many moments when her testimony brought me to tears. I thought the way she opened was particularly moving. She said:

I am here today not because I want to be. I am terrified. I

am here because I believe it is my civic duty to tell you

what happened to me while Brett Kavanaugh and I were in high

school. I agonized daily with this decision throughout August

and early September 2018. The sense of duty that motivated me

to reach out confidentially to the Washington Post,

Representative Eshoo's office and Senator Feinstein's office

was always there, but my fears of the consequences of

speaking out started to increase.

During August 2018, the press reported that Mr. Kavanaugh's

confirmation was virtually certain. His allies painted him as

a champion of women's rights and empowerment. I believed that

if I came forward my voice would be drowned out by a chorus

of powerful supporters.

By the time of the confirmation hearings, I had resigned

myself to remaining quiet and letting the committee and the

Senate make their decision without knowing what Mr. Kavanaugh

had done to me. At the same time, my greatest fears have been

realized and the reality has been far worse than I expected.

Apart from the assault itself, these last couple of weeks

have been the hardest of my life. I have had to relive my

trauma in front of the entire world and have seen my life

picked apart by people on television, in the media, or in

this body who have never met or spoken with me. I have been

accused of acting out of partisan political motives. Those

who say that do not know me. I am a fiercely independent

person and I am no one's pawn.

My motivation in coming forward was to provide the facts

about how Mr. Kavanaugh's actions have damaged my life so

that you can take that into serious consideration as you make

your decisions about how to proceed. It is not my

responsibility to determine whether Mr. Kavanaugh deserves to

sit on the Supreme Court. My responsibility is to tell the

truth.

That is a woman of extraordinary humility and extraordinary courage.

I want to compare Dr. Blasey Ford's testimony to Judge Kavanaugh's testimony right after her. We all saw it. Some of my colleagues have suggested that because multiple women were making very credible accusations against Judge Kavanaugh that he had a right to be angry, that he was right to come out strong and fight back, like a politician would. Really? Is that how a judge is supposed to act? Not according to Judge Kavanaugh.

I want to quote from a law review article he wrote 2 years ago about how a good judge is supposed to act:

To be a good judge and a good umpire, it is critical that

you have the proper demeanor. We must walk in the shoes of

other judges, the lawyers, and the parties.

It is important to understand then to keep our emotions in

check, and be calm against

the storm. To put it in the vernacular: to be a good umpire

and be a good judge, don't be a jerk.

Judge Kavanaugh would have been well served to listen to his own advice.

I was shocked by his tirade against my colleagues and my party. I was disturbed by its vindictiveness, his animosity. I want to quote from his testimony to remind you of exactly what he said at his hearings. Every time I see these words, I am in disbelief that a sitting Federal judge--a nominee for the Supreme Court--said them to the Judiciary Committee in prepared testimony under oath.

He said:

This whole two-week effort has been a calculated and

orchestrated political hit, fueled with apparent pent-up

anger about President Trump and the 2016 election.

Fear that has been unfairly stoked about my judicial

record.

Revenge on behalf of the Clintons. And millions of dollars

in money from outside left-wing opposition groups.

Supreme Court Justices are supposed to be thinking about the law and only the law, not elections, not political parties, but now we know exactly what Judge Kavanaugh is thinking about. He is thinking about politics. He is thinking about leftwing conspiracies. He is thinking about the 2016 election and Trump and the Clintons.

Those aren't my words; those are his words, his testimony. He said them directly to the committee under oath while the entire Nation was watching. He showed us his true colors. He showed us what he does when he is under pressure. He showed us how he really feels about our politics and our political parties, even though he said he always stays far away from politics because judges aren't supposed to go there.

He showed us what he really thinks, deep down, when his back is against a wall. Think about that. A sitting Federal judge, a nominee to the Supreme Court, shouting--shouted about Democrats trying to take him down.

It makes me wonder, even if you love every judicial decision this judge has ever written, how can any of my colleagues argue, after hearing that tirade, that this judge is unbiased? It makes me wonder how any of my colleagues can ignore that fact. It makes me wonder, to my colleagues who are so desperate to confirm Brett Kavanaugh at all costs, what decisions by this judge are you so eager to see? What do you already know about how the supposedly fairminded judge is going to rule that you would risk the Court's reputation by putting such a blatant partisan on the bench?

A retired Supreme Court Justice, John Paul Stevens, who was appointed by a Republican, even came so far as to change his mind and oppose Judge Kavanaugh. Why? Because Judge Kavanaugh is now clearly biased. He said:

He has demonstrated a potential bias involving potential

litigants before the court that he would not be able to

perform its full responsibilities.

And I think there is merit in that criticism and that the

Senators should really pay attention to it.

For the good of the court, it's not healthy to get a new

justice that can only do a part-time job.

I agree with that. When the next big gerrymandering case comes before the Supreme Court, we already know how Judge Kavanaugh feels about Democrats because we heard directly from him at the hearing, so we can't expect him to rule fairly in that case.

What if a forced arbitration case related to sexual harassment comes before the Court? We all heard Judge Kavanaugh say under oath that credible allegations of sexual assault are nothing but a leftwing conspiracy, so we can't expect him to rule fairly on that one either.

There are real consequences to the bias and partisanship and anger Judge Kavanaugh showed at his hearing. I am incredibly disappointed by this, and I hope my colleagues think about this one last time before they cast their votes today.

I would like to talk a little bit about his record as a judge. Whose side does he take? Whom does he believe?

In one case, in a dissent, Judge Kavanaugh said employers should not have to give their workers insurance that covers birth control if they don't want to. In other words, he thinks a boss's religion is more important than a worker's religion. Does that sound fair to you, Madam President?

In another case, he had to decide whether a pregnant teenage immigrant girl should be allowed to have an abortion. He made her wait for 9 weeks before he said no, and then he was overruled by his judicial colleagues. He said he didn't think what he did to the girl was an undue burden. Does that sound fair to you?

Let's not forget that President Trump said he wanted the new Supreme Court Justice to overturn Roe v. Wade, that he wanted to nominate someone who would automatically vote to overturn it. He chose Brett Kavanaugh to get the job done.

