Floor Statements

Madam President, my remarks are coming about 6 minutes after I was intending to start. I would ask for permission to complete my remarks before the vote begins.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, for nearly half a century, the Supreme Court held that the right to make reproductive decisions was protected by the 14th Amendment. Generations of women have relied on the freedom to make reproductive health decisions as a matter of fundamental personal rights. In particular, seminal cases such as Roe v. Wade, Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt, Griswold v. Connecticut, Eisenstadt v. Baird, and Carey v. Population Services International established basic rights to obtain abortion services and access contraception.

The Supreme Court's recent decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health overruled Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, the landmark decisions holding that a woman's right to a pre-viability abortion is constitutionally protected. As the dissenters in Dobbs observed, this right is ``embedded in core constitutional concepts of individual freedom, and of the equal rights of citizens to decide on the shape of their lives.'' The Supreme Court's decision in Dobbs resulted in immediate abortion bans in several States and means that millions of women, particularly women who live in the South, parts of the Midwest, and the West, will live hundreds of miles from the nearest abortion clinic. In fact, approximately 17 million women could be forced to travel more than 200 miles in order to obtain abortion care.

Not only does the Supreme Court's decision in Dobbs upset decades of precedent protecting the right of Americans to make personal decisions about abortion, but it also places in jeopardy many other important 14th Amendment rights, including the right to access birth control. Because the Supreme Court has abandoned constitutional protection of reproductive rights, it is the responsibility of Congress to act.

That is why Senators Murkowski, Sinema, Collins, and I are introducing the Reproductive Freedom for All Act, bipartisan legislation to guarantee protections for reproductive and contraceptive care by enacting the essential holdings of the landmark cases Roe v. Wade, Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt, Griswold v. Connecticut, Eisenstadt v. Baird, and Carey v. Population Services International. The Reproductive Freedom for All Act returns Federal law to its pre-Dobbs status by allowing pre-viability abortions, prohibiting States from banning post- viability abortions necessary to protect the life and health of the mother, and protecting access to contraception. The Reproductive Freedom for All Act creates a minimum Federal standard which states must follow. The bill also ensures that the U.S. Department of Justice or individuals adversely affected by a State abortion restriction can challenge any State restriction on reproductive freedom in court.

The Supreme Court's overturning of Roe and Casey goes directly against the will of the people. More than 60 percent of Americans believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Support for reproductive freedom transcends regional, political, ethnic, and religious differences. Since support for reproductive freedom is nonpartisan among the public, it is important to have a legislative vehicle protecting that freedom that can gain bipartisan support.

I urge my colleagues to support the passage of the Reproductive Freedom for All Act. It is imperative that Congress come together to ensure that decisions as fundamental as reproductive choice are not determined by the State or ZIP Code where someone lives.

I thank my colleagues for standing together in support of a bipartisan solution to the crisis created by Dobbs. I also acknowledge the work of advocates supporting Michigan's Reproductive Freedom for All ballot initiative, which informed my work on this bill and which I hope will inspire similar efforts in other States. We must come together to pass the Reproductive Freedom for All Act now.

Mr. President, I rise to essentially do a part two of a talk that I gave on the Senate floor about 2 weeks ago. The first part of my talk was my analysis of the Dobbs decision of the Supreme Court, expressing my deep disillusionment with the Court's decision to cast aside a century of precedent under the 14th Amendment due process clause and, in particular, casting aside 50 years of using the 14th Amendment to protect women's rights to make reproductive decisions with regard to contraception and abortion.

I analyzed the Court's opinion and precedents at that time, but I sort of left it hanging what needs to be done because while we can critique the Court decision, and I do view it as completely ahistorical and not understanding the purpose of the 14th Amendment, nevertheless, the Court's majority ruling was the protection of reproductive freedom was now no longer a matter for constitutional protection but was, instead, for legislatures.

The majority seemed to assume that that would be State legislatures, but at least one of the concurring opinions acknowledged legislatures could include Congress.

And I take the floor today in the second part of this talk to discuss a bill that I have today introduced with three other Senate colleagues--Senator Sinema, Senator Collins, and Senator Murkowski--the Reproductive Freedom for All Act, taking the Supreme Court up on the challenge that what we need to do to protect reproductive freedom is to legislate to do so.

Let me describe the origin of the bill. Beginning in February, the Senate has had two votes on a bill that I have cosponsored--the Women's Health Protection Act, which was designed--written before the Dobbs case but designed to protect reproductive freedom by disabling State legislatures from putting schemes and obstacles in the way of women making reproductive decisions.

The first time we had a vote on that bill, I voted yes. It was in February. It received 49 votes. We were scheduled to have a second vote on the Women's Health Protection Act in May. And it occurred to me that we would likely have the same result; we would get 49 votes.

And I had a strong feeling before that vote that if that was the case, we would be leaving votes on the table. By that, I understood from talking to my colleagues that there were more than 49 Members of this Chamber who wanted to codify Roe and related cases and protect women's rights to access contraception and abortion services but that it wouldn't be ideal to send a message that less than a majority of the Senate was committed to reproductive freedom. And so I began efforts in May to find additional votes beyond the 49 that I knew would vote yes on the WHPA. And I began discussions with colleagues, including Republican colleagues, to look for a way to codify Roe that, yes, might be different in wording from the Women's Health Protection Act but would accomplish the same goal of providing a Federal guarantee that would operate in every ZIP Code in this country to protect women's rights to make decisions about contraception and abortion.

And today we have introduced that bill, the Reproductive Freedom for All Act. The name of it is a tribute to a ballot initiative that is currently under debate in Michigan and scheduled for a vote to be added to the Michigan Constitution in November, the Reproductive Freedom for All initiative. And the bill that we have put together fairly closely tracks--not identically but fairly closely tracks the language of the ballot referendum in Michigan.

What does the bill do? We worked on the bill between the leak of the Dobbs opinion and when Dobbs was decided by the Supreme Court right before our July Fourth recess. And we worked to make the bill as strong as we could. But then we set it aside because we knew the Dobbs decision might change from the leaked opinion, and we wanted to see what was actually in the opinion before we finalized the bill. And it is good that we waited because there were some aspects of the Dobbs opinion that were a bit different. They took some sandpaper to some controversial parts of the case, and they extended other arguments in the case that needed a response.

And so what we have done since Dobbs is analyzed the opinion but also, more importantly, looked at life in the United States since that decision was rendered. I could give many examples, even in the month since that decision has been rendered, of the tragedy of what I believe is now post-Dobbs America.

In particular, when a 10-year-old child has to be smuggled across State lines to receive care following her rape, that is gruesome. That is not what this country should expect, nor, indeed, what we should tolerate. And yet that is not an accidental byproduct of the Dobbs decision. That was a completely foreseeable and even foreseen consequence of the Dobbs decision that turning it over to 50 States would lead to a patchwork of horrible examples one after the next.

