Floor Statements

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 3 p.m., Monday, February 14; that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and morning business be closed; that upon the conclusion of morning business, the Senate resume consideration of the motion to proceed to Calendar No. 266, H.R. 3076, the Postal Service Reform Act; that the cloture motions filed during today's session of the Senate ripen at 5:30 p.m.

For the information of Senators, we expect to have one rollcall vote at 5:30 p.m. on Monday.

Madam President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it stand adjourned under the previous order.

I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan) is necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan) is necessarily absent.

Madam President, I think Senator Blunt from Missouri is going to ask for recognition, and I do not object to that. But I was scheduled for earlier, and I would like to ask unanimous consent that when the upcoming rollcall is completed, I be the first Senator recognized.

Sorry, after the second rollcall, that I be the first Senator.

Madam President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan) and the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Sanders), are necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan) and the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Sanders) are necessarily absent.

Madam President, our history books are filled with the names of great men and women who devoted their lives to others. One who may not be as recognizable as others is Norman Borlaug. He was an American biologist. He successfully developed a strain of wheat that grew more quickly and was disease-resistant. His work to feed the hungry has been credited with saving a billion lives worldwide.

Madame Marie Curie was a Polish chemist who is remembered for her discovery of radium and polonium and her huge contribution toward finding a treatment for cancer.

Of course, there are all the scientists throughout history who developed lifesaving vaccines: Edward Jenner, smallpox vaccine; Louis Pasteur, rabies; Albert Calmette, TB; Leila Denmark, whooping cough; Jonas Salk, polio. I might add Albert Sabin, too, because I was a kid and remember he came up with the oral version, which meant we didn't have to get a shot. Kids remember that.

These men and women will be remembered for improving and saving lives with their breakthroughs in medicine, agriculture, and science.

I want to nominate another person to be remembered in that same light. His name is Anthony Fauci. Born in 1940, Tony Fauci, the grandson of Italian immigrants, grew up a Yankees fan in Brooklyn. He was the captain of his high school basketball team. He worked construction jobs over breaks in the summer from school.

He ultimately decided he wanted to pursue a career in medicine. Thank goodness he did. In 1972, Anthony Fauci accepted a senior researcher position at the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health, and for the past 38 years, Dr. Fauci has been the leader of that Institute. He has advised seven Presidents of both political parties. He has guided our Nation and the world through countless public health crises--SARS, avian influenza, swine flu, Zika, Ebola.

Aside from his work against COVID-19, he is best known for his work on HIV/AIDS. Anthony Fauci's tireless efforts on HIV/AIDS, both domestically and worldwide, through the creation of PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, is the main reason why HIV/ AIDS is no longer a death sentence.

Some of us can remember when HIV/AIDS was first discovered. I can recall coming to vote in the House and somebody stopping me on the sidewalk and saying: Did you hear Magic Johnson has AIDS? I can remember hearings in the House Budget Committee as a young Congressman when we thought it was a death sentence that we were all going to face eventually. There was ultimate panic in the air, but thank goodness there were talented people like Tony Fauci with the nerves of steel needed to confront that.

Harold Varmus, a former NIH Director, once said:

PEPFAR has turned around declining life expectancies in

many countries and likely saved some countries--even an

entire continent--from economic ruin.

Larry Kramer, a prominent and well-known AIDS activist who recently passed away, called Dr. Fauci ``the only true and great hero'' among government officials of the AIDS crisis.

For his work on HIV/AIDS, Dr. Fauci was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2008--our Nation's highest civilian honor--from then-President George W. Bush, who called Dr. Fauci ``my hero.''

Dr. Fauci has devoted his career and his life to improving public health. He has saved countless lives here and around the world. These days, he is working 18 hours a day, 7 days a week, shuttling from the NIH to the White House and back home.

He is a classic example of American excellence, a brilliant scientific mind. Yet, despite all this, despite all that I have told you about this man, some Members of today's Republican Party have chosen to make him a political target. They think attacking Dr. Fauci will cause us to forget the real history of COVID-19.

