Floor Statements

Madam President, this morning as I came to work in the Capitol, I saw our National Guard troops outside. I wanted to thank them, again, on behalf of the Senate and the people of America for coming to our assistance during the inauguration ceremonies. Some are still on the job, making sure that we maintain order in the streets of Washington, DC, and that we conduct the business of the American people here in the Capitol Building.

I want to thank them again, particularly the 270 National Guard forces from my State of Illinois--I had a chance to meet many of them-- sacrificing time away from their families to serve their Nation. It was a job well done.

For those who continue to do the work, we stand by you, and we thank you again.

Heather Cox Richardson does a column each day that is really a source of information that is important. She reminded us in her column this morning about what happened here in this Capitol Building just 3 weeks ago on January 6. Let me read what she said:

In testimony yesterday, the acting chief of the

Metropolitan Police Department in Washington told the House

Appropriations Committee that at least 65 officers filed

reports of injury after the January 6 attack. The chair of

the Capitol Police officers' union . . . put the number

closer to 140. ``I have officers who were not issued helmets

prior to the attack [and] who have sustained brain injuries.

One officer has two cracked ribs and two smashed spinal

discs. One officer is going to lose his eye, and another was

stabbed with a metal fence stake,'' he said. One officer died

of injuries sustained on January 6. Two officers have since

taken their own lives.

I want to put that in the Record because in a week, beginning with the impeachment trial, we are going to reflect, again, on what happened January 6.

Some of my colleagues, and many people on their side, are saying we shouldn't spend time talking about what happened on January 6. In the words of the former Governor of South Carolina, Nikki Haley, we ought to ``get over it''--``get over it.'' It is hard to get over it when you consider the facts that I just read into the Record. For the families of those officers who lost their lives and those who were seriously injured, they won't get over it for a long, long time.

I don't know what the impeachment trial will find in terms of the role of the former President of the United States, but I believe it is an important milestone in America's history for us to stop and recount what actually happened in this building on January 6, where a mob, incited by the President, stormed this Capitol, broke through, smashing windows and doors, and literally took control of this Capitol Building for several hours. Here in the Senate Chamber, we were evacuated. Thank goodness, we returned that same evening to complete our business and complete our work.

There is ample evidence of what happened that day by video, photographs, and testimony. I hope it is part of the record in this impeachment hearing so that this generation and future generations will have no doubt what happened that day.

Already, we have those who are in denial, who are arguing that this was really some far-left group that was taking over the demonstration-- a ludicrous argument on its face. And we have many who are in complete denial that it happened or that it had anything to do with rightwing politics. They are wrong. We saw it. We recorded it. We are going to put it, in part, as part of the record so that America knows what happened on that day.

Yesterday, we got a warning that this may not be the end of it, that there may be more activity. Let me say at the outset that I condemn extremism and violence on any part of the political spectrum. But yesterday, the

warning was to the right, who apparently are going to continue in their efforts to disrupt life in America and endanger the lives of fellow Americans and law enforcement officers.

We need to stand up as a nation and say, ``Enough.'' Whatever your political strife, there is no room for extremism and violence in the exercise of a constitutional responsibility or right.

I wanted to make that as part of the Record as an opening statement

Madam President, now, on another issue, this morning, I went on a radio show in Bloomington-Normal, IL, WJBC, Scott Miller. The topic de jour--no surprise--was the vaccines, the COVID-19 vaccines, and why so many people in that part of Central Illinois can't get access to vaccinations.

I listened to the frustration of people who called in to the announcer about waiting on the phone for hours, trying to get through, unable to make an appointment, and I called the Governor of Illinois, JB Pritzker, to ask him what was happening. He gave me some numbers in our part of the world, which probably reflect our country's status at the moment.

He said that we were receiving 120,000 first doses of COVID-19 vaccine each week--120,000 a week. We have approximately 10 million people eligible to be vaccinated in Illinois. Those under the age of 16 are excluded for reasons determined by medical professionals, so we start with 10 million. We anticipate that at least 50 percent are currently hoping to get a vaccine as quickly as a possible. So we have to get 5 million people vaccinated in our State with two doses. There are 10 million doses, and we are receiving 120,000 a week. Is it any wonder that the new President, Joe Biden, has spoken up that we need to obtain as quickly as possible new sources of COVID-19 vaccine in large numbers? I support that completely.