I have spoken about another example in Virginia. An individual who was living in Kentucky got a breast cancer diagnosis on the day the Dobbs opinion was leaked, went to her doctor and found out that her contraception could potentially cause accelerated growth of cancer cells. And so she needed to come off contraception to get cancer treatment. She has two young children. She is worrying about her own cancer. She is trying to keep herself healthy for herself but also for her young children. If she were to come off contraception, there would be the chance of an unwanted pregnancy. The cancer treatments also would significantly degrade the possibility for a healthy pregnancy, but she was now living in a State that, post-Dobbs, would not allow her to have an abortion.

She wrote a piece about this in NBC News. She was fortunate enough to be able to move and get a new job in Virginia, where she would be able to make these choices, but these are the kinds of choices, post-Dobbs, people have to make every day: Do we smuggle a youngster across State lines or does someone move from one State to the next? Every person in this country, no matter what ZIP Code they live in, should have a basic Federal guarantee about contraception and availability of abortion services.

What the Reproductive Freedom for All Act would do would be, essentially--we tried to put ourselves in a time machine after Dobbs and travel back to the day before the Dobbs decision. It was a very narrow focus. You can look at this in other ways. Some folks didn't like what the law was the day before the Dobbs decision. But in order to find some bipartisanship--because, truly, the American public, on a bipartisan basis, wants to preserve reproductive rights--we looked at could we come up with a Federal statutory guarantee that would match the state of constitutional law that existed the day before the Dobbs decision and protect the rights of all to contraception access and also protect the rights of all to abortion access as it existed before Dobbs.

Simply put, that is this; that prior to fetal viability, no State can pass any statute regulating abortion that imposes an undue burden on a woman seeking to exercise that right. And post-viability, while a State can more significantly regulate abortion, no State can deprive any woman of the right to receive an abortion should she and her health providers determine that it is necessary to protect her life or health.

That is the bill that I have introduced today with Senators Collins, Murkowski, and Sinema. I thank them for working to try to show--because now we have shown that there is not a minority of the U.S. Senate, but there is actually a majority that wants to codify Roe and related cases; that we might have some differences of opinion about the right language to use to do that, but there is a difference between a Senate where that is only a minority sentiment and a Senate where, like in the rest of the American public, that is a majority sentiment.

The last thing I will say is this. I am very well aware, as are my cosponsors

in introducing that bill, that we do not have the votes today, should it be put up, to get 60 votes in the Senate for it. We don't. Yet I am given some inspiration by the fact that we recently passed a gun safety bill where 2 months before there were not 60 votes either. In fact, for the 10 years I have been in the Senate, we have been trying to pass legislation in this Chamber to deal with the scourge of gun violence and again and again and again have fallen short of 60 votes even to proceed to legislation. But in the aftermath of tragedies in Buffalo and Texas, a decision was made by the Members of this deliberative body that inaction was no longer an option and resolute action to protect people's rights and safety was a mandate.

I believe the Dobbs decision and what we have seen since is a catastrophe that, as it plays out over time in State after State, will also change the dynamic in the article I branch and demonstrate the need for a national protection for reproductive rights rather than a 50-State free-for-all in a race to the bottom.

It is in that spirit my colleagues and I have introduced this bipartisan bill today demonstrating that there is now bipartisan support and majority support in the U.S. Senate to protect reproductive freedom for all.

Mr. President, for nearly half a century, the Supreme Court held that the right to make reproductive decisions was protected by the 14th Amendment. Generations of women have relied on the freedom to make reproductive health decisions as a matter of fundamental personal rights. In particular, seminal cases such as Roe v. Wade, Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt, Griswold v. Connecticut, Eisenstadt v. Baird, and Carey v. Population Services International established basic rights to obtain abortion services and access contraception.

The Supreme Court's recent decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health overruled Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, the landmark decisions holding that a woman's right to a pre-viability abortion is constitutionally protected. As the dissenters in Dobbs observed, this right is ``embedded in core constitutional concepts of individual freedom, and of the equal rights of citizens to decide on the shape of their lives.'' The Supreme Court's decision in Dobbs resulted in immediate abortion bans in several States and means that millions of women, particularly women who live in the South, parts of the Midwest, and the West, will live hundreds of miles from the nearest abortion clinic. In fact, approximately 17 million women could be forced to travel more than 200 miles in order to obtain abortion care.

Not only does the Supreme Court's decision in Dobbs upset decades of precedent protecting the right of Americans to make personal decisions about abortion, but it also places in jeopardy many other important 14th Amendment rights, including the right to access birth control. Because the Supreme Court has abandoned constitutional protection of reproductive rights, it is the responsibility of Congress to act.

That is why Senators Murkowski, Sinema, Collins, and I are introducing the Reproductive Freedom for All Act, bipartisan legislation to guarantee protections for reproductive and contraceptive care by enacting the essential holdings of the landmark cases Roe v. Wade, Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt, Griswold v. Connecticut, Eisenstadt v. Baird, and Carey v. Population Services International. The Reproductive Freedom for All Act returns Federal law to its pre-Dobbs status by allowing pre-viability abortions, prohibiting States from banning post- viability abortions necessary to protect the life and health of the mother, and protecting access to contraception. The Reproductive Freedom for All Act creates a minimum Federal standard which states must follow. The bill also ensures that the U.S. Department of Justice or individuals adversely affected by a State abortion restriction can challenge any State restriction on reproductive freedom in court.

The Supreme Court's overturning of Roe and Casey goes directly against the will of the people. More than 60 percent of Americans believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases. Support for reproductive freedom transcends regional, political, ethnic, and religious differences. Since support for reproductive freedom is nonpartisan among the public, it is important to have a legislative vehicle protecting that freedom that can gain bipartisan support.

I urge my colleagues to support the passage of the Reproductive Freedom for All Act. It is imperative that Congress come together to ensure that decisions as fundamental as reproductive choice are not determined by the State or ZIP Code where someone lives.

I thank my colleagues for standing together in support of a bipartisan solution to the crisis created by Dobbs. I also acknowledge the work of advocates supporting Michigan's Reproductive Freedom for All ballot initiative, which informed my work on this bill and which I hope will inspire similar efforts in other States. We must come together to pass the Reproductive Freedom for All Act now.

Mr. President, I rise to essentially do a part two of a talk that I gave on the Senate floor about 2 weeks ago. The first part of my talk was my analysis of the Dobbs decision of the Supreme Court, expressing my deep disillusionment with the Court's decision to cast aside a century of precedent under the 14th Amendment due process clause and, in particular, casting aside 50 years of using the 14th Amendment to protect women's rights to make reproductive decisions with regard to contraception and abortion.

I analyzed the Court's opinion and precedents at that time, but I sort of left it hanging what needs to be done because while we can critique the Court decision, and I do view it as completely ahistorical and not understanding the purpose of the 14th Amendment, nevertheless, the Court's majority ruling was the protection of reproductive freedom was now no longer a matter for constitutional protection but was, instead, for legislatures.

The majority seemed to assume that that would be State legislatures, but at least one of the concurring opinions acknowledged legislatures could include Congress.