You see, the Republican Party has consistently failed the American people when it has come to COVID--from President Trump's refusing to take it seriously, to the discouragement of mask-wearing and vaccines, to promoting horse tranquilizers and bleach and bizarre theories as a cure. They have too little courage to face their communities and to do the hard work of governing during this public health crisis, so they have invented a political target, a convenient target, on which to focus their blame.

Instead of addressing this public health crisis head on, they are trying to deflect and distract from it in attacking Dr. Tony Fauci. They are, without evidence, suggesting the false narrative that Dr. Fauci secretly and purposely funded illicit research that caused this virus. They are even criticizing his government salary, for goodness' sakes.

He accrued that salary, I might remind them, over four decades of public service, as though he wouldn't make twice or three times that amount in the private sector today. They are questioning his financials and ties to the drug industry, even though he has made every requested document available, and no malfeasance or conflicts have been found.

So why do they do this? Why are they determined to run this man down? Why would they attack this public servant who is working around the clock to keep us safe?

It is because it is much easier to malign a person than it is to do the hard work of enacting policies to tackle this virus and keep America healthy. Their distractions have sunk so low that they are using these attacks to raise money for their political campaigns.

We have Republican candidates, from Ohio to Florida, who are running ads entitled, ``Fire Fauci,'' who are promising to subpoena him and reduce his salary to zero if it is within their power, who are selling ``Freedom over Fauci Flip-Flops,'' which comes from none other than the Governor of Florida. A few of my Senate Republican colleagues have loaded up their websites with anti-Fauci fervor, conveniently located next to a ``donate here'' option.

We have FOX News' anchors and podcast comedians giving air time to anti-vaxxers who are hoping to get their 15 minutes of fame by leveling baseless claims against Dr. Fauci, baseless claims that have resulted in death threats and harassment against Dr. Fauci, his wife, and his children.

Let me ask you this: What have Dr. Fauci's most vocal critics done to advance the cause of public health?

Nothing. They have done nothing. Worse than that, their lies about Dr. Fauci and about COVID are creating a toxic political environment that is literally killing people, as 900,000 Americans have now died from COVID. Some of these deaths could have been prevented with vaccinations.

Americans who are unvaccinated--listen to this; the Presiding Officer knows it--are 97 times more likely to die from COVID than their vaccinated and boosted counterparts--97 times more likely to die. Yet, instead of spending their time encouraging vaccinations and promoting other proven, legitimate public health measures that would end this pandemic, many in the Republican Party want to get their 5 or 10 minutes of Sun on FOX TV, and they spend their time attacking Dr. Fauci.

These attacks are a shameful fraud, and for what--to fundraise? to win another guest appearance on FOX?

Working in politics, you get used to a lot of things--grandstanding, demagoguery, hypocrisy--but what some of my Republican colleagues are doing to Dr. Fauci is the lowest form of political life. They are lying about someone who has devoted his life to saving people--saving AIDS patients, containing and eradicating Ebola, preventing the spread of Zika and the avian flu. He is someone who has worked harder than anyone to end this COVID pandemic.

David Relman, a microbiologist who has advised the U.S. Government for years on biological threats, said this of Dr. Fauci:

Nobody is a more tireless champion of the truth and the

facts . . . I am not entirely sure what we would do without

him.

Dr. Fauci's name is--and deserves to be--listed alongside our world's greatest scientific minds. History will reserve another place for those who lied about him for their own gain--inciting hatred, prolonging this pandemic, and contributing to needless pain and suffering.

America is blessed to have the talent, dedication, and compassion of Anthony Fauci in the midst of this deadly pandemic.

I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an article from The Washington Post, entitled, ``Anthony Fauci is up against more than a virus,'' after these remarks.

Madam President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, this week, the Senate will vote to confirm Judge Leonard Stark to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

Judge Stark is an exceptional and experienced jurist. For the past 14 years, he has served the District of Delaware--first, as a magistrate judge and, since 2010, as a district court judge.

He has presided over 6,000 civil and criminal cases, including 2,400 patent matters and 63 patent trials.

This experience will be of particular importance on the Federal Circuit for two reasons. First, unlike the 12 other courts of appeals, the Federal Circuit has a specialized jurisdiction; it hears all of the Nation's patent appeals. Second, Judge Stark would replace the only active judge on the court who has previously served as a trial judge. This makes his extensive background as a trial judge especially valuable.

