This is signed by 18 senators as follows. The majority leader. With First ExperienceSupreme Court confirmations in the senate, i was a young staffer for a Junior Member of the judiciary committee. Time i met a young guy named Lamar Alexander who left the senate to go down to the white house to work in congressional affairs. So ive had an opportunity for quite a long time to observe the confirmation process through various ups and downs, periods when nominees were confirmed almost overwhelmingly and periods during which they were heated, to put it mildly, contests over the nomination. What i think i can safely say about the senate over the last 40 or 50 years is that its in an assertive period. In other words, viewing the whole process as a joint thing that the president has a role to play and the senate has a role to play and at various times in the history of our country, the senates been pretty passive about it and at other times theyve been pretty aggressive about it. But the constitution is clear, the senate has a role if it chooses to exercise it. Rarely have we ever had a nominee as extraordinary as the one we have before us right now. Weve had a chance to witness this outstanding nominee. Weve watched her in committee. Shes demonstrated she has the deep legal expertise, dispassionate judicial temperament and sheer intellectual horsepower that the American People deserve to have on their Supreme Court. Last week we saw why fellow legal scholars called judge barrett a brilliant and conscientious lawyer who will analyze and decide cases in good faith and they say she is, quote, tailor made tailor made for this job. We saw why her former law clerks, her students call her, quote, a woman of unassailable integrity and a role model for generations to come. We saw why the american bar association, an institution the democratic leader has called the Gold Standard the Gold Standard deemed judge barrett well qualified who stood on the Supreme Court and they heard why the Legal Professionals behind that rating called her, quote, listen to this, a staggering staggering academic mind. The chair of the a. B. A. s Standing Committee on the federal judiciary told the committee directly that, quote, in interviews with individuals in the Legal Profession and community who know judge barrett, whether for a few years or decades, not one person, not one not one uttered a negative word about her character. This outstanding nominee is exceptionally suited to this job, period. And i know we all know that. She is an exceptional nominee to the Supreme Court who will make the senate and the country exceedingly proud. Now there are a few of us around here who have experienced the last 30 years up close and personal, and im one of them. Those of you who followed parts of history from the outside and now youre making history. Its a matter of fact a matter of history that it was Senate Democrats who first began our contrary difficulties contemporary difficulties back in 1987 and who initiated every single meaningful escalation, every single one of them, from then up to the present day. Every escalation was initiated by the other side. In 1987, ted kennedy and his friends introduced the country to robert borks america. The first effort to smear a fully qualified judicial nominee based on insulting apocalyptic scare tactics. Even some of pt people who were some of the people who were directly involved in borking bork, democrats, by the way, say they regret that low moment and what it has unleashed in the years since. In the early 2000s, it was democrats who very willfully invented a brandnew strategy to make judicial ideology and not disqualificationings an acceptable criteria for tanking president ial nominees. I remember reading in the early part of bush 43s first term a seminar convened, and Laurence Tribe and Cass Sunstein talked about the appropriateness of using every single tool in the toolbox to stop judicial nominations. It was always possible to filibuster judges, it just wasnt done. I mean there are plenty of things that you could do you dont do, it simply wasnt done. The best example of that was the Clarence Thomas nomination. It couldnt have been a more controversial nomination than that one. Chairman of the judiciary committee, joe biden and ted kennedy sitting next to him, it was about as aggressive as it gets. It made in some ways the bork treatment look like childs play. The committee reported out Justice Thomas with an even vote even. And as we all know around here, it only takes one of 100 senators to make you get 60. Just one. Only one to get the senate in a place where you have to get 60 votes. The tradition of dealing with the judicial nominees with a simple majority was so strong that not one democrat, not one, required 60 votes on Clarence Thomas. In case you dont remember the vote by on his confirmation, it was 5248. One senator out of 100 could have denied Clarence Thomas his career on the Supreme Court. Thats how strong the tradition was of dealing with the judiciary in a simple majority way. Well, in bush 43, my colleague, the democratic leader, at this meeting apparently with csaa cass unstein was saying these rightwing judges would be set up by bush 43 and we ought to use every tool in the toolbox, whether its used before or not, to stop judicial nominees. So democrats used the brandnew tool, the partisan filibuster one bush nominee after another. In her own confirmation hearing years later, for example, now justice kagan, went out of her way to say miguel estrada, a name you may not be familiar with, would be qualified to sit on the d. C. Circuit. She said he would even be qualified to sit on the Supreme Court. He became the poster child for this new press invented by the democratic leader and his colleagues to routinely filibuster judges. It was written, the suspicion was, that it might provide for bush 43 the opportunity to name the first hispanic Supreme Court justice and, of course, they didnt want that to happen. So Senate Democrats filibustered him seven separate times in 2003. He was one of the many victims of this normshattering, precedentbreaking behavior. A few years later, colleagues such as biden, durbin, leahy and schumer tried to filibuster Justice Alitos nomination to the Supreme Court. Fortunately that was not successful. Then something really funny happened. Something really funny happened. All of a sudden there was a new president , president obama. Suddenly a democratic president was making judicial nominations. Well, imagine what happened then. Suddenly Senate Democrats became very allergic to experiencing