If this Chamber confirms Judge Kavanaugh, I have no doubt that the Supreme Court will take away women's reproductive rights. I have no doubt that the Supreme Court will tell women they aren't allowed to make their own decisions with their own doctors about their own health.

I want to speak about another part of his record. Judge Kavanaugh wrote in an opinion that if the President doesn't like a law, then the President could ignore the law and ignore the courts. This is what he said. As you listen to this, let me know if you think this is judicially sound judgment. He wrote: ``Under the Constitution, the president may decline to enforce a statute that regulates private individuals when the president deems the statute unconstitutional, even if a court has held or would hold the statute constitutional.''

Anyone with the most basic understanding of how our constitutional system of government works knows that this is not what our Founding Fathers designed. Anyone who has been paying attention to President Trump's attacks on our institutions and his repeated attempts to undermine the Mueller investigation should be alarmed by that statement alone. It makes me think President Trump's choice for this nominee was because he wanted to be protected from the Mueller investigation.

I am also deeply concerned about Judge Kavanaugh's record on money in politics.

It should come as no surprise that Judge Kavanaugh is on the side of big money interests that pollute our political system. Kavanaugh was handpicked by White House Counsel Don McGahn, a former FEC Commissioner who was notorious for his hostility toward campaign finance laws. Indeed, Judge Kavanaugh fulfills President Trump's promise to nominate individuals in the mold of Justice Scalia, a steadfast opponent of campaign finance regulations.

Like McGahn and Justice Scalia, Kavanaugh has made his opposition to campaign finance laws clear during his time on the DC Circuit.

In 2011, Kavanaugh authored an opinion that would allow foreign nationals to spend unlimited funds on issue ads in U.S. elections. Let me say that again. Kavanaugh authored an opinion that would allow foreign nationals to spend unlimited funds on issue ads in U.S. elections. That is the Bluman v. FEC decision.

Kavanaugh presided over a lawsuit brought by foreign persons living in the United States who wanted to make campaign contributions to candidates in U.S. Federal elections. Although Kavanaugh upheld provisions of Federal election law banning foreign persons from contributing directly to a candidate or party, Kavanaugh found that federal election law ``does not restrain foreign nationals from speaking out about issues or spending money to advocate their views about issues.''

Under his reading of Federal election law in Bluman, Kavanaugh would only take issue with a small fraction of the election meddling perpetrated by the Russian operatives indicted by Special Counsel Mueller.

At his confirmation hearing, Judge Kavanaugh was given the opportunity to directly address the possibility that his decision in Bluman opened the door for ``Vladimir Putin . . . to buy issue ads in American elections.'' Judge Kavanaugh's response to Senator Whitehouse was misleading, indicating that the Supreme Court affirmed the case unanimously, which, while true as to foreign contributions to candidates, was not true on the point of issue ads.

Indeed, Judge Kavanaugh's response to a question for the record from Senator Coons also revealed his misleading response to Senator Whitehouse's question. He wrote: ``The challengers in Bluman did not seek to make contributions to organizations that make

expenditures on issue ads. The opinion made clear that the court's `holding does not address' whether `Congress might bar' foreign nationals living temporarily in the United States `from issue advocacy and speaking out on issues of public policy.' '' The Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the decision.

Judge Kavanaugh seeks to have it both ways. He brags about his opinion being unanimously upheld by the Court, but when he is confronted with the real-world consequences of his decision, he hides behind the pleadings.

According to Special Counsel Mueller's indictment, the issue ads run by Russian operatives seeking to meddle in the 2016 election include the messages ``JOIN our #HillaryClintonForPrison2016''--I don't even want to read the others; they are so horrible. ``Donald wants to defeat terrorism . . . Hillary wants to sponsor it.'' Yet Judge Kavanaugh's Bluman decision would permit foreign actors to run advertisements like the ones above without consequence. In fact, legal briefs filed by lawyers for the Russian operatives indicted by Special Counsel Mueller cite Kavanaugh's Bluman opinion for the proposition that ``[f]oreign nationals are not barred from issue advocacy . . . such as what is described in the indictment.''

Judge Kavanaugh opposes limitations on big money in politics. During his confirmation hearing, Judge Kavanaugh was confronted by Senator Klobuchar with an email he wrote in March 2002 wherein he suggested that contribution limits could be unconstitutional: ``And I have heard very few people say that the limits on contributions to candidates are unconstitutional, although I for one tend to think those limits have some constitutional problems.'' When Senator Klobuchar pressed Judge Kavanaugh on whether he believed that ``contribution limits have constitutional problems,'' Judge Kavanaugh evaded the question and issued a nonresponsive answer.

In a 2016 American Enterprise Institute speech, Kavanaugh said that political spending ``absolutely'' deserves First Amendment protection because ``to make your voice heard [in politics] . . . you need to raise money to be able to communicate to others in any kind of effective way.''

In 2009, in EMILY's List v. FEC, Kavanaugh heard a challenge to multiple FEC regulations restricting the use of ``hard-money'' by nonprofit organizations in Federal elections. These particular regulations were passed in striking down these regulations. Kavanaugh held that nonprofit organizations are ``constitutionally entitled to raise and spend unlimited money in support of candidates for elected office'' because it is ``implausible that contributions to independent expenditure political committees are corrupting.''

These are really concerning statements about unlimited money and spending in politics from foreign nationals on issue ads and from moneyed interests. I do not believe that money is speech, and I do not believe that corporations should have the same free speech rights as individuals, but Judge Kavanaugh does, and I find that to be deeply troubling.

Judge Kavanaugh also has a very disturbing record when it comes to rolling back the civil rights of millions of Americans.

In his time as a judge, Brett Kavanaugh has consistently sided against Americans who are trying to exercise their civil rights. From voting rights, to employment discrimination, to the rights of those with disabilities, Kavanaugh has taken positions that perpetuate inequality. Judge Kavanaugh's record leaves little doubt--if confirmed to the Supreme Court, he will continue to roll back the hard-won rights of millions of Americans.