Judge Stark brings with him considerable experience serving on Federal appeals panels. He has sat, by designation, on the Third and Federal Circuits, where he heard 54 appeals and authored 11 unanimous opinions. Before joining the bench, Judge Stark served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Delaware for 4 years. He worked as a litigation associate at an international law firm. And he clerked on the Third Circuit.

Judge Stark earned his bachelor of arts, bachelor of science, and master of arts simultaneously at the University of Delaware. He was awarded the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship and received a doctorate in philosophy from the University of Oxford. He also holds a J.D. from Yale Law School. With such impressive credentials, it is clear why the American Bar Association rated Judge Stark unanimously as ``Well Qualified'' to sit on the Federal Circuit.

His expertise in adjudicating patents combined with his experience hearing appeals will be an asset to the Federal Circuit and to our industrious, inventive Nation. I will be voting for Judge Stark's confirmation, and I urge my colleagues to join me.

I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan) is necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan) is necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan) is necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Heinrich), the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan), and the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Sanders) are necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Heinrich) and the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan), are necessarily absent.

Mr. President, I am sure that you, more than most Members of the Senate, remember our debate a few weeks ago on the Voting Rights Act. I remember your statement on the floor. It was powerful and really spoke to the truth of why we were meeting and debating this issue.

We realize that, sadly, since the Civil War, when African Americans were finally given the right to vote, this has been a battle every year since. And yesterday, the Supreme Court decision tells us that we still have a battle to fight when it comes to voting rights in America.

By a 5-to-4 vote yesterday, the Supreme Court's conservative majority allowed Alabama lawmakers to move forward with a congressional districting map that diminishes the power of Black voters in a State where Black Americans account for more than 25 percent of the population.

You see, this case had been considered by a three-judge district court panel in Alabama, and they ruled in a unanimous decision that the map likely violated the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and they ruled that we should block that map because it would violate the right to vote of African Americans.

I might say, for the record, this three-judge panel, two of the three judges were appointed by former President Trump, and yet they came to that conclusion. So the Supreme Court had a decision of whether to go along with this three-judge panel and stop the implementation of this map until they

could have a full hearing on the subject or allow them to go forward. And, sadly, by a 5-to-4-vote, the Supreme Court's conservative majority stayed a lower court's decision, where they ruled unanimously that the district map was discriminatory.

The Supreme Court did not issue a well-reasoned decision; they issued basically no reason. They did so on what is known as the shadow docket. We are seeing it more and more by this Court--no explanation, no full briefing, no signed opinion for the majority. What we have was a scant reaction by the Court.

But I do want to note that Justice Kagan wrote that that decision by the Supreme Court in favor of allowing this Alabama map to go forward ``does a disservice to the District Court, which meticulously applied this Court's longstanding voting-rights precedent.'' She went on to note that ``most of all, it does a disservice to the Black people of Alabama who under that precedent have had their electoral power diminished in violation of the law this Court once knew to buttress all of American democracy.''

Yesterday's decision is the latest example of the Supreme Court hacking away the protections of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, one of the most important civil rights laws in our history--a law singularly responsible for decades of progress in minority representation in public office.

As a result of these decisions, legal protections for voters of color throughout the country are being systematically dismantled by the Republican Party through State legislatures and, sadly, by our Federal courts.

So now what do we do? Well, Congress must act. We must restore the Voting Rights Act to its full power and potential, and we can do that by enacting the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.

This legislation would strengthen and modernize the Voting Rights Act's protections, including by requiring Supreme Court Justices to actually explain their reasoning behind their decisions when they overturn a lower court's decision on a voting rights case. Is that too much to ask, that the Supreme Court explain to the American people why they are overruling a lower court's decision which says Americans are being discriminated against when it comes to their right to vote? I don't think the Supreme Court is that busy that it can't tell the American people its logic behind these decisions.

Every day, we are seeing the consequences of this Senate's failure just a few weeks ago to protect the right to vote. Mr. President, you and I agree; we cannot wait any longer.

I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein) and the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan) are necessarily absent.

I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein) and the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Lujan) are necessarily absent.