And I take the floor today in the second part of this talk to discuss a bill that I have today introduced with three other Senate colleagues--Senator Sinema, Senator Collins, and Senator Murkowski--the Reproductive Freedom for All Act, taking the Supreme Court up on the challenge that what we need to do to protect reproductive freedom is to legislate to do so.

Let me describe the origin of the bill. Beginning in February, the Senate has had two votes on a bill that I have cosponsored--the Women's Health Protection Act, which was designed--written before the Dobbs case but designed to protect reproductive freedom by disabling State legislatures from putting schemes and obstacles in the way of women making reproductive decisions.

The first time we had a vote on that bill, I voted yes. It was in February. It received 49 votes. We were scheduled to have a second vote on the Women's Health Protection Act in May. And it occurred to me that we would likely have the same result; we would get 49 votes.

And I had a strong feeling before that vote that if that was the case, we would be leaving votes on the table. By that, I understood from talking to my colleagues that there were more than 49 Members of this Chamber who wanted to codify Roe and related cases and protect women's rights to access contraception and abortion services but that it wouldn't be ideal to send a message that less than a majority of the Senate was committed to reproductive freedom. And so I began efforts in May to find additional votes beyond the 49 that I knew would vote yes on the WHPA. And I began discussions with colleagues, including Republican colleagues, to look for a way to codify Roe that, yes, might be different in wording from the Women's Health Protection Act but would accomplish the same goal of providing a Federal guarantee that would operate in every ZIP Code in this country to protect women's rights to make decisions about contraception and abortion.

And today we have introduced that bill, the Reproductive Freedom for All Act. The name of it is a tribute to a ballot initiative that is currently under debate in Michigan and scheduled for a vote to be added to the Michigan Constitution in November, the Reproductive Freedom for All initiative. And the bill that we have put together fairly closely tracks--not identically but fairly closely tracks the language of the ballot referendum in Michigan.

What does the bill do? We worked on the bill between the leak of the Dobbs opinion and when Dobbs was decided by the Supreme Court right before our July Fourth recess. And we worked to make the bill as strong as we could. But then we set it aside because we knew the Dobbs decision might change from the leaked opinion, and we wanted to see what was actually in the opinion before we finalized the bill. And it is good that we waited because there were some aspects of the Dobbs opinion that were a bit different. They took some sandpaper to some controversial parts of the case, and they extended other arguments in the case that needed a response.

And so what we have done since Dobbs is analyzed the opinion but also, more importantly, looked at life in the United States since that decision was rendered. I could give many examples, even in the month since that decision has been rendered, of the tragedy of what I believe is now post-Dobbs America.

In particular, when a 10-year-old child has to be smuggled across State lines to receive care following her rape, that is gruesome. That is not what this country should expect, nor, indeed, what we should tolerate. And yet that is not an accidental byproduct of the Dobbs decision. That was a completely foreseeable and even foreseen consequence of the Dobbs decision that turning it over to 50 States would lead to a patchwork of horrible examples one after the next.

I have spoken about another example in Virginia. An individual who was living in Kentucky got a breast cancer diagnosis on the day the Dobbs opinion was leaked, went to her doctor and found out that her contraception could potentially cause accelerated growth of cancer cells. And so she needed to come off contraception to get cancer treatment. She has two young children. She is worrying about her own cancer. She is trying to keep herself healthy for herself but also for her young children. If she were to come off contraception, there would be the chance of an unwanted pregnancy. The cancer treatments also would significantly degrade the possibility for a healthy pregnancy, but she was now living in a State that, post-Dobbs, would not allow her to have an abortion.

She wrote a piece about this in NBC News. She was fortunate enough to be able to move and get a new job in Virginia, where she would be able to make these choices, but these are the kinds of choices, post-Dobbs, people have to make every day: Do we smuggle a youngster across State lines or does someone move from one State to the next? Every person in this country, no matter what ZIP Code they live in, should have a basic Federal guarantee about contraception and availability of abortion services.

What the Reproductive Freedom for All Act would do would be, essentially--we tried to put ourselves in a time machine after Dobbs and travel back to the day before the Dobbs decision. It was a very narrow focus. You can look at this in other ways. Some folks didn't like what the law was the day before the Dobbs decision. But in order to find some bipartisanship--because, truly, the American public, on a bipartisan basis, wants to preserve reproductive rights--we looked at could we come up with a Federal statutory guarantee that would match the state of constitutional law that existed the day before the Dobbs decision and protect the rights of all to contraception access and also protect the rights of all to abortion access as it existed before Dobbs.

Simply put, that is this; that prior to fetal viability, no State can pass any statute regulating abortion that imposes an undue burden on a woman seeking to exercise that right. And post-viability, while a State can more significantly regulate abortion, no State can deprive any woman of the right to receive an abortion should she and her health providers determine that it is necessary to protect her life or health.

That is the bill that I have introduced today with Senators Collins, Murkowski, and Sinema. I thank them for working to try to show--because now we have shown that there is not a minority of the U.S. Senate, but there is actually a majority that wants to codify Roe and related cases; that we might have some differences of opinion about the right language to use to do that, but there is a difference between a Senate where that is only a minority sentiment and a Senate where, like in the rest of the American public, that is a majority sentiment.

The last thing I will say is this. I am very well aware, as are my cosponsors

in introducing that bill, that we do not have the votes today, should it be put up, to get 60 votes in the Senate for it. We don't. Yet I am given some inspiration by the fact that we recently passed a gun safety bill where 2 months before there were not 60 votes either. In fact, for the 10 years I have been in the Senate, we have been trying to pass legislation in this Chamber to deal with the scourge of gun violence and again and again and again have fallen short of 60 votes even to proceed to legislation. But in the aftermath of tragedies in Buffalo and Texas, a decision was made by the Members of this deliberative body that inaction was no longer an option and resolute action to protect people's rights and safety was a mandate.

I believe the Dobbs decision and what we have seen since is a catastrophe that, as it plays out over time in State after State, will also change the dynamic in the article I branch and demonstrate the need for a national protection for reproductive rights rather than a 50-State free-for-all in a race to the bottom.

It is in that spirit my colleagues and I have introduced this bipartisan bill today demonstrating that there is now bipartisan support and majority support in the U.S. Senate to protect reproductive freedom for all.

Mr. President, I have one request for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority Leaders.

Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the fo11owing committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate:

Mr. President, today, I am introducing legislation to remove ``Robert E. Lee Memorial'' from the official name of Arlington House.

This legislation is partially inspired by requests from descendants of General Robert E. Lee and people who were enslaved at Arlington House. This is also an effort to promote a society that is more just and equitable for all, regardless of race, by moving on from a public symbol that honors a figure that fought to protect slavery.