As a partner at Kirkland & Ellis, Kavanaugh was involved in Rice v. Cayetano, which challenged Hawaii's right to limit participation in an election for the State's Office of Hawaiian Affairs to Native Hawaiians. In a brief he cowrote with Robert Bork and Roger Clegg--the latter of whom heads the anti-affirmative-action Center for Equal Opportunity--Kavanaugh argued that restricting participation to Native Hawaiians was unconstitutional. According to Kavanaugh, it did not matter that Hawaii's ``voting qualification in elections for the Office of Hawaiian Affairs [was] designed to remedy past discrimination in voting against `Hawaiians' in Hawaii.'' Discussing that decision in a 1999 interview, Kavanaugh said that the ``case is one more step along the way in what I see as an inevitable conclusion within the next 10 or 20 years when the court will say we are all one race in the eyes of government.''

Kavanaugh's adoption of Justice Scalia's approach from Adarand Constructors v. Pena that ``in the eyes of government, we are [all] just one race'' indicates a belief that the government should be ``color blind.'' Under this theory, affirmative action and minority contracting requirements would be constitutionally prohibited.

Those are just some of the issues that I care about and that New Yorkers care about. I am very troubled about this nominee for so many reasons--for his record, for his beliefs, for his judicial temperament, for how he treated women Senators during that hearing.

When we vote on this nomination later today, when we decide whether Judge Kavanaugh deserves to have the privilege to serve on the Supreme Court, there is just one fundamental question that I believe should be on all of our minds when we make this decision: Do we as a country value women? Does the Supreme Court value women? Does the Senate value women? Does the President? Most of all, does Brett Kavanaugh value women?

Millions of Americans--millions of women--are watching us today. They are waiting to see whether, when a woman comes forward and says she is a survivor of sexual assault, this Chamber--do the individuals here take her seriously? Do we listen to her, or do we disregard her and disbelieve her and patronize her?

The last 2 weeks have been so incredibly painful for women who have experienced sexual trauma, for survivors all across this country. When they are watching some of the most powerful people in this country disregard Dr. Blasey Ford--they distrust her, they disbelieve her, and they devalue her--it is painful for all of them. It is painful because they are tired of seeing the same old outcome every single time. They are tired of the same old scenario where the men are believed and the women are not. They can't believe their eyes when they see two women being treated with so little respect and with less of a process than even Anita Hill received.

One of the worst parts of this process has been that we have been through it before. Almost three decades ago, Anita Hill sat right where Dr. Blasey Ford sat. She went through the same kind of cross- examination. She was disbelieved. She was patronized. She was disrespected. We said we would never put another woman through that. We said we had learned lessons from that fiasco. We said it would never happen again, but it did. And I really believe that the process over the last few weeks was shameful. We should have learned from our mistakes, and we should be doing much better.

But I can tell you, America's women are watching. They are watching what our leaders decide to do. They are watching who is listening and who is not. And they have made a decision that I could have never imagined or predicted. So many women in this country--and men--have made the decision since President Trump was elected that they are going to be heard. They are going to march. They are showing up at townhalls. They are showing up outside of Federal offices. They are coming to Washington. They are knocking on Senate doors. They are speaking out. They are protesting. They are carrying signs. They are speaking their truth, and they are speaking truth to power in a way they perhaps never imagined they would do.

They are running for office. Over 200 women are running for Congress alone as nominees of their party this year--more than ever in the history of America. They are working hard to right the wrongs that they see happening in this country.

They know that what makes this country great--what has always made this country great--is that we have cared about one another, that we are a country that believes in the golden rule, and that we are a country that believes you should care about the least among us.

Every generation has tried to make this country a more perfect union. Whether it is fighting to end slavery through abolition; whether it is fighting for basic voting rights for all Americans through the suffragist movement; whether it is the civil rights movement saying that equality is necessary in this country and people must be protected by the law; whether it is the LGBT equality movement to ensure that we can marry the people we love; whether it is people's desire today to ensure healthcare as a right and not a privilege, this is what our country is about.

I deeply feel that the process over these last few months has turned our backs on that basic desire to bring our country to a more perfect union, to a place where we value one another.

Do we value women? Unfortunately, for too many in this Chamber, the answer is no.

I hope the American people are listening. I hope they are watching. I hope they will fight for what they believe in, their values, and what this country stands for.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, I rise to speak about Judge Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court.

I urge my colleagues to actually listen to Dr. Blasey Ford and treat her with the respect that she deserves. She deserves better than the setup she is walking into tomorrow.

I want to take a step back for a second and look at the big picture of what is actually going on with this nomination. We have a nominee for a lifetime appointment to the highest Court in the land who has been accused, credibly, of sexual assault. Dr. Blasey Ford reluctantly came forward out of civic duty and said that Brett Kavanaugh tried to rape her in high school. She is now facing death threats for her courage, and her worst fears of how she would be treated by this body have come to fruition.

Another woman, Deborah Ramirez, agreed to tell her story after being contacted by a reporter--again, risking her career and her safety--and said that Brett Kavanaugh exposed himself to her face in college while laughing, as part of a game.

These accusations are disturbing enough by themselves, but the response to these allegations by our colleagues are so disappointing. Take a look at how Dr. Blasey Ford is being bullied because she told her story. Listen to how she is being patronized and dismissed by some Members of the Judiciary Committee. Look at how our President belittled and demeaned Dr. Blasey Ford and Ms. Ramirez, reminding us once again that he has been credibly accused of committing sexual assault himself and denigrates not just women who accuse him but survivors everywhere.

That is not all. The chief counsel of the Senate Judiciary Committee tweeted after Dr. Blasey Ford's sexual assault allegation: ``Unfazed and determined. We will confirm Judge Kavanaugh.''

According to Ms. Ramirez's lawyer, the Judiciary Committee isn't even interested in taking her claims seriously or getting information from her about her claims. Instead of getting the facts--instead of even wanting the facts--they try to dismiss this as a smear campaign and plow right ahead.

For anyone who has ever wondered why so many survivors of sexual assault don't come forward--obviously, there is trauma, but there is also the fear of this very kind of retaliation and scorn. The question I have, that I know you have: Do we value women in this country? Do we listen to women when they tell us about sexual trauma? Do we listen to their stories about how their lives have been forever scarred? Do we take their claims seriously or do we just disbelieve them as a matter of course?

I want to echo the words of my colleague from Alaska: ``It is about whether or not a woman who has been a victim at some point of her life is to be believed.''

