Floor Statements

Mr. President, today I wish to recognize Audubon Greenwich as it celebrates 75 years of dedication to the protection and preservation of local bird species and their habitats.

Founded in 1943, the organization began as the Greenwich Main Sanctuary, thanks to the property gifted by Eleanor and Hall Clovis. This sanctuary is recognized as the National Audubon Society's first educational nature center. Two years later, Audubon Greenwich expanded thanks to the donation of the Fairchild Wildflower Sanctuary by Mrs. Elon Huntington Hooker and garden clubs in the area.

For three-quarters of a century, Audubon Greenwich has continued to expand its impact on protecting local wildlife. Today, 686 acres of protected habitat, including seven sanctuaries, provide protection for many species of birds. Though the organization's underlying focus is to support Important Bird Areas and protect bird species of concern, Audubon Greenwich has an even wider ranging set of goals. As part of the National Audubon Society, they advocate for far-reaching innovative steps to reduce the impact of global climate change, prevent air and water pollution, and reduce pesticide use, among other missions.

One of the most notable aspects of Audubon Greenwich is how accessible it is to the public. For 75 years, the sanctuaries have welcomed people to visit and explore, appreciating the preserved areas and the wildlife that resides there. Audubon Greenwich now sees over 20,000 visitors every year. The sanctuaries, nature center, and trails provide many opportunities for public learning and enjoyment, enhanced by the organization's nature education programs for children and adults.

Audubon Greenwich boasts an array of bodies of water, forests, an apple orchard, and even original New England homestead buildings. Their conservation efforts play a vital role in keeping Greenwich and the surrounding area safe for wildlife and well preserved.

Dedicated to preserving the past and preparing natural ecosystems and people for the future, Audubon Greenwich is a positive model for environmental education and wildlife conservation. I applaud its accomplishments and hope my colleagues will join me in congratulating Audubon Greenwich on 75 years of excellence.

Mr. President, today I wish to recognize the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights

and Opportunities, CHRO, as they celebrate 75 years of dedication to eliminating discrimination and seeking equal opportunity for everyone throughout the State regardless of their gender, race, nationality, sexual orientation, disability, or other personal characteristics.

Founded in 1943 as the Inter-racial Commission, the commission is the oldest State-sponsored civil rights agency in the United States. Originally, it researched ways to provide equal opportunities and employment to everyone in Connecticut. Thanks to the Fair Employment Practices Act, which the State implemented in 1947, the commission was provided the legal authority to investigate employment discrimination complaints, conduct hearings, and enforce the law.

Throughout the years, CHRO jurisdiction has expanded, including research, public education, and working with other groups in order to enact positive change. The commission's research division helped lay the groundwork for greater civil rights laws in Connecticut. The agency changed its name during the peak of the American civil rights movement after Governor John Dempsey responded in 1967 to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s ``I Have a Dream'' speech by calling a Governor's conference on human rights and opportunities to put words into action.

Now able to help with individual complaints, CHRO works to ensure compliance with Connecticut human rights laws, including those requiring affirmative action in State agency personnel practices and State contract compliance laws. The agency further assists the people of Connecticut by bringing civil enforcement efforts against illegal discrimination in public accommodations, housing, employment, and credit transactions. Over the past three-quarters of a century, the commission has unfailingly sought to achieve its goals for the benefit of every person in the State.

Tirelessly devoted to eradicating discrimination and creating justice and equal opportunity for all Connecticut residents, CHRO is a catalyst for positive change. I applaud the commission's accomplishments and hope my colleagues will join me in congratulating the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities on their 75 years of advocacy, education, research, and assistance.

Mr. President, I am honored to join these two eloquent colleagues who have each been champions for this cause as women speaking about the problem of sexual assault in our country--the epidemic of sexual assault that continues to be a scourge across our country. Most of my career in law enforcement, like my distinguished colleague from California, has been involved in making laws work for people and deterring exactly this kind of heinous lawbreaking. It is criminal. It is a crime, but it is one of the least reported crimes because of the public shaming and character assassination and mocking and ridiculing we have seen from men in power over just the last few days and weeks.

I want to say, as a man speaking on the Senate floor--and greatly honored to do so--to other men in this country, those men in power who have mocked and ridiculed Dr. Blasey Ford cannot be our role model. Those men in power--they may be colleagues and they may be the President of the United States who have belittled and demeaned and dismissed Dr. Blasey Ford and Deborah Ramirez and survivors across the country--do not speak for us. I believe Dr. Blasey Ford. I believe Dr. Blasey Ford because she was credible and powerful as a witness before us in what she remembered and what she so candidly said she couldn't remember. I believe Deborah Ramirez. I believe all of you who have written my office or called us, as many of you have done in other States to my colleagues, who have recounted the horrors of your personal experience with sexual assault, who have come to me as I have been in airports or rallies or other public meetings and shared with me your horrific story. I believe you. America believes you.

Let me say to Dr. Blasey Ford's sons, you should be proud of your mom. You should be proud of your mom because she is a profile in courage.

To Mr. Ford, you should be proud of your wife.

To all the men in America, we need to believe survivors of sexual assault. We need to protect and respect them, not just in word but in deed so they will come forward and tell us their stories so we can conquer scourge.

We should be proud of the brave women who have brought us truth that cannot be denied no matter how much character assassination and public shaming they have endured. We know their truth. This issue of how America moves forward on sexual assault is bigger than this nomination. It will last beyond the vote tomorrow. It will be a defining question for each of us as men, as human beings.

Judge Kavanaugh, in facing these allegations, has also revealed something profoundly significant about himself. When he came to the committee after Dr. Blasey Ford, he revealed his true character. He pulled back the mask on the judge and revealed the man. What we saw was someone filled with rage and spite, self-pitying and arrogant, deeply partisan, and threatening. We can disagree on Judge Kavanaugh's views on jurisprudential issues and policy and law. We can disagree on issues relating to his out-of-the-mainstream, far-right ideological position, but what cannot be denied is that picture of Judge Kavanaugh before our committee that indicated profoundly a lack of temperament and trustworthiness. That picture led former Justice John Paul Stevens to revoke his endorsement and to say his performance was disqualifying.

What we saw--as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words--was a man who refused to answer questions; he snapped at my colleagues; he spouted partisan conspiracy theories. That is the real Brett Kavanaugh--the Brett Kavanaugh who characterized Dr. Ford's serious and credible allegations as nothing more than ``a calculated and orchestrated political hit.'' He, in effect, depicted her as a puppet or a pawn of Senators or political figures, not people who came forward voluntarily in their own right and on their own initiative, as truly they did.

He was the Brett Kavanaugh who alleged that it was all ``revenge on behalf of the Clintons.'' He is the Brett Kavanaugh who, as the Portland Press Herald characterized it, ``ripped off the nonpartisan mask'' and never looked back.

He is the Brett Kavanaugh who threatened us, saying, ``What goes around, comes around.''

In Brett Kavanaugh's own words, a judge must be someone who is ``even-handed, unbiased, impartial, courteous yet firm, and dedicated to a process, not a result.'' Those are his own words. That is not Brett Kavanaugh the man. It will not be Brett Kavanaugh the Justice if he is confirmed.