As part of his request for the American Rescue Plan, which has come before the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, in that request he spells out what he thinks are the priorities in this country, and I believe he is correct.

We talk about $160 billion to provide the supplies, emergency response, testing, and workforce for our country to stop the spread of COVID-19. Could there be any higher priority?

There is $170 billion for schools and higher education so they can safely reopen and operate. Any parent or grandparent knows how urgent that need is.

There is $80 billion for paid leave. It includes 14 weeks of paid family medical leave through the end of September. Certainly, people need to have that option available either because of their own illness or an illness in the family.

Direct payments--already $600 has gone out to many families in direct payments. Another $1,400 per person has been promised. That is included in the Biden proposal.

Unemployment insurance--we still are finding record numbers of people who are filing for unemployment; $290 billion extends the current benefits and eligibility and a $400 supplement per week until the end of September. Rental assistance, SNAP benefits, childcare, relief to families, such as the child tax credit--the list is lengthy, and I have read through it carefully.

Should we do it? There are some who argue: No, we don't need more stimulus. We have done all we need to do.

I have to disagree with that conclusion. The news this morning that was alluded to by the Democratic leader suggests that we are not out of the woods by a long shot when it comes to the state of the economy.

CNN reported this morning that the Donald Trump final economic report card could be very underwhelming.

[For example,] the U.S. gross domestic product, the

broadest measure of economic activity, is forecast to have

grown at an annualized rate of 4% between October and

December [of last year].

In a normal year, that would be [cause for celebration]--an

A+. . . . But 2020 was no normal year.

America is still recovering from the worst economic shock

in living memory. [Our gross domestic product] shrank [by] a

record 31.4% on an annualized basis in the second quarter. .

. . [I]t came screaming back at a 33.4% annualized pace in

the third quarter, [but] that wasn't . . . enough to make up

for the damage [that was] already done.

I ask unanimous consent that this article be printed in the Record with my statement

The statistics are devastating, as well, when it comes to the number of people filing for unemployment--recordbreaking numbers-- and those are included in this article as well.

So we are counseled by the new Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, approved by this body, that we shouldn't take our foot off the accelerator for fear that this economy will bog down again. Businesses will find it difficult to survive--even open--and their employees, of course, will be without work. We need to get this economy roaring back, and that means making the investment that President Biden is asking for.

Similarly, we need to get our kids back in school. I know most parents would feel that is true, grandparents as

well. And the sooner we do it, the better, but do it safely--safely for the teachers, administrators, and everyone involved in that decision.

It is hard to imagine what we have been through in the last calendar year, the year 2020. I am glad it is behind us.

We will still have many challenges ahead, but it is hard to believe that just 1 year ago this week, in the State of Illinois, we confirmed our first case of coronavirus--1 year ago. A patient had returned from China to suburban Chicago and transmitted the virus to her husband. She was treated successfully, as was her husband.

But in the 365 days since then that transpired, 1.1 million COVID-19 cases occurred in my State of Illinois--from one person a year ago, 1.1 million cases--and almost 19,000 Illinoisans have died. The story is repeated in every State and every community. What started as a worry ended up becoming a pandemic and one of the deadliest in American history.

Last year, I came to the floor to ask unanimous consent for a resolution with a simple message, that the United States should work with other nations around the world to address the COVID-19 pandemic. It seemed like a commonsense proposition. To think that one case in Wuhan, China, has led us to where we are today tells us that this is a shrinking world.

We need to tackle that deadly communicable disease because it knows no boundaries. No nation is safe from COVID-19 if it is raging in any part of the world. Equally, no nation's economy is immune from the impacts of the pandemic raging elsewhere.

I am glad the Senate eventually passed the resolution that I introduced, affirming the need to join with others in fighting the pandemic.

Now, the first priority is obvious: Take care of the American people and American families and everyone who lives in our Nation. That is the first and highest priority for our elected officials at every single level.