Arlington House is the first name of the historic mansion, which sits on Federal land within Arlington National Cemetery. The property is administered by the National Park Service and overlooks the Potomac River and the Nation's Capital. The house was built by Martha Custis Washington's grandson, George Washington Parke Custis, as the Nation's first memorial to George Washington. Later, his daughter married Robert E. Lee, and the couple lived in the home until the Civil War. During that period, the site was chosen to serve as a national military cemetery in part to prevent Lee from returning. Congress passed legislation in 1955 designating the house the ``Custis-Lee Mansion'' to memorialize Lee and subsequently amended the official title to ``Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial.'' The legislation would remove the latter part of that name and return the house to its original name, ``Arlington House.''

Today, the National Park Service is dedicated to telling the story of those who were enslaved at the Arlington House. I am hopeful that this name change will help to do just a little bit more to encapsulate the full history of the site, which included the presence of many families and generations throughout history, such as the Syphax, Burke, Parks, and Gray families.

I am pleased that companion legislation is also being introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by my colleague, Representative Don Beyer, who has led this effort for years.

Mr. President, today, I am introducing legislation to remove ``Robert E. Lee Memorial'' from the official name of Arlington House.

This legislation is partially inspired by requests from descendants of General Robert E. Lee and people who were enslaved at Arlington House. This is also an effort to promote a society that is more just and equitable for all, regardless of race, by moving on from a public symbol that honors a figure that fought to protect slavery.

Arlington House is the first name of the historic mansion, which sits on Federal land within Arlington National Cemetery. The property is administered by the National Park Service and overlooks the Potomac River and the Nation's Capital. The house was built by Martha Custis Washington's grandson, George Washington Parke Custis, as the Nation's first memorial to George Washington. Later, his daughter married Robert E. Lee, and the couple lived in the home until the Civil War. During that period, the site was chosen to serve as a national military cemetery in part to prevent Lee from returning. Congress passed legislation in 1955 designating the house the ``Custis-Lee Mansion'' to memorialize Lee and subsequently amended the official title to ``Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial.'' The legislation would remove the latter part of that name and return the house to its original name, ``Arlington House.''

Today, the National Park Service is dedicated to telling the story of those who were enslaved at the Arlington House. I am hopeful that this name change will help to do just a little bit more to encapsulate the full history of the site, which included the presence of many families and generations throughout history, such as the Syphax, Burke, Parks, and Gray families.

I am pleased that companion legislation is also being introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by my colleague, Representative Don Beyer, who has led this effort for years.

Mr. President, I rise to offer my own thoughts on the Dobbs decision that the Supreme Court rendered a couple of weeks back right after we went into a July Fourth recess.

My colleagues were on the floor earlier advocating for a bill that would go after the pernicious practice of States in trying to penalize women from traveling to seek reproductive healthcare. I am a strong supporter of that legislation. I understand it will be proposed for floor action later today.

I wanted to focus on two particular elements of the Dobbs decision that, as a former civil rights lawyer, struck me very, very deeply. Never in my life--I am 64 years old--has the Supreme Court taken away constitutional rights that had been counted on by generations of Americans. The Court has narrowed rights, redefined rights, articulated new standards for judging rights, but they have not taken rights away.

In this instance, the Supreme Court took away rights that had been established in both Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. They took away those rights for women to make reproductive healthcare decisions and ruled that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution--which protects citizens' ability to enjoy privileges and immunities of other States and persons' abilities to be treated equally under the law and not have life, liberty, or property--be taken from them without due process.

The Court ruled that the 14th Amendment, the Constitution, had nothing to do with women's reproductive rights. In my view, that is a horrible

misreading of the history of the 14th Amendment.

Further, the Court went on to say, in sort of a sunny way, but no worries. You can now rely on State legislatures to solve these issues.

What I want to do is address how wrong the Court is about the 14th Amendment and how their belief that reliance on State legislatures is somehow a substitute for constitutional protection is so fundamentally wrongheaded.

What is the 14th Amendment? Before the 14th Amendment was passed-- this is hard to believe--the Constitution had no definition of what it was to be a U.S. citizen, none. And the pre-14th Amendment Constitution also established a system of laws in this country where you were primarily subject to the laws of your State. The 50 States could have very different laws. A person from Virginia visiting Maine, for example, could be treated by Maine laws in a harsh and punitive way just because they happen to live in Virginia.

That was the way the Nation used to be. We were more citizens of States than citizens of the United States of America. The pre-14th Amendment Constitution led to one of the seminal decisions in the history of the Court: Dred Scott v. Sandford, in 1856, where the Court ruled that no person of African descent, even a free person, could be considered a U.S. citizen. Even if their families had been in the country for more than 200 years, they could not be a citizen.

In the aftermath of the Civil War, this Congress, this Senate, the States of this Nation banded together to pass three very critical amendments, the first, the 13th Amendment banned slavery. The 15th Amendment banned States from blocking people from voting based on the color of their skin.

But what the 14th Amendment did, finally, after 90 years from the beginning of the Nation, the Declaration of Independence, what the 14th Amendment did was define what it is to be a citizen of the United States.

There was a definition, for the first time, if you were born here or naturalized, you are a citizen of the United States. And citizens of the country were given rights to not be discriminated against because of moving into other States, privileges and immunities accorded to all citizens.

No person shall be deprived of equal protection of the law. No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process. For the first time in the Constitution, we began to not just be a collection of people living in 50 States but actually have a definition of what it is to be an American.

I don't have enough time to go over the whole history of the 14th Amendment, but where it really begins is in World War I.

In World War I, many States, including the State of Nebraska, made it illegal for parents to teach their children German. Some even made it illegal to learn other languages. We were in the midst of the First World War, and so States made it a criminal offense for teachers and parents to teach their children German.

The case of Meyer v. Nebraska came to the Supreme Court in the early 1920s, a family and an instructor challenging this State law. And under the 14th Amendment due process clause, the Court unanimously, in an opinion by Justice McReynolds, said: Wait a minute. What is it to be an American?

Well, the 14th Amendment doesn't say anything about language instruction. It doesn't say anything about education, but the 14th Amendment created a national identity, and clearly being an American must involve the ability of a family to decide if they want to teach the children their native language or practice an occupation, elicit a whole series of things that were naturally connected with what it was to be an American citizen.

That was the first use of the 14th Amendment, to basically say: Clearly, if you live in this country, you get a zone of protection to make decisions that the criminal law of States and the Federal Government cannot intrude upon.

A few years later, hard to believe, during massive Ku Klux Klan activities the State of Oregon made it a criminal offense to send your children to parochial schools. There was anti-Catholic sentiment that was being drummed up by the Klan in Oregon and elsewhere, and so now the criminal law of Oregon was marshaled against parents who wanted to send their kids to Catholic schools.

And, once again, a unanimous Supreme Court said: Hold on a second. The 14th Amendment says nothing about education, but this is a deprivation of liberty in such an extreme way. To be a citizen of this country means you should have the ability to make decisions about the education of your children and no State can use the criminal law to deprive a parent or child of that liberty.

And just as in Meyer v. Nebraska, when the 14th Amendment was used to strike down prohibition on foreign language instruction, Pierce v. Society of Sisters, the 14th Amendment was used to strike down a bar on attending parochial schools.