Brett Kavanaugh revealed himself to be a partisan--an angry and bitter partisan--not an impartial jurist, and he did so in prepared remarks, planned and premeditated, well calculated, written word for word, and delivered word for word as he angrily turned the pages, and that is the message that, for me, resonates because I have argued cases in the Supreme Court. I have spent a career standing before judges. Some of their rulings I liked; some of them I disliked. Some of their conclusions I thought were maybe incorrect. But I knew that those men and women wanted to be impartial. When they put those robes on, as Brett Kavanaugh has done, they left party and partisan interests at the door.

Now, when I go to the U.S. Supreme Court, if Brett Kavanaugh is confirmed, there can be no trust or confidence that he will be that impartial jurist. It is and will be a stain, a cloud, on the U.S. Supreme Court. All the Supreme Court has in the way of power is the trust and credibility and confidence of the American people, which will be diminished forever.

So let me pose a question to my colleague from California because she has so well described the voir dire process. It is jury selection, where we make an effort to pick jurors who are impartial and nonpartisan.

I say to Senator Harris, if Brett Kavanaugh came to a courtroom where the Senator was trying a case as an attorney general, and he were in the jury pool to be picked for a jury, would the Senator pick him as a juror? After that appearance before our committee, would the Senator allow him to sit on a case where the Senator was litigating?

I think this issue of temperament--and I am going to pose a question to my colleague from Washington--is fundamental to our system of justice in this country. Courtrooms are sometimes really emotional places, and sometimes they are angry places. The function of the judge is to remove the emotion and the anger, to be impartial and balanced and even keeled.

So for a judge on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals to engage in the kind of angry outburst--it was not spontaneous; it was not the result of some accusation in the moment. It was calculated. It was premeditated. It was written the day before. It was inexcusable and unacceptable.

I will ask my colleague from the State of Washington, since she is not a lawyer, perhaps to her credit: If the Senator were appearing in a courtroom with Judge Kavanaugh, wouldn't the Senator ask that he step away from the case, that he recuse himself in light of what he has said about all Democrats, about vast classes of people--this anger that he has expressed?

I will yield back to my colleague from California, but let me just close my part of this colloquy by saying that we saw the real Brett Kavanaugh before us on that day at that moment, and I think my colleagues, if they review that picture, a picture is worth a thousand words. If they apply common sense--we should not leave common sense at the door. If they put themselves in the shoes of someone appearing, seeking justice, they will vote against Brett Kavanaugh and the disrespect that he showed that brave survivor, Dr. Blasey Ford.

I yield back to my colleague from California.

Thank you, Mr. President.

At some point during the confirmation hearing--now seemingly years ago but probably only just a month or so ago--I saw young women going through the halls of the Capitol with T-shirts that said ``I am what's at stake.'' I want to thank those young women and all of the countless women and men of all ages who have come to our Nation's Capital to show us what democracy looks like.

I know that some of my colleagues have been displeased--in fact, have called it mob rule--but the power and force of democracy within those voices and faces--a lot of them were from Connecticut, and I am proud of your coming here to tell us what you think both for and against this nomination. That is what democracy looks like. When we reject the voices and faces of democracy coming to tell us their truth, we lose something very precious. It is of equal importance to the townhalls and the meetings and parades and all we do at home. I do a lot of it at home, but I was proud of the folks from Connecticut who came here and the folks who came from all over the country from as far away as Alaska and Hawaii to give us the benefit of their insight and perspective. ``I am what's at stake'' is the message those women were conveying to us in real time.

We talk here in words. Sometimes we hold up posters. We talk in abstract; that is, the legal parlance of the courts and our legislature. But our decisions have real-life consequences, and the appointment of Brett Kavanaugh and the confirmation that likely will take place tomorrow will affect real people in real time for generations to come because it is for a lifetime.

The courts are among the most anti-democratic institutions in our country, the greatest democracy in the world and the most enduring of any democracy. They are lifetime appointments. They are insulated generally from attack or even criticism because folks who criticize a judge in his or her presence can be held in contempt. They have powers to punish contempt by immediately jailing someone. They are anti- democratic so long as they fail to reflect the will of the people if there are excesses, if the nomination and confirmation process goes off the rails. And that is what is happening here--a broken promise and process that has caused a rush to judgment simply for the sake of arbitrary deadlines and irrational timelines placed on a nomination that is fundamentally flawed.

A lot of my colleagues have relied on personal assurances from Brett Kavanaugh in their chambers. He talked to me an hour, and he assured me, I heard my colleagues say. He assured me that he will not overturn Roe v. Wade, but his answers to us under oath on those topics were evasive and misleading.

When I asked him, for example, in our hearings about Roe v. Wade, he repeated the vague commitment to settled precedent, but he couldn't explain why he referred to that precedent in his Garza dissent as ``existing precedent.'' It would be like introducing your wife as ``my current wife.'' How long do you think that wife is going to be around?

He referred to abortion-on-demand. These kinds of code words sent a signal to the Federalist Society and the Heritage Foundation, and they were the direct cause--or at least one of them--for his being on the President's short list after he hadn't been on it before he issued that dissent.

Looking to what he has actually written and said is a much keener, more reliable insight into what he will do, more than personal assurances.

His writings indicate that he believes, in effect, in a President who can refuse to enforce the Affordable Care Act simply because he deems it unconstitutional. He concludes, in his vision of the Constitution and his interpretation of the statute, that they are in conflict, even after the Supreme Court of the United States upholds it and a prior President signs the law and a Congress passes it.

That kind of monarchial power is an anathema to our constitutional sense of checks and balances, and the result could well be--in fact, likely will be--that millions of Americans will be deprived of protections when they suffer from diabetes and heart disease, Parkinson's, high blood pressure, pregnancy--the preexisting conditions for which the Affordable Care Act was designed to afford people protections in insurance.

Healthcare, women's reproductive rights, the right of a woman to decide when she wants to have children, the

right of people across America to decide when they want to marry the person they love, consumer rights, workers' rights, environmental protection--all are at stake to real people in their real lives for generations to come. ``I am what is at stake'' applies to every American.

I have never been angrier or sadder since coming to the Senate. This nomination was essentially the result of a rush to judgment and of a coverup, starting with the concealment of millions of pages of documents. Those documents are in the National Archives. They belong to the people of the United States, but the White House chose to hide them.

Then, there was a straitjacketed sham of an investigation into sexual assault--yes, a sham; really, a whitewash--that refused to interview dozens of witnesses, some of them eyewitnesses who could corroborate the credible and powerful allegations made by sexual assault survivors.

My office spoke directly to Kerry Berchem. There is a more recent report out tonight--an excellent report by NBC--about how she and others tried to be interviewed. They sought and beseeched the FBI to talk to them, but the FBI was given a list because the purpose of that investigation was not to find the facts. It was to offer cover. It was to permit our colleagues to say there has been a seventh investigation.

Have my colleagues read those six investigations? Do they understand that the general practice--we can't talk about the details on the floor, of course--of the FBI is to begin at age 18, not before? Do they understand that the general practice of an FBI background investigation is to interview professional colleagues, coworkers, supervisors, and references that are suggested by the nominee to any particular position?

The seventh investigation was really the crucial one regarding those allegations of an individual 17 years old or even 18, in college, where there was no reason in those earlier six investigations to go back. The FBI was straitjacketed, and that is a disservice to the U.S. Supreme Court, to the Senate in our constitutional responsibility, to the people of the United States, and, ultimately, to Brett Kavanaugh, himself, because these allegations will not be going away any time soon. They will hang over him and the Court as a cloud and a stain for years and years to come. Facts and evidence have a really powerful way of coming out. Eventually, facts and evidence have a way of finding a way to the public realm.

