Floor Statements

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. President, I come to the floor to join my colleagues in lifting up the voices of women across the country who, right now, are being ignored, swept aside, and attacked, and in calling on our Republican colleagues to join us and do everything we can to make sure women are heard, listened to, and respected as we debate and deliberate over Judge Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court.

Recently, I was back home in Washington State to talk to my constituents about the Supreme Court nomination, and I met a woman named Caitlin, who bravely told me and others about her experience of being sexually assaulted.

She shared her story. It was July 2016. She had gone to a concert that evening, and she was sexually assaulted that night, but it was how she explained what happened after that I want to share today.

She said:

As a sexual assault survivor, I know firsthand that these

experiences have a lasting impact and the pain can't be

overstated. In the aftermath of sexual violence, it's common

to feel humiliated and to blame ourselves; to just want to

forget it ever happened. I didn't want to admit that I'd

``allowed'' this to happen to me, so I tried to convince

myself that the attack had never occurred. For these reasons

and so many others, it's common to wait months or . . . years

before confiding in anyone, even those closest to us.

Those were Caitlin's words to me. She went on, and she said:

Going public with our stories, opens us up to criticism

ranging from victim blaming to accusations that we're liars

and attention-seekers, in addition to far uglier insults that

I won't repeat right now. I know that coming forward and

forever tying our names to one of the most terrifying,

degrading experiences of our lives isn't a decision to be

taken lightly.

Sadly, Caitlin is not alone--far from it. She shared her story with me so her story can help others and so I can lift it up, make sure it is being heard, and help her make a difference.

So this brings me to the question I want to ask today: What is this really about, right now, in this moment, in the U.S. Senate? There is a whole lot of confusion, a whole lot of mud being kicked up, and a whole lot of distractions, but what is this moment, right now, really about?

It is not the question of this confirmation, although that is clearly important. It is not whether we think Judge Kavanaugh would make a good Supreme Court Justice or whether we can trust him, despite the lies we have already heard on issue after issue. Those are, of course, critical questions too. It is not even whether my colleagues will believe the allegations brought against him are true once all the evidence is weighed and all investigations are complete--although, of course, for many of us, that question must be dug into--but to me and millions of people across the country, this moment right now is about the answer to a few simple questions.

Is the Senate a place where women are listened to, heard, and respected or is it still just one more place where women's voices are swept under the rug, where our voices are ignored, attacked, and undermined, right now, in this moment, in the U.S. Senate, while the President of the United States is saying a woman can't be trusted because ``she was drunk''; while he was tweeting that Dr. Ford can't be trusted because if it were really as bad as she said, she would have reported it back when she was 15 when it happened; while Republican leaders are saying they will ``plow right through'' this; while they are desperately trying to distract people by pointing to the process and the timing--anything but the substance; while they hire a woman they are calling their ``female assistant''--the lawyer they found to ask Dr. Ford the questions they can't trust the Republican men on the Judiciary Committee to ask; while they are already sweeping past this hearing and scrambling to line up a committee vote right away; while they are planning to stay through the weekend to rush to a vote on the Senate floor that their leader says is ``confident'' they ``will win''--before Dr. Ford has even had a chance to be heard and a vote that doesn't need to be rushed for any good reason?

Right now, in this moment, in the U.S. Senate, these are the questions: Will women be heard or will women be ignored? Will women who are bravely coming forward to share the most horrific experience of their lives be trusted or will they be treated like liars? Will women, such as Caitlin, Dr. Ford, and Ms. Ramirez be respected, listened to, and heard or will they be pushed aside, put in their places, and told to remain quiet?

Right now, in this moment, in the U.S. Senate, what kind of message will we send to women and girls across the country who are watching, who are looking to see how Dr. Ford is being treated; whether Ms. Ramirez, who is reportedly willing to testify to the committee under oath--whether her story will be taken seriously or even be investigated. They are grappling with what may be one of the toughest decisions of their lives: Should they report a sexual assault? Should they try to bring a perpetrator to justice and make sure he faces the consequences he deserves or should they keep it to themselves, worried about the ways they may be attacked or ignored or disbelieved, interrogated about what they drank or wore, whom they told and when?

Right now, in this moment, in the U.S. Senate, what kind of message will we send to men and boys across the country who are watching right now, who will see whether women are empowered to share their experience, men facing the consequences of their actions, and a message sent that this is not acceptable behavior in high school, in college, or anywhere else, or who will, once again, hear that women can be attacked and abused and disrespected and used and then ignored and attacked all over again when they share their stories?

I decided to run for the U.S. Senate after I saw Senators get those questions wrong in the Anita Hill hearings in 1991. I ran to be a voice for the women and men across the country who thought it was absolutely wrong for her to be ignored, attacked, swept aside, and disbelieved. I ran for, right here, in this moment, in the U.S. Senate, to make sure we never allow that to happen again. I ran for my daughter who sat by my side as we watched that all-male Judiciary Committee grill Anita Hill, for her daughters--my granddaughters--who are not quite old enough to understand what will happen on Thursday but who will grow up in a world that will treat them better or worse depending on how women are treated this week, for Caitlin and the women like her who shared their stories with me--some out loud in front of crowds, some in whispered voices after everyone else has left--and for the women we don't know who have buried their experiences deep down inside, who have kept their secret for decades because they have been too scared or intimidated to come forward and who are watching right now to see what happens here, right now, in this moment, in the U.S. Senate.

I am proud to bring their voices to the floor today, and I am truly hopeful enough Republicans stand with them and that we can do the right thing.

Republican leaders need to listen--truly listen--to the women coming forward to share their experiences. Republican leaders need to investigate--truly investigate--the allegations they are making and the inconsistencies in Judge Kavanaugh's statements on so many issues. Republican leaders need to end this scramble and rush. They need to slow it down and do this right.

Women and men are watching. They are paying attention, and they are not going to forget.

Thank you.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I thank my colleague Senator Blunt and echo his comments this morning. I come to the floor to urge our colleagues to support this conference report.

I do thank Chairman Shelby, Vice Chairman Leahy, Chairman Frelinghuysen, and Ranking Member Lowey, as well as Leaders McConnell and Schumer. Because of their hard work and leadership, we have been able to work together across the aisle and pass bills under regular order in a way that we have been unable to do for many years.

I also want to again thank my partners on the LHHS part of this bill--Senator Blunt, Representative Cole, and Representative DeLauro-- and I want to recognize the effort of the staffs on both sides of the aisle who worked extremely hard over the summer. Thank you to all who have brought us this far.

I am very proud that we were able to negotiate and pass our bill through our

committees and the Senate floor of Congress--something that has not been done here on the Senate side for over a decade--and that we were able to work together to get this conference report done. I believe this was possible because we rejected partisanship and poison pill riders and worked together to make strong investments in families, patients, students, children, workers, and our middle class.

Our bill builds on the strong work we have done to increase access to child care and early learning. It includes targeted funding to address the opioid epidemic, especially in underserved areas, and significant new resources to address the truly alarming issue of maternal mortality. Senator Blunt just went through much of what is in this bill, so I will not repeat that but will just echo that we have done much in this bill for a lot of our families. I am proud of the work we have been able to do.