We are now debating a measure to help the American people gain access to vaccines--the Biden rescue plan--and the harsh economic impact it has had on America. President Biden understands the immediacy of these needs, and I hope that we in Congress do as well.

As we respond to the COVID-19 crisis in America, though, we cannot ignore the need for a global response. This isn't a matter of being charitable. It is in our national interest and a reflection of our values to ensure that poorer nations have access to vaccines and tools to manage their impact.

The New York Times columnist Nick Kristof chronicled this problem in a powerful piece earlier this month, entitled ``Starving Children Don't Cry.'' He noted that while some developing countries may have avoided high COVID death tolls, the pandemic has led, in many places, to what he calls ``pandemics of hunger, disease and illiteracy.'' Day laborers can't find work. Campaigns to address malaria, polio, AIDS, and malnutrition have been disrupted. It is estimated that hundreds of thousands of children in the developing world will die from malnutrition. Many who survive will face lifetimes of disabilities.

A study by the International Chamber of Commerce found that the global cost of unequal global vaccine distribution will hit affluent countries almost as hard as developing countries.

The study showed what would happen if wealthy nations were fully vaccinated by the middle of the year but poor countries shut out, a likely scenario.

This week, the World Health Organization noted that only 1 of 29 low- income countries has begun vaccination, and in that particular country of Guinea, only 55 out of 12 million people have been reached.

The study concluded that the global economy could lose more than $9 trillion, with nearly half of those costs absorbed by the United States and other wealthy countries.

We are already seeing how illness in poor nations affects us. U.S. exports have plunged by nearly 28 percent in the last 6 months, resulting in lost jobs here, lower profits, and lower wages.

So that is why I am reintroducing legislation to direct the U.S. Treasury to use its vote at the International Monetary Fund to release what are known as special drawing rights. These are foreign exchange reserve assets maintained by the IMF that can be used by developing nations during severe economic downturns, as done during the 2008 global financial crisis.

A release of these special drawing rights would not cost American taxpayers a single dollar, but they would help developing nations purchase and distribute COVID vaccines and stem the pandemic's economic impact overseas.

This proposal is supported by a broad coalition, including American farm leaders, business leaders, and trade associations, leading economists, faith groups, labor unions, and humanitarian groups.

I want to thank my cosponsors in this effort: Senators Sanders, Cardin, Reed, Merkley, and Leahy. We are joined in the House by my colleague from Illinois, Congressman Chuy Garcia.

Three-quarters of a century ago, much of the world lay in ruins as a result of a global war. The United States made an unprecedented commitment to help the nations of the world rise from the ashes of World War II and rebuild. We did so because it was in keeping with our moral beliefs and it served our political and economic interests.

The Marshall Plan and other international aid efforts by the United States helped make America the most powerful Nation on Earth, politically and economically. This global crisis, COVID-19, gives us another opportunity to strengthen America as we help repair a damaged world.

Of course, our first priority is American families, and this effort would not take a single dollar away from buying the vaccines that are necessary to keep our Nation safe. But by using these special drawing rights, we provide resources to some of the poorest nations around the world so that they, too, can start vaccinating their population.

This world got sick, we believe, because of one person in China, and it spread around the world. That is, at least, the theory that has been backed up by evidence so far. So let's make certain that, as we address this issue, we do it on a global basis.

I urge the Senate to support this measure as a way to not only do the right thing for our less fortunate brothers and sisters around the world but as a way to help our own pandemic and economic recovery.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

I announce that the Senator from Virginia (Mr. Warner) is necessarily absent.

Mr. President, today, January 27, marks an anniversary, in a way, of an event that occurred in this Chamber 3 weeks ago, an event on January 6, which some of us will never forget.

We are in the midst of preparing for an impeachment trial of President Donald Trump for any responsibility that he bears for that day's events. Some have said we shouldn't do that, that we shouldn't have an impeachment trial.

The former U.N. Ambassador and Governor of South Carolina, Nikki Haley, said in an interview on FOX television it is time for America to get over it--get over it. She is not the only one who has expressed that point of view.