From the beginning, this nomination has been a crucial test for the Senate and for the Nation, but this fight is about more than just this Supreme Court seat. It is about a courageous and credible sexual assault survivor who came forward. Actually, she expressed concerns to friends before the nomination was made about Brett Kavanaugh's possible nomination. She recounted her story years before even the seat opened, as documented by her therapist's notes and her husband, who, by the way, was never interviewed. Her husband was never interviewed. Talk about corroborating witnesses. Her therapist's notes were never reviewed, and she herself was never interviewed by the FBI. That is an absence of factfinding. And, of course, Judge Kavanaugh was never interviewed, as well.

She came forward to say she was sexually assaulted by Brett Kavanaugh, and the details of her claim were lacking in some part. She was frank to admit that she couldn't remember everything, which is not atypical of sexual assault survivors, as the experts would have told the FBI if they had interviewed some experts. But she could remember some parts of that story, and they are details that I will never forget: the laughter from Brett Kavanaugh and Mark Judge, the third person she knew to be in that room--the laughter at her expense. The mocking and ridiculing laughter are so vivid in her memory. It is the same mocking and ridiculing laughter that we heard at some of the rallies where the President mocked and ridiculed her--the same mocking and ridiculing that, for decades, have been applied to survivors of sexual assault who come forward. She has endured the same nightmare of public shaming and character assassination and threats--potential retaliation that all too often has silenced sexual assault survivors. She braved that nightmare, knowing full well what was coming, but maybe she thought it would not come from Members of the Senate. Maybe she had that naive hope, and if she had it, she was wrong.

Our colleagues here said she was mixed up. They said they believe her, they find her credible, but she must be wrong about the identity of the person who attacked her. Well, that echos to the second point that rung true and vividly in her testimony when she was asked: Could it be mistaken identity? Absolutely not. Was she sure it was Brett Kavanaugh? 100 percent sure.

I have a message for my Republican colleagues: You can't believe the survivors only when they say what you want to hear. You can't believe the survivors for only those parts of the story that are comfortable and convenient. You can't believe them only when they tell you how they have been hurt, horrifically harmed, but not the person who harmed them and hurt them. And you can't believe them if you reject the possibility of a thorough, complete, fair, and impartial investigation into all of the facts and the evidence.

My Republican colleagues say they would like to believe Dr. Blasey Ford and they would like to believe Deborah Ramirez, but there is no corroborating evidence. You cannot believe survivors without seeking the corroborating evidence. You cannot believe them if you turn a blind eye to witnesses who come forward and not only are willing but, actually, in effect, pound at the FBI's door.

I reviewed those interviews with the people who were on the list that the FBI permitted to be interviewed, but I have also reviewed the mounds of tip line records. I don't know how many of my colleagues have done so. They are fascinating and illuminating and profoundly revealing because there are actually tips from people who came forward and had a personal connection to the events of interest. Of course, I am barred from providing details, but none of them were contacted or interviewed. That is not an investigation. That is not an investigation by the FBI worthy of the FBI's name.

I offer no criticism of the FBI because they were, in effect, narrowly circumscribed, limited, straitjacketed, handcuffed by someone in the administration. We need to find out who it was and how it was done. Both women offered evidence of the kind that is routinely offered in sexual assault cases. They can prove that they told others about their experiences long before the current nomination fight. Christine Ford had a polygraph test and therapist notes. And both women can point to a history of Brett Kavanaugh acting inappropriately when drunk. What my Republican colleagues apparently mean when they say there are no corroborating witnesses is that none were permitted to tell their story to the FBI, not that they weren't available.

I would like to say that this approach to sexual assault survivors is a thing of the past, a throwback to some other time, but the fact is that it remains real in the lives of survivors around this country today. They should know that we are going to stand with them, that this example of, in effect, failing a proper and complete impartial investigation is far from acceptable to us.

I want to make a commitment to my colleagues and the public that I will continue fighting to find the facts. The American people deserve to know why the FBI failed to complete a full investigation of these powerful and credible allegations. They deserve a full understanding of what the investigation would have found. They deserve full access to Judge Kavanaugh's record--those millions of pages of documents that were concealed and that raise the question: What are they hiding? What are they afraid of the American people seeing from the time that Brett Kavanaugh served in the White House as Staff Secretary?

I filed an FOIA suit to force disclosure of millions of pages of Judge Kavanaugh's documents that have been hidden from the country. The majority leader chose to vote without seeing those documents, but I have no intention of stopping in this effort until they have been disclosed--and they will be. They will come out, adding to the cloud and the stain.

The allegations here are desperately serious. They are credible and powerful, and our job was to make sure that the facts and the evidence either supported them or not.

Debates over the Supreme Court often focus on civil rights and civil liberties, those protections enshrined in the first 10 Amendments to the Constitution. Make no mistake. Those rights and liberties are at stake here. But this Supreme Court debate is also about the fight between powerful corporate interests and ordinary Americans. Corporations have become adept at using the courts when their arguments fail to persuade policymakers and the American people.

When the EPA bans polluters from spewing poison into the environment, polluters go to court to stop that Agency. When the FCC prevents cable giants from censoring the internet, those companies go to court to stop that enforcement.

When the Labor Department or the NLRB take action to protect workers or when the CFPB or FTC take action to protect consumers, big employers and financial services firms go to court to stop them. If you want to breathe clean air and drink clean water, if you want a free and open internet, if you want to work or purchase products free of corporate abuse and fraud, this fight is about your life. It is about you.

This nomination poses a clear and present danger to those enforcement efforts. He poses a danger to the rights of women to decide when they want to have children and to millions of Americans with preexisting conditions who want to keep their affordable health insurance. He poses a danger--clear and present--to workers and consumers who want to live free of corporate domination. He poses, most dangerously, a threat to the checks and balances that prevent a President from running this country like his own personal fiefdom.

In his opinions, his speeches, his writings, and his testimony, we can see where this nominee will take the country if he is a swing vote, as he is likely to be on so many of these issues. He has used those dog whistles or bumper stickers in his campaign for his nomination, those terms and buzz words, ``abortion on demand.'' Sometimes he uses a bullhorn, as when he promises conservative organizations that he will overturn longstanding, near-unanimous precedents that have fallen out of favor with the rightwing or when he goes out of his way to publish long dissents, articulating a radical understanding of the law and its value.

He has been not so much a nominee as a candidate for office. He has been campaigning for this job since law school. Like many candidates for office, he has spent that time demonstrating to potential political patrons that if they pick him, he will diligently represent their interests. He is their guy. That is how he became a member of that elite group on the President's short list.

I will conclude by saying that most chilling--indeed, frightening for me--was his appearance before this committee when he gave a rant and a screed that was written the day before, so he said. It was delivered word for word from that text. It was hardly the result of some spontaneous insult or outburst. It was calculated and planned. It took back the mask of the judge and revealed the man--bitter self-pity, rageful, and a deep partisan, which he had demonstrated before throughout his career as a party operative but perhaps not on the bench. The man revealed there said to us: ``What goes around comes around.''