I do want to note, I was disappointed that we were unable to include language clarifying that the Department of Education can't allow title IV funding to be used to arm teachers and put more guns into our schools. I believe Congress was clear when we passed the bipartisan Every Student Succeeds Act; that is not what the funds are intended for. I was heartened to hear many Republicans on our committee agree. I had hoped we could clarify this further for Secretary DeVos in our bill, and I do want Senators to know that I will keep working with Democrats and Republicans to keep the pressure on her to do the right thing.

The conference report we will be voting on today is a product of hard work and a commitment to bipartisanship. I am really glad we are taking this next step and moving it closer to becoming law.

Again, I thank Chairman Shelby, Senator Durbin, Representative Granger, and Representative Visclosky for their work and leadership on the defense side of this bill. I encourage all of our colleagues to vote in support of this conference report.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, I have heard from people across Washington State about the need to respond to the opioid crisis and its tragic impact on so many families and communities. I have visited with people from communities in Seattle and Everett and Longview, and I have heard from families across my State. I know my colleagues across the aisle and across the Nation have heard from constituents about the urgency of this crisis. So I am really glad today that the Senate is able to come together and pass the Opioid Crisis Response Act--the bipartisan legislation I have been working on with Senator Alexander and so many others.

This bill is a bipartisan compromise. It is not what I would have written on my own, and I know it is not what my colleagues on the other side would--have written on their own, but it is the result of more than 70 proposals from Members on both sides of the aisle, and that is important. The bill we will vote on today does not reflect the full agreement struck between Democrats and Republicans.

I am glad that Chairman Alexander and Republican leaders have worked with us as the bill has hit the final stretch here in the Senate and that they committed to a number of specific changes beyond the text of this bill to make sure we could have this vote tonight and keep working to get it signed into law.

The text of our agreement has been released, and I am hoping that Republican leaders live up to their agreement to take this agreement into the conference and work by our side in conference to get this done in the bipartisan manner it began.

This agreement goes to show that when we work together, when we focus on the problems families are actually facing and when we look for common ground and commonsense solutions, we can actually craft and pass legislation.

This agreement is a much needed and long overdue step toward helping those families on the frontlines of the opioid epidemic to address its root causes and ripple effects, including some of the issues, by the way, that I have heard firsthand in my State.

I heard from hospital staff about how many of the babies they deliver are born with neonatal abstinence syndrome, battling symptoms of opioid withdrawal, which is why I fought to make sure this agreement includes support for State efforts to include plans of safe care for children born to mothers battling addiction and also ensures the health department is implementing strategies already identified to protect moms and babies from the effects of opioid substance abuse.

I heard from an elementary school principal about how some of his students are having trouble focusing in class because they deal with the trauma of a family member's addiction at home, which is why I worked to make sure this agreement includes provisions to develop a task force and grants to help support trauma-informed care programs and increase access to mental health care for children in their communities, including their schools.

I heard from many more experts and everyday people, as the HELP Committee held a series of bipartisan hearings focused on this crisis. We heard about the many different faces of this epidemic and the broad challenges we have to consider to make sure we address its root causes and ripple effects, which is why I worked with my colleagues to make sure this agreement includes provisions to address the economic and workforce impacts of the opioid crisis, support for training to help the nearly 1 million people out of work due to opioid addiction to gain and retain employment. Washington State has already received a grant for this important work to get workers back on their feet after they battle addiction. So I am glad we could expand this valuable grant program.

This bipartisan package of proposals is an important step forward to help our families and communities who are on the frontlines of the opioid crisis, and I look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues to see it signed into law.

While this bill is an important step, it is by no means final. We have a lot more to do to end the tragedy and address the ongoing issue. So even as we work to get this agreement across the finish line, I am going to keep fighting for more support, resources, and solutions for the families in my home State of Washington and across the country who are facing the heartbreak of this epidemic.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a fellow on my HELP Committee staff, Nikki Meadows, be granted floor privileges until October 1, 2018.

Mr. President, I come to the floor to speak about the opioid legislation. I will get to that; however, I do wish to briefly comment on another critical issue.

Once again, I want to thank Professor Ford for her bravery. This is not easy for anyone. Nobody asks for this to happen to them, and I can only imagine the trauma and heartache involved in sharing and reliving a sexual assault like this. But she should know that I and millions of people are standing by her side and stand ready to help however we can.

I want to make three points.

First, this nomination needs to be delayed. The idea that this nomination could be jammed through given what we know now is almost unthinkable and would be shameful and wrong. Whatever one may think about the timing of this new information and the process that has taken us to this point, the fact is that Senators now have new information about a potential crime committed by a nominee for the highest Court in the land and an individual who has come forward with details of the alleged criminal act, and we can't simply ignore it.

There is no urgency to fill this seat before October. Republicans held a Supreme Court seat open for more than a year in order to prevent President Obama from fulfilling his constitutional role, so surely we can take the time we need now in order to fulfill our constitutional role. To be very clear, we should have nine Justices on the Supreme Court, but it is more important right now to slow down, make sure we have all of the facts, all the information, and that Senators have a chance to weigh that before casting a vote to a position of such importance.

Secondly, we need a full, fair, and robust investigation into these allegations, and we need this to happen before anyone is brought in to testify or ``re-testify'' to make sure Senators have the information they need to ask the right questions and to do their jobs.

We saw what happened in 1991 when an accuser was brought in for questioning before the Senators had access to all of the corroborating information, and we cannot allow that to happen again. We saw the way Senators completely mishandled the questioning of Anita Hill when they didn't have access to the facts, hadn't yet heard from all of the witnesses, and didn't have a grasp of the information and her experience. I am very worried this would happen exactly that way again if we don't take the time to do this right. There is no way a thorough investigation can be completed in time for a hearing on Monday.

That brings me to my third and most important point. We cannot allow this to turn into another attack on a woman who has come forward to talk about her experience. We just can't.

The Senate needs to be better than that. And I am going to do everything I can with anyone who is willing to join me to make sure we are.

I joined millions of women in 1991 in watching as Anita Hill was attacked, interrogated, and maligned on national television simply for sharing her experience. A generation of women watched what happened to her and were then less likely to share their own stories and more likely to let their attackers and harassers off the hook because they saw what happened to Anita Hill at the hands of the U.S. Senate, and they didn't want anything like that to happen to them. That cannot happen again. An all-male Judiciary Committee dropped the ball in 1991. We cannot allow an all-male Republican side of the Judiciary Committee to do the same in 2018.

Over the past year, we have made some tremendous strides with the ``me too.'' movement and the understanding more and more that sexual harassment and assault is not OK and cannot be tolerated no matter how powerful the perpetrator. We have made tremendous strides with the understanding more and more that women who have come forward should be listened to, should be heard and believed, and that investigations and all appropriate actions should be taken once they have come forward to share their experience. We have made tremendous strides with the understanding more and more that women who come forward do so at great cost. None of them want to have to do so. All of them wish they had never been through what they went through. And the idea that they are making it up for some personal gain or agenda is as wrong as it is offensive.