I believe Dr. Blasey Ford. Here is why I believe her. She has risked everything--her own safety--to come out on the record to say Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her. She told her therapist and her husband about it 5 years ago. She told a friend about it a year ago. She told a reporter about it before Kavanaugh was ever named. She has even taken a lie detector test.

Why are my colleagues moving so fast, as fast as they possibly can, to confirm this judge?

This process is sending the worst possible message to girls and boys everywhere. It is telling American women that your voices don't matter. It is telling survivors everywhere that your experiences don't count, that they are not important, and that they are not to be believed. We are saying that women are worth less than a man's promotion. That is not how the world is in 2018, and we cannot allow this Senate, this body, to take us back to before 1991.

To those whom I hear say over and over that this isn't fair to Judge Kavanaugh, that he is entitled to due process and to the presumption of innocence until proven guilty and that Dr. Blasey Ford has to prove her case beyond a reasonable doubt, those are the standards for a trial. Those are the standards in criminal justice. We are not having a trial. This is not a court. He is not entitled to those because we are not actually seeking to convict him or to put him in jail. We are seeking the truth. We are seeking facts. We are seeking just what happened.

We, Senators--not staff members, not female lawyers--are being asked to assess his honesty. Is he an honest person? Is he trustworthy? Can we trust him to do the right thing for decades? To rule on women's lives for decades to come? Can we trust him to do that right?

This is not about whether he should be convicted. This is about whether he has the privilege to serve on the highest Court of the land for a lifetime. This is not a court of law. This is a job interview, and it is our job as Senators to assess if he is honest. Has he lied about his past? Has he misled members of the Judiciary Committee? Is he trustworthy?

One point, I think, that our colleagues are somewhat blind to, which I know the Presiding Officer is not, is that the last 2 weeks have been so painful for women who have experienced sexual trauma. Women have lived through this. So, when they are watching some of the most powerful people in this country disregard, distrust, disbelieve, minimize, devalue, unfortunately, it is painful for all of them. It is painful because you are tired of seeing the same old outcome every single time. You are tired of the scenarios in which the men are believed and the women are not. They can't believe their eyes when they see two women being treated with less respect and having less of a process than even Anita Hill received.

I quote a friend of mine, Amina Sow, who just disclosed today that she is a survivor. Her words are powerful and truthful and describe exactly the way many people feel:

The truth is our strength. We are each other's strengths.

To the women who are struggling: I see you. I am sorry we

have to go through this. Thank you for trusting us with your

stories. I am heartened by them and honored to know about

you.

I believe Dr. Blasey Ford because she is risking everything--her safety, her security, her reputation, her career--to tell this story at this moment for all the right reasons. If we allow women's experiences of sexual trauma to be second to a man's promotion, it will not only diminish this watershed moment of the societal change we are in, but it will bring shame on this body and on the Court.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Mr. President, I rise to speak in opposition to President Trump's nominee to the Supreme Court, Judge Brett Kavanaugh.

In my home State of New York, more than 8 million people have health problems. That is almost half my State. They are living with diabetes. They have had treatment for cancer. They have a childhood disease.

Before the Affordable Care Act became law, if you had a health problem and you needed to see a doctor, health insurance companies were allowed to make you pay much more. The health insurance companies were allowed to turn you away. They were allowed to tell you ``Sorry, you are not profitable for us because you are sick,'' and they did it many times. Let's not forget that included women who were pregnant.

But they can't tell them that anymore because of the Affordable Care Act. The Affordable Care Act made that simple statement illegal.

Now insurance companies must cover you if you are sick. They must cover you if you have had a health problem in the past. And millions of Americans are better off now because of that fact.

So what does this have to do with the Supreme Court? President Trump has made it clear that one of his biggest goals as President is to destroy the Affordable Care Act. He has already tried hard to get Congress to repeal the law, and luckily for us, he failed. He failed because people don't want their health insurance taken away from them. It is really that simple.

Millions of Americans raised their voices and told Congress that if the Affordable Care Act were repealed, they would lose their insurance, and that would be devastating for them and their families. And Congress listened to them.

But now there is a new challenge to the law in Federal court, and the Trump administration is refusing to defend the Affordable Care Act.

When this case makes it to the Supreme Court in a few more years, then the next Supreme Court Justice could be the deciding vote on whether the Affordable Care Act is overturned. That means the next Supreme Court Justice could have the power to decide that insurance companies don't have to cover patients anymore if they have a health problem. He could have the power to decide that insurance companies don't have to cover you or your child anymore if your child is sick.

Healthcare costs in my State have already skyrocketed because of the fact that the Trump administration has attacked this law over and over again. But repealing the law would be absolutely devastating to so many families. More than 8 million New Yorkers could lose their health insurance or pay more for their coverage. So would millions more all across the country. I am very concerned that is exactly what Judge Kavanaugh would do if he were given this opportunity.

Just look at his record. When Judge Kavanaugh had a case before him that was attacking another part of the Affordable Care Act, he dissented in the case, and he said that even though the Affordable Care Act requires employers to cover birth control medicines for their workers, they shouldn't have to do it if they don't want to. He even took it so far as to say that if the President doesn't like a law--if the President doesn't like a law--then the President could ignore the law and ignore the courts.

Listen to this one opinion. This will interest the Presiding Officer, I am sure. Tell me if you think this is sound judicial judgment. He wrote: ``Under the Constitution, the President may decline to enforce a statute that regulates private individuals when the President deems the statute unconstitutional, even if a court has held or would hold the statute constitutional.''

Anyone with the most basic understanding of how the constitutional system of government works in this country knows that this is not what our Founding Fathers intended.

If this judge is confirmed, then there is a dangerously high likelihood that he will strike down the Affordable Care Act.

We must not go back to the days when an insurance company could charge a person more just because they have health problems. We cannot go back to the days when an insurance company could say no to a patient because they could say: You are just not going to make us enough money.

We must listen to our constituents--listen to the millions of men, women, and children all across this country who need access to basic healthcare, and they cannot afford to lose their insurance.

We must reject this nominee.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, I rise to speak about the farm bill-- something that we have in common, something that both of our States know is very important for this country's economy. This legislation is one of the most important chances we have in this Chamber to address one of the

most pressing issues in rural parts of our country right now.