He said that the powerful allegations of the sexual assault survivors were the result of a leftwing conspiracy fueled by revenge on behalf of the Clintons. Those remarks demean the brave and courageous survivors who came forward on their own initiative, without any encouragement by any Senator, and they were degrading to Christine Blasey Ford and Deborah Ramirez and to the survivor community. They were directly contrary to Judge Kavanaugh's own test of what a judge should do:

The Supreme Court must never be viewed as a partisan

institution. The Justices on the Supreme Court do not sit on

opposite sides of the aisle.

He was sitting on one side of the aisle. In fact, he was sitting on one distinct side of that side of the aisle. That is the reason former Justice John Paul Stevens found his appearance before that committee-- not only his prepared remarks but what he said after--as disqualifying. That is the reason the 2,400 lawyers and professors and former judges have written urging that his nomination be rejected. That is the reason I find most frightening.

I have appeared four times before the U.S. Supreme Court. Every time has been an extraordinary honor, and I have spent a good part of my career standing in front of judges, sometimes with juries and sometimes not. What I prized in judges most importantly was that they were nonpartisan, that they were objective and neutral. I don't know how lawyers or ordinary parties to any case could stand before Judge Kavanaugh now and feel they will be judged fairly and impartially.

My colleagues have come to accept these vague assurances from nominees that they will simply call balls and strikes, that they will follow settled precedent, but we have seen those vague promises betrayed when judges or Justices actually reach the Court.

I look to what he said in that hearing before the Judiciary Committee as a warning about what will happen if Justice Kavanaugh is confirmed. What he wrote in the op-ed today in the Wall Street Journal provides no assurance because the real Brett Kavanaugh came before our committee, and the real Brett Kavanaugh wrote down in advance what he felt. The real Brett Kavanaugh should not be confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court. Even at this late hour, I hope my colleagues will heed that warning.

We may lose this battle, but we cannot lose the broader struggle for justice in this country. I will stay angry. I hope my colleagues and others around the country will as well.

To the young people who came to these halls wearing that T-shirt, ``I am what's at stake,'' you are right. You are what is at stake. Stay angry.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise today to provide clarification surrounding section 317 of H.R. 302, the Federal Aviation Administration, FAA, Reauthorization Act of 2018.

New section 44737 of title 49, as added by section 317 of the bill, allows for the consideration of other means acceptable to the FAA Administrator that provide an equivalent level of fuel system crash resistance. I want to state clearly for the record that the intent of Congress in new section 44737 subsection (a), paragraph (1), subparagraph (B) is to provide flexibility for the FAA to consider innovative fuel system designs when determining an equivalent level of fuel system crash resistance.

Madam President, the Judiciary Committee had an extraordinary meeting this morning, and each of us spoke at some length about our reservations or support for the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to be a U.S. Supreme Court Justice. At the end of that meeting, as we were about to take a vote, Senator Jeff Flake, our colleague, announced his decision that he would request and seek a 1-week extension of the vote so there could be an FBI investigation of some of the unanswered questions that still very seriously and urgently demand responses in fact and evidence.

That is a very promising and important step. It has to be a real investigation, not a sham or show. It has to be penetrating and impartial, which the trained professionals of the FBI can do.

I have a lot of confidence that the FBI will do its job and answer those very serious and urgent questions.

The answers are all the more pressing after the extraordinary hearing we held yesterday at the Judiciary Committee. The entire Nation watched as two people told their stories; two very, very different stories and also told in very, very different ways, but let's be very clear. The roles of these individuals and their responsibilities were also very different.

Judge Brett Kavanaugh came before us for a job interview. He has no right to be on the U.S. Supreme Court. It is a privilege of extraordinary magnitude and significance. The position is one of the most important in our country--a lifetime appointment to the highest Court in the land.

Our responsibility in the Judiciary Committee is not to approve just anyone for that job. We should be seeking the best person, a person of intellect and integrity and temperament who will be fair and impartial, objective, and considerate.

I concluded well before the hearing yesterday--it is no secret--that I would oppose Judge Brett Kavanaugh for the U.S. Supreme Court.

My opposition was based on his extreme ideological views and judicial philosophy which were amply demonstrated at the previous hearing we had with him. My concern is, he would be a fifth vote to cut back or even overturn Roe v. Wade and stop women from making decisions about when they will become pregnant or have children; stop people from marrying and exercising their right to do so with the person they love; cutting back on consumer rights and workers' rights and environmental objectives; and permitting an imperial Presidency--a President who could decide unilaterally that he believes the law is unconstitutional, and therefore it should not be enforced, meaning that laws protecting millions of Americans who suffer from preexisting conditions like diabetes and heart disease, cancer, mental illness, and, yes, pregnancy would go unprotected, and other rights under the Affordable Care Act. An imperial Presidency giving the power of that kind of unilateral authority is an anathema.

What we saw yesterday went beyond views on substantive issues, and I will be very blunt. What we saw was a man filled with anger, even rage, and self-pity, someone of arrogance, highly intensely partisan, and someone, in my view, temperamentally unfit for the U.S. Supreme Court. In fact, I fear his rancor and animus, his partisan bitterness, which came across so clearly and explicitly in his reference to a leftwing conspiracy; Democrats organized to fight him and dredge dirt to destroy his family, a conspiratorial view of the world that is not only factually totally false but also deeply dangerous and unprecedented in anything we have ever heard from any nominee for any judicial position as long as I have been here and I believe unprecedented also in the Senate's consideration of Supreme Court nominees. He indicated a partisanship that was disrespectful and dangerous.

We saw also a woman who came before us as a sexual assault survivor who was temperamentally almost exactly the opposite. Instead of hostile, she was helpful. Instead of angry, she was calm. Instead of rancorous and arrogant, she was modest and humble.

Like Judge Kavanaugh, her family has been harmed by death threats and other vile, vicious behavior that has no tolerance in a democratic society, and my heart goes out to both families. We should reject threats to both of those families, as we do to anyone else in our society, and I have sympathy for the children and the families on both sides and others who may have been affected in coming forth with truth that relates to this nomination.

The demeanor of Professor-Dr. Christine Blasey Ford was completely distinct and different. She was mesmerizing. Even now, her visage haunts me in her profound honesty. She was credible and powerful in recounting events that caused her untold terror and anguish; events she hid because of the trauma she experienced then and because of many of the fears that cause other survivors of sexual assault to hide the same kinds of assault, the fears of blame and public shaming and character assassination and threats of retaliation and sometimes self-blame or stigma or embarrassment.

In her case, coming forward has made many of those fears a reality, tragically and unfortunately. She has endured the nightmare befallen her and her family simply to serve the public with facts and evidence she believes we should know--we in the Senate, we in America--should take into account before we make a decision on Brett Kavanaugh as the nominee.

So there are profound questions raised by her powerful testimony that need to be answered in the FBI interview. That is the reason the American Bar Association Thursday evening called for postponing a vote on Brett Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court until sexual assault and misconduct allegations made by Dr. Blasey Ford and others are fully investigated and why separately the magazine of the Jesuit Order in the United States, America, withdrew its endorsement of Judge Kavanaugh. He was educated by Jesuits at Georgetown Preparatory School in Maryland, and on Thursday, the editors said the nomination was no longer in the best interest of the country.

I want to quote further the magazine, which said:

If Senate Republicans proceed with his nomination, they

will be prioritizing policy aims over a woman's report of

assault. Were he to be confirmed without this allegation

being firmly disproved, it would hang over future decisions

on the Supreme Court for decades and further divide the

country.