We have made progress, but all that progress is at stake if this is now allowed to become a replay of what happened to Anita Hill, and I am already seeing some troubling signs of some people going down that path. Right away, some Republicans have shifted into an attack mode, attacking the process and starting to attack the accuser. I can only imagine Republicans are getting ready to attack and interrogate Professor Ford in a misguided attempt to protect Judge Kavanaugh and put politics ahead of their job as U.S. Senators and their duty to their constituents. We cannot allow attacks like that to happen. I urge all of my colleagues, Democrats and Republicans, to put a stop to it whenever they see it.

Let's look at the facts. Let's investigate the allegations. Let's consider what that means for our view on this nominee, but let's make sure that it doesn't become another 1991, and let's make sure this doesn't become another attack on a woman resulting in another chill on women everywhere.

Mr. President, I want to turn to another issue, and I ask unanimous consent that my remarks appear in the Record before the vote took place.

Madam President, I come to the floor today to join the vice chairman of the Appropriations Committee, who will be joining me shortly, in urging our colleagues to avoid a completely unnecessary crisis and work together with us to get out our spending bills and get all of our spending bills signed into law.

We should be able to do this. I am very proud of the work we have done so far. Under the leadership of the chairman and vice chairman of the Appropriations Committee, we have been able to negotiate and pass bills under regular order in a way we have been unable to do for years.

We did this by rejecting the awful and counterproductive budget ideas from President Trump and his administration and by pushing aside poison pill riders that would derail this process--such as attacks on healthcare, higher education, public schools, patient protections, workers' rights, and more.

I am particularly proud that we were able to work together and negotiate and pass our LHHS bill through the full Senate, something that has not been done in over a decade.

Our bill makes strong investments in families, patients, students, workers, and the middle class, and it rejects poison pill riders. It builds on the strong work we have done to increase access to childcare and early learning and includes targeted funding to address the opioid epidemic, especially in our underserved areas. It includes significant new resources to address the truly alarming issues of maternal mortality, to help us understand why so many women in our country are dying as a result of childbirth and pregnancy and prevent this from happening. The list goes on and on.

We still have some work to do, but we should be able to get this done in the coming days. I am going to keep working until we do. However, I am very concerned that President Trump continues to threaten to refuse to sign these bills and shut down the government.

Just this week, we saw new reports that he is talking, once again, about shutting down the government to try to get the money for his ill- advised and wasteful border wall. President Trump told his voters that Mexico was going to pay for his wall, so maybe he is talking about shutting down the Mexican Government so that he can get money in Mexican spending bills. But if he is talking about trying to get American taxpayers to foot the bill, that is not going to happen.

I hope Republicans in Congress will continue to stand with us to stay the course on these bipartisan bills. We have come far in this process by putting families first and rejecting attempts to insert partisanship and poison pill riders in all of our spending bills. We need to get this done.

Thank you, Madam President.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, as ranking member on the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor,

Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies, I would like to recognize a public servant deeply committed to protecting and improving the health of the American people, Ms. Anne Houser. Anne will retire in January, after a distinguished 48-year career at the National Institutes of Health, where she has for many years been the principal liaison with the Appropriations Committees.

Over the course of her career, Anne has worked for eight NIH Directors, performing the essential but often overlooked role of helping the committees understand the agency's research and funding needs. It is the kind of low-key work that takes place behind the scenes, but has been essential to building the case in Congress for sustained increased investment in medical research. No matter the issue, or the time of the day or night that it might arise, Anne has always been there, supporting the case for research that will help lead to cures. Her honest, thoughtful, and helpful advice has been valuable to me and to everyone with whom she worked. In short, Anne has set the gold standard for how agencies can most effectively work with the committees that oversee them.

Both within NIH and in Congress, Anne is recognized as a consummate professional and an independent thinker who understands the issues, gets to the bottom of problems, and communicates those issues clearly to Members of Congress, our staff, and to the researchers she works with. Thanks to the dedication of Anne, not only is the NIH working better, but Americans are better off as well. Her absence will be a loss for everyone who depends upon her, but I am glad that she will have more time to spend with her friends and family, and especially her grandson, Alex, of whom she is so proud.

Mr. President, as ranking member on the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions and along with my colleague, Senator Alexander, the chairman, I would like to recognize a public servant deeply committed to protecting the health of the American people, Dr. Marcia Crosse. Dr. Crosse will retire on August 31, 2018, after a distinguished 35-year career at the Government Accountability Office, where she is currently a director with the Health Care Team.

Over the course of her career, Dr. Crosse led the work behind more than 200 reports and congressional testimonies on a wide range of important public health issues, including the safety of drugs and medical devices; bioterrorism; infectious disease outbreaks such as SARS and the West Nile Virus; pandemic and emergency preparedness; biomedical research; and HIV/AIDS. She has helped shed light on problems that otherwise may have long gone unnoticed. Her work has not only led agencies to take action, but has also informed important legislative changes, including more effective medical device recalls, a risk-based approach to foreign drug inspections, clarification of FDA's authority to oversee drug compounding, and enhanced authority for FDA to better manage drug shortages. Her work has helped to improve the health and safety of families across the country for generations to come, and we are incredibly grateful for her service.

Mr. President, I am very pleased that the Senate is now considering legislation to fund the Departments of Defense, Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education for the coming fiscal year.

Both bills have been supported by broad bipartisan majorities. The Defense and Labor-HHS appropriations subcommittees are the largest of the committee's 12 subcommittees, with 19 members each, almost one- fifth of the Senate.

Despite the diversity of views on our committee, each was reported out of subcommittee and committee with strong bipartisan support.

As my colleagues know, these are the two biggest appropriations bills, which together comprise almost two-thirds of Federal discretionary spending.

I note that the last time the Labor-HHS appropriations bill was on the Senate floor was more than a decade ago, so it is an especially welcome development that we are debating this bill here today.

It is a testament to the work we have been able to do to push aside the partisanship and reject President Trump's budget requests and poison pill riders, and I am hopeful that this will continue.

I would like to congratulate Chairman Shelby and Vice Chairman Leahy, as well as Senator Blunt, for their commitment to working in a bipartisan fashion to restore regular order to the appropriations process.

This isn't the bill I would have written on my own, and it is not the bill Senator Blunt--or any other member of the committee--would have written on their own, but it is a good bipartisan compromise, and it would help so many workers, children, students, families, and communities if enacted.

Overall, we rejected the President's push for massive cuts to investments we know are so important, in education, public health, research, and workforce training, to programs that affect workers, seniors, students, women, and so much more.

I am particularly proud that Democrats and Republicans stood together to roundly reject Secretary DeVos's budget requests, from her attempts to privatize and voucherize public schools, to her massive cuts to education funding that would have hurt so many students.

Earlier this year, we reviewed this harmful budget just as we saw teachers and parents around the country organizing and standing up for public education after years of budgets for education not keeping up with needs--because our kids shouldn't be forced to learn in crumbling classrooms with shabby textbooks and our teachers should be paid fairly for the important work they do.

