Floor Statements

Mr. President, today the Senate voted on the nomination of Steve Dettelbach to be the Director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives--ATF. I commend President Biden for nominating Steve, who I know will excel as ATF Director at a time when enforcement of our country's gun laws is so critical.

As gun violence continues to plague our country and as mass shootings become more and more common, it is

hard not to feel paralyzed by the endless tragedy. But we must take action. I am proud to reflect on this body's efforts to pass the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which was signed into law by President Biden last month.

But we must do more, and we must continue to do all that we can to prevent these senseless tragedies from occurring in the first place. That is why this confirmation vote today was so crucial. The ATF is charged with enforcing our Nation's gun laws, but the Agency has been without a Senate-confirmed Director since 2015. How can that be? In a time when firearms have become the leading cause of death among children in our country, how can we expect the ATF to fully function without a permanent Director? Finally, thankfully, that changes today.

I know Steve personally, and I can attest not only to his strong work ethic, but to his extraordinary set of skills and professional experiences that will no doubt serve him well as ATF Director. Steve served on my Judiciary Committee staff as a detailee from the Department of Justice, a role requiring time-sensitive evaluations of a wide range of issues relating to criminal justice and law enforcement. I am grateful for his wise counsel during his 2 years on my staff, and I have taken a great deal of personal pride in observing all of his achievements and leadership roles he has held since that time.

Steve has spent more than two decades as a prosecutor within the Justice Department, and was confirmed unanimously by the Senate to serve as U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, a position he held from 2009 to 2016. Over the course of his 30-year career, Steve has demonstrated that he is a dedicated, principled, law enforcement official who is highly qualified to take on this position. With the passage of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, the Congress proved that it is not so paralyzed that it cannot take reasonable--rational-- steps to confront the scourge of gun violence. The Senate can further prove that today by confirming Steve Dettelbach to lead the ATF. There could be no one more qualified for this position.

I regret that personal matters kept me from casting my vote in favor of Steve's confirmation today, but my enthusiastic support for his confirmation remains steadfast. I look forward to continuing that support by doing all that I can to ensure that Steve and the ATF have the resources they need to enforce our Nation's gun laws and protect our communities.

It is no easy task, but I know Steve is ready. And I stand ready to support him, and I urge all other Senators to do the same today.

Mr. President, as Senators are preparing to return home to their home States over the Fourth of July, it is frustrating to me that we once again kick the can down the road on providing needed funding to address the ongoing COVID pandemic.

For months, the administration, scientists, and healthcare experts have raised the alarm that we don't have the resources we need to stay ahead of this virus. And actually with COVID, if you are not staying ahead of it, you are slipping behind, to the detriment of all Americans.

To keep our recovery afloat, we have robbed Peter to pay Paul. Earlier this month, the administration announced that it is repurposing $10 billion that we appropriated in Congress--$10 billion--to purchase additional vaccines and additional therapeutics because our stocks are running low.

The action by the administration, unfortunately, was necessary. Projections indicate that as many as 100 million Americans--100 million Americans--nearly 1 in 3, will be infected or reinfected with COVID this fall and winter as our immunity from this disease wanes.

The President requested COVID funding. President Biden requested that 3 months ago. Republicans have blocked this funding. Without new funding appropriated by Congress, the administration is left with no choice but to repurpose that $10 billion. Even that, experts across the board agree, is totally insufficient to prepare for the coming surge.

But even this necessary choice has consequences. To pay for these vaccines and therapeutics, the administration had to take funding from research for the next generation of vaccines and to sustain our testing capacity. It was not, as some Republican Members have indicated, excess cash that was simply there for the taking. This means that as the next surge crashes over the country, we will not have the resources necessary to assure that people can get tested.

Have we already forgotten the mad scramble driving from pharmacy to pharmacy to get a rapid test so we could safely spend the holidays with our friends and families just 6 months ago? It means that as new variants will emerge, we are not going to have the necessary resources to adequately continue the groundbreaking research we have supported for next-generation vaccines.

And fueled by our waning immunity and insufficient vaccination efforts abroad, new variants could emerge, and those will impose new threats to us here at home.