Fifteen or 20 years later, the State of Oklahoma had a statute that said if you get convicted of a crime three times, you will be sterilized. Passing a check, making a false statement on a loan application--habitual criminal law, you would be sterilized. That was the law that was passed. And it was a law that was pretty common in other States. In Virginia, for years, people were sterilized if the State judged that they were ``feebleminded.''

In Skinner v. Oklahoma, the Court said: Under the 14th Amendment, it says nothing about procreation and nothing about sterilization, but could there be a deprivation of liberty more severe than being sterilized so that you can't have children for life if you were in prison for an offense that might be just an offense that would have you there for a few years?

And so even though the 14th Amendment didn't specifically discuss sterilization, the Court's rule was this comes with being an American that you have some zone where you are protected to make decisions in your own life without the long arm of the criminal law putting you in prison or, even worse, maiming your body and making you unable to have descendants forever.

An important case in Virginia, 1966, Loving v. Virginia, Virginia like many States made it illegal by the criminal law to marry someone whose skin color was different. Richard and Mildred Loving got married in Caroline County, and the police broke into their bedroom hoping to find them having sex. They pointed to their marriage certificate on the wall.

They were arrested and jailed. The judge said that your only path out of jail is to move out of Virginia. They moved to DC, but they couldn't come back and visit their families, their mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers. And eventually, they challenged the Virginia law, and it went up to the Supreme Court. And under the 14th Amendment, the Supreme Court said, Well, yes, the 14th Amendment doesn't say anything about marriage, but there is something about being an American that gives you the right to marry whom you choose without the long arm of the criminal law forcing you to leave the State of your birth and exile yourself from your own family.

And so in Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court struck down anti miscegenation bans, which still existed in Virginia and many other States.

A few years later, Griswold v. Connecticut, the State made it a criminal offense to use contraception. The Supreme Court: Well, there is nothing in the 14th Amendment about contraception, but clearly, there is this zone where Americans can make decisions without the long arm of the government throwing them in jail, and contraception is one of those areas.

Roe v. Wade, a few years later, the State of Texas criminalizing women and providers for seeking an abortion. The Court used the same rationale. Well, the 14th Amendment, the word ``abortion'' isn't in it, we will grant you that, but all the way back to the passage of the 14th Amendment and certainly back to the Meyer v. Nebraska case, we have said that being a citizen of this country gives you some rights that the government can't, by criminal law, take away from you.

Since Roe, there has been Casey reaffirming that right. Since Roe, there has been Lawrence v. Texas saying a State can't make it a crime to have sex with a same sex partner when they

don't make it a crime to have sex with a partner of an opposite sex.

Again, the 14th Amendment says zero about intimacy or sexual relations or reproduction, but there is a zone of decisions we are entitled to make as citizens of this country that the criminal law cannot intrude upon.

Obergefell, you can marry someone of the same sex, same rationale.

So when the Supreme Court said: Well, there is nothing about abortion in the 14th Amendment, well, they are right. The word ``abortion'' is not in the 14th Amendment. But it has been clear now for more than 100 years, and it was really clear when the 14th Amendment was added to the Constitution that we are no longer just citizens of 50 States; we are citizens of a country that believes individuals have decision making power and autonomy, and the criminal law of this country can't reach in and throw you in jail for making decisions about how you operate the most intimate areas of your life.

That is why the Supreme Court's decision in Dobbs is so destructive. It is as if they do not understand the history of this country before the 14th Amendment, when there was no definition of citizenship, and it is as if they do not understand what the 14th Amendment was designed to do.

I will conclude by making one other comment. The Court sort of sunnily suggests that, well, no worries; abortion now gets no constitutional protection, but this can be resolved by State legislatures.

It was State legislatures that were the problem that the 14th Amendment was designed to address. It was State legislatures that passed the laws about slavery. It was State legislatures that prohibited women in the State of Illinois from taking the bar exam. It was State legislatures that imposed all kinds of restrictions upon the right to vote.

So the notion that, OK, there is no constitutional protection for privacy anymore, but State legislatures will take care of it is a fundamental misunderstanding.

And why weren't State legislatures sufficient? It was because slaves weren't represented in State legislatures, and women, at the time, weren't represented in State legislatures. And so we needed a zone of protection for decision making because people who have traditionally not been represented in State legislatures or this Congress can hardly look with confidence on the ability of a majority that does not include them to protect their interests.

One example, Congress today, the U.S. Congress today is about 26 percent women. That is our North Star in our history. That is the best we have ever been.

Guess what. That ranks us in the world, if you look at national parliamentary bodies that ranks us about 75th, below the global average, below nations like Mexico, below Iraq and Afghanistan, far below leading nations like Rwanda, where more than 50 percent of the legislature is women.

To say to the women of this country: We are taking away rights you have relied upon for more than 50 years but no worry, no worry; you can go to the State legislature, where you are dramatically underrepresented, which is the case in most of our State legislative houses, you can go there, and they will give you a fair shake, is to put on blinders instead of looking at reality.

The 14th Amendment was put in the Constitution for a reason. It was to give a right for individual decision making to every citizen in this country, no matter whether they were politically powerful or not, no matter whether there was anybody in the legislative body who looked like them or not, and to say that being an American gave you those rights and those rights couldn't be taken away couldn't be taken away by the long arm of the criminal law in statutes that were elected, enacted by State legislatures where you were not represented, that is why this ruling is so destructive.

And that is why my colleagues and I must work so hard to make sure that we don't devolve back to a pre-14th Amendment society, where your ability to exercise fundamental decisions depends upon the ZIP Code you were born or live in, but that instead we accord the right to make fundamental personal decisions equally to everyone who is an American.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise and thank my colleague from Hawaii for stating plainly the qualifications of these candidates.

As a member of the Armed Services Committee, I have had a chance to review their qualifications. And as the father of a U.S. marine, I agree wholeheartedly with the Senator's contention that these three positions would be very important to fill at a time when the United States has so many security challenges.

Anticipating a productive dialogue with my colleague from Missouri, I would like to ask unanimous consent that the Senate consider the following nominations en bloc: Calendar Nos. 779, 780, 781; that the Senate vote on the nominations en bloc without intervening action or debate; that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table; that any statements related to the nominations be printed in the Record; and that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action.

Mr. President.

Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. President, if my colleague from Missouri would yield for a series of questions, I want to make sure that I understand the objection. I certainly understand the objection as indicated with respect to seeking accountability for Afghanistan. I understand that point.

Is it correct that in the committee, however, you supported each of the three nominations who are proffered on the floor today?

I will yield for a response, yes.

My question was: I believe, in the Armed Services Committee, these three individuals, you supported their nominations for reporting to the floor. And I just want to make sure that I am accurate about that.

On all three?

Is it the Senator's position today that you do not object to them individually but there are other Members of your caucus who individually object to them?

I will rephrase the question.

Do you object to having a vote on them? So, for example, I can modify the motion to suggest to seek unanimous consent that we schedule a vote on these three nominees instead of trying to move them en bloc.

I would be very happy to amend my motion to that, if you would find that acceptable.