I was in the airport in Chicago last week in a waiting area to get on a plane when someone seated nearby said: Hey, Senator, get over it. Let this President ride off into the sunset. Those were his words: Get over it.

It is hard to get over it if you lived it, and many of us in this Chamber did.

Last night, there was a vote as to whether we should go forward with the impeachment. All of the Democrats, 50, voted in favor of having the trial, since we received that Article from the House. Five--five-- Republicans joined us. Forty-five Republicans voted to end the impeachment proceeding, voting in favor of the point of order that was raised by the junior Senator from Kentucky.

I don't know what was going through their minds when they joined that point of order from the Senator from Kentucky. I don't know if it truly was a constitutional issue they were thinking about, whether it was loyalty to Donald Trump, or whether it was fear of Trump's followers in their home States that led them to vote to end the impeachment inquiry.

But we should move forward. We should go forward, as Lincoln reminded us, because we cannot escape history, and we certainly shouldn't be party to rewriting history.

When almost 50 percent of Trump loyalists refuse to believe that the events 3 weeks ago in this Capitol occurred or, if they occurred, that they had anything to do with President Trump, we need to make a record, a record of fact, not just for our current deliberations but for history.

How can anyone who was in this Chamber on January 6 really argue that nothing critical and important and horrific occurred?

Do you remember at 2:15, when the Secret Service went up and grabbed the Vice President by his arms and pulled him down, out that door, so they could take him to a secure place? We were stunned by that. I was.

They told us to sit here. And do you know what I saw next? Two men, plainclothes security people--I don't know what Agency they were working for--came right down here, right down in the middle of this well. Why do I remember that they were there? Because one of them had an automatic weapon around his neck, in the Senate Chamber.

Then we were told by a Capitol policeman who stood in front of us: Sit down. Stay in your seats. We are bringing in your staff and locking the doors. This will be a secure room. Then they closed the doors off to the public, and we sat here for a few minutes.

And then the same policeman said: Leave. Evacuate quickly, out the doors. The crowd, the mob, was advancing and getting closer to the Senate Chamber.

We went out the back corridor and down the steps. As you go down the steps, there is a window that looks out on the sidewalk near the Capitol Building, and I saw this mob coming at us with Trump flags and American flags and signs--coming right at us. We hurried down those steps and through the long tunnel to, we hoped, a safe location in one of the office buildings nearby.

I will never forget it. Do the 45 Senators who voted against the impeachment trial last night still remember it? I certainly hope they do, and I certainly hope they can recall it as they watch the videotapes, the mountain of videotapes of what happened that day.

And, of course, I hope we all remember what the Capitol Police went through. For those who say they love law and order, take a look at what they went through when this mob came after them. They were beaten. One gave his life. And we can never forget.

So how did this come about? Was this just a spontaneous gathering of people who decided to come to Capitol Hill? Far from it. The President of the United States, Donald Trump, requested his followers to come to Washington on January 6. Why did he pick January 6? Because the Constitution says that is the day when Congress will count the electoral votes and determine who will be the next President.

And because President Trump refused to accept the reality of his loss on November 3 and continued in every imaginable way to try to change the numbers coming out of States like Georgia, he called his followers to Washington on that day and held a rally on the Ellipse

We have a tape of that rally, and it should be part of the record as to what this President said to his followers who had gathered on that day, how his rhetoric inflamed them. We can see it. It is a matter of record.

Then he pointed to the Capitol Building, this building, and told them to come up here. Why? Because we were in the process of counting the electoral votes, which would finally and constitutionally announce that he had lost the election. It was his last desperate gasp to keep the White House, even at the expense of the Constitution and reality.

Then the crowd turned and advanced on the Capitol. We have seen those videotapes as well, as they overran the flimsy barricades that were set up in the hopes that they would discourage and stop them. And they broke through windows and doors, came into this building, invading it for the first time since 1814.

It was 1814 when the British forces came into this building, burned it, as an invasion. Well, this was a new invasion, an invasion by those who were either inspired by this President or, for whatever political reasons, decided to try to stop this government.