The desperate measures taken by the administration, which they had to do in the absence of congressional action, do nothing to support a global vaccination effort that is running on fumes. The U.S. Agency for International Development, which manages our global response to the COVID pandemic, has already obligated more than 95 percent of the funds they have available--95. Soon, they will have no choice but to start shutting down their vaccine delivery operations. That will mean more mutations, more variants, more infections, and more deaths abroad and at home.

Keep in mind what we are doing with USAID. We are trying to stop this pandemic outside our borders because we realize that every single one of these variants is one airplane trip away from crossing our borders even as we have to do things to stop it within our borders.

Finally, I want to make clear that we don't have time to say, ``Well, we can act later on,'' as this is not a problem that can be solved by flipping a switch, or to produce the tens of millions of doses of vaccines and therapeutics necessary to prepare for a fall surge. The government and biotech companies need to begin purchasing supplies now.

They can't say: Oh, we have an epidemic. Golly, go out and buy some supplies.

Well, we have to make them first. Come back to us in a few months.

That doesn't do anything for the people who are getting hit with

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I understand there is a bill at the desk that is due for a second reading.

Mr. President, in order to place the bill on the calendar, under the provisions of rule XIV, I would object to further proceedings.

Mr. President, I have another matter to speak of, and before I do, I wish to commend my colleague and neighbor from New England, the distinguished Presiding Officer. As President pro tempore, I am always delighted to see somebody step into that position, but I wish to commend him for his tireless and, at times, what must be frustrating negotiations on a matter that is of extreme importance to our country.

In my prior profession, I went to many murder scenes. It seemed always at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning people died of gunshots, and I can remember each one of them as though it was yesterday.

Since then, what we have seen has been far, far worse. And I commend the Senator and his leadership and those in both parties who have worked with him and have tried to at least take some steps to curtail that in this country.

Mr. President, on June 20, yesterday, we commemorated World Refugee Day. It is an important reminder that we have to rededicate ourselves to a cornerstone of our Nation's founding: providing refuge to the persecuted and oppressed.

Since the days of the earliest European settlers, America has provided safe harbor to waves of refugees throughout our history. Many Americans today can trace their ancestry back to refugees who fled their homelands seeking freedom and security. Welcoming refugees is not just something America does; it is who we always have been.

Americans have put this long tradition of welcoming refugees on full display in recent months. After the withdrawal from Afghanistan, Americans across the political spectrum opened their hearts, homes, and wallets to Afghans fleeing the Taliban's ruthless rule. To date, American families have helped to welcome nearly 80,000 vulnerable Afghans into the United States, giving them a fresh start. As a Vermonter, I am proud that our small State joined this cause and volunteered to welcome and resettle 100 refugees--100 Afghan refugees.

Now, when Russia shocked the world and invaded Ukraine, Americans of all walks of life yet again stepped up to assist Ukrainians fleeing violence and destruction. Already, tens of thousands of Americans have volunteered to serve as private sponsors for arriving Ukrainian refugees. In fact, a Gallup poll from April confirmed that nearly 80 percent of Americans support resettling 100,000 Ukrainian refugees in the United States. That happens to be a central goal of the Biden administration, the Uniting for Ukraine initiative.

The deep and broad support for refugees among the American people has, for many years, been reflected in the Halls of Congress. I strongly supported

the 1980 Refugee Act, the landmark law creating our modern U.S. Refugee Admissions Program and asylum system. That legislation was passed overwhelmingly in the House and here in the Senate unanimously. In the decades since, both parties have worked together to provide refuge to exiled Cubans, displaced Haitians, dissident Chinese, and many other refugee populations feeling persecution and tyranny.

Most recently, as chairman of the Appropriations Committee, I worked again with Members of both parties to pass multibillion-dollar aid packages to fund our government's efforts to aid Afghan and Ukrainian refugees.

So it should come as no surprise that both parties have more often than not worked together to support refugees seeking to begin anew in the United States. The over 3 million refugees who have resettled in the United States over the past several decades have enriched our country economically and culturally. Refugees are entrepreneurs and job creators. They are active and committed. They are members of our communities. They are our neighbors and friends. Our Nation's history has been defined by refugees, from Albert Einstein, to Madeleine Albright. Their stories and the stories of the millions of other refugees who come to our shores are the American way.