Then let me ask one final question. If we are able to clear the objections of others, would you agree--at a time that is convenient for the floor leaders of each party--to a recorded vote on the three nominees, if we were able to clear the objections with your other colleagues?

Yes, move to a final passage vote, on which you would be able to express your views on each of these nominees.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, as we continue our battle with COVID-19, we must acknowledge the healthcare healers that are serving in our rural communities. In particular, I would like to highlight the work of the Health Wagon in Virginia. The Health Wagon is the oldest mobile clinic in the Nation. Their mission is to provide compassionate, quality healthcare to medically underserved people in Appalachia. The Health Wagon works to mitigate barriers to healthcare access, taking healthcare into the community, into places like grocery stores, food banks, workplaces, and providing communities in southwest Virginia with access to primary, specialty, dental and vision care.

Health Wagon originated 40 years ago with Sister Bernadette Kenny of the Catholic order Medical Missionaries of Mary. Sister Bernie traveled on rural mountain roads in her Volkswagen Beetle to deliver healthcare to individuals in southwest Virginia. Now, the organization employs more than 50 staff members across four clinics and four mobile units. Their average patient is 41 years old, with 100 percent of patients being uninsured or underinsured. Over the last year, the Health Wagon has served 10,857 individual patients and documented 35,250 patient encounters.

The Health Wagon has also been vital in the fight against COVID-19. Since March 2020, the Health Wagon has provided more than 18,000 COVID- 19 tests, provided 19,567 COVID-19 vaccinations, and administered over 5,500 monoclonal antibody treatments. They do not bill for services, and their programs are sustained by grants and donations from individuals, corporations, and foundations. The Health Wagon is led by president and CEO, Dr. Teresa Tyson. Dr. Tyson has served with the Health Wagon for 30 years, and under her leadership, the organization has received national recognition for its innovative projects in telehealth space. The Health Wagon was the first to deliver a virtual wound care clinic and conducted the first FAA-approved drone delivery of medications in the United States. Dr. Tyson led the largest health outreach of its kind in the Nation, as well as providing the first telecytoscopy in the world in partnership with University of Virginia. Dr. Tyson leads a group of caring and committed providers.

Rural communities are the backbone of our country, and the Health Wagon has served the Appalachia community admirably. I thank them for their service.

Mr. President, I rise to just share candid emotions about yesterday's tragic shooting of schoolchildren who were 2 days from the end of the school year in Texas--19 deaths of little ones and 2 teachers and others injured. This is rough. I don't have any notes because I am really emotional about it. These shootings kind of give me PTSD, I have to admit.

I was the mayor of Richmond, and our city had the second highest homicide rate in the United States. At a much younger period of my life, I found myself going to too many funerals, to too many wakes, to maybe the most memorable crime scenes, then also to homicide victims' family support group meetings in church basements in my city.

Then I got to be the Governor of Virginia. In April of 2007, my wife and I landed in Japan while leading a trade mission, and we went to a hotel and immediately got a phone call saying that there was a shooting underway on the campus of Virginia Tech University and that I should turn on CNN, which I did, in Japan.

As I saw the events unfold, I said: Take us right back to the airport.

We had flown 14 hours. We were in the hotel for about an hour but went right back to the airport and flew all the way back home to what was the worst day of my life in trying to comfort 32 family members who had lost kids or their spouses who were faculty members--and that process went on for years--in the days right after the horrible tragedy but then commissioning a study about what went wrong and then trying to find an appropriate settlement with these families that would honor their loved ones.

I had to deal with State police officers--hardened, hardened law enforcement veterans--who walked into the classrooms at Virginia Tech, to find carnage and on each body a cell phone ringing because a parent had seen it on television and wanted to call to make sure it wasn't one of their children who had been killed. My law enforcement officers talked about how those rings that would never be answered just haunted them, haunted them.

So when there are these shootings at a school, at a nightclub, at a concert, in a grocery store, in a church, in a synagogue, I feel like I am back in April of 2007, experiencing those emotions for the first time.

I was analyzing my own emotions for the first time last night. Why have I not been able to reach a point of more--I don't know--emotional equilibrium about this after 15 years? I realized that the reason was that my emotional reaction that is kind of a PTSD thing is not just because of the shootings, not just because of the deaths, not just because of the promising lives cut short; it is compounded by a realization that, here in this body, we have done nothing.

It would be bad enough to experience the violence and be reminded of that most painful time in my life, but to experience it as a U.S. Senator, as a Member of a body, and to say, ``Well, what have we done? We didn't do anything at the Federal level after Virginia Tech, and we didn't do anything after Pulse, and we didn't do anything after Las Vegas, and we didn't do anything after Sandy Hook, and we didn't do anything after one tragedy after the next,'' then that compounds in some ways, and that is the thing that makes the emotional reaction a reaction that is as fresh today as it was in April of 2007. It is a wound that can't heal until we do something to heal the injury, to heal the problem.

I was thinking about this last night, and I was trying to, you know, think, what is some wisdom that I can derive to make me feel less down and less despondent? And I just thought of two things that I wanted to share. One is a spiritual insight, and the other is a practical reason not to lose hope.

So, as a spiritual insight, a few years ago, Pope Francis was kicking off a yearlong effort to encourage the revitalization of parish life-- not the life of the big, universal church but the life of parishes. He challenged parishes, but this challenge could go for people, and it certainly could go for political leaders. He challenged parishes to be (statement made in Spanish) ``islands of mercy in the midst of a sea of indifference,'' and I thought, what an interesting challenge.

The thing about that challenge that I thought was so beautiful and a little bit unexpected is he didn't counterpose mercy to evil or mercy to cruelty or mercy to hatred; he contrasted mercy with indifference-- with indifference.

There is evil in the world, and there is hatred in the world, and there is cruelty in the world. Yet usually those forces are not strong enough to succeed for very long unless--unless--there is widespread indifference. We are challenged not to be indifferent.

If we assess why the Senate, this great deliberative body, has been unwilling to act for 15 years, I don't think it is cruelty or evil; it is indifference. It is the very thing that Pope Francis was warning us to avoid.

We should be merciful. We should not be indifferent. Evil doesn't thrive for very long absent indifference. Yet, despite what we often say after tragedies like this, with our thoughts and our prayers and our sincere emotions, if we don't demonstrate by more than just words that we are touched by these tragedies, then we are committing the sin of indifference.

I hope very much that the tragedy of these little children's deaths may push us out of the indifference that we have been sunk in at least on this issue. I really hope that it will.

Then, finally, there is a practical reason I am not going to give up hope that it will. I mentioned that I was the mayor of Richmond, dealing with a homicide problem, and that I was the Governor during what was at the time the worst mass shooting in the history of the United States. Sadly, it has been eclipsed. The Virginia Tech shooting is no longer the most tragic shooting in history. Others have eclipsed it in terms of the numbers of those killed.