Secretary DeVos wasn't listening to these parents and teachers, and her budget calls for more cuts.

It would eliminate afterschool programs for almost 2 million students, need-based financial aid that helps make college more affordable for millions of students, options for repayment and student loan forgiveness for millions of borrowers and their families, and grants that can be used to keep students safe and healthy through school-based mental health services.

Despite proposing a discretionary budget that would cut $7.7 billion in Federal investments in education, the request includes $1 billion for programs aligned with Secretary DeVos's personal privatization agenda, but are not authorized by the bipartisan Every Student Succeeds Act.

By contrast, the bill we are considering today chooses to invest in public schools and progress for all students, no matter where they live, how they learn, or how much money their parents make.

Our bipartisan bill increases funding for the core Federal elementary and secondary education program, title I-A grants to school districts, by $125 million.

This critical program reaches almost 90 percent of school districts and half of all schools. I would have preferred to invest even more, but this is a good step in the right direction, and I am glad we were able to get this done.

Funding for meeting the 40 percent promise under I-D-E-A, our special education law, also goes up by $125 million. In the most recent fiscal year, Congress provided just 15 percent of special education funding, meaning State and local taxpayers are making up the $20 billion shortfall. While I would have invested even more, I am glad we were at least able to meet our commitment in this budget and take a good step in the right direction.

Finally, I am glad that I was able to work with Senator Blunt to include $93.5 million for meeting the education needs of homeless children and youth.

This increase will help school districts address the barriers homeless children and youth face, and if enacted, this would be the third year in a row of increased funding.

Almost 41,000 public school students were homeless during the 2016- 2017 school year in my home State of Washington alone. That is an increase of almost 88 percent since the 2009-2010 school year. That is unacceptable, and this bill would take an important step to help address their needs.

Making college more affordable is another priority in this bill.

We were able to do this by rejecting the administration's proposals to eliminate grant assistance, cut work-study funding, and slash student loan relief that help make college more affordable for millions of college students and borrowers.

The bill also addresses college affordability by increasing the Pell Grant maximum award by $100, to a new level of $6,195, for almost 8 million low-income students.

When combined with the $175 increase in the maximum award included in the fiscal year 2018 omnibus bill, we are sustaining the inflationary increases that had been provided with mandatory funding that expired at the end of fiscal year 2017.

These increases build on the bipartisan reinstatement of the year- round Pell Grant authority that Senator Blunt and I worked together to include in the fiscal year 2017 appropriations bill, which allows eligible students to receive up to 150 percent of the maximum award level for additional classes they take during the summer term--it is enabling students to complete their program of study more quickly and with less loan debt--and, in my home State of Washington, has already helped make college more affordable for an estimated 15,000 students.

Finally, I am glad Senator Blunt and I were able to work together to provide an additional $8 million for the Department of Education's Office for Civil

Rights, despite Secretary DeVos's attempts to cut funding and erode civil rights protection.

This office addresses title IX enforcement on college campuses, among other important civil rights workloads, and is more important now than ever before.

The bill also continues and builds on the massive and historic investments in childcare and early learning across the country.

It maintains the increase in the Child Care and Development Block Grant that was provided in the fiscal year 2018 omnibus bill, the largest increase in Federal child care spending ever.

States are already starting to increase childcare provider rates, improve quality to comply with the bipartisan CCDBG reauthorization law, improve services for special populations, and address long wait lists. I look forward to seeing the continued progress towards addressing our Nation's childcare crisis.

Our bill also provides an additional $250 million for Head Start, providing grantees with a cost-of-living adjustment so they can keep up with the cost of inflation and providing additional funds for expanding programs' hours of operation.

Investing in our youngest learners and dedicated early childhood workers is one of the smartest investments we can make.

I consider these investments to be another important step forward and down payment on my Child Care for Working Families Act, which would help make childcare truly affordable, high quality, and accessible to all.

The bill also rejects the President's proposal to eliminate crucial safety net programs. Instead of eliminations, it provides increases for the Community Services Block Grant, which helps fund community action agencies in every county in my home of State of Washington, and for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, an indispensable lifeline for households struggling to pay their energy bills.

Our bill rejects proposed cuts and continues to invest in the title X family planning program, and I am going to keep fighting against this administration's attempts to sabotage this critical source of healthcare for vulnerable women and families.

I am especially pleased that this bill includes significant new resources to address the truly alarming issue of maternal mortality in the United States.

An American woman is three times as likely to die from childbirth as is a woman in Canada and six times as likely to die as a woman in Finland, and this disparity impacts women of color disproportionately.

This is simply unacceptable, so I am very pleased that this bill includes $50 million at HHS for a new initiative to help understand why mothers are dying as a result of childbirth and pregnancy and prevent this from happening.

We have included $12 million to expand data collection and surveillance at State maternal mortality review boards, consistent with a bill that Senators Heitkamp and Capito have been working on to help support these boards, and $38 million to expand evidence-based programs to prevent maternal mortality and advance maternal health equity.

This is far from the last step we need to take to address this crisis, but it is an important step.

This bill continues the major investments we included in the 2018 omnibus to address the opioid crisis, including over $3.7 billion to increase access to medication assisted treatment, mental health services, and provider training for substance use disorders, especially focusing on rural area, and an increase of $50 million for certified community mental health clinics and $25 million more for the Mental Health Block Grant.

We all know the opioid epidemic is having a tremendous effect on millions of children and families, so this bill continues the fiscal year 2018 investments in child welfare services to help respond to the impacts of substance use on children and families.

It provides additional funds to States to improve plans of safe care to help ensure infants with prenatal substance exposure and their families have access to the treatment they need.

For the fourth year in a row, the bill makes significant new investments in the National Institutes of Health to support researchers' efforts to take full advantage of opportunities to make progress against human disease and disability.

This includes the largest increase to date for Alzheimer's disease research, as well as more than $500 million to address the opioid addiction epidemic, and increased resources to combat the growing threat posed by antimicrobial resistance.

The bill also includes important investments in high-quality workforce training programs that help workers get good jobs, improve the efficiency of businesses, and grow our economy.

This includes $3 billion for the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act State grants to provide support for our national workforce system and help approximately 20 million people each year train for in-demand careers.

The bill includes $160 million for registered apprenticeship grants, an increase of $15 million, to expand support for the registered apprenticeship program that the Committees on Appropriations first established dedicated funding for in fiscal year 2016, and reject the President's proposal to create a duplicative nonregistered apprenticeship program that would open the door for any employer, for- profit school, or association to develop a lower-quality program.

This focuses Federal dollars where there is strong evidence and a return on investment rather than on duplicative systems that do not guarantee quality training and provide fewer safeguards for workers and employers.

The bill also includes $300 million for veterans training programs to help ensure our veterans have the supportive services they need to re- enter the labor force, including job training and placement.

The Department of Labor's other important role is enforcing laws that protect worker health, safety, and rights in the workplace. The bill before us includes modest increases for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and Wage and Hour Division for the first time in years.

These are important investments for workers at a time when they need the support. Last year, wage and hour investigations recovered $270 million in back wages that employers owed their workers, money that is now back in the pockets of more than 240,000 workers across the country.