Now, the Trump administration gave rise to a dark turn toward nativism and xenophobia, a jarring retreat from what has made America great. The hateful policies of the Trump administration, espoused first by the former President himself, aimed to demonize refugees and asylum seekers, to shut our doors to the persecuted and oppressed. These policies were shameful. They should be repudiated--repudiated forcefully by every Member of the Senate.

Now, there is much more to be done to rebuild our Nation's capacity and welcome and resettle refugees. I will continue fighting to defend and support refugees in my remaining months in the Senate, just as I have throughout my Senate career.

Today, though, I am hopeful. I see Vermonters coming together in aid of native Afghan and Ukrainian refugees over the past several months, and I am confident that America's highest ideals have not seen their last days. We, the American people, have not lost sight of our roots. We are still here, an imperfect but compassionate beacon of hope for the hopeless. We are still here, our torch held high.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, the passage of the Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring Our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act of 2022, or PACT Act, is an example of what can happen when the Congress puts aside partisanship and comes together for the good of the country and, importantly, our veterans.

Each of us, in every State and in every congressional district across the country, has a friend, a neighbor, or a constituent, a veteran, or an Active-Duty servicemember, who has become sick or died from exposure to toxics while serving in the military. And for too many of those people, recognition of the connection between their illnesses and toxic exposures came too late.

Early in my time in the Senate, I heard from Vietnam veterans who were sickened by exposure to herbicides such as Agent Orange. Too many of these veterans died before Congress pushed the Department of Veterans Affairs to recognize and treat their illnesses or compensate them for the disability caused by our own government's use of such a toxic substance throughout Vietnam and in other parts of Southeast Asia.

I hoped we would have learned from our mistakes there. I hoped we would learn from the veterans and civilians who suffered from radiation exposure when we tested the atomic bomb. I hoped we would learn from the veterans who came home from the first Gulf War with unexplained illnesses.

But just a few years ago, I watched my dear friend, BG Mike Heston, ravaged by pancreatic cancer, fight for the VA and the Department of Defense to acknowledge that his cancer was caused by exposure to the burn pits that had been used during his tours in Afghanistan.

Mike served as a Vermont State trooper for 26 years and for 33 years in the military, including in the Marine Corps Reserve and the Vermont National Guard. He served his State and his country without question. When he got sick, he should not have had to spend his precious remaining time fighting for the government to acknowledge what caused his illness.

But Mike did fight. Mike fought to ensure that his family, his two wonderful children, Kelsey and Keegan, would be cared for if he succumbed to his illness. He and his wife June also fought to make sure that other veterans would not have to endure what they did, that they might get an earlier diagnosis, that they might not have to spend any of their precious moments fighting for the benefits they earned.

After Mike passed away in 2018, June continued and expanded the fight. Joining her in Vermont were Staff Sergeant Wesley Black, who died last year of colon cancer at the age of 36, leaving behind his wife Laura and son Ronan; Pat Cram, widow of Sergeant Major Mike Cram, who died of prostate cancer at the age of 47; and many others who through their experience with friends or loved ones were determined to make sure that things would be better for those who followed.

As we stand here today prepared to enact one of the most sweeping packages of veterans benefits and healthcare measures in modern history, I am thinking of Mike and June, of Kelsey and Keegan, of Mike and Pat, and of Wesley and Laura and Ronan. And I know that each Senator voting yes today is thinking of people in their States and districts who are sick or who have died as a result of exposure to toxics while serving our country.

Their stories are meaningful, and they, themselves, ensured that their sacrifice is meaningful, too. And I hope that this time we will learn from our experiences with toxic substances and hold the Department of Defense to a higher standard in the future.

Madam President, first, let me say that I am glad to see the successful discharge of Steven Dettelbach's nomination. I have known him since he was a detailee for the Department of Justice to the Judiciary Committee. I found him one of the hardest working, most talented, honest, and evenhanded people I knew. I was happy to support him for U.S. attorney in Ohio. I can understand why so many law enforcement organizations backed him because of his values there. I will have more to say when he is confirmed, but it is a good move.