Approval of Brett Kavanaugh for the U.S. Supreme Court would be a cloud, it would be a stain on the U.S. Supreme Court for generations to come. We do that damage to the Nation's highest Court at our peril whether we are in agreement or disagreement with Brett Kavanaugh on his policy aims, as the magazine said.

We are talking about the fundamental integrity of an institution and our responsibility to uphold that integrity.

In her testimony yesterday, she was convincing not only because of what she knew and recalled in such precise, vivid detail--indeed, highlighting the laughter of Brett Kavanaugh as he groped her and held her down, as he lay on top of her, the laughter from both him and from Mark Judge--but after we heard her compelling and powerful story, in Judge Kavanaugh, we heard several statements that clearly contradict the facts in evidence. They are untruths.

He claimed the FBI had already investigated him because they did a background check six times. The FBI never investigated Dr. Blasey Ford's allegations. It never investigated Deborah Ramirez's allegations. It never investigated Julie Swetnick's allegations. In fact, the ABA highlights this point.

Senator Grassley said that committee investigators were willing to talk to the witnesses about their allegations, but committee investigators are no substitute for the FBI. The FBI must send those trained professionals to talk to these brave survivors who have come forward, and it must talk to Mark Judge.

I offered a motion to subpoena Mark Judge this morning before our committee. The motion was voted down.

The FBI must talk to Mark Judge, who was allegedly in that room with Brett Kavanaugh when he assaulted Dr. Blasey Ford.

We asked Judge Kavanaugh to call for an investigation by the FBI. A person who is innocent would want the FBI to investigate their claims and clear their name. That is what Dr. Blasey Ford wanted. She said so publicly.

When Brett Kavanaugh was asked, he refused to make that same call. The question is, Why? What is he hiding? What is the administration concealing in refusing to disclose more than a million pages of documents that relate to Brett Kavanaugh's service in the Bush White House as Staff Secretary? They bear on his credibility, maybe not on these specific allegations, but on his credibility.

Judge Kavanaugh claimed that polygraphs are not reliable; that the polygraph Dr. Blasey Ford took and passed was meaningless. Yet, on the DC Circuit as a judge, Brett Kavanaugh ruled otherwise. He wrote ``law enforcement agencies use polygraphs to test the credibility of witnesses and criminal defendants.''

As a former U.S. attorney, I know how polygraphs are used to test credibility of witnesses and criminal defendants. They may sometimes be inadmissible. They may be inadmissible generally, but they have a use. Judge Kavanaugh claimed that all four witnesses Dr. Ford identified as being present at the party have said that the sexual assault ``didn't happen,'' but in fact, only one person has said the sexual assault didn't happen. That one person is Brett Kavanaugh. The other three parties identified by Dr. Blasey Ford said they do not remember. There is a big difference between ``do not remember'' and ``it didn't happen.''

The other woman Dr. Blasey Ford named who was there has since publicly stated that she believes Dr. Ford's account. She believes Dr. Ford, and I do too. Judge Kavanaugh tried to give himself an alibi by making it sound like he never drank on weeknights. His own high school calendar, which he provided the committee as evidence, disputes that statement.

During the hearing, he admitted that one of the entries on his calendar from

a Thursday signified that he went to a friend's house to drink.

Judge Kavanaugh repeatedly said that he had never in his life had so much to drink that he couldn't remember everything that happened, but numerous people who spent time with him during his high school, college, and law school years confirmed that he frequently drank to excess and sometimes became belligerent.

Judge Kavanaugh claimed that he always treated women ``with dignity and respect''--his words--and yet he and his football friends from high school named one of my constituents, Renate Dolphin, in their yearbook pages, saying they were her ``alumnius,'' in effect, boasting of sexual conquests and objectifying her, demeaning her. That is hardly treating a woman with dignity and respect. Judge Kavanaugh said this reference meant nothing sexual, but Renate Dolphin disagrees. In a quote to the New York Times, she said:

The insinuation is horrible, hurtful, and simply untrue. I

pray their daughters are never treated that way.

He said the allegations against him were ``a calculated and orchestrated political hit fueled with apparent pent-up anger about President Trump and the 2016 election.'' He called it ``revenge on behalf of the Clintons.'' He issued a warning--more like a threat--that ``what goes around comes around.'' That threat to the Judiciary Committee of the U.S. Senate is a threat to America. It is profoundly and deeply dangerous to think that litigants will come before his court with the threat that their political views will determine how he decides their cases. That is antithetical to the basic fundamental principles of this country. It contravenes the entire concept of an independent judiciary. President Trump has demonstrated his contempt for the rule of law and an independent judiciary, but a member of one of the highest courts in the country doing so is chilling. It is stunning. It is staggering.

My Republican colleagues, unfortunately, followed that example. They said we leaked her letters to the press at the last minute to derail Judge Kavanaugh's nomination. They called the allegation against Judge Kavanaugh a coordinated smear campaign. That contention is false. It implies that these courageous survivors of sexual assault are puppets or pawns orchestrated by politicians. Anybody who heard and saw Dr. Blasey Ford yesterday knows that is blatantly false. She came forward on her own initiative. She did it reluctantly, foreseeing the nightmare that would befall her and her family. She did it without encouragement from any Member of the U.S. Senate or any other political figure. That contention is an insult to her and all survivors of this horrific crime. Is Deborah Ramirez's story, too, a fabricated allegation to take down Judge Kavanaugh?

When Senator Harris asked Judge Kavanaugh if he had listened to Dr. Ford's testimony, he said: ``I did not.'' He should have. He should have listened to her testimony. He should have heard and heeded what Deborah Ramirez said about his sexual misconduct toward her and, likewise, Julie Swetnick, about the chilling acts that she alleged that he was involved in performing.

Judge Kavanaugh and my Republican colleagues say they don't dispute that Dr. Blasey Ford may have been sexually assaulted at some point but by some other person, just not Brett Kavanaugh. Maybe she was mixed up. Maybe she was confused. Those kinds of words used to describe her and other sexual assault victims demonstrate the disrespect and disregard that has shamed and silenced so many sexual assault survivors from coming forward to tell their truth, seek prosecution, and consult their parents or loved ones and seek healing. It is the reason that sexual assault is one of the most underreported crimes in our country. One out of every three women is a survivor, but so very few come forward because of the public shaming, character assassination, and threats and rejections they fear and, in fact, they rightly foresee.

To my friends on the other side of the aisle, you cannot have it both ways. You either believe Dr. Blasey Ford or you reject her testimony. Either you accept her veracity or you don't. Dr. Blasey Ford was asked whether it was possible that she confused her attacker, whether there was mistaken identity, or whether there was maybe someone else other than Brett Kavanaugh. Firmly, unequivocally, repeatedly, she said no. Before us and the entire country, she said she was ``100 percent'' sure that Brett Kavanaugh was her attacker.

This detail is seared in her memory. There is no mistaken identity here. A person so brutally attacked at the age of 15 who admits to these details and also the details that she doesn't remember and insists on the details she does remember doesn't make something like that up out of whole cloth. She came forward at great personal sacrifice. I believe her. I think America believes her.

She testified that she was terrified--that is her word, ``terrified''--to come forward. She was very nearly silenced by her fear. She worried if she told her story that she would be shouted down or vilified by Judge Kavanaugh's defenders and that he would never be held accountable. That fear silences too many survivors. We must prove them wrong. We must hold him accountable.