The bill also rejects the cuts to the Women's Bureau and International Labor Affairs Bureau proposed in the President's budget.

These proposals would have curtailed important work on eliminating the wage gap for women and deficiencies in labor standards implementation in trading partner countries.

The bill rejects the President's proposal to reduce the budget for the National Labor Relations Board, which safeguards workers' ability to organize and collectively negotiate for better pay and working conditions.

Finally, so many of us have been horrified by what we are seeing on the southern border, and many of us are hoping for even more action from this administration to address it right away and without any additional action from Congress.

I was glad we took some action in this bill to restore the cuts President Trump proposed to the Office of Refugee Resettlement and that we took important steps to increase transparency and hold the administration accountable for its policies and actions, including requiring HHS to finally respond to the committee's requests for information on the resources ORR needs to appropriately care for every child in its custody.

In summary, this bill offers a different direction than the one proposed by the administration. It focuses on helping people--on our workers, our students, our children, our families, and our economy. It will help our country compete in the 21st century, and it will help our communities to thrive.

It is a good bill. It helps educate the next generation, protects our workers' rights and prepares them for good-paying jobs, cares for the sick and most vulnerable in society, and supports medical research that will heal the sick and extend life.

I urge all Senators to support this bill and move us rapidly to final passage.

Thank you.

Mr. President, in February, the HELP Committee passed a bill to reauthorize the animal drug and animal generic drug user fee programs at FDA. That bill was the result of months of bipartisan work. During markup, we worked together to put aside differences and adopted an amendment from Senator Murphy increasing innovation in animal drug trial designs to advance more medicines for our pets and livestock-- similar to the work we did for humans in the 21st Century Cures Act-- and an amendment from Senator Paul to clarify the regulatory process for animal feed additives.

We worked together because this bill has to pass by August 1 to avoid disruption to the hard-working employees at FDA who ensure our pets and food-producing animals have safe and effective drugs.

Last month, the House Energy and Commerce Committee took our bipartisan bill that we worked on together and added a controversial amendment that expands the conditional approval pathway for animal drugs. Currently, the FDA can conditionally approve an animal drug for a minor species or for an uncommon disease in a major species. This narrow category of drugs can be approved, for a limited time, and sold to customers while the company collects data to determine whether the drug actually works. This pathway was supposed to spur innovation, but only four drugs have ever been conditionally approved in the pathway's 14-year history, and only one of those four was actually effective and gained full approval.

That is not a very good track record. Nonetheless, the House bill expands that pathway to any difficult-to-develop animal drug that can address an unmet need and doesn't even define what qualifies as difficult.

I have been very concerned that the undefined scope of this pathway sets a terrible precedent and, more importantly, doesn't uphold the gold standard of FDA approval that our public relies on. However, today Dr. Gottlieb has made public assurances to both me and our chairman that he intends to implement this provision with additional caution and restrictions, according to congressional intent.

FDA has committed to promulgating regulations to define what it means for a study to be ``difficult.'' Importantly, FDA has publicly agreed that conditional approval is not an appropriate pathway for any human medical products or antibiotics.

Antibiotic resistance is a large and growing global public health problem, and the rampant overuse of medically important antibiotics in our food supply compounds that problem. I am very pleased this bill requires FDA to report on its work to bring all medically important antibiotics under veterinary supervision, but there is more to do.

I thank Senators Warren, Feinstein, Gillibrand, and Blumenthal for their leadership on reducing the nonjudicious use of antibiotics in animals. On Friday, Senator Warren sent a letter to FDA asking for additional actions and commitments to bring all medically important antibiotics under veterinary supervision and reevaluate duration limits for antibiotic abuse.

I thank Mr. Gottlieb for his quick response to Senator Warren and his clear commitment to work with us on these issues, including greater transparency into the progress of removing unlimited durations of antibiotic use. I sincerely hope we can avoid these situations in the future, where deals struck between FDA and the industry, with little transparency, are then somehow demanded of Congress.

Senator Alexander and I included language in this year's agricultural appropriations bill that makes clear Congress does not find this appropriate, and I hope the FDA and its regulated industries take that language seriously in future user fee negotiations.

I support moving this bill forward today, but I do plan to conduct careful oversight into the implementation of this law and hold FDA accountable for any deviations from the commitments made to me today.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the letter addressed to Senator Alexander and myself from Scott Gottlieb and Steve Solomon be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, although President Trump has spent the majority of his Presidency undermining workers and their economic security, today President Trump is taking a small step in the right direction by signing the Strengthening Career and Technical Education for the 21st Century Act into law.

This doesn't undo President Trump's actions to roll back health and safety protections for workers or his efforts to make it easier for corporations to take advantage of their workers or his continued attempts to gut workforce training programs, including WIOA and our registered apprenticeships, but this bill makes clear that, when Republicans and Democrats work together and put the needs of students, workers, businesses, and educators at the forefront, even President Trump would not stand in the way.

Now, I want to talk about what went into passing this law, what is included in it, and why that is so important. As we were working to reauthorize the Perkins Career and Technical Education Act, we heard from employers, workers, students, educators, advocates, and our own colleagues on the need to update this law.

While I agreed reauthorizing Perkins was critical to giving workers and students the tools and skills they need to get better jobs and higher wages, we could not pass a law for the sake of passing a law; we needed to ensure this law improved the current Perkins program and was able to adapt to a changing 21st century economy.

That meant putting aside partisanship and working together, across party lines, with the goal of improving career and technical education programs for the communities we represent.

I am pleased we were able to move away from attempts to voucherize this program, an idea that was widely rejected by the CTE community because it would mean programs teaching career and technical education would receive less funding, and though the theory of privatization has been championed by some in this administration, including Secretary DeVos, it has never worked in practice.

We also rejected attempts to change Perkins funding to competitive grants, which would make it significantly harder for communities to apply for and receive funding.

Instead we worked together and focused on what businesses, educators, and students were asking for.

The details here are so important, and I want to make it very clear where we landed in this agreement.

To better improve career and technical education for students, workers, local businesses, and communities, this bill will require States, schools, and training programs to update education and job training programs to meet the needs of the local economy, ensuring students are being provided with the skills they need to find high- skill, high-wage, or in-demand jobs where they live.

Because the economy is constantly changing, and new equipment, technology, and curriculum are needed to help students and workers keep up with technological advancements, this bill would authorize a new innovation grant program to allow States to explore new and creative ways to improve career and technical education that use evidence-based measurements to ensure students are still receiving high quality education and training.

Updating career and technical education programs and promoting innovation is important, but we cannot lose sight of our top priority: improving the quality of the career and technical education students are receiving.

For that reason, this bill appropriately balances State and local flexibility with protections and guardrails to ensure our students are receiving the best possible education and training.

I want to dig a little deeper into these protections today because it is so important we get this right.

First, on the role of the Secretary of Education, I want to be very clear: This bill does not prohibit the Secretary's authority to oversee this law in any new way.

The Strengthening Career and Technical Education for the 21st Century Act gives States the ability to determine what education and training is most needed in their communities and what accountability levels those programs have to meet.