Nomination of Beth Robinson

Madam President, Vermonters are no strangers to making history, and in November 2021, one Vermonter in particular made history again: the U.S. Senate confirmed Beth Robinson to a seat on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. She assumed her seat on that bench days later. I could not be more proud. Vermont has one seat on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, so we always try to send our best.

Judge Robinson embodies Vermont's values: her commitment to justice and equality and her compassion for her fellow human beings. She has also proven to be an exceptional jurist, one dedicated to the rule of law above all else. There should be no doubt that she brings that same excellence to Vermont's single seat on the Second Circuit, as a successor to my dear friend, the late Judge Peter Hall.

Since Vermonters first elected me to the U.S. Senate, I have worked hard to ensure that Vermont's best and brightest represent our State on the Federal judiciary. In 2004, I recommended Judge Hall, then Vermont's U.S. Attorney and a Republican, to serve on the Second Circuit because he was the most qualified. During his 17-year tenure on the panel, Judge Hall was a fine jurist. He was fair and kind to all litigants before him, and was always humble. His passing, at just age 72, was a loss to not just Vermont, but also to the Federal judiciary at large.

In 2009, I proudly recommended Christina Reiss to be a judge for the District Court of Vermont. We have a very small district court with a State of our size. With her confirmation, Judge Reiss became the first woman to serve on the District Court of Vermont. And, like Judge Hall, she has served as a model of fairness and impartiality on the bench ever since.

Judge Robinson is a trailblazer herself. As a tireless champion for LGBTQ rights, she successfully litigated the landmark Baker v. Vermont decision, which led to Vermont becoming the first ever State to enact civil unions in the United States. Beth's advocacy served as a blueprint for the successful advancement of LGBTQ rights across the country, securing her place as one of the first pioneers in the national movement for LGBTQ rights.

Her smart and steady approach and her unimpeachable reputation won her

allies across the political spectrum in Vermont. In 2011, she was appointed by Governor Peter Shumlin to serve as a justice on the Vermont Supreme Court--that is a five-member court--a position to which she was confirmed unanimously by the Vermont Senate. She became the first openly gay Vermont Supreme Court justice, breaking yet another barrier. Now, today, Judge Robinson is the first openly gay female judge to serve in our Federal circuit courts.

While on the Vermont Supreme Court, Judge Robinson seamlessly traded her advocate's cap for that of an impartial jurist. She is a consensus builder. Her unwavering commitment to the neutral application of the law was second-to-none on the Vermont Supreme Court; it is a commitment I know she brings with her to the Second Circuit.

When I recommended to President Biden that he nominate Beth Robinson to the Second Circuit, there was such an outpouring of support from all corners of Vermont. The membership of the Vermont Supreme Court-- justices appointed by both Democratic and Republican Governors--signed a strong letter of support for her nomination. They were joined by prominent Republicans and Democrats from all around the State, underscoring just how widely respected she was for her reputation as an impartial and independent jurist.

When Judge Robinson was confirmed in the Senate with bipartisan support, I celebrated. Judge Robinson is a Vermonter who has dedicated her life to the causes of justice and equality. She is a Vermonter who embodies our State's highest ideals, who brings fairness, independence, and integrity on the Second Circuit.

Next week, along the shores of Lake Champlain, friends, family, State leaders, fellow lawyers, and many more Vermonters will gather to celebrate the investiture of Vermont's newest judge on the Second Circuit. Vermonters can be assured that Judge Robinson will continue to be guided by the same principles that have brought her this far. Marcelle and I are two Vermonters who are proud that, once again, we are breaking barriers and making history, now with the investiture of Judge Beth Robinson on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, it is hard really to know where to start. I am here on the Senate floor to talk about guns. In a world in chaos, we cannot forget about the chaos right here at home. Gun violence is killing our children: 19 students and two of their teachers in Uvalde 2 weeks ago; 20 children, and 7 others, in Newtown, CT--nearly 10 years ago; 12 students and a teacher at Columbine--23 years ago. In between? Las Vegas, 58 dead; the Pulse nightclub, 49 dead; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, 17 dead--all victims of gun violence. And this is just a snapshot of the epidemic of gun violence in our country.

