Floor Statements

Mr. President, for the President of the United States, there are few decisions more important than nominating leaders of integrity and good judgment to hold trusted positions in office. And few of those trusted positions are more important than the Chair of the Federal Reserve. Those words were uttered by President Trump during his first term when he announced Jerome Powell as his nominee to Chair the Fed. How times have changed.

During his tenure, Chair Powell served with competency and dignity as he navigated the economic problems of our time, from the COVID-19 pandemic to rapidly rising inflation. Yet he also faced a challenge unlike any other Chair in history: a sham legal battle waged by the very President who nominated him. To President Trump, it seems that exercising good judgment does not mean reliance on the economic facts and data, but instead obedience to his every demand.

Because of Chair Powell's refusal to kowtow, Donald Trump has weaponized the Department of Justice to pressure, belittle, and threaten him. I want to commend Chair Powell for standing firm in the face of the President's tirades. It is not easy to face Trump's vengeful wrath, and it is indefensible that DOJ has kept open the possibility of pursuing these baseless, politicized charges in the future.

But Mr. Powell's term as Chair expires on Friday, and President Trump seems determined to nominate a Chair who will do his bidding, instead of one who is independently minded. Earlier this year, President Trump nominated Kevin Warsh to lead the Fed after Powell's departure. Mr. Warsh previously served as member of the Board of Governors from 2006 through 2011 as a Bush appointee.

Warsh's actions during that time raise cause for concern: Mr. Warsh played a central role in arranging numerous multibillion-dollar bank bailouts, while warning against interest rate cuts even as unemployment soared. He has expressed no regrets about these bailouts and continues to support Trump's Wall Street deregulatory agenda. We already have seen the damage across our government, from the Department of Justice to Health and Human Services, that Trump loyalists can wreck. We cannot allow that chaos in our central bank.

America's economy is trusted by the world because of the belief that our economic policies are determined by facts not politics. Warsh threatens to undermine that.

When President Trump asks him to juice the economy by lowering interest rates, even if it raises inflation, will Warsh have the courage to say no? When one of the President or his allies' many shady business ventures fail, will Warsh stand strong amid pressure to provide a taxpayer funded bailout? When the chips are down, will Warsh make the decisions that best benefit his country or the President who picked him? Warsh's record and his answers at his confirmation hearing indicate the answers are no. Americans are struggling more than ever to afford basic goods, from housing, to gas, to groceries. Yesterday, data showed that Trump's war of choice in Iran has caused inflation to reach 3.8 percent, the highest in 3 years. Working families deserve a central bank that will fight for them, not the President and his billionaire buddies.

I am not convinced that Mr. Warsh has the willingness to do what is best for the American people. For that reason, I will be voting no on his nomination and encourage my colleagues to do the same.

I announce that the Senator from New York (Mrs. Gillibrand) is necessarily absent.

Mr. President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 395, S.J. Res. 147.

Mr. President, I was proud in 2008 during the financial crisis facing this country to join a majority of Senators in creating the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. This Bureau has been a watchdog for consumers ever since.

Congress took steps to strengthen consumer protection laws after this crisis which centered on mortgage lenders profiting on loans doomed to fail. Millions of Americans lost their homes. The unemployment rate was 10 percent.

Shortly after, Congress passed this Consumer Financial Protection Act to address consumer protection failures and to ban abusive financial conduct to ensure fair dealing and protect consumers.

The CFPB issued guidance on what constitutes financial abuse, warning bad actors, and making it easy to enforce the law.

In 2023, the Biden CFPB issued a policy statement that spelled out by legal definition the abusive conduct and provided summaries and explanations as how to analyze the abusers. For example, the CFPB explained that abusive practices include obscuring or withholding information on mortgages in a

way that makes it difficult for consumers to understand them--same thing for credit card agreements, same thing for financial contracts and for student loans. The guidance warned bad actors about engaging in these practices and deterring abusive conduct, making it easier to bring enforcement actions when it occurs. The Trump administration withdrew this guidance and protection, and this JRD seeks to restore it.

Now, I ask those who want to stand up for families that are struggling with their expenses today to vote yes and those who want to approve of low-rent, bottom-feeder, sleazy conduct by cheaters to vote no.

Vote on Motion to Proceed

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

I announce that the Senator from Colorado (Mr. Bennet) is necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from Colorado (Mr. Bennet) is necessarily absent.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

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

Mr. President, last week was an opportunity for us to return home to our States and districts, and in my case, the city of Chicago, where it was a glorious week but for one sobering event--we lost one of Chicago's finest--patrolman and policeman John Bartholomew. In the line of duty, he was shot, and we had a tribute to him at his Greek Orthodox church on Hollywood Avenue in Chicago. Hundreds of his fellow law enforcement officers came in from jurisdictions all over the Midwest and across the United States.

John Bartholomew leaves three small children and his wife and family behind. I went to that memorial service, and I was just at a loss for words as I met his mother and told her how sorry I was for what had happened.