At the same time, it ensures the Secretary has the ability and the authority to implement and enforce the law as we intended.

This bill allows the Secretary to issue rules to implement the law, including notifying Congress before a rule is issued and allowing Congress to provide input on those proposed rules.

Second, this bill includes a number of measures to support States and ensure their top priority is student success.

Because regions of the country have different needs and economies, this bill will allow States to set their own levels of performance, but each State must meet minimum requirements when they set those levels of performance, including ensuring our most vulnerable students are making meaningful progress and performance gaps in the States are closing.

Under current law, we have data on performance gaps and disparities, but no one is required to do anything about those gaps. So for the first time, in this law, States and local recipients will not only have to report data on performance gaps and disparities, they will have to describe how they will address those disparities and gaps.

We also improved the quality of data in this bill. Right now, there are not many common definitions in the Perkins law, so it is hard for local businesses and communities to know which career and technical education programs are high quality and which programs need more resources to improve. This law establishes more common definitions so that the data collected going forward will be more meaningful and comparable among localities and States and will provide more actionable data to help local communities improve these programs.

As I mentioned before, this bill gives States and local CTE providers flexibility to design their own improvement programs for States or locals failing to meet 90 percent of the goals they set for themselves, but it also includes basic requirements to ensure low-performing programs improve in the specific areas they are underperforming, something all parents, educators, and community members want for the programs that serve their children--because, if programs don't have to improve and help the students and workers who need it most, there is no way our communities will be ready for the economic challenges the 21st century holds for us all.

Our bottom line should always be that we support students to succeed. If we aren't, then we have a responsibility to do better. This new law maintains the authority of the Secretary to hold States' feet to the fire to do just that.

Finally, I want to thank my negotiating partners in this legislation, Chairman Alexander, Senator Casey, and Senator Enzi, for working with me on a bipartisan bill that makes important, needed updates to career and technical education, while maintaining guardrails to ensure States and programs receiving Federal money are focused on providing students and workers with the skills they needy and providing businesses with workers they need to compete in the 21st century economy.

I also want to take a moment to recognize the hard work and long hours our staff put in to make this a bill we were all proud to support.

I want to thank David Cleary, Bob Moran, Jake Baker, and Richard Petty from Senator Alexander's office, Garnett Decosimo from Senator Enzi's office, and Julia Sferlazzo from Senator Casey's office.

I want to thank members of my own staff, including my staff director Evan Schatz, my deputy staff director John Righter, and my education policy director Kara Marchione.

I also want to thank Amanda Beaumont, Katherine McClelland, Katharine Parham, Manuel Contreras, and Mairead Lynn for their hard work and support.

This law shows that, if we keep students, workers, and businesses at the forefront, we can work together and build an economy that works for all.

Thank you.

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

Madam President, I want to start today by sharing a story that is very personal to me and that has informed my work and my values ever since it happened. When I was in college, a friend of mine--we were close and lived together in the dorm--went out on a date. She was raped. She got pregnant. She didn't know where to get a safe abortion, and she wasn't wealthy. So she knew she couldn't afford it, either. The botched procedure she ended up having left her, at a very young age, unable to bear children.

I saw my friend hurt and frightened, alone and unable to get the care she needed because someone else's beliefs mattered more under our laws than her health and her future. That impacted me a lot, and it has stayed with me to this day.

Let me tell you a few other stories. This is the story of a woman I met just a few weeks ago. When she was 23, fresh out of college, she became pregnant while living paycheck to paycheck in what she described as ``an extremely unhealthy and volatile relationship.''

She and her partner realized they were not ready to be parents and couldn't afford to raise a child, so they drove to a Planned Parenthood a few miles from her apartment. There, she was informed of her options. She was treated with respect and kindness and got a safe, legal abortion. Today, she is a writer and an editor and the mother of an adorable little boy, with another child on the way.

Here is another story. This young woman became pregnant in her first semester of college after a contraceptive failure. Having a baby would not only have meant dropping out of college but returning to an abusive home. She was grateful to be in New Jersey when this happened, where she could get an abortion without a waiting period and where there are a number of providers. She wrote that abortion access was ``critical in allowing me to determine my life path'' and in escaping the abusive household she had grown up in.

Finally, there is the story of a partner in a major law firm who was already the mother of a 3-year-old child. She was thrilled to find out she was pregnant with another child. But headed into the sixth month of her pregnancy, she and her husband were told that because of a rare heart defect, there was, in the best case scenario, just a 10-percent chance of the pregnancy making it to term, and there was less than a 1- percent chance of their baby making it to its first birthday--with no hope of a reasonable quality of life.

There is no right answer when it comes to decisions like these. Some women, some families choose one way; some, another. But this woman and her husband made the decision to end the pregnancy. It was their family, their future--her choice. She says she knows she did the right thing for her and her family, as difficult as it was.

A year later, she gave birth to a healthy son. She wrote: ``I have shared my story with my children and hope that should my daughter ever find herself in a position similar to mine, she will enjoy the same rights that were available to me.''

There are decades between my college friend's story and the three I just told and the historic ruling in Roe v. Wade, which affirmed that our Constitution protects a woman's right to control her own healthcare decisions. Roe and the rulings that have upheld it make clear what women across the country know at their core to be true--that reproductive freedom is essential to a woman's ability to control her future, plan her family, and contribute to

her community in all the ways she may choose to, as those three women were able to.

Reproductive freedom means women are more able to participate equally and fully in our country. And while I can't adequately express how frustrating it is to have to assert this in the 21st Century, we are stronger today because women in the United States are treated more equally than we were in the 1970s. In fact, former Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen--the only woman to hold this position in the Reserve's 100-year history--has said that our country's economic growth in the last half-century was in large part due to women joining the labor force, and to continue the growth we have seen, we will need to do more to ensure that more women have a level playing field in the workplace and in society as a whole.

But the progress women have made--and the prospect of future progress--truly hangs in the balance. Today, I want not only to emphasize how real this threat is but also to paint a picture of how much more unequal life would be for women in the United States of America should Judge Kavanaugh be confirmed and add a fifth vote on the Supreme Court for overturning Roe v. Wade and rolling back reproductive rights women have had for more than four decades.

Let me say it again. The threat to women's reproductive rights is frighteningly real. It is real because, unless Democrats and Republicans come together, President Trump will follow through on his promise to overturn Roe.

On the campaign trail, Candidate Trump assured extreme, anti-choice special interest groups that he would implement their agenda if elected. He established a litmus test for Supreme Court nominees and released a list of potential picks, each of whom had demonstrated opposition to a woman's right to choose.

He said that under his Presidency, Roe would be overturned automatically once he had the opportunity to appoint Justices because they would all be pro-life. He said that women should be punished for having abortions. He chose a Vice President, Mike Pence, whose views on women and women's health are about as antiquated as smelling salts--and far more damaging.

Candidate Trump aligned himself unequivocally with those who want to roll back women's rights. And while President Trump has broken promise after promise to workers and families, he has never once wavered in following through for those anti-choice special interests.