I look back at my 48 years here in the Senate and say, When will we say enough? We hadn't yet finished honoring and celebrating the lives of the 10 victims in Buffalo before news broke of the tragedy unfolding in Uvalde--19 children, 2 teachers, massacred in their school, where they learn and work, where they should be safe--safe to just be children.

This weekend, at least a dozen people were killed and 60 more injured in shooting incidents across the country. When is it enough?

After Sandy Hook, well over decade after Columbine shook the Nation, the conscience of the country was stirred. Now, we said, now we must look at our gun laws. Now, we must think about what simply makes sense and what does not. The Judiciary Committee acted. I was proud to lead that, but the Senate did not. There were bipartisan proposals-- proposals that I believe can muster bipartisan support again today, support that acknowledges that there is a problem and acknowledges that we can and must do something about it. The problem is not the Second Amendment. The problem is the view that the Second Amendment is itself absolute.

I was in Vermont last week, and people would say to me, Of course, we pray for the victims, but we also pray that Congress will finally stand up and do something.

I am with my fellow Vermonters. I am a lifelong gun owner. I was on the target shooting team at St. Michael's College in Vermont, my alma mater--earned my letter in that. Millions of other Americans like myself, lifelong gun owners, are responsible gun owners and honor Americans' rights to own firearms and choose to own firearms to defend their families, or to hunt--but not to commit battlefield-style murders. To most Americans, firearms are valued for defensive purposes and not for murder and mayhem.

There are ways that we can use our common sense to keep our communities safe and keep guns out of the hands of people who are dangerous. Let's start with background checks. They are a quick and easy way to help accomplish that goal. There is bipartisan support to require background checks for commercial firearms sales. Now, I think we should go further, but we have to start somewhere, and commercial sales background checks are a good start; background checks would help to bring common sense back into this discussion.

How about extreme risk laws, also called ``red flag'' laws? We should encourage more States to enact these laws to allow loved ones or law enforcement agencies to petition a court for an order that would temporarily prevent an individual in crisis from accessing firearms. People who are in crisis and are a danger to themselves or others should not have ready access to firearms. This, again, is practical common sense.

We have seen where criminal gangs will send people into other States to make straw purchases of weapons that are then sold back to them. There is no criminal statute specifically prohibiting straw purchasing, so prosecutors have to rely on laws that prohibit making false statements in connection with the purchase of a firearm--a paperwork

offense. There is bipartisan agreement that we should strengthen the penalties for straw purchasers to deter this dangerous conduct. This, again, is practical common sense.

We should also add common sense and consistency to minimum age requirements to purchase guns. You have to be 21 to buy a handgun. You also have to be 21 to purchase alcohol or even cigarettes. But under our Federal laws? Just 18 to buy a shotgun or rifle, including an automatic rifle like those used on battlefields, like the ones used in Buffalo and Uvalde. And if we cannot find enough common ground to ban military-style assault rifles, we should at least raise the age at which they can be purchased from 18 to 21.

All of these proposals are practical common sense; they should be the least that Congress can do to help prevent the next mass shooting. But we have a problem. We have a problem in the United States when the leading cause of childhood death in 2020 was firearms. Think of that. Our children and our grandchildren--and the leading cause of death is firearms.

We have a problem when we cannot stand up--and together--to respond to the fears of our children. We have a problem when we cannot push aside the interests of the NRA and the gun industry or of the Gun Owners of America or other pressure groups that tell us that Democrats are ``coming for your guns.'' Of course, some of the gun industry will say that because it boosts their sales. It boosts their sales, and children die.

I am a Democrat. I am a gun owner. I have been both, nearly my entire life. I have also been a prosecutor and prosecuted cases and went to death scenes at 3 in the morning and seeing people shot. I am also parent and a grandparent. I am a U.S. Senator. I am the Dean of the Senate, and I am a proud Vermonter. In my home State, we have a long tradition, dating back to our founding, of hunting the land. Ownership of our firearms is part of that. I have also heard from more than 1,000 Vermonters since Uvalde, urgently telling me that something must be done.