I want to speak about two of my most urgent priorities for this year's farm bill, and I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting them.

The first is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which most of us call SNAP. There are more than 40 million Americans who rely on SNAP every day. More than 40 million people would go hungry if they didn't have access to SNAP. Many of these Americans are disabled. Many of them are elderly and retired. Nearly half of them are children. Millions of them--and I truly mean millions--are working.

Congress should not take SNAP away from hard-working Americans just because they don't fill out monthly paperwork. Last week, the House passed its own version of the farm bill that would do just that. That is shameful.

Here is the truth about SNAP. The vast majority of able-bodied adults on SNAP are already working. They are already working. They have jobs. Many of them work several jobs. They are doing everything they can to get ahead, just to have a small slice of the American dream. They still need SNAP. They need SNAP because their wages are too low.

To be clear, they already have to follow the work requirements. There have been work requirements in place since 1971. But the farm bill would just add more redtape, more paperwork for struggling families just so they could eat dinner.

This is the difference between the House farm bill and the Senate farm bill: The Senate farm bill got it right; the House farm bill has created this terrible requirement of paperwork just to get SNAP. One of our House colleagues said that it is to promote ``self-sufficiency,'' as if low-income workers on SNAP aren't already working every waking hour just to scrape by. The House plan is a blatant example of how out of touch Congress is about poverty in this country. It is shameful that some Members of the House from my own State would even support this cruel plan when so many New Yorkers rely on SNAP every single day. I am happy that the Senate farm bill has more heart than that.

The bill that came out of committee shows respect for all hard- working families who need SNAP, and now we need to take it a step further to do even more to help hungry children. I am submitting an amendment to the Senate farm bill called the SNAP for Kids Act. It would increase the amount of SNAP funding that families with kids in school are allowed to receive. If we pass this amendment, we will help families stretch their food budgets just a few more days at the end of every month when they need it the most, before the next paycheck comes in, and we will help keep millions of children in this country from going hungry. That should be a priority here--protecting children--for all of us.

I have two young children, and I know that many of our colleagues in this Chamber also have young children. Our children will never have to have access to SNAP to get basic nutrition. They will never know what it is like to wake up hungry because their parents didn't have enough food to feed them a nutritious dinner. I believe at my core that we need to care about other people's children as much as we care about our own, so I urge my colleagues to do what is right and support the SNAP for Kids Act. Let's reject the House of Representatives' cruel plan and commit ourselves to protecting SNAP instead of destroying it.

The second issue I want to talk about today is dairy prices. My home State of New York is one of the biggest dairy-producing States in the country. We are blessed with thousands of dairy farms and even more hard-working men and women who wake up before the Sun rises every single day to produce the milk that keeps our families healthy.

Unfortunately, over the last few years, our dairy farmers have taken a serious hit from persistently low dairy prices. Many of our dairy farms are operating below their cost of production. Over the last decade, dairy farms all over New York have actually had to shut down because of this crisis. Many are currently on the brink of failing.

This is what one dairy farmer said:

It's stressful. . . . Do I want to wake up and lose $30,000

a day?

Imagine the pain our dairy farmers and their families suffer when they wake up before dawn, every day, without a break, and they still can't make ends meet and provide for their own children. Imagine the heartbreak and the depression of the last dairy farmer in a family--the one who has to sell the farm despite generations of hard work because he just can't make ends meet.

This is a crisis right in our backyard. It is hurting our agricultural economy. It is hurting our rural communities, and, most of all, it is hurting our farmers and their families. One big reason is that our dairy insurance program didn't work.

I have heard from dairy farmers all across New York who have been essentially ripped off by the dairy insurance program because the program failed to cover our farmers when they needed it the most--when milk prices have plummeted.

Our dairy farmers need a lifeline, and I was very proud to add a provision to the Senate farm bill for $77 million of those premiums to be returned. This is great news for our dairy farmers, but there is still so much more we can do. I have asked the Secretary of Agriculture for emergency funding to address this issue now, but he refuses to help our dairy farmers.

I am submitting an amendment that would require the Department of Agriculture to help our dairy farmers with emergency funding now. I am asking the Secretary of Agriculture for the exact same amount of funding he just gave cotton farmers across this country when they were struggling.

The USDA should be fair and treat our dairy farmers with the same support. I want this emergency funding to go directly to those farmers who need it so they can keep producing milk--without going bankrupt-- long enough for the industry to come together to balance supply and for Congress to create a more fair milk pricing system.

I urge my colleagues to support this amendment too. It affects all of us. I know you believe our farmers work hard every day. They need our support. I urge all of us to stand with them.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, I rise to speak about the humanitarian crisis that is at our southern border right now. We are living through a moment in history when we are literally sending babies and toddlers into detention camps.

Think about that. Think about what I just said. Our Federal Government is sending babies and toddlers to detention camps. This is immoral. It is wrong.

The AP broke a story last night that left me speechless, and I want the details of this horror recorded and documented in the official Senate Record so Americans years from now will look back on us and will see how wrong we were.

I will read this article from the Associated Press, called ``Youngest Migrants Held in `Tender Age' Shelters.'' It is by Garance Burke and Martha Mendoza.

Trump administration officials have been sending babies and

other young children forcibly separated from their parents at

the U.S.-Mexico border to at least three ``tender age''

shelters in South Texas, the Associated Press has learned.

Lawyers and medical providers who have visited the Rio

Grande Valley shelters described play rooms of crying

preschool-age children in crisis. The government also plans

to open a fourth shelter to house hundreds of young migrant

children in Houston, where city leaders denounced the move

Tuesday.

Since the White House announced its zero tolerance policy

in early May, more than 23,000 children have been taken from

their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border, resulting in a new

influx of young children requiring government care. The

government has faced withering critiques over images of some

of the children in cages inside U.S. Border Patrol processing

stations.

Decades after the nation's child welfare system ended the

use of orphanages over concerns about the lasting trauma to

children, the administration is starting up new institutions

to hold Central American toddlers that the government

separated from their parents.