This is Police Week. We are remembering John Bartholomew and hundreds of others who lost their lives in the line of duty to protect us and their families and neighborhoods. We take them for granted until these terrible tragedies occur, and then we come to realize how much is on the line every single day they put the badge on.

I listened earlier when the Republican leader Senator Thune said this Police Week should be a reminder to Democrats to take police seriously. We do. I trust that both political parties do.

When I was chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I looked forward to this week to pass bipartisan--bipartisan--legislation to help our policemen. Under Chairman Grassley in my service as a ranking member, I will join that bipartisan effort again. But I do have to tell you I am disappointed that during Police Week we would consider on the floor of the U.S. Senate nominations for U.S. attorneys who have testified before our committee and said things which I believe do not reflect respect for the law as it should be--particularly when it comes to the January 6 insurrection in the Capitol.

I remember that day. It was one of the most noteworthy days of my service in the Senate. When Vice President Pence was presiding, we were counting the electoral ballots for the 2020 Presidential election. At about 2:10 p.m. in the afternoon, someone came in and pulled Vice President Pence out of that chair out that door. People couldn't understand why. There was a demonstration outside--a political demonstration--but we went about our business, and yet something had happened.

At that point someone from the Capitol Police came and stood before us and said: You can continue what you are doing, but stay in this room. We are going to make this a safe room in the U.S. Capitol--a safe room.

It wasn't 10 minutes later until the same Capitol policeman came before us and said: Change of plans. We are evacuating the Senate Chamber, and we all filed out the door to another adjourning building where we were protected.

These Capitol policemen and -women risked their lives for us on that day. I think it was nothing less than an act of heroism and courage for them to defy this Trump crowd that was sent to disrupt the proceedings.

Unfortunately, the mob took over the Senate Chamber. C-SPAN broadcast as they took pictures and photos for one another, went rifling through our desks, and tried to take over the Capitol--we saw that later on. What an embarrassing chapter in the history of the United States.

What is even more embarrassing is the fact that there have been people who have come before us seeking Federal positions since who don't take that seriously--what happened on January 6. Let me give you an example--and this individual is going to come up for a vote this week in the Senate--Police Week.

His name is Phillip Williams. He is from Alabama. Phillip Williams is seeking the U.S. attorney spot in Alabama. He argued that January 6 rioters were ``Hunted down by Federal law enforcement,'' whom he accused of prosecutorial abuse many, many times over.

Williams equated these prosecutions to the Salem witch trials on a national scale. He minimized the attack on the Capitol stating: It certainly was not an insurrection because there was no attempt to overthrow the government.

He criticized the 87-month prison sentence imposed on a rioter named Guy Reffitt because he was nonviolent according to Williams and did not step into the Capitol.

Let me tell you the rest of the story about Reffitt that Mr. Williams, who seeks to represent the Department of Justice in the State of Alabama had to say.

Reffitt traveled to the Capitol on January 6 wearing body armor, carrying handguns, flex cuffs, and radios for communication. Prior to his arrest, Reffitt threatened his own minor children telling them: If you turn me in, you are traitors, and traitors get shot.

Williams contended, without evidence, that Federal judges ruling against President Trump were setting Trump up.

This man who dismissed Mr. Reffitt as a threat on January 6 wants to represent the U.S. Attorney's Office, the Department of Justice, in the State of Alabama. He has no place doing that. And for the Senate to vote for confirmation of this nomination on Police Week is, to my mind, a travesty.

He is not the only one in this group. I want to note one or two others. Darin Smith of Wyoming. Darin Smith, again, is seeking to become a U.S. attorney representing the Department of Justice in the State of Wyoming.

Mr. Smith was present at the U.S. Capitol on January 6--though he claimed he didn't enter any buildings. Regarding the insurrection, Smith contended that rioters were entrapped and that the U.S. Capitol Police were guilty of massive incompetence.

Mr. President, 140 of the U.S. Capitol Police who defended my life and the life of everyone in the Capitol on that day were injured. Two or three died as a consequence of that experience. And for him to argue that they were guilty of massive incompetence is an embarrassing statement. It is a slap in the face to the Capitol Police who risked their lives for me and for other Members.

Mr. Smith baselessly claimed FBI agents who interviewed him regarding his presence at the Capitol were sent there by Representative Liz Cheney ``and her goons.'' Afterward, he demanded that she should be censored by the Wyoming Republican Party.

How do these people proceed through the ranks of the Trump administration to be given such positions of importance when they are so dismissive of the efforts by that mob to first injure the policemen who were doing their duty here in the Capitol and then to disrupt the proceedings that the Vice President was presiding over? The list goes on.

(Mr. McCORMICK assumed the Chair.)

It has been the case ever since Trump has been reelected that when it comes to many judges and many U.S. attorneys, dismissing January 6 as just tourists out of control is acceptable by the Trump administration. Well, it is not acceptable. As someone who lived it, who witnessed it, saw it firsthand, that they are dismissing this operation on that day as simply some political statement is unfair.