He has done virtually everything he can to chip away at women's constitutionally protected reproductive rights from the Oval Office, whether it is proposing a domestic gag rule that would allow the government to interfere in provider-patient relationships, attempting time and again to defund Planned Parenthood, or trying to allow virtually any employer to decide to exclude birth control coverage from their employer-sponsored coverage.

I could go on.

Anyone who says President Trump isn't applying an anti-choice litmus test in this nomination or thinks it is unclear where President Trump's allegiance lies when it comes to women's health should take a look at what he has said and done. Unless they willfully ignore the facts, they will quickly realize that the President, far beyond any modern President, has championed the anti-choice cause and has found exactly what he is looking for in Judge Kavanaugh--a fifth vote to overturn Roe v. Wade.

The best evidence that Judge Kavanaugh would overturn Roe is that extreme, anti-choice groups vetted his likelihood to do exactly that and sent him straight to President Trump.

But I do want to address a few aspects of Judge Kavanaugh's records that, to me, expose how unqualified he is to make decisions that will impact women from all backgrounds for generations to come. When I examine the record and history of a Supreme Court nominee, I hope to see a breadth of life experience, the ability to walk in someone else's shoes. Judge Kavanaugh has not demonstrated either of those qualities.

In expressing support for Justice Rehnquist's dissent in Roe--where the Justice argued for allowing restrictions on women's reproductive rights--Kavanaugh agreed with the idea that if a right is not explicitly stated in the Constitution, it must be ``rooted in the traditions and conscience of our people.'' But he made clear that he does not believe a woman's right to choose is rooted in the traditions or the conscience of our people.

I am deeply concerned about who Judge Kavanaugh thinks about and trusts when he imagines the traditions and conscience of our people and makes those decisions accordingly.

His opinions from the bench only heighten my concern. In one opinion, Judge Kavanaugh ruled to allow the Trump administration to block a pregnant 17-year-old who arrived alone at our borders from accessing an abortion until the government could place her with a sponsor. He felt she needed a ``support network'' around her before she was capable of making that decision, even though she had been seeking an abortion for months and had already met State level requirements.

In another opinion, he expressed the belief that if a woman's employer doesn't believe in birth control, that employer shouldn't even have to fill out a one-page form to allow the woman to get birth control coverage directly from her own insurer.

The ``traditions'' and ``conscience'' Judge Kavanaugh referred to may be, in his mind, that of historically powerful, very wealthy White men--first in powdered wigs and then in suits--who never faced the challenges women in these cases face. These women matter, too, and they deserve a Justice who accounts for their rights and liberties in his or her decisions.

Unfortunately, Judge Kavanaugh's opinions indicate he will not do so. Instead, they display a fundamental lack of trust in women's abilities to make their own healthcare decisions. They also show something more: a very poor understanding of the unequal economic and social realities women continue to face in our country, despite the progress we have made, and the degree to which these differences make it all the more important that women be trusted and treated equally under the law, independently, and in their own right.

If an employer tries to deny his employee affordable birth control because he thinks he knows better or if a politicized Federal agency is detaining a young woman in hopes that it can impose its beliefs on her or if a woman does not want to carry her rapist's child to term, our Nation's laws must affirm her autonomy because our laws are her place of last resort.

But under Judge Kavanaugh's vision for our country, based on his assessment of traditions and conscience, women wouldn't have that last resort. Instead, a woman's ability to get reproductive healthcare would overwhelmingly depend, as it did before Roe, on whether she could afford it and, therefore, disproportionately on her race and ZIP Code as well.

Our country as a whole would see outcomes like those we are already seeing in States like Texas and Mississippi, where abortion access is heavily restricted under policies Judge Kavanaugh has referenced approvingly. While women with resources have more options, women without resources see the providers where they had received affordable contraception and healthcare closed down because of anti-abortion politics.

Reproductive healthcare--from sex education, to birth control, to abortion--becomes a privilege for the wealthy, rather than the right of every woman, regardless of who she is. That isn't fair. It is not right, and it truly isn't what people in this country want.

President Trump said that Roe is a ``50-50'' issue in the United States. He is wrong. People in our country--Democrats, Republicans, women and men of all ages and backgrounds--overwhelmingly understand that abortion is a deeply personal decision, one our laws should allow women to make, just as every American's bodily autonomy should be their own concern and not their government's. Despite what the White House would have us believe, this is not a country that wants to follow President Trump, Vice President Pence, and five male Supreme Court Justices back to 1972.

The only way to stop this from happening is for people to take action. I urge anyone who is concerned right

now--women or men--to make that clear, loudly and immediately. If you have a story that shows why reproductive rights matter in our country, share it. If you haven't signed up to vote--or told your friends to--do it.

One year ago this week, three of my Republican colleagues stood with Democrats and stopped President Trump's effort to enact TrumpCare, which would have gutted protections for patients with preexisting conditions, ended Medicaid as we know it, and more. That happened because people across the country knew what was at stake and spoke up, despite how long the odds seemed. That is what we need now. I am confident we can succeed again if people who care show it.

The last story I will tell is one I hope women and men today will be able to tell their daughters and their granddaughters decades from now, should they ever need to hear it. It is that our country went through an extremely frightening time when one of the many rights on the verge of being taken away was a woman's right to choose. We thought about them--our daughters and granddaughters--and how important it is that each one of them be treated equally under our country's laws and have the opportunity to achieve the goals they set out to achieve. We did everything we could to fight back, and we didn't let it happen on our watch. I hope we make that our story.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, reserving the right to object to the Senator's request, families should have access to simple, straightforward information so they can make the food choices that are right for them.

I was very glad to see that after 7 years of delays and foot- dragging, 7 years of objections from Republicans who didn't want to allow this commonsense law to be fully implemented, in May of this year, we finally saw this law implemented--by a Republican administration, no less. Yet, today, before us now is a proposal-- however well intended it may be--that would take us backward.

This bill would undermine nutrition labeling. It would punish businesses along the way that have already fully implemented the law and would carve out an entire category of businesses from providing labeling in their stores. It would bar the FDA from conducting the oversight we all count on it to do. It would weaken consumer protections

as well as protections for States and localities.

Frankly, why? This is a solution in search of a problem. Restaurants across this country are already providing labeling, and the FDA has made it clear that it intends to work with, not against, businesses in implementing the law. Furthermore, many States and localities have required caloric labeling for years, and not one restaurant chain has been sued.

So I am going to keep advocating for families being able to have access to clear, transparent nutrition information.

I object.

Mr. President, I come to the floor today with my colleagues in defense of the millions of Federal workers around the country who have been targeted by President Trump and his administration, including tens of thousands of workers in my home State of Washington.

Federal workers go to work every day, performing jobs that often go unnoticed or unappreciated. They ensure that our grandparents receive Social Security and Medicare benefits. They investigate claims of unsafe working conditions or employers not paying workers what they are owed. Federal workers are the nurses and the doctors who take care of our veterans at VA hospitals and facilities. They are our first responders when natural disasters devastate communities, including thousands of men and women on the frontlines of the wildfires that today are ravaging the West. They help protect our drinking water and clean air as scientists at the Environmental Protection Agency. They educate us about our Nation's landmarks at our national parks, and so much more. They work tirelessly every day to make sure our lives are a little bit better.