When is it enough? Everywhere Marcelle and I went last week in Vermont, we heard, When is enough enough?

I have spent months--or actually years--listening to my friends on the Republican side in Congress talk about protecting children. Who will step up now and who will step in to say enough? If we are to protect our children, we must be the adults with the courage to listen to their fears and to act to alleviate them. We are the adults who must protect our children. We must protect our children. If we do nothing, we are not protecting them.

This isn't about politics. This isn't about the moneyed interests of pressure groups, lobbying Congress without acknowledging the tragedies in our world today. This isn't even about you or me, Mr. President. This is about the thousands of people who are killed through gun violence every year and the countless family members forced to sorrowfully move on in their absence, saying, Why our family? Why our loved one? Why my parents? Why my children? Why my brother? Or why my sister? Why? In this, the greatest country on earth, our horrific record of gun violence.

In no way is this about revoking the Second Amendment, but about applying practical common sense safeguards to help mitigate the violence.

Yet again, I ask, as I have since I have been in the Senate, and the American people ask: When is it enough? When is it enough? I join those who pray for the victims, but I especially join those who pray that Congress will have the courage, Democrats and Republicans alike, to finally do something meaningful.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Madam President, I will speak more on this subject later this week, but I spent much of last week, both Marcelle and I did, in Vermont. It is a very peaceful State.

We walk across the fields at our home, walk down the dirt road where we live, and then go to various places just meeting with people all over the State. A lot of it was in what is called Chittenden County. That is about a quarter of the State's population. That is where I was a prosecutor, State's attorney is what we called it.

I made it a point during that time that if we had a violent crime, a gun crime, I would go to the scene, whether it was 3 o'clock in the morning or 3 o'clock in the afternoon. Some of the most violent ones were, of course, at 3 o'clock in the morning. I can still remember every single one of them like it was yesterday, but they were a tiny fraction of what we see every day.

I hear people say we should pray for these children. I would say pray that the Congress has the guts to stand up and pass real gun control legislation.

In Vermont, we limit the number of rounds you can have in a semiautomatic weapon during deer season. We ought to try to protect children as much as we do deer.

Again, fortunately in our State, the number of murders and shootings I went to were nothing like we see today. But I have awakened in the middle of the night remembering the scenes. When you are at a murder scene and it is a child who has been murdered and it is 3 o'clock in the morning, the grieving family is there, there is no way you forget it.

That is more than 50 years ago I was doing that. I can tell you exactly what each of those rooms looked like. I can tell you exactly who the person was I prosecuted for it. And I can tell you exactly how many times I prayed, Why

did this have to happen and never let it happen again.

As I said, I will speak further on this. I know in my State of Vermont, we do have a very large percentage of gun owners. Most of them tell me, ``Do something.''

As I said, of course, pray for the children. Pray that the Congress does the right thing with real--with real--gun control.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I am proud to recognize the Ohavi Zedek community and former Vermont Governor and U.S. Ambassador to Switzerland Madeleine Kunin for their efforts to preserve and restore the Shul Mural. Painted in 1910 by Ben Zion Black, the mural was commissioned by Burlington's Lithuanian Jewish community, who had come to Vermont from the town of Kovno and its environs to escape Russian pogroms.

The immigrants founded the Ohavi Zedek Synagogue in 1885 and the Chai Adam Synagogue 4 years later. It was at the latter synagogue that the Shul Mural was painted. Stretching from floor to ceiling, it depicts the Tent of the Tabernacle, as described in the Book of Numbers. The style in which it was painted was well-known to the members of Chai Adam, as it could be found in synagogues throughout Eastern Europe. Now, the Shul Mural is one of the few remaining examples of this style of painting in the world. The works which inspired it were destroyed, as part of the burning of synagogues and the extermination of millions of Eastern European Jews by the Nazis, including the decimation of Lithuania's Jewish population.