the effects of what they had started. In effect, the effects of their own playbook. They had no patience to taste their own medicine. None whatsoever. Colleagues did not appreciate being held to the standards they just created a few years before. The shoe was on the other foot. Well, we all know what happened next. Another Massive Senate shaking escalation by Senate Democrats in 2013, the nuclear option. They broke the senate rules to change the senate rules so that a democratic president would not have to play by the same rules they are invented shortly before. And with a 51vote threshold in place, democrats began confirming nominees without meaningful minority support. I said at the time, quoting myself, theyd regret it a lot sooner than they would think. Well, that regret began in 2016. In 2016 when Justice Scalia passed away, Senate Republicans had won our majority a year later. As i said then when i recommended to all of you that we not fill that vacancy created in the middle of a president ial Election Year that youd have to go back to 1888 to find the last time a senate of a Different Party from the president confirmed a Supreme Court nominee to a vacancy created during the president ial Election Year. In other words, not surprisingly, one party in control of the senate was less inclined and had been less inclined for a very long time confirm a Supreme Court nominee in the middle of a president ial Election Year. Entirely within the rights of the senate to do that because what had clearly developed over these years was the senate viewed itself as a partner a partner in the process. The president gets to nominate, but we get to decide whether to act on the nomination. Needless to say, after the unprecedented senateshaking steps that the Senate Democrats had taken, the Republican Senate majority was not much inclined to depart from precedent and do president obama that favor. Our decision in 2016 was fully in line with precedent, fully within the constitution and completely within the senate rules. Now, i understand why they didnt like it. I wouldnt have either. Of course they didnt like it. But elections have consequences and america had chosen a Republican Senate in 2014. But theres no parallel between actually breaking the rules, as democrats did in 2013 and merely applying the rules in ways that democrats do not like. Theres a big difference between breaking the rules and applying the rules in ways the democrats did not like. If the senates going to function, we must maintain a distinction between when people break the rules and when they apply the rules in ways we may not like. When President Trump won in 2016, Senate Democrats took yet another reckless and unprecedented step. They mounted the firstever, the firstever successful partisan filibuster of a Supreme Court nominee. That had not been done before. Tried it on alito. It didnt succeed. Tried it on gorsuch, and it did. So the message was, in effect, nobody who President Trump anonymous is nominates is going to get 60 votes for the Supreme Court. No matter how qualified. Of course, speaking of qualifications, Justice Gorsuch s qualifications were simply beyond question. Someone who frankly has gone on to issue some rulings, by the way, that these guys over here like, which shows you predicting what a Supreme Court justice is going to rule on has been a hazardous guess most of the time. Their apocalyptic threats about predictions about whats going to happen with nominees of republican president s have been consistent going back to john paul stevens. Every single one of them is going to be a disaster for women and minorities and all the rest, none of which, of course, ever materializes. So republicans applied and extended what Senate Democrats had begun in 2013. They had left out the Supreme Court from being dealt with as a simple majority. So we decided were going to return to where, by the way, the judicial calendar was by practice anyway just a few years ago. It was always dealt with with a simple majority. The thomas nomination proved it. That was the custom here until our friends on the other side decided to start a new custom within the rules, but a new custom. So all my friends thats happened as a result of the threshold being lowered for the Supreme Court is were back to where we were as recently as Clarence Thomas. The executive calendar is dealt with with a simple majority. I think thats better for the country, and they will benefit from that, too, at some point. When you have a president and a senate of the same party, obviously, this is going to happen quicker. Thats the way its always been. Whether the rule allowed a filibuster or not. So ironically, we are back to where we were, the entire executive calendar will now be dealt with as it was a few years ago before all of this back and forth with a simple majority. Well, obviously, Justice Gorsuch was confirmed on a bipartisan basis once the executive calendar was returned finally to a simple majority. And then justice kavanaugh, most of us were here for that. Despite the horrific and embarrassing display that some of our Senate Colleagues aided and abetted, we made it through that. So the good news is this in about 72 hours, i anticipate we will have a third new associate justice of the Supreme Court. In about 72 hours. I do not blame some of my democratic colleagues who are not present for all of this, wish the senate would behave differently, but just know this. This is not spin. This is fact. Just know this. Every new escalation, every new step, every new shattered precedence, every one of them, was initiated over there. No exceptions. Every one of them. And it all happened over the strenuous objection of republicans who tried in each instance to stop democrats from trading away longterm senate norms for shortterm political wins. 17 years ago, colleagues, 17 years ago, democrats were boasting to newspapers about this brandnew campaign to politicize judicial confirmations. They thought it was a great idea. They bragged about it. One of my colleagues called himself the king of the filibuster. He proudly wanted to own it. Well, sooner or later, the shoe is always on the other foot. So i hope our colleague from new york is happy with what he has built. I hope he is happy with where his ingenuity has gotten the senate. Colleagues, we have had this argument over and over for months, if not years. This is not really what we are here to debate today. We are here to actually consider an outstanding nominee whose qualifications nobody doubts, judge Amy Coney Barrett. So, colleagues, lets get on with it. Lets