It is the first time that has ever happened since 1814. I will never forget it. I am sorry to say that the 45 Senators who said stop the investigation, stop the impeachment, may not have as clear a memory as I do.

Each year, we have a commemoration of George Washington's Farewell Address, and a different Member of the Senate is asked to read it on the floor of the Senate. I have to tell you that, honestly, I don't come to the floor and listen carefully. It doesn't have the impact it once had. It is a commemoration which is honorific but doesn't have the real power to create a memory.

Doug Jones is a former Senator from Alabama, and he said on Martin Luther King's birthday, or nearby, we should all come to the floor and hear a reading of King's letter from the Birmingham jail, and I think that is appropriate and it is good.

How will we remember and commemorate January 6? Maybe it is too soon to think about that, but how can we forget what happened that day? How can we possibly get over it?

I don't want to get over it. I want to face it squarely and honestly with the facts. History demands it of us. Those of us who are honored to serve in this Chamber bear a responsibility to keep the facts alive, not let those who wish to ignore them or rewrite history have the last word.

We now have a responsibility to go forward with this impeachment trial, to make a record and decide as a U.S. Senate. We owe it to the people we represent. That is for sure. But, more importantly, we owe it to future generations to show them just how fragile a democracy can be when a mob turns on the U.S. Capitol and tries to stop the business of this government.

The good news is this. If there is any source of elation, it is this: We returned to the Capitol that same day, January 6, and finished our business of counting the electoral vote. In the early hours of the morning of January 7, Joseph Biden was announced the winner of the Presidency, and just 2 weeks later--2 weeks later to the day--he was sworn in as President of the United States.

Our democracy survived this mob that came forward in insurrection against our government, and we are now in the beginning of the second week of the Biden Presidency. He has spoken to the American people and told them we are going to come together; we are going to unify. Bless him for doing that.

We owe him this opportunity. We owe it to our country.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, 76 years ago today, scouts from the Soviet Red Army pushed their way through Poland. They stumbled on a place that haunts the world to this day--a place of incomprehensible suffering, cruelty, and depravity--Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Auschwitz was the largest of Nazi Germany's death camps--40 sprawling acres of hell on Earth.

Between 1940 and 1945, 1.1 million men, women, and children were transported to Auschwitz from Nazi-occupied lands; 1.1 million were murdered there. More than 950,000 of those were Jewish.

At the height of the Nazi concentration and extermination camp's operations, an average--average--of 6,000 Jews were poisoned and cremated every day in the gas chambers and crematoria of Auschwitz. It was mass murder on an industrial scale.

The first Soviet soldiers who entered Auschwitz on January 27, 1945, were met with an eerie stillness. Most of the camp's prisoners--nearly 60,000 of them--had been evacuated days earlier by Nazis and dispersed to other concentration camps, where they continued to be exploited as slave labor. Only about 9,000 prisoners remained. They were the ones who were too sick to endure the evacuation, simply left there to die-- no food, no water, no heat, no medical care.

In a frantic effort to conceal their monstrous crimes, the SS had tried to dismantle that killing machine before they abandoned it. They forced prisoners to dismantle the barracks and demolish the gas chambers and ovens, but the fires still burned in Auschwitz.

Three weeks ago today, on January 6, 2021, an angry mob attacked this Capitol Building and this Congress as we gathered to fulfill our constitutional obligation to certify the results of the 2020 Presidential election. That siege on the Capitol was an attack on American democracy itself. Sadly, it was incited by then-President Donald Trump.

So many scenes from that day still haunt us: police officers trying to maintain order, battered with American flags, threatened to be murdered with their own service weapons; a scaffold erected on the Capitol grounds; calls to hang the Vice President of the United States; a Confederate battle flag paraded through the halls of the Senate--a desecration that never happened during our Civil War. But for many, the most painful image of that day was of a middle-aged White man proudly wearing the sweatshirt that read: ``Camp Auschwitz,'' and then the words: ``Work makes you free''--a translation of the cruel slogan atop the black iron gates leading into the Auschwitz concentration camp.