In Burlington, the Ohavi Zedek and Chai Adam synagogues merged in 1939. Chai Adam was sold. The building went through multiple uses and in 1986 the mural was covered with a false wall to protect it at the urging of Jeffrey Potash, a historian and Ohavi Zedek's archivist.

In 2012, the building was sold once again. The new owner agreed to donate the mural to Ohavi Zedek and efforts began to move the mural, a massive undertaking that was successfully completed in 2015. Since then, work has been underway to fully restore the painting.

The relocation and restoration of the mural were a significant undertaking, with costs exceeding $1 million. The funding came from foundations, historic preservation groups, arts organizations, and individuals.

Governor Kunin, herself a Jewish immigrant, lent her leadership skills to the effort, chairing the Friends of the Mural Board. Governor Kunin's parents were German Jews who fled to Switzerland, where her father died. Her mother brought Madeleine and her brother, Edgar, to the United States to escape the Nazis when Madeleine was 6 years old and Edgar 10. Although her immediate family survived the Holocaust, Governor Kunin lost extended family in the concentration camps. She is fond of saying both she and the mural are survivors.

Despite having arrived in the United States at a time of rising nativism, racism, and anti-Semitism, the families which had originally arrived from Lithuania continued to encourage their friends and former neighbors to follow them. At its peak, the community had more than a thousand members in Burlington. That community produced leaders in a number of fields, including Robert Larner, a physician who treated soldiers at Guadalcanal and Okinawa, and for whom Vermont's only medical school is now named, and Ed Colodny, the former CEO of U.S. Air.

While the story of Burlington's Lithuanian Jewish community is unique, it is also a perfect example of what immigrants have brought and continue to bring to the United States. They enrich our country and society by sharing their art, their culture, and their experience.

The story of the Shul Mural, the people who commissioned and created it, and those who ensured its preservation for future generations, is a Jewish story, an immigrant story, and a quintessentially American story.

Mr. President, I have long told the story of my love for Batman comics dating back to my younger years growing up in Montpelier, VT. When I was 4 years old, I would race to the Kellogg Hubbard Library in Montpelier with my latest Batman comic. As a child, reading comic books allowed me, like so many others, to broaden the expanses of my imagination. While Spider-Man and Superman are fine, I have always preferred Batman. His values, his pursuit of justice, his balance of human strength and vulnerability have always resonated with me.

I would like to take a moment today to recognize a store where I have bought more than my fair share of ``The Dark Knight,'' an institution foundational to the comic-loving community in Vermont: Earth Prime Comics.

Founded in 1983, Earth Prime Comics was one of Vermont's first comic book stores. It began as a shared venture between Christine Farrell and John Young, first operating out of John Young's attic in Burlington, VT. In that attic, John and Christine's extensive collection of comics quickly garnered a surprisingly large following. Earth Prime Comics soon moved into a real retail space: a converted Victorian house on Bank Street in Burlington. Requiring even more space for its growing business, Earth Prime moved to a storefront on Church Street in Burlington in 1989, a location where it has remained for 33 years.

Over the past few decades, Earth Prime Comics has drawn comic book fans from across Vermont and forged a comic-loving community where all were welcome. Christine still owns Earth Prime Comics, and it has been great to see how she and her team have continued to build and shape their community to keep pace with the ever-changing comic landscape. In the years to come, I have full faith that comic lovers of all ages will continue to

thumb through the pages of comics in Earth Prime Comics, as I have on so many occasions.

Earth Prime Comics was recently featured in an article published earlier this year in ``Seven Days.'' I ask unanimous consent that excerpts from the article, titled ``Origin Story: How Burlington's Earth Prime Comics helped unite Vermont's comic lovers,'' be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, many hoped that President Giammattei would reject the corruption and impunity that his predecessors institutionalized. The reappointment of Attorney General Porras, who according to the State Department has ``repeatedly obstructed and undermined anti-corruption investigations,'' shows that it is business as usual.

Democracy cannot survive without an independent judiciary, which Attorney General Porras has sought to dismantle by persecuting prosecutors and judges who have stood up for the principle that no one is above the law. As long as this continues, Guatemala's government is not a serious anti-corruption partner of the United States.