Don't salute the police and ignore the obvious. The police were under attack on that day, and to dismiss that is to dismiss the obvious.

Mr. President, so now we are going to consider a reconciliation bill to spend tens of billions of dollars for ICE and CBP. We all know the story of ICE. We saw it on the streets of Chicago, Minneapolis, and many other places.

Do you know what is interesting? As I was walking through the airport and all of these policemen were coming in for Police Week this week in Washington--wearing their formal uniforms, smart looking as they were-- I didn't see a single one of them with a mask on their face. Yet ICE continues to argue it is the only police force in America that should be masked and the American people shouldn't be able to identify who these ICE agents are. I think that is reprehensible. We are trying to change it, and the Republicans are resisting it. I don't know why.

Let me say also that there is no reference in this budget reconciliation package to language that would rein in lawless immigration agents who are terrorizing communities like Chicago and Minneapolis while carrying out the President's mass deportation campaign.

Just this last week, we had a press conference in Chicago to talk about those who are here in the United States under DACA. DACA is a product of the DREAM Act, which I introduced 22 years ago--a provision in the law which we need to enact which says that if you are here in the United States, brought into the country as a child, that you ought to have an opportunity to earn your way to citizenship.

These young men and women grew up in America, pledged allegiance to that flag in their classroom every single day, and believed they were part of America's future, only to learn when they had become teenagers that their parents brought them in and didn't file the appropriate papers, so now they are subject to deportation.

The DREAM Act addressed that issue, and I called on President Obama and asked him to use his Executive powers to give these Dreamers a chance. He created a program called DACA.

Under the DACA Program, if you were one of the Dreamers, every 2 years, you are to be registering with the government and paying a $600 fee and going through a criminal background check so that you can continue to work in the United States and not be deported.

So what happened 2 weeks ago? The bureau of immigration came out with a ruling that DACA no longer protected these individuals. How many were affected? Originally, 800,000-plus; today, somewhere in the range of 500,000. They run the very real risk now that if they try to sign up again for DACA, as they are entitled to under President Obama's Executive order, they could be arrested and deported. For more and more of them, that is happening as the weeks go by, and we held a press conference in Chicago to talk about that.

That is ICE at work. That is CBP at work. And unfortunately, these young people, who have no criminal background--they have gone through criminal background checks and are showing up, as required, to pay their fee every 2 years so they can work legally in the United States-- are subject to deportation.

There is also a provision in this bill--hard to believe--of $1 billion for President Trump's White House ballroom--a billion-dollar ballroom--the same ballroom that he promised the American people wouldn't cost them a penny. He was going to go to his buddies, as he always does, and they were going to come up with the money, and the American people wouldn't have to pay anything. Guess what. The budget reconciliation bill presented by Republicans in the Senate this week requires $1 billion for this ``Great Gatsby'' ballroom that the President wants to see. I think that is a horrendous waste of time and money, and it did not go through the appropriate channels.

The President just plowed down the East Wing of the White House, and it sits there as a gaping hole waiting to be filled. It was going to be his billionaire buddies to fill it; now, it is the American taxpayers-- $1 billion. I distinctly recall the President saying that the taxpayers would not have to pay for this.

Add it to that endless list of broken promises--the President ending the Ukrainian war on his first day in office and a long list of contradictions when it comes to the war with Iran. Depending on the day of the week, we are either proceeding with a war or ending a war, wiping them off the face of the Earth or sitting down and negotiating. It is impossible to follow what his strategy might be, and that is just more of the same when it comes to this President.

Mr. President, when it comes to the DACA children, who are now adults, we have to accept the obvious. We made a promise to them--many of us did--which can't be kept under this President.

I remember that day when DACA became official and people could sign up for it. Congressman Luis Gutierrez and I held a meeting at Navy Pier in Chicago, expecting perhaps 800 people to show up. The number was way in excess of 10,000. Some of them waited all night to bring their children in to sign up for this.

There was an initial hesitation by many. They argued: If we identify ourselves to the government under Obama, who is to say that government won't turn on us, arrest us, and deport us?

We gave them our word that we would stand by the promise that we would not use this information they were filing with the government against them in the future. That promise was kept through President Obama, through President Biden, but it hasn't been kept by this administration. Those who are protected by DACA today run the risk-- when they go to the Federal Government to sign up and renew their DACA protection--of being detained and deported. We did not keep our promise to these young people, and I feel very badly about that.

Let me also say that we are going to have a hearing this week, a spotlight hearing by Democrats, to have these DACA recipients come before us and explain what has happened to their lives. It is heartbreaking. They deserve a chance to be part of America's future. They are doctors, teachers, nurses, entrepreneurs, policemen, military. They are part of America and its future. To blame them as being the worst of the worst and they should be deported is grossly unfair.

I yield the floor.

I announce that the Senator from Colorado (Mr. Bennet) and the Senator from Washington (Mrs. Murray) are necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from Colorado (Mr. Bennet) is necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from Washington (Mrs. Murray) is necessarily absent.