For one retired dentist and grandfather in the Chicago area, that despicable neo-Nazi hate symbol, shown during the Capitol insurrection, and the chants of ``Jews will not replace us'' 3 years earlier in Charlottesville were shocking reminders. George Brent is 91 years old now, but he was 15 years old and living in Hungary when his parents and his little brother saw a Nazi invasion on March 19, 1944.

Two months after that invasion, on May 19, 1944, Hungarian townspeople sympathetic to the Nazis woke George and his family in the early morning hours and told them they had 2 hours to get out of their home. The family was taken to the Jewish ghetto. The following morning, they and the rest of the town's Jews were loaded onto open cattle cars. After 6 days traveling on the railroad, the doors of the cattle cars were opened to reveal dogs and whips and SS officers barking commands.

George and his father were ordered to walk in one direction. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his mom and his little brother Peter being herded in the opposite direction. He never saw them again. They almost certainly died that day in Auschwitz.

George and his father were spared immediate death because they happened to be strong enough to work. George's father was sent to clean up destruction and carnage in the Warsaw Ghetto. George was given different jobs at Auschwitz. He remembers the smoke that billowed from the crematoria.

In mid-January 1945, as the Allies pushed into Poland, George and 56,000 other prisoners were evacuated from Auschwitz. The emaciated men and boys were forced to walk hours in the freezing cold and snow, clad only in rags and wooden clogs. They called it ``The March of Death.'' A fourth of the prisoners died along the way.

The survivors were loaded into box cars and shipped west. George was sent to Mauthausen, a notoriously brutal camp in Upper Austria. A few days later, he was sent to Ebensee, a satellite camp.

The official policy of both camps was ``extermination through labor.'' It was a cruel mockery of the sign that greeted the prisoners as they entered Auschwitz: ``Work makes you free.''

At Ebensee, George was put to work digging tunnels in which the Nazis could hide their war armaments from Allied bombing.

On May 6, 1945--11\1/2\ months after George was ripped from his home and family, Ebensee was finally liberated by George Patton's 80th Infantry Division--the last of the Nazi camps to be liberated. George was then 16 years of age. He weighed less than 70 pounds.

After the war, George stayed briefly with two of his aunts in Budapest. Together, they discovered their father was still alive but desperately ill in a tuberculosis sanatorium in Munich. Several months later, George was able to visit him. He settled into a displaced camp for Jewish children near Munich.

In October 1949, he moved to America to live with his great-uncle, who owned a small grocery store on the South Side of Chicago. George slept on a recliner chair in the storeroom. He was even happy to be there. He had reached the age of 20.

In May of 1950--7 months after arriving in the United States--he enlisted in the U.S. Air Force Reserve and served 2 years during the Korean war. In 1951, George's father moved to Chicago, and they were reunited for nearly 20 years before his father passed away.

After the war, George married and raised a family. He graduated from the University of Illinois College of Dentistry in Chicago. He later taught dentistry at the college for 29 years and practiced dentistry for 50 years.

After he retired in 2010, he became a volunteer lecturer at the Illinois Holocaust Museum, where he tells his story mostly to kids.

George Brent is a proud American. He is not really political. But when he saw the clothing and the symbols at the Capitol siege glorifying the murderous Nazi regime, he was outraged. How could this happen in America, he asked?

One effort that I believe is needed--in fact, it is long overdue--is for Congress to pass legislation aimed at addressing the significant threat of domestic terrorism--domestic, homegrown American terrorism. That is why I have introduced the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act in each Congress since 2017. I will be reintroducing it soon in this Congress.

For far too long, we have failed to adequately monitor the dangerous groups that threaten us, the violent White supremacists and other extremist groups. While we looked the other way, the threat grew.

Intelligence experts have now warned us that such groups constitute a serious and growing threat to America's security. Unfortunately, instead of addressing this threat, the Trump administration spent 4 years downplaying it, and the former President made appalling, incendiary, and embarrassing statements that only served to further incite these violent extremists. We can't waste another moment. Congress has to act against this hateful extremism.

As the incoming chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I am going to hold hearings on this matter.

I brought it up to the head of the FBI before. He acknowledged the problem, but little or nothing was done during the Trump years. I trust that President Biden will take a different approach. This is a serious threat to security in America.