As I said at the very start, a lifetime appointment and promotion to the Supreme Court is not an entitlement. It is a privilege for the person who is best for that position.

Last Friday, President Trump said about Dr. Blasey Ford's story on Twitter:

I have no doubt that, if the attack on Dr. Ford was as bad

as she says, charges would have been immediately filed by

local Law Enforcement Authorities by either her or her loving

parents. I ask that she bring those filings forward so we can

learn the date, time, and place!

President Trump knows better. I hope he knows better. Psychologists have noted, and it is widely known, that there are a number of reasons why survivors opt for silence, such as fear of retaliation and repercussions in the workplace or at home, feelings of self-blame. They are told to dismiss it. They are told by their parents they will be blamed, not the perpetrators. They fear they will not be believed, and they want to forget. They want to put this trauma somewhere deep and dark where it will be a source of less pain.

So Dr. Ford did not share the details of her abuse until a therapy session in 2012. She told her husband early in their relationship, but even he did not know the details of this incident until that therapy session.

That is not uncommon for people who have experienced trauma. In the last few weeks, numerous survivors of sexual assault have stepped forward with their stories to explain why they hid their own trauma. I want to take this opportunity to express my admiration for the survivors who are coming forward now with stories of terrible crimes, of impulses to stay silent, and of fears that they have conquered in coming forward.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that these stories be printed in the Record.

I will not read them all now, but I wish for the statements of Lindsey Jones of Connecticut; Tara, who asked that her last name not be used, also of Connecticut; and survivors from other parts of the country who have contacted me just over the past few days be printed in the Record.

Madam President, let me conclude with this thought. Dr. Blasey Ford is a profile in courage. Her name will be remembered long after many of ours are forgotten. She will be in the history books as a teacher--she is a teacher by profession--for this teaching moment for America. It is a teaching moment for all of us--for women who need perhaps that inspiration and role model to come forward and to know that they will be embraced, not rejected. They will be believed, not shunned. They will be bolstered and heeded, and their perpetrator will be held accountable. It is a teaching moment for men--all of us--that we need to do better. It is also a teaching moment for young men--high school juniors and seniors, like Brett Kavanaugh was. When he put into his yearbook that hurtful, horrible phrase about Renate Dolphin--in effect, laughing at her and ridiculing that young woman, just as he laughed and ridiculed Dr. Blasey Ford, then 15 years old, as he allegedly was on top of her, groping and trying to undress her--that laughter was the detail that continued to ring in the ears of Dr. Blasey Ford. It was the most identifiable fact about that incident, as she said yesterday: That laughter is what I hear when I see that entry in the yearbook.

So to all of us men and women in America, her profile in courage should send a message. We should be proud of her, and no one should be prouder than her two sons. I say to Dr. Blasey Ford's sons, as I did this morning in the Judiciary Committee meeting: You should be proud of your mom. She is an American woman who stood strong and spoke out and fearlessly and relentlessly insisted on America hearing her story-- well, maybe not fearlessly. She had fear, but she conquered it. That is the definition of courage--not to be without fear but to act courageously in

spite of it. Grace under pressure--that is Christine Blasey Ford.

I expressed my gratitude that I think is shared by many in America for that great teaching moment yesterday. We should honor her by acting in a way that keeps faith with her honesty and bravery.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, shortly, I will move for unanimous consent to pass S. Res. 610, urging the release of information regarding the September 11 terrorist attacks upon the United States. It is a bipartisan resolution, and I thank the cosponsors who joined me in this historic effort: Senators Cornyn, Schumer, Gillibrand, Murphy, Menendez, Grassley, Markey, Booker, Rubio, and Sanders. At a time of very deep division in our country and in this body, all of us are still able to come together to help the survivors and families of the horrific September 11 terrorist attack as they seek justice and fairness to deter additional and ongoing state sponsorship of terror.

Following our successful efforts in 2016 to enact the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, also known as JASTA, the families of 9/11 victims who perished earned the right to have their day in court. We thought that day would come quickly and they would receive justice. We believe they also earned a right to the necessary

Federal Government archive investigative files on the al-Qaida terrorists and foreign nationals who may have assisted. As much as we expected justice, the Federal Government denied them those records and documents that are vital to their cause.

So 17 years after this national tragedy, the appropriate declassification releasing these documents poses no threat to our national security, and there is no reason for the Federal Government to resist their requests. These files have been kept secret for too long. That secrecy contradicts the national interest. Their cause serves our national security, not only because it gives them justice individually, but it also deters terrorists in the future. Denying them access to this important evidence is unjust, unfair, and unwise.

The U.S. Government should make public any evidence of links between the Saudi Arabian Government officials and the support network inside the United States used to aid and abet the 9/11 hijackers. The legal and moral responsibility of our government is to provide its citizens with all available information regarding this horrific tragedy on September 11, 2001, particularly where there may be evidence that foreign nationals conspired within our borders to support terror with the assistance of foreign governments.

This resolution would never have been possible without the efforts of my constituent Brett Eagleson, of Middletown, CT. He was 15 years old when his father Bruce was lost to him in that massive, unspeakable destruction. He was on the 17th floor of Tower 2 of the World Trade Center. Brett was joined in his advocacy and efforts by members across the country of the 9/11 Families and Survivors United for Justice Against Terrorism. That group is a profile in courage, reliving the pain and anguish of those days in their efforts to seek justice for all Americans. They include a number of individuals whose names I wish to place in the Record: Mary Fetchet of New Cannan, who lost her son; Gordon Haberman of Wisconsin, who lost his daughter; Carol Ashley of Long Island, who lost her daughter; Tim Frolich, a survivor from New York City; Sharon Premoli, a survivor from Vermont; Loreen Sellitto from Florida, who lost her son; and Charles Wolf of New York City, who lost his wife. I thank each of them and the many others who supported this effort for their courage and strength.

There are so many we honor today by our passage of this sense-of-the- Senate resolution. This Senate resolution is itself succinct but significant. It resolves that it is the sense of the Senate that documents related to the events of September 11, 2001, should be declassified to the greatest extent possible; and, two, that the survivors, the families of the victims, and the people of the United States deserve answers about the events and circumstances surrounding the September 11 terrorist attack upon the United States.

Many years later, the pain and grief they endure on that horrific day is still with them. Each year in Connecticut we commemorate this day, and we will never forget. That is our resolve--never to forget, never to yield to hopelessness, never to allow our support for these families to diminish.

This sense-of-the-Senate resolution makes real the promise the Nation made to these 9/11 families. They deserve this evidence. Even if it is embarrassing to foreign governments or foreign nationals, they deserve justice.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs be discharged from further consideration of S. Res. 610 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, today I wish to recognize the Connecticut Chiropractic Association, Inc., CTChiro, as it celebrates 100 years of extraordinary and exemplary advocacy on behalf of chiropractic doctors in Connecticut.

Since its formation in 1918, CTChiro has demonstrated tireless dedication to the advancement of the chiropractic profession. The association seeks to support these doctors and their practices throughout Connecticut in order to improve public health policies and provide their patients with the best treatment possible.

Endeavoring to raise awareness of the profession and make chiropractic care more accessible to the people of Connecticut, CTChiro diligently monitors healthcare legislation to ensure chiropractic services are a viable health option for residents. To meet the need for such medical care throughout the State, CTChiro strives to improve patient awareness of chiropractic services, while advocating for greater insurance coverage.