I felt that same despair then, and I threw myself into trying to make changes. I made the changes in the Virginia laws that I could make as the Governor by executive action, but there are some things I couldn't do by executive action. I needed the support of my legislature to do a comprehensive background check bill because, in the case of the Virginia Tech shooting, Seung-Hui Cho, the disturbed 19-year-old who committed that crime, was legally barred from owning a weapon, but weaknesses in the background check system didn't catch that, and he was able to get the weapons that led to that carnage.

I couldn't get my legislature, even in the aftermath of the worst shooting in the history of the United States, to be willing to take action, but we never gave up. We kept pushing. We kept pushing in Virginia, the headquarters' State of the National Rifle Association. We kept pushing and pushing and pushing, and in 2019, 12 years after the tragedy at Virginia Tech, my legislature passed a set of commonsense gun safety rules: one handgun a month, a ban on certain kinds of weapons that nobody needs, a comprehensive background check, mental health support--a series of initiatives. My legislature did pass it in 2019, and my State is safer as a result, but 12 years was a

long time to wait. There were a lot of tragedies that happened between 2007 and 2019.

Thank God for the Virginia Tech family members and for the other advocates who said: We will wait. We are not going away. We are patient. We are discouraged. Each loss we feel afresh, but we are not stopping until we make that happen.

In my first months in the Senate, we voted on the floor on a comprehensive background check bill. I think that was the last time we had a meaningful debate about gun safety policy on the floor of this body--9 years ago. It is like there is a gag rule here. You know, it used to be, in Congress, you were not allowed to have debate or to vote about issues dealing with slavery during the 1830s. It is like we have a gag rule about debating gun safety on the floor of this body.

But I remember voting that day, and it was on the anniversary of the shooting at Virginia Tech that we voted on a bipartisan background check bill in this body in 2013. The Sandy Hook families were sitting in the Galleries, and many of the Virginia Tech families had come up to join them to offer them support. I was reminded of the Scripture and the letter of Paul to the Hebrews being surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. And here we were on the floor, trying to respond to this tragedy and do something to ease their grief, and we fell a couple of vote shorts. We couldn't get to 60. I think we had 57 votes that day for a background check bill. That was painful. It was painful. It was especially painful to fall short in the view of all of these grieving family members.

But I draw hope from this. If we can make progress on this issue in Virginia--the headquarters of the NRA--we can make it in the U.S. Senate. It may not happen as quickly as I want, and it may not happen while I am still here to see it, but there is no reason to give up. If we can do this in Virginia, we can do this in the U.S. Senate, and we ought to. There is nothing we can do to bring back the lives of these young people, but if we can act to decrease the chance that this will ever happen again, they will at least have the ability to grab on and say: Our advocacy made a difference, and kids who go to school will be safer in the future.

This is the last thing I will say, and I will sit down. I was walking around the building this morning, and because I am fluent in Spanish and people around here know it--a lot of the Capitol staffers are Latinos, and they talk to me in Spanish--I passed by a longtime Capitol staffer who said in Spanish: Senator, what is going on? What is going on with this country?

I said: I know what you are asking me about, and it is such a tragedy.

Then she said this to me. She is from El Salvador. She said: My country is a mess, and the violence is awful, and the homicide rate is unacceptable, but no children in schools feel unsafe. No people going to church services feel unsafe. What is going on, Senator?

I didn't have a good answer for her. I didn't have a good answer for her.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, the Food and Drug Administration's ``Purple Book'' provides patients, providers, and public health experts with key information about FDA-licensed biological products. Providers rely on accurate and up-to-date information from this searchable online database to make crucial decisions regarding the treatment of their patients. The ``Purple Book'' provides transparency on the availability of biological products. This can help inform public health decision- making and increase competition among manufacturers to lower prices. Improvements to the ``Purple Book'' clarifying when biological products leave the market would allow the FDA and the public to monitor the availability of these key medications.

That is why I am proud to join my colleagues, Senators Marshall, Hassan, and Cassidy, in introducing the Biologics Market Transparency Act, legislation that would extend to biological products certain reporting and transparency requirements that already exist for small molecule drugs. This is the Senate companion to legislation introduced by Representatives Kathy Manning and Richard Hudson in the House. It would require manufacturers of biological products to confirm that their products listed in the ``Purple Book'' are available for sale. This bill would also require manufacturers to report to the Secretary of Health and Human Services when their products are withdrawn from the market. These updates to the ``Purple Book'' would provide patients and providers with real-time access to changes in drug availability, allowing physicians to make informed decisions about the best treatment for their patients. These changes would also improve the ability of the FDA to respond to and anticipate drug shortages.

I look forward to working with my colleagues to pass these commonsense reforms to strengthen public health and increase transparency for patients and providers.

Mr. President, biologics, or complex large molecule drugs typically derived from living organisms, play a critical role in our healthcare system, treating a range of conditions such as diabetes, arthritis, and cancer. Yet spending on these products accounts for an alarming and significant portion of overall drug spending in the United States. In 2018, biologics accounted for 40 percent of spending on all prescription drugs, with spending on biologics growing twice as quickly as overall drug spending since 2015.

Biosimilars are drugs that are highly similar to existing biologics, and interchangeable biosimilars are biosimilars that can be substituted for a biologic product without the intervention of a healthcare provider. Biosimilars and interchangeable biosimilars can play a significant role in reducing drug spending. For example, Medicare Part D spending for both beneficiaries and the program is less than spending on reference biologic products even as the use of biosimilars increases with increased availability. As of April 2022, there were 33 biosimilar products on the market including interchangeable

biosimilar products. Food and Drug Administration, FDA, approval of additional interchangeable biosimilars could provide patients with more treatment options, increase competition, and lower costs. We must take steps to provide clarity around the FDA's review process for interchangeable biosimilars to facilitate development of these products, bringing them to market faster.

That is why I am proud to join my colleague, Senator Collins, in introducing the Interchangeable Biologics Clarity Act, legislation that would make key improvements in the FDA's review process for interchangeable biosimilars. Specifically, this bill would clarify the FDA's authority to tentatively approve a second or third interchangeable before the end of the first interchangeable's exclusivity period, allowing additional products to enter the market more efficiently when that exclusivity period ends. This legislation would also specify that two interchangeable biologics approved on the same day could share an exclusivity period. These provisions would allow the FDA to issue additional guidance around the review of interchangeable biologic products and ensure increased transparency about the exclusivity periods for interchangeable products.

I look forward to working with my colleagues to pass these important improvements to the FDA's biosimilar review process that will increase patients' treatment options and help foster competition.

Mr. President, biologics, or complex large molecule drugs typically derived from living organisms, play a critical role in our healthcare system, treating a range of conditions such as diabetes, arthritis, and cancer. Yet spending on these products accounts for an alarming and significant portion of overall drug spending in the United States. In 2018, biologics accounted for 40 percent of spending on all prescription drugs, with spending on biologics growing twice as quickly as overall drug spending since 2015.