I feel badly for George Brent, a man who miraculously survived Auschwitz, the concentration camps, and everything the Nazis threw at him. He came to the United States because he dearly loved this country and the freedoms that are part of it. He made a great life and a great contribution. He still does with his work at the Holocaust museum. Can you imagine what went through his mind when he saw that photograph of the demonstrator in the Capitol--the United States Capitol--with a sweatshirt mocking his life experience, a sweatshirt which bore the words ``Camp Auschwitz''?

It was a sad day for America when that group, that mob, overran this Capitol. I am sorry for the pain that it brought to so many people.

But let me add quickly: We cannot ignore it. It is not a question of getting over it. It is not a question of letting President Trump ride off into the sunset. We have got to come to grips with the reality of what occurred 3 weeks ago today--3 weeks ago today--when we ran out of this Chamber, and we were told to move as quickly as possible with the fear that this mob was going to overtake us and harm us.

After we left the building, they overran this Chamber. They went through the desks. They posed in the chairs where the Presiding Officer is sitting, took videos and photos of themselves and were just dumb enough to put them on Facebook. So we have them, and many of these people are going to pay the price for this criminal invasion of the Capitol that they were part of.

Again, to George Brent's family: I am sorry for what you had to go through. We are better than that. America is better than that. We are glad that you are a part of this great country.

I will work to pass this bill and to get President Biden to sign it into law. And as I do, I will remember George Brent.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule XXII, at 1:45 p.m., tomorrow, Thursday, January 28, the Senate vote on cloture on Executive Calendar No. 4, Alejandro Mayorkas; that if cloture is invoked, the vote on confirmation be at 5 p.m., Monday, February 1.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

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

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10 a.m., Thursday, January 28; further, that following the prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance, 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 the Senate be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

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

Thereupon, the Senate, at 5:32 p.m., adjourned until Thursday, January 28, 2021, at 10 a.m.

Mr. President, it has been my good fortune to serve in the Senate for 24 years. I have great respect for this institution and continue to believe that the men and women who serve here are extraordinary examples, by and large, of public service and that we have done great things of a historic nature.

I think of the days of the Obama Presidency, when we had to rescue our economy, make reforms on Wall Street that made a difference, and build a public health system that we have aspired to for decades. We achieved those goals--not easily--with hard work and determination. I am glad to have been a part of it.

When I hear the Republican leader come to the floor and talk about his memory of the Senate, I hasten to add: There is another side to the story. I will come to the floor in a few days to outline the history of the filibuster, but I am sure the Senator from Kentucky, who has been in the Senate--and his staff--in elected capacity for decades, would concede this point: Up until the 1960s, the filibuster was rarely used in this U.S. Senate. The demand for, once, 67 votes, then 60 votes was rare.

Oh, it was remembered that, in the 1960s, civil rights legislation foundered on the floor of this U.S. Senate because of the filibuster, but it was rarely applied. That changed. It changed under the Senator from Kentucky's leadership. It became so commonplace--the filibuster was being used so frequently--that it led to Senator Reid, then the Democratic leader, making some fundamental changes in the Senate rules.

I remember that day very well, and I remember the anguish that Senator Reid felt at the time. But he felt he had no recourse because the filibuster had become commonplace, the 60-vote requirement commonplace.

I don't know exactly what the argument is from the other side at the moment, but I think any fairminded Senator would concede the Senate is capable of doing great things; it is capable of being deliberative; yet it still can be decisive.

There comes a time when we should act. And to merely let every issue get mired down into a 60-vote requirement and filibuster and nothing come out of this Chamber as a result cannot be what our Founding Fathers envisioned for the world of the U.S. Senate.

I want to address that issue at another time in more detail, with facts and figures on the use and misuse of filibuster, but at this moment I would like to raise another question, which is related.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10:30 a.m., Wednesday, January 27; further, that following the prayer and the Pledge of Allegiance, 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 day, and the Senate be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

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

Thereupon, the Senate, at 5:39 p.m., adjourned until Wednesday, January 27, 2021, at 10:30 a.m.