Continuously seeking to raise the standard for doctors in the field and the treatment they provide to their patients, CTChiro also offers opportunities for its member doctors to access resources and continue with higher education. Thanks to the association's longstanding, consistent efforts, institutions, representatives, agencies, and Connecticut residents are able to see the importance and availability of chiropractic medicine. Additionally, they can feel secure in the services offered to them as a result of CTChiro's dedication to developing a more comprehensive and knowledgeable set of doctors.

Since its establishment, CTChiro routinely prioritizes the creation of thorough, economical, and beneficial chiropractic care, supported by experienced, well-rounded professional doctors. I applaud their numerous achievements and hope my colleagues will join me in congratulating the Connecticut Chiropractic Association, Inc., on 100 years of service and commitment to Connecticut chiropractic doctors and patients.

Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Tennessee, as well as leaders on both sides. This effort has been truly bipartisan. It is a profoundly significant beginning but only a first step. It needs to be followed by others because we know that this epidemic truly is national.

I especially thank my colleague from West Virginia who will follow me, Senator Manchin, for his tireless, relentless efforts on this issue. I have been very proud to work with him and to begin working on it when I was attorney general of the State of Connecticut in suing the painkiller manufacturers and taking action against the sellers of prescription opioids, to make sure they are held accountable.

The communities need our help. We promised action, and we are now delivering, in part, on this issue, which has been so devastating and deadly for so many families, communities, States, and towns throughout Connecticut and our Nation.

The calls for action tonight are answered in this beginning step with money that will go to treatment, prevention, and law enforcement. That money is a good first step, but it must be followed by additional investments and commitment.

This measure increases the number of drug take-back programs. I visited communities, most recently East Hartford in Greenwich, where these take-back programs have provided an anonymous, secure way to rid medicine cabinets of drugs that all too often can be a menace. Medicine cabinets are a modern-day menace when they provide accessible painkillers and opioids to teenagers, children, and others who begin lifetimes of addiction.

This measure is profoundly important in setting standards and guidelines for sober houses, a very important resource but one that requires some sense of regularity and guidelines. There are many sober homes in Connecticut--for example, in Torrington--that do good work. But Connecticut is grappling with sober homes operated by bad actors who put lives at risk. This prevention is a step in the right direction.

I am very proud of a bill I have led with Senators Grassley and Brown to enhance transparency in opioid prescribing. This provision requires drug companies to disclose payments made to nurse practitioners, physician assistants, and other prescribers, ensuring that they are not being inappropriately influenced by these manufacturers. It is already required for doctors. It ought to be required for everyone who may be involved in prescribing these powerful medicines.

The bill will also fight back against deadly drug trafficking when it involves use of the postal system. Just a few weeks ago, in New Haven, there was a mass overdose caused by trafficked synthetic drugs. More than 100 people overdosed on K2 brought into this country by China and Mexico through the mail. These new law enforcement tools are critically important, as is the reauthorization of the Office of National Drug Control Policy and its High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas Program. This bill will help protect our citizens. I thank all my colleagues for supporting it.

I am looking forward to a positive, affirmative vote that will help communities throughout the country and spare families the heartbreaking and gut-wrenching problem that infects so many healthy communities. Everyone is affected and touched by this problem. I thank my colleagues for supporting this bill.

Mr. President, today I recognize Judge Guido Calabresi, a dedicated public servant and professor who is celebrating 70 years as a naturalized citizen of the United States on September 16.

His life and career constitute a legacy of commitment and passion for initiating positive change. A deeply insightful and tirelessly driven person, he is recognized as a pioneer in the academic world who has spent six decades educating and serving others.

In 1939, Judge Calabresi moved with his family to New York and then New Haven, CT, from Milan, Italy, where his parents were notable antifascist figures. Forbidden from bringing money with them to America, his family had to start again from scratch upon their arrival. Judge Calabresi and his older brother, Paul, worked to learn English and assimilate into their new home. Their father had a fellowship at Yale, which at the time had no Italian or Jewish faculty members, forcing the family to forge a unique identity at the institution.

Young Guido devoted himself unstintingly to his studies. Once naturalized as a citizen, along with his parents and brother in 1948, he graduated summa cum laude from Yale in 1953 with a bachelor of science in economics, earned a bachelor of arts with first class honors from Oxford in 1955 as a Rhodes Scholar, and then a bachelor of laws magna cum laude from Yale Law School 5 years later and a master of arts the next year in 1959 from the University of Oxford in politics, philosophy, and economics.

Judge Calabresi focused on legal scholarship starting in the late 1950s, when he served as a law review member and note editor for the Yale Law Journal and graduated first in his class from the law school. After graduation, he clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Hugo Black and went on to become the youngest full professor ever at Yale Law School.

His impressive career led him to become dean of the Yale Law School for 9 years, ending in 1994. One of Judge Calabresi's most notable accomplishments in the academic world is his role as a founder of the subfield of law and

economics along with Nobel Prize winner Ronald Coase. His public service included impressive charitable and local government activities, including as a town selectman in Woodbridge for 4 years, beginning in 1971.

In 1994, recognizing his extraordinary accomplishments as a teacher and scholar, President Bill Clinton nominated him to serve as a U.S. circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Judge Calabresi joined the court in September 1994, 55 years after fleeing to America to escape Italian racial laws.

Judge Calabresi was shaped throughout his education, as a lawyer, and as a judge by his experiences as a refugee who courageously forged his own path as a U.S. citizen. Now a senior judge for the Second Circuit and sterling professor emeritus of law and professional lecturer at Yale, he has written seven books and more than 100 articles on law and other related subjects. He has also been awarded 50 honorary degrees from universities across the globe.

With his remarkable record of public and academic service, Judge Calabresi is a credit to the State of Connecticut and to our country. His unfailing readiness to embrace new challenges and benefit his communities sets an inspiring model for all of us.

I applaud his many accomplishments and hope my colleagues will join me in congratulating Judge Guido Calabresi on this landmark of attaining 70 years as a naturalized American citizen.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, today I wish to recognize Greg Bollard, who will be honored at the 15th anniversary celebration for Friends of the Lake on August 9, 2018. His numerous accomplishments on behalf of Lake Lillinonah have made a great impact on the health of Connecticut's environment.

Mr. Bollard is the cofounder of Friends of the Lake, a nonprofit organization created to improve the water quality of Lake Lillinonah in Connecticut, enhance the enjoyment of the lake's pristine and stunning surroundings and protect that portion of the Housatonic River and its watershed.

Friends of the Lake works alongside an array of community and environmental organizations, Federal, State and local officials, and residents in order to acquire vital funding to improve the lake, raise awareness of the project and its importance, and bring together the community around Lake Lillinonah. Mr. Bollard has worked tirelessly over the past decade and a half to obtain and deploy a monitoring buoy. This buoy uses the Global Lake Observatory Network GLEON, to share data about the lake with scientists and other lake organizations worldwide, in order to facilitate more thorough monitoring and study of lake ecology.

In order to ensure Lake Lillinonah is clean, safe, and accessible to the community, Mr. Bollard has led tireless efforts to learn more about invasive species and control their populations, along with chairing the water quality committee. He is known as an incredibly dependable man, who is able to fix any problem by spearheading key efforts to develop a solution and bring the right group of people together to see it through successfully.