Biosimilars are drugs that are highly similar to existing biologics, and interchangeable biosimilars are biosimilars that can be substituted for a biologic product without the intervention of a healthcare provider. Biosimilars and interchangeable biosimilars can play a significant role in reducing drug spending. For example, Medicare Part D spending for both beneficiaries and the program is less than spending on reference biologic products even as the use of biosimilars increases with increased availability. As of April 2022, there were 33 biosimilar products on the market including interchangeable

biosimilar products. Food and Drug Administration, FDA, approval of additional interchangeable biosimilars could provide patients with more treatment options, increase competition, and lower costs. We must take steps to provide clarity around the FDA's review process for interchangeable biosimilars to facilitate development of these products, bringing them to market faster.

That is why I am proud to join my colleague, Senator Collins, in introducing the Interchangeable Biologics Clarity Act, legislation that would make key improvements in the FDA's review process for interchangeable biosimilars. Specifically, this bill would clarify the FDA's authority to tentatively approve a second or third interchangeable before the end of the first interchangeable's exclusivity period, allowing additional products to enter the market more efficiently when that exclusivity period ends. This legislation would also specify that two interchangeable biologics approved on the same day could share an exclusivity period. These provisions would allow the FDA to issue additional guidance around the review of interchangeable biologic products and ensure increased transparency about the exclusivity periods for interchangeable products.

I look forward to working with my colleagues to pass these important improvements to the FDA's biosimilar review process that will increase patients' treatment options and help foster competition.

Madam President, in a moment, I am going to make a motion by unanimous consent to call up, and hopefully confirm, significant appointments in the Department of Defense.

We are in the midst of a war in Europe right now. It is hard to imagine that, and yet it is the case. Every day we see atrocities committed by Vladimir Putin's illegal invasion of Ukraine, but every day we also see the concerted effort of the United States and NATO allies and other nations to provide dramatic support for the Ukrainian defense force and the Ukrainian people.

We honor the Ukrainians' resolve and heroism, and we feel proud of the role that the United States and other nations are playing in providing defense. And I hope we will take additional defense support up on the floor in the days to come. However, this is not easy work to do.

One of the positions that I am going to be seeking a UC on is the DOD Assistant Secretary for Sustainment, Christopher Lowman, who is a Virginian. He and his family live in Fredericksburg.

Mr. Lowman is, according to the committee, completely noncontroversial and very much desired in this position.

He was born in Germany, in a military family, grew up in Virginia, went to college in New Jersey. He was a U.S. marine beginning in 1984, and then after his Active Marine service, entered the Army civil service as an Army maintenance management intern in 1989. And he has been with the Army ever since.

His specialty is logistics. So this Assistant Secretary of Sustainment is kind of the peak logistics officer in the Pentagon.

He previously was the Acting Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics, and Technology. OK. That is a title that is--you know, what does that actually mean? I will tell you what it means. When the United States is trying to get historic amounts of military aid across a contested border from allied countries into a war zone, we need people who know logistics. It may not be the sexiest part of the military mission, but it is part of the mission that is absolutely critical, and it is part of the mission where the U.S. military is second to none in the world.

If you wonder why the Russian military's grand plans to topple Ukraine in just a couple of days came to naught, you first say it is Ukrainian heroism, and you second say it is the support of our allies, but, third, you have to point out the Russian military has demonstrated that they haven't mastered logistics. The inability to maintain supply chains, the inability to do proper maintenance of tanks and other vehicles is one of the reasons that the Russians have not been able to accomplish their aims. So what this war in Europe is demonstrating is militaries that have the capacity to do logistics and provide supplies to people on the front end of the fight are critical to success.

Given the fact that the United States is the key to pulling together the international effort to provide support to the Ukrainian defense force, and given the fact that that mission depends upon having the best logistics in the world, why would we leave the chief logistics official at the Pentagon position vacant in the middle of a war when the United States is playing this heroic role?

For that reason, Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to executive session to consider the following nominations en bloc: Calendar Nos. 477, 599, 777, 779, 780, 781, 861, and 886; that the Senate vote on the nominations en bloc without intervening action or debate; that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table; that any statements related to the nominations be printed in the Record; that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action and the Senate resume legislative session.

Madam President, will the Senator yield for a question?

Will the Senator yield for a question?

It strikes me that the Senator's objection is you do not want to have this candidate--the bloc of them advanced without a vote. If I can guarantee that you get a vote on these nominations, will you drop your objection?

Yeah. I mean, I know you will vote no. You have made it plain. But if I can guarantee you would get a vote, will you drop your objection?

Yeah.

Yes.

And that is what my point is. We are not fast-tracking these without a vote. This is a motion to allow a vote en bloc on the floor. So you will have an opportunity to vote against Mr. Chaudhary or all of these. This is not a motion to immediately approve them without a vote. It is just a motion to bring them up so that you and others can vote on these nominees. That is all I am seeking.

And so my request, basically, would guarantee you a vote on all of these nominations if you drop your objection.

It would be a--yes. It would be en bloc, but it is a recorded vote, is my understanding.

And, again, Madam President, just to clarify, my motion is only that the Senate be allowed to vote on these nominees: Alex Wagner for Assistant Secretary of the Air Force; Ashish Vazirani for Deputy Under Secretary of Defense; Christopher Lowman, Assistant Secretary of Defense; Lester Martinez-Lopez, Assistant Secretary of Defense; Agnes Schaefer, Assistant Secretary of the Army; Franklin Parker, Assistant Secretary of the Navy; Musetta Tia Johnson, Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces; and Ravi Chaudhary, Assistant Secretary of the Air Force.

I understand my colleague will vote no, but all I am moving is for the Senate to be able to have a vote on these nominees.

My motion is to consider them, yes, en bloc; but it would be a recorded vote, is my understanding.

I appreciate the objection being heard, and I would just say to my colleague, I hope we could work out a deal that would enable us to have a floor vote where my colleague could vote as he chooses on these nominees. This was not an attempt to bypass a vote; it was just an effort to have a vote where everybody can be recorded on the nominees. I hope we can work that out.

I yield back all time on the Democrats' side.

Vote on Motion

Mr. President, today I am introducing the Too Narrow to Succeed Act with my colleagues Senators Booker, Murray, and Menendez. Enacting this bill would increase opportunities for women- and minority-owned asset management firms to direct investments and strengthen our Nation's retirement security.

Women- and minority-owned firms are significantly underrepresented in asset management, managing just over 1 percent of the sector's assets under management. This severe underrepresentation also extends to employment within the industry. This is not due to a lack of diverse talent; women- and minority-owned asset management firms have consistently performed just as well as or better than other firms in terms of returns on investment. In fact, women- and minority-owned firms are overrepresented among top-performing firms.

Having a diverse portfolio is a key part of having healthy finances because diversifying investments mitigates risk and improves long-term returns. Far too often, however, those making investment decisions at our Nation's financial firms are not diverse. If asset managers have too narrow a perspective, the/place the financial success of their clients at risk. This commonsense legislation supports asset managers' fiduciary responsibility to deliver returns to investors, and it will help ensure a safe financial future for workers and their families.

I hope my colleagues will support this bill.