``The thought that they are going to be putting such little

kids in an institutional setting? I mean it is hard for me

even to wrap my mind around it,'' said Kay Bellor, vice

president for programs at Lutheran Immigration and Refugee

Service, which provides foster care and other child welfare

services to migrant children. ``Toddlers are being

detained.''

Bellor said shelters follow strict procedures surrounding

who can gain access to the children in order to protect their

safety, but that means information about their welfare can be

limited.

By law, child migrants traveling alone must be sent to

facilities run by the U.S. Department of Health and Human

Services within three days of being detained. The agency then

is responsible for placing the children in shelters or foster

homes until they are united with a relative or sponsor in the

community as they await immigration court hearings.

But U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions' announcement last

month that the government would criminally prosecute everyone

who crosses the U.S.-Mexico border illegally has led to the

breakup of migrant families and sent a new group of hundreds

of young children into the government's care.

The United Nations, some Democratic and Republican

lawmakers and religious groups have sharply criticized the

policy, calling it inhumane.

Not so, said Steven Wagner, an official with the Department

of Health and Human Services.

``We have specialized facilities that are devoted to

providing care to children with special needs and tender age

children as we define as under 13 would fall into that

category,'' he said. ``They're not government facilities per

se, and they have very well-trained clinicians, and those

facilities meet state licensing standards for child welfare

agencies, and they're staffed by people who know how to deal

with the needs--particularly of the younger children.''

Until now, however, it's been unknown where they are.

``In general we do not identify the locations of permanent

unaccompanied alien children program facilities,'' said

agency spokesman Kenneth Wolfe.

The three centers--in Combes, Raymondville, and

Brownsville--have been rapidly repurposed to serve needs of

children including some under 5. A fourth, planned for

Houston, would house up to 240 children in a warehouse

previously used for people displaced by Hurricane Harvey,

Mayor Sylvester Turner said.

Turner said he met with officials from Austin-based

Southwest Key Programs, the contractor that operates some of

the child shelters, to ask them to reconsider their plans. A

spokeswoman for Southwest Key didn't immediately reply to an

email seeking comment.

``And so there comes a point in time we draw a line, and

for me, the line is with these children,'' Turner said during

a news conference Tuesday.

On a practical level, the zero tolerance policy has

overwhelmed the federal agency charged with caring for the

new influx of children who tend to be much younger than teens

who typically have been traveling to the U.S. alone. Indeed

some recent detainees are infants, taken from their mothers.

Doctors and lawyers who have visited the shelter said the

facilities were fine, clean and safe, but the kids--who have

no idea where their parents are--were hysterical, crying, and

acting out.

``The shelters aren't the problem, it's taking kids from

their parents that's the problem,'' said South Texas

pediatrician Marsha Griffin who has visited many.

Alicia Lieberman, who runs the Early Trauma Treatment

Network at the University of California, San Francisco, said

decades of study show early separations can cause permanent

emotional damage.

``Children are biologically programmed to grow best in the

care of a parent figure. When that bond is broken through

long and unexpected separations with no set timeline for

reunion, children respond at the deepest psychological and

emotional levels,'' she said. ``Their fear triggers a flood

of stress hormones that disrupt neural circuits in the brain,

create high levels of anxiety, make them more susceptible to

physical and emotional illness, and damage their capacity to

manage their emotions, trust people, and focus their

attention on age-appropriate activities.''

Days after Sessions announced the zero-tolerance policy,

the government issued a call for proposals from shelter and

foster care providers to provide services for the new influx

of children taken from their families after journeying from

Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Mexico.

As children are separated from their families, law

enforcement agents reclassify them from members of family

units to ``unaccompanied alien children.'' Federal officials

said Tuesday that since May, they have separated 2,342

children from their families, rendering them unaccompanied

minors in the government's care.

While Mexico is still the most common country of origin for

families arrested at the border, in the last eight months,

Honduras has become the fastest-growing category as compared

to fiscal year 2017.

During a press briefing [on] Tuesday, reporters repeatedly

asked for an age breakdown of the children who have been

taken. Officials from both law enforcement and Health and

Human Services said they didn't know how many children were

under 5, under 2, or even so little they're non-verbal.

``The facilities that they have for the most part are not

licensed for tender age children,'' said Michelle Brane,

director of migrant rights at the Women's Refugee Commission,

who met with a 4-year-old girl in diapers in a McAllen

warehouse where Border Patrol temporarily holds migrant

families. ``There is no model for how you house tons of

little children in cots institutionally in our country. We

don't do orphanages, our child welfare has recognized that is

an inappropriate setting for little children.''

So now, the government has to try to hire more caregivers.

The recent call for proposals by the federal government's

Office of Refugee Resettlement said it was seeking applicants

who can provide services for a diverse population ``of all

ages and genders, as well as pregnant and parenting teens.''

Even the policy surrounding what age to take away a baby is

inconsistent. Customs and Border Protection field chiefs over

all nine southwest border districts can use their discretion

over how young is too young, officials said. And while Health

and Human Services defines ``tender age'' typically as 12 and

under, Customs and Border Protection has at times defined it

as 5 and under.

For 30 years, Los Fresnos, Texas-based International

Education Services ran emergency shelters and foster care

programs for younger children and pregnant teens who arrived

in the U.S. as unaccompanied minors. At least one resident

sued for the right to have an abortion in a high-profile case

last March.

For reasons the agency did not explain, three months ago

the government's refugee resettlement office said it was

ending its funding to the program and transferring all

children to other facilities. This came weeks before the

administration began its ``zero tolerance'' policy, prompting

a surge in ``tender age'' migrant children needing shelter.

In recent days, members of Congress have been visiting the

shelters and processing centers, or watching news reports

about them, bearing witness to the growing chaos. In a letter

sent to Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Tuesday, a dozen

Republican senators wrote that separating families isn't

consistent with American values and ordinary human decency.

On Tuesday, a Guatemalan mother who hasn't seen her 7-year-

old son since he was taken from her a month ago sued the

Trump administration. Beata Mariana de Jesus Mejia-Mejia was

released from custody while her asylum case is pending and

thinks her son, Darwin, might be in a shelter in Arizona.

``I only got to talk to him once and he sounded so sad. My

son never used to sound like that, he was such a dynamic

boy,'' Mejia-Mejia said as she wept. ``I call and call, and

no one will tell me where he is.''