While it is the responsibility of government to ensure that every worker is able to go to work without putting their health or safety at risk, earn a living wage to support their families, and retire with dignity, the Federal Government has even more direct responsibility for its own workers and should be a model for treating workers fairly and protecting their rights.

Unfortunately, since day one, President Trump has fought to roll back those worker protections and undermine their rights. Now he has taken a number of steps targeting Federal workers' right to join together and collectively bargain for better working conditions.

Through a series of Executive orders, President Trump has made it harder for workers to organize, for their unions to effectively represent them when they have a dispute with management, and for Federal agencies to bargain collectively with their employees in good faith. These Executive orders target protections that were painstakingly negotiated and agreed to by both parties to make sure workers who are paid with our taxpayer dollars are treated fairly and that workplace disputes in the Federal Government are resolved efficiently and equitably.

Again, the Federal Government should be a model for employers, demonstrating how to treat their workers fairly and with respect. By treating

these Federal workers poorly, President Trump is sending a clear signal that this administration doesn't care about workers and will do nothing to intervene when corporate management mistreats their workers.

These series of Executive orders are not the only way President Trump is making it harder for working families to succeed in this country. Since day one, President Trump has undermined worker protections, including the right to overtime pay and collective bargaining, and made it harder for working families to become economically secure.

Now he has nominated another anti-worker, anti-union judge to our Supreme Court. Last month's Supreme Court decision in Janus made it clear that working families have to have a fair voice in the highest Court in the land.

Judge Kavanaugh's record proves he wouldn't be a fair voice for working families. Throughout his long career, Judge Kavanaugh has sided with corporate special interests at the expense of their workers and rights. He has argued against health and safety standards for workers-- a view not shared by other members of the circuit court. He has argued against workers' rights to be paid fairly for the work they do and repeatedly has been hostile toward workers' rights to organize and join a union and speak up together for better wages and working conditions.

Judge Kavanaugh has used his power as a Federal judge to try to create loopholes for corporations to avoid negotiating with unions and has even argued that some immigrant workers don't have a right to organize or collectively bargain.

Judge Kavanaugh's record is not one of someone who will be balanced and who will listen to each case without bias. It is the record of someone who has consistently sided with corporations and management, and I fear he will do the same on our Nation's highest Court. I fear that Judge Kavanaugh's pro-corporate, anti-worker record is exactly why President Trump and Republicans in Congress are pushing so hard to get him on the Supreme Court.

I am proud to join my colleagues on the floor today to stand for our Federal workers and for their families.

I urge every worker who believes that our economy should work for them, not just for corporations and special interests, to make their voice heard. Call, write, and text your Senators, and urge them to oppose this nomination. Our government, our economy, and our country are strongest when workers are able to make their voices heard and are part of this process.

I hope my colleagues across the aisle who care about the economic security of our working families and the middle class will join us in pushing back against President Trump's harmful Executive orders and opposing this anti-worker Supreme Court nominee.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I wish to thank the Senator from Connecticut. I, too, join him in being very proud, as we were a year ago, to see Congress stand with families across the country who did not want to see their healthcare rolled back.

A year ago, as Senator Murphy said, President Trump tried to make good on his campaign promise to repeal the Affordable Care Act and to jeopardize healthcare for millions of people. A year ago, the President tried to jam TrumpCare through Congress. It was a harmful, mean- spirited bill that would have spiked premiums and gutted Medicaid and scrapped protections for people with preexisting conditions, which would put families back at the mercy of big insurance companies.

But people across the country stood up, they spoke out, and they made it absolutely clear that they did not want President Trump to take away their healthcare or give power back to those insurance companies.

During that debate, I heard personal stories from patients and families all over my State of Washington who were concerned about TrumpCare because it would make it harder to get the care they needed.

I heard stories like Julie's. Julie has a genetic condition. As a result of that, she has had four--four--different types of cancer. She has had four different organs removed during treatment. She has had her diet severely restricted, and her life has dramatically changed. But she is a fighter. She had excellent care, and she ultimately won each of those four battles with cancer.

However, without protections for people with preexisting conditions, her healthcare costs could skyrocket. If President Trump had his way, Julie could not get the care she needed, and, by the way, she is not the only one.

I also heard from families like the family of a woman named Vanessa. When Vanessa was pregnant, she learned that her daughter would be born with significant health challenges. In fact, her daughter Cheyenne had her first surgery when she was just 20 days old, and she would have two more before her very first birthday. Even though Cheyenne was born with preexisting conditions that would be costly to treat for years to come, Vanessa, her mom, was able to get insurance through our State exchange and get her daughter the care she needed. But if President Trump had his way, that might not be possible.

Last year, in the midst of the TrumpCare debate, I shared Vanessa's story, Julie's story, and many stories from families in Washington State, and I heard even more that I would love to share. People from other States across the country were also reaching out and letting their Senators know how damaging TrumpCare would be for their

family and urging them to vote against it. It worked.

Last year we came together and gave President Trump's healthcare repeal scheme a big thumbs down. Unfortunately, that has not stopped President Trump from doing everything he can to sabotage families' healthcare from the Oval Office.

When he couldn't jam through TrumpCare, instead he jammed through a partisan tax bill that gave cuts to big insurance companies and drug companies and paid for them with steps that even his former Health and Human Services Secretary confessed would drive up families' premiums.

He slashed investments that help people understand their healthcare options and get coverage.

He handed power back to the insurance companies by expanding loopholes for junk plans and making it easier to ignore patient protections, including protections, by the way, for women, for seniors, and for people with preexisting conditions.

The Trump administration is even refusing to defend preexisting protections in court, both abandoning its duty to defend the law and ignoring the will of the people across the country who want them to fight for these protections.

While President Trump has broken a lot of promises, it is clear that he has never wavered in his promise to undermine healthcare for our families, and he has never failed to put insurance companies ahead of patients.

That is why his decision to nominate Judge Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court is such an alarming omen for families' healthcare.

As a candidate, President Trump left no question that he would nominate far-right Supreme Court Justices who would strike down the Affordable Care Act and jeopardize care for millions of families. To be sure that candidates met that extreme ideological standard, he had them vetted by extreme, ideological conservative groups.

We know that President Trump chose Judge Kavanaugh because he has no doubt that Kavanaugh will support his efforts to sabotage family healthcare and make it harder for people to get the care they need.

We know that preexisting condition protections are on the line.

We know that stopping Kavanaugh's confirmation isn't a matter of partisan politics. For many families in our country, it is a matter of life and death.

We know we can stop it if people across this country do exactly what they did to beat TrumpCare--stand up, speak out, and make clear that families who didn't want their healthcare stripped away last year don't want it stripped away this year either. I have heard from many families concerned about this, and I know others are sharing their stories as well.

So I hope that our Republican colleagues are listening even more closely than they were last year and that more of them will join us on the side of patients and families, not the President on the side of insurance companies.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.