Transcripts For CSPAN2 U.S. Senate U.S. Senate 20240707

a confirmation vote on president biden's nominee to be general council. cia has been scheduled for 11:45 eastern this morning. this is live coverage of the senate here on c-span2. order. the chaplain, dr. barry black, will lead the senate in prayer. let us pray. p. the chaplain: eternal god, we know that you exist. every time we hear a baby cry or touch a leaf, we are reminded of your presence in our world. lord, continue to look with favor upon our senators. enable them to go from strength to strength as they strive to live in day-time compartments. guide them around the obstacles that hinder them from living for your glory. as they strive to please you, empower them to stand for right and leave the consequences to you. we pray in your great name. amen. the presiding officer: please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance to the flag. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the presiding officer: the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington d.c, july 14, 2022. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable jacky rosen, a senator from the state of nevada, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the leadership time is reserved. morning business is closed. under the previous order, the senate will proceed to executive session to resume consideration of the following nomination which the clerk will report. the clerk: nomination, central intelligence agency, kate elizabeth heinzelman of new york to be general counsel. mr. mcconnell: madam president. the presiding officer: the republican leader. mr. mcconnell: yesterday's c.p.i. report told americans what they already knew all too well. the disastrous effects of washington democrats' he spending binge last year still have our economy in a vice grip. year on year, inflation has hit 9.1% for the first time since the fallout of the carter administration. and the signs are inescapable. price hikes on everything from food to fuel to housing are setting new multidecade highs. a shopper out in oregon told a reporter recently she doesn't buy beef anymore. here's what she said. we kind of try to eat what we have while we have it. yesterday we learned exactly what she and millions of americans are up against, this fastest-rising grocery prices since 1979. in nevada, the owner of a local diner says, quote, my concerns are that my food costs have escalated dramatically. i used to gut wrench about raising menu prices 2% or 3%. now it's way more than that just to keep my doors open. yesterday's report says he's not alone. nationwide prices on food outside the home haven't risen this fast since back in 1981. and this new reality is especially frustrating for those working to help. as the head of one south dakota food bank put it, quote, the donation load has seemed to lighten up. when we give out food boxes, they are not as full as they used to be. right as working families are struggling the most, so are the organizations trying to help them. just one more cruel twist of washington democrats' runaway inflation. one of the first and most painful consequences of the biden administration's failed policies has been the soaring cost of energy. remember on their party's watch, the cost of heating a home rose by double-digit percentages last winter. electricity prices climbed at their highest rate since 2006, and prices at the gas pump have doubled since president biden took office. one pennsylvania woman said that ever since her heating bill skyrocketed last winter, she's had to scale back her spending big time. here's what she had to say. i need to hide under my bed and save every dollar i can. and in maryland, one retiree reports that skyrocketing gas prices means that visits to the local library, about five miles round trip, no longer feel free. from day one, the biden administration has worked overtime to make it harder to produce the most affordable and reliable forms of energy americans rely on right here at home. now as their radical climate agenda takes its toll on domestic production, millions of americans are facing the possibility -- listen to this -- of summer blackouts. the heartland, the west, and the southwest face the highest risk. the people of arizona and nevada, for example, are already at what the experts call elevated risk for the summer. for arizonans and nevadans clamoring for a new gas hike on top of everything else? i doubt it. are they destined to double down on the green sources that set us on this path in the first place? i don't think so. our electric grid is overburdened already but democrats apparently want to strain it even more by eliminating the most reliable sources of energy we have, all the while spending hundreds of billions on schemes that depend on chinese minerals, components and supply chains. trading american energy independence for less reliable sources that depend on forced child labor and foreign producers with questionable environmental standards. is this what our colleagues think will usher in a big transition to green daydreams? washington democrats are the only ones who would define higher energy costs and lower reliability as a victory. we would like americans to know riezing costs are the result of a failed leadership pushing failed policies. working families are still reeling from the time democrats decided to spend us into inflation. they have no appetite for being taxed into recession. ongoing another matter, all -- on another matter all week long i've been discussing the historic supreme court term that wrapped up last month. over the course of several month the textualists and originalists majority had the most consequential decisions since plessy v. ferguson with brown v. board of education in 1954. it was the best supreme court term in generations. the court corrected one of the most moral and legal mistakes of the 20th century and returned power to the american people to implement commonsense protections for unborn life and bring america back inside the global mainstream. the court handed down two historic wins for religious liberty, rolling back decades of infringement on the rights of americans to worship and to raise families as they choose. the court strengthened the rights of law-abiding americans to p defend themselves outside the home in resounding reaffirmation of the second amendment and the court took a huge bite out of the unconstitutional administrative state and rolled back a big part of the obama-biden administration totally illegal clean power plan. electricity prices skyrocketing on democrats' watch, experts warning abouti am penning summer blackouts and pain at the gas pump the last thing americans need is a war on fossil fuels that congress never authorized. the court's decision in west virginia versus e.p.a. is a reminder that the power to make laws rests with elected representatives, not on elected bureaucrats. but today i want to talk about something that runs even deeper than these historic rulings. as in any high-profile term, last month the court arrived at rulings that some politicians in some -- and some citizens like more than others. goodness knows i have been disappointed in my share of supreme court rulings over the years, including some extremely consequential cases. going back decades, there have been countless times when the federal judiciary has left conservative citizens feeling every bit as i did pointed in a particular -- every bit as disappointed in a particular outcome as far left activists seem to feel right now. after all, the courts don't exist to enforce any one political ideology or policy agenda. the justices' sacred job is to follow the written text of our laws and constitution wherever it may lead them and let the chips fall where they may. but there's something funny, madam president, if. i can't recall anytime when our side, the right of center side of america, engaged in prolonged mob protests outside judges' private family homes. the attacks on the judiciary, on this fundamental institution of our society, seem to only run in one direction. a few weeks ago the speaker of the house and the senate democratic leader teamed up to issue a frankly unhinged statement. most of the top democrats in the country followed suit. the reckless statements did not stop, indeed barely even took a pause, when a disturbed left wing person very nearly tried to assassinate a sitting judge. frankly, the inflammatory tone of all these attacks echoed the furious attacks on the court, ironically from the democrats on the day after brown overturned plessy back in 1954. we're hearing absurd calls from the far left to have congress politically persecute individual justices because of their view of the law. they want to take off lady justice's blindfold and scare the court into becoming politically partial. well, this didn't start now. sadly, it's been years in the making. along the path to this moment, the far left has stoked reckless rhetoric, and we've heard it from democrats in elected office. like the amicus brief from several senators that declared the court unwell, unwell, and warned it to, quote, heal itself before the public demands that it be restructured. in other words, do what we want to do or we'll change the makeup of the court. or the main threats from the democratic leader himself that sitting justices would pay the price for ruling in ways that he didn't like. said that over in front of the supreme court. so, madam president, we've spent a year and a half now hearing democrats say over and over and over again that a core principle of democracy is accepting the legitimacy of an outcome when you don't like it. sound familiar? our colleagues need to practice what they preach. mr. durbin: madam president. the presiding