The Presiding Officer has young children. I have young children. I am certain he cannot imagine how horrific it would be for him to give up his child

into the hands of those he does not know and then not know where they will take him or her. I am certain he can't imagine that pain and horror. This body should not allow it. We should stand against it. It is morally wrong. It is outrageous, and it must end.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise to speak about the humanitarian crisis happening right now in our country at the border-- something I implore my colleagues to fight to stop. The Department of Homeland Security is tearing young children from the arms of their parents. They are traumatizing infants and children, and Congress needs urgently to act.

I know we have disagreements about immigration policy in this Chamber, and I know we have disagreements about how we should fix our immigration system, which we have desperately needed to fix for decades. Surely, we must be able to agree that Federal agents should not be tearing young children from the arms of their parents. We must be able to agree that families with infants should not be forcibly separated.

Where is the outrage? Where is the urgency?

I hear my colleagues speak all the time about Federal Government overreach. If this isn't Federal Government overreach, what is? This is the moment that they have gone too far. One mother was breastfeeding her infant. A Federal agent took that baby out of her mother's arms, handcuffed her, and arrested her.

Where is that baby now? How is that baby doing? Where is the baby's mother?

From mid-April through the end of last month, almost 2,000 children were separated from adults at the border. Nearly 50 times a day on American soil, our government has separated a child from their parents, creating fear and terror in their lives. Just today, it was reported that the Department of Homeland Security is now holding 11,785 minors-- 11,785 minors. This is a disgrace.

One worker at a detention center for children just resigned as a conscientious objector, and he described the children being held there as a ``traumatized population that has no clue what's going on.'' He said the staff was not prepared at all to look after 4- and 5-year-olds who were coming into these detention centers. He said the kids were screaming and crying for their moms and dads. Pediatricians who met these children were calling it ``government-sanctioned child abuse.''

One of our colleagues in the House was able to meet with mothers whose children were taken from them at the border. She said that in some cases, the mothers were ``literally sitting in a room next to where the children were being held and could hear their children screaming.''

Have we not studied our own history? This is the kind of thing we read about in history books and to which we shake our heads in disgust. We ask ourselves: How did we let this happen? We ask ourselves: Why didn't Congress stop this? Why didn't anyone do anything? Don't we remember what happened during World War II with the Japanese internment camps? Children were traumatized, and families were damaged--in some cases permanently. The memorial to remind us of this is a stone's throw from the U.S. Capitol. It is just for the purpose of reminding us to never do it again. We cannot let our country go down this dark road again.

If Congress does not stop the out-of-control Department of Homeland Security--if Congress does not stop families from being torn apart-- even though it is happening right in front of our eyes, then this Congress will go down in history as a weak Congress that did nothing to stop one of the worst, horrific chapters of American history.

This has to be the moment when we do our jobs--when we stand up, speak truth to power, and do the right thing. We don't know how many kids are going to be traumatized for the rest of their lives because of our actions. These young children will never forget that when they first came to America, they were separated from their mothers and their fathers.

The President of the United States is not telling the truth to the American people about this policy. It is not true that this immoral and repulsive practice of separating children from their parents is a mandatory result of existing law. It is just not true. This is the stated practice and policy of zero tolerance by this administration. It is abhorrent and immoral. The administration could stop this all by itself today if it wanted to, but since it will not, Congress will need to act. If this Congress cannot or will not push back against this administration when it is actually harming children, when will it act?

I urge my colleagues to come together right now to stop this stain on our Nation. We have a bill that was introduced by Senator Feinstein. We already have 49 cosponsors. We should vote on this bill. It would protect the welfare of children. It would make sure that children would not be separated from their parents. The only time they would be separated from their parents or the adults they are with is if they are being trafficked or abused. Otherwise, families should be allowed to stay together.

We should do the right thing. This is a moral issue. This is a humanitarian issue. This is an issue of right versus wrong. As a mother and as a legislator, I can't imagine the terror these parents face in not knowing what is going to happen to their children. It is wrong for us to stand by silently. It is wrong for us to do nothing. This is what the darkness looks like. We have to stand up against it.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I rise to urge my colleagues to join me in voting for a bipartisan amendment, No. 2294, the Military Justice Improvement Act. It will fix our broken military justice system.

I believe our servicemembers deserve a military justice system that is worthy of their sacrifice. That means one that is both professional and fair. I think every one of my colleagues in this Chamber agrees that this is a priority, no matter where you are from and no matter your background. Some of my newer colleagues may be less familiar with this issue. So I am going to tell them what I am talking about.

We all deeply revere our servicemembers, which means it is not easy to talk about problems within an institution that we treasure so greatly in this country. The fact is that the military has a problem with sexual assault. It is pervasive, it is destroying lives, and it has been going on for years.

Listen to these most disturbing numbers.

Since we first introduced this bill 5 years ago, the number of cases that commanders have moved forward has decreased despite an increased number of reports. In fiscal year 2013, 484 cases proceeded to trial, and in fiscal year 2017, only 406 cases proceeded to trial. It is estimated that there were close to 15,000 cases of military sexual assault in 2016. That doesn't even include spouses and civilians in that estimate. It is just an estimate of servicemembers. In a survey of Afghanistan and Iraq veterans--and supported by the Department of Defense's own data--7 out of 10 military sexual assault survivors said they had experienced retaliation or other negative behaviors because they had reported the crimes, and 14 percent of survivors declined even to participate in the justice process after their reporting. That is how little confidence they have in this current system.

This is after years of our committee's working with the Defense Department to fix this problem. I think we have passed every small- ball, incremental reform anybody has been willing to agree on, and it hasn't made a difference. This is even after every Secretary of Defense since Dick Cheney was Secretary of Defense has said there will be zero tolerance for sexual assault in the military. Almost nothing has changed. Listen to these stories.

In one case, a woman was raped by a servicemember. She went to the hospital. She told a friend. An investigation then started. During the investigation, two more victims came forward to tell their stories. They said they had been raped by the very same servicemember. The military investigative team--the military police--recommended that the case proceed to a court-martial, but because of the way our military justice system works today, a military commander was in charge of the case, not a trained military prosecutor. That commander chose just to discharge the perpetrator--to send him right into the civilian world with no trial, with no court-martial, with no record. Not only were those servicemembers who were violently assaulted denied justice, but

a serial predator was also released into the general public. That is not right.