Mr. Bollard's desire to help his community extends beyond his work with Friends of the Lake, as well. For 16 years, he served on the Bridgewater Inland Wetlands Commission, and he continues to dedicate his time to his community through his role as an EMT and ambulance coordinator for the Bridgewater Fire Department, a firefighter and EMT for the Morris Volunteer Fire Department, and as a member of the Shepaug parent council.

Through his devotion to helping our State with Friends of the Lake and his great work as a public servant, Mr. Bollard has left a lasting, positive impression upon Connecticut and laid a profoundly strong foundation for improving our State's environment in the years to come.

I applaud Greg Bollard's dedicated commitment to improve and protect Lake Lillinonah, and I hope my colleagues will join me in congratulating Mr. Bollard on his well-deserved honor.

Mr. President, I thank my colleague and friend from Florida for his leadership on this profoundly important and imminently threatening issue of safety, as well my colleague from New Jersey for his very important leadership and also Senator Markey from Massachusetts. We have joined together in this cause to prevent a new wave of lethal gun violence in our streets and communities resulting from these plastic, undetectable, and untraceable, weapons. We are talking about assault rifles, pistols, and shotguns--all of them homemade. They are ghost guns. They are the new frontier and new face of gun violence in this country.

Our colleague from Utah raised a First Amendment objection. The fact is that the courts are dealing with that objection. It is the basis of a challenge brought by a group who so far has failed in the courts to stop this public health regulation.

No right is absolute. The First Amendment is not absolute. The idea of crying fire in a movie house is one example that is given time and again. Likewise, in the course of our history, we have found that the First Amendment has to yield to public safety when there is an imminent and urgent threat. Clearly, there is here.

I have supported companion legislation that would, in fact, stop the actual making of these kinds of weapons. It involves none of the First Amendment difficulties the Senator from Utah has raised, and I will be pursuing it perhaps through the same kind of unanimous consent effort in the days to come.

Today, the Senator from Florida is absolutely right to seek this body's unanimous consent in the face of this threat that is self- inflicted by the Trump administration. It has caved to the rightwing fringe group and the NRA, which are challenging this public safety regulation, and it has, in effect, snatched defeat from the jaws of victory because the litigation was on a path to prevailing against those objections. This litigation should have been permitted to run its course. It was on a path to success. But now the administration has created this emergency, beginning at midnight tonight. On August 1, plans, designs, blueprints can be published without limit on the internet, making possible the mass homemade manufacture of these ghost guns. They are a scourge, a potential source of death and injury on our streets.

Any idea that plastic is less durable or strong as a source of material for these guns is completely outmoded because we make planes from plastic. Plastic in some forms is as durable and strong as metal.

The threat here is real and urgent, and I join my colleague from Florida in asking that there be unanimous consent. I hope we will pursue this legislative effort together and that we will have bipartisan support. I stress that we must have bipartisan support. Senators who fail to step up, speak out, and act in the face of this emergency should be held accountable.

Mr. President, I yield the floor to our colleague from New Jersey.

Mr. President, I rise today with a heavy heart to pay tribute to SFC, Retired, Restituto ``Tuto'' Oyola-Alvarez, a courageous member of our military and devoted family man. Sadly, Sergeant First Class Oyola-Alvarez passed away on July 22, 2018, at the age of 101. He will be remembered for his tireless, dedicated service to our nation.

Sergeant First Class Oyola-Alvarez was born in Arecibo, PR, and he enlisted in the U.S. Army at Fort Buchanan on January 22, 1941. He went on to serve in Puerto Rico's 65th Infantry Regiment during the Korean war. The regiment was referred to as the Borinqueneers, and Sergeant First Class Oyola-Alvarez and the rest of his Latino-segregated unit played a valuable role in helping American war efforts.

Unfortunately, despite their remarkable dedication, the Borinqueneers' contributions went largely overlooked once the war ended. After 20 years of Active service and many more decades during which it went unrecognized, Sergeant First Class Oyola-Alvarez was at last granted the awards his unfailing support of our Nation deserved. On Veterans Day in 2012, I was honored to present him a number of hard- earned medals at his home in Hartford, CT. Four years later, I was proud to present him and his fellow Borinqueneers with the Congressional Gold Medal at the Connecticut State Capitol. At the ceremony, Sergeant First Class Oyola-Alvarez also received more medals acknowledging his efforts on behalf of America, including the World War II Victory Medal and Korean Service Medal, among others.

Honorably discharged in 1961, he gained proper recognition for his service when he reached his mid-90s. Citations and certificates from his home State of Connecticut were given by the Connecticut General Assembly, the secretary of the State of Connecticut, and the mayor of Hartford. In 2014, Sergeant First Class Oyola-Alvarez's tenacious defense of our democracy earned him the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Latino Puerto Rican Affairs Commission in Connecticut.

His sincere devotion to his birth island of Puerto Rico, the United States, and the U.S. Armed Forces carried into his family life as well. Sergeant First Class Oyola-Alvarez cherished his wife of 70 years, the late Sarah Rivera, as well as his only daughter, Sara Victoria, his son-in-law, Merril, and his many grandchildren and great-grandchildren. His years of outstanding leadership, loyalty, and commitment are a model for all of us and have left a lasting positive impact upon the country.

My wife, Cynthia, and I extend our deepest sympathies to Restituto's family during this difficult time. May their many wonderful memories of him provide them solace and comfort in the days ahead.

Mr. President, today I wish to recognize Fred Grimsey, in whose honor a beach in Waterford, CT, will be named Grimsey Beach on August 11, 2018. I have had the honor of seeing firsthand the many amazing accomplishments of Fred Grimsey over the past decade.

Mr. Grimsey is the founder and president of Save the River-Save the Hills, Inc., a nonprofit, grassroots environmental organization focused on preserving the health of the Niantic River Estuary, its watershed, and the natural beauty of the Oswegatchie Hills.

In 2003, Mr. Grimsey built a system to use his boat as a pump-out vessel. Relying on his personal funds for 2 years to keep what became the Pump-Out Program going, Mr. Grimsey has since secured grants from the DEEP and the towns of Waterford and East Lyme, CT, to maintain it. Just this year, over 16,000 gallons of sewerage were pumped from boats on the Niantic River, preventing a significant amount of pollution from being dumped in the river.

As director of the Pump-Out Program and president of Save the River- Save the Hills, Mr. Grimsey has worked long hours to improve the diversity and amount of aquatic life in the estuary, encourage safe recreation, and enhance economic growth of the Niantic River area. His determined dedication has helped lead to the designation of the river and the Long Island Sound as a Federal No Discharge Zone.

Mr. Grimsey's significant environmental efforts has extended Statewide, including serving on numerous committees centered on improving waterways in and around Connecticut.

Currently, Mr. Grimsey and Save the River-Save the Hills are working on a Unified Water Study with the Connecticut Fund for the Environment. The goal of the study is to encourage collaboration between multiple monitoring groups in order to measure the ecological health of a local bay, cove, or harbor.

Mr. Grimsey's positive impact upon the Niantic River has greatly benefitted our State. In 2008, he received the President's Volunteer Service Award for the State of Connecticut, and in 2017, I was proud to recognize his environmental achievements by presenting Mr. Grimsey with the Aquarion Environmental Champion Award in the adult category.

I applaud his tireless efforts to improve and protect the Niantic River, and I hope my colleagues will join me in congratulating Mr. Grimsey on his well-earned honor.