do our job. Lets rediscover the rational treatment of nominations that the democratic leader embarked on a deliberate project starting 20 years ago to erase. We will give this nominee the vote she deserves no later than monday. I yield the floor. Mr. Schumer mr. President. The presiding officer the democratic leader. Mr. Schumer we have just heard a tit for tat, convoluted version of history that the majority leader uses to justify steering the senate towards one of the lowest moments in its long history. Might does not make right. You did something wrong, so we can do something wrong is no justification when the rights of the American People are at stake. The republican majority is steering the senate towards one of the lowest moments in its long history. The republican majority is on the precipice of making a colossal and historic mistake, and the damage it does to this chamber will be irrevocable. After thwarting the constitutional prerogative of a duly elected democratic president to support to appoint a Supreme Court justice because it was an Election Year, the republican majority is rushing to confirm a justice for a republican president one week before election day. Consistency . Afraid not. You dont have the right to argue consistency when youre doing what youre doing now. Four short years ago, all of our republican friends argued that it was a principle that was the word they used principle to let the American People have a voice in the selection of a Supreme Court justice because an election was eight months away. Those same republicans are preparing to confirm a justice with an election that is eight days away. In the process, the majority has trampled over norms, rules, standards, honor, values, any of them that could possibly stand in its monomaniacal pursuit to put someone on the court who will take away the rights of so many americans. The republican majority, of course, ignored Health Guidelines to conduct inperson hearings in the middle of a pandemic after republican members of the committee themselves had contracted covid19. It has broken Longstanding Senate precedent. Never, never in the history of the senate, despite any sophistic analyses of recent history, never has a Supreme Court nominee, a lifetime appointment, been considered so close to an election. The presiding officer of the Senate Confirmed this yesterday in response to this senators inquiry. Never in the history of the senate has a Supreme Court nominee been confirmed after july of an Election Year. My friends, it is a hallmark of democracy that might does not make right. The Republican Senate is blatantly ignoring this principle. Here in leader mcconnells senate, the majority lives by the rules of because we can. They completely ignore the question of whether they should. A Supreme Court nominee will be confirmed on a partyline vote after the rules were changed to allow it. Now it doesnt matter that an election is just a short time away. Its a complete contradiction of the supposed principle that same party so vehemently argued only four years ago. Again, eight days, eight days before an election in which the American People will choose exactly who they want to pick Supreme Court justices for them. For the republican leader to argue for consistency, using his convoluted version of history is laughable. It is absurd. It is outrageous. It is a stain on this body, and an indelible mark on this senate majority. In short, the Senate Republican majority is conducting the most rushed, most partisan, and least legitimate process in the entire history of Supreme Court nominations. And democrats will not lend an ounce of legitimacy to the process. Yesterday, the seats of the democratic members of the judiciary remained vacant in that committee room. In their place were the reminders of what is ultimately at stake in this nomination, the fundamental rights of the American People. Its not democrat or republican or who did this when or who did that when. It is the rights of the American People, what america needs, and what judge barrett has stood for on these issues in the past, that is ultimately what matters. On the seats of those democratic members were photographs of americans whose lives would be devastated if a Justice Barrett delivers the decisive vote to strike down the Affordable Care act, ripping away health care from tens of millions of americans and eliminating protections for more than 130 million americans with preexisting conditions. You could imagine alongside their faces the faces of women who share who cherish the right to make their own private medical decisions, the faces of lgbtq americans who want to marry who they love and not be fired for who they are. The faces of American Workers who are breaking their backs to make ends meet and need their union to help them get a better wage. The faces of young people who know that the planet is in peril in their lifetimes. I hope that when republican members of the senate think about this nomination, they will think about those faces. What that what this nomination means to them, hundreds of millions of americans who will lose rights and fundamental things they need to make their lives better because of this nomination. Its not about qualifications. Its about what the American People need and want and will an unelected body take those rights away from them. So i hope my colleagues will think about that. Take a moment. Take a moment to think about it. And then think about what it says about this sham of a process and the passion that we on this side of the aisle feel about protecting those peoples rights that we were forced to take the extraordinary step of refusing to participate in this process. Because while they may realize it or not, our republican majoritys mono maniacal drive to confirm this justice in the most hypocritical, the most inconsistent of circumstances will forever defile the senate and even more importantly, curtail the fundamental rights of the American People for generations to come. Democrats will play no part in on friday, the senate started the confirmation process for judge Amy Coney Barrett for the Supreme Court. Today, they begin several days of debate on whether to approve the nominee. Democrats have been asking republican members to hold off on approving a new justice until after the november election. Mitch mcconnell filed a cloture motion on the nomination, setting up a vote on limiting debate, at a confirmation vote monday. The senate is back in session saturday at noon eastern. Follow live on cspan2. This morning, we will hear from thirdparty president ial candidates