Listen to another case of a former marine who was working as an Air Force civilian. She was from a military family with Army and Navy veterans. She was proud to serve and loved to support the camaraderie, but she was abused by her own immediate commander, who had direct power over her in the chain of command. She tried to seek justice, but, once again, a military commander was in charge of the case, not a trained military prosecutor who understands these kinds of cases and understands criminal justice. Despite overwhelming evidence, including text messages, physical evidence, and eyewitnesses, the perpetrator was allowed to retire without bearing any financial penalty, without there being any charges, and with a full military pension.

My office hears all the time from women and men who have been raped in the military, who have been abused, who have been stalked, who have been retaliated against. It is an epidemic, and it is not improving.

Listen to the most recent headline from USA Today: ``Marine Corps general fired for calling sexual harassment claims `fake news.' ''

The Navy Times reads: ``Officer accused of patronizing prostitutes worked in the sex assault prevention office while awaiting court- martial.''

The Stars and Stripes reads: ``Fort Benning drill sergeants suspended amid sexual assault allegations.''

USA Today reads: ``Bad Santa: Navy's top admiral kept spokesman after boozy party, sexual predator warning.''

Another from the same paper reads: ``Senior military officials sanctioned for more than 500 cases of serious misconduct.''

The AP reads: ``Pentagon misled lawmakers on military sexual assault cases.''

These are just the recent headlines. There is a pattern here.

Our military justice system is broken, and the Pentagon is not being forthright about this problem. Yet Congress is still hesitating. Congress is still refusing to put trained military prosecutors in charge of these cases. This has to end. Congress has to step in. It has to do its job. Our job is to provide oversight and accountability over the administration and over the Department of Defense on this very issue. We have the responsibility to ensure that military justice is possible for survivors in the military. It shouldn't matter if the perpetrator has skills that the commander needs. It shouldn't matter if he happens to be buddies with the commander. What should matter is whether there is evidence that a serious crime has been committed. That should be the determining factor of whether these cases go forward to trial.

We need to pass the Military Justice Improvement Act. This legislation is as bipartisan as it gets. It is supported by conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats alike and plenty in between. It has the support of some of the biggest veterans' organizations, women's organizations, and legal organizations. There is good reason for this in that the bipartisan bill we have put together would ensure that the survivors of these heinous crimes and the alleged perpetrators of these crimes will all be afforded due process--the due process they are entitled to under the U.S. Constitution.

The bill in no way exceeds a commander's ability to take action for military-specific crimes, like when a soldier goes AWOL. What it would do is to take the prosecutions of sexual assault and other serious crimes--serious violent felonies--out of the chain of command and put them in the hands of trained military prosecutors, who actually understand how to deal with serious crimes. This would allow our survivors--men and women who sacrifice everything for this country--to have the basic right to civil liberty and justice.

This bill would also professionalize the military. It would make sure that all people, every servicemember--men, women, Black, White, gay, straight--will not be subjected to biased judgments and will actually have the benefit of having trained prosecutors look at the evidence. Sadly, according to a report that came out recently, in all four of the services--Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines--Black servicemembers are more likely to be court-martialed than are White servicemembers. This is unacceptable.

This bill would help to alleviate some of the unfairness in the current system by having trained prosecutors make those judgments based solely on evidence. Our commanders have a tough enough job in defending our country. So we should let these trained prosecutors do their jobs and make the right decisions based on the evidence alone. We can only make this change if we pass this amendment.

I urge all of my colleagues to look at this bill--to look at it anew--and to look at the fact that we have not improved our rate of cases that actually go to court-martial and our rate of convictions, even though more are reported. It is a huge problem. I promise you. Every year, we have this excuse: Let the reforms take more time to work. OK, well, it has been 5 years, and this has had a spotlight on it. If the commanders cannot put more cases forward for court-martial and if the cases can't result in more convictions, we are not doing it right. We are failing the men and women who will die for this country.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I understand there is a bill at the desk, and I ask for its first reading.

I now ask for a second reading and, in order to place the bill on the calendar under the provisions of rule XIV, I object to my own request.

Madam President, 100 days ago, the House of Representatives voted unanimously to pass the Congressional Accountability Act of 1995 Reform Act, the bill that would fix the way we deal with sexual harassment and discrimination here in Congress.

The current system is broken. It makes no sense that a staffer who is sexually harassed or discriminated against has to possibly wait months for mediation, for counseling, or for a cooling off before she or he is able to even file a claim.

This bill would also make sure that when a Member of Congress has sexually harassed or discriminated against someone on their staff, the taxpayers are not left holding the bag. That is what the bill does. There is no reasonable excuse for anyone to stand in the way.

Our constituents do not deserve to have their hard-earned dollars paying for these settlements. What they deserve is a vote on this reform now. But what have we seen since the House acted? Nothing but politics as usual, despite having significant bipartisan support on this issue.

I thank my colleagues--Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Senator Klobuchar, and Senator Murray--for their strong leadership on this issue and all of their efforts to pass this bill in the Senate. They have been great partners in trying to move this forward.

It is long since time that we should be acting on this issue. We need to pass this bill and send it to the President's desk so he can sign it into law, because what we have seen so clearly, after the several months and years that we have been talking about this, is that sexual harassment and discrimination in the workplace is far more pervasive and egregious than we previously might have recognized.

We have all witnessed harassment and discrimination. We all see what it actually does to society--whether it is happening in factories, in restaurants, in Hollywood, in the Halls of Congress, or right here in this building. But the difference is that while practically every other industry in the country seems to be taking this issue far more seriously and at least trying to make an effort to change their workplaces, Congress is dragging its feet.

Once again, a problem is staring us right in the face, and we are looking the other way. Enough is enough. We should do better. We have waited 100 days, and we should not have to wait any longer.

So I urge my colleagues to do the right thing now, to support this bill. Fix this system here in Congress that is failing our staffers on this issue of sexual harassment. This one is as easy as it gets. So let's have a vote and let's pass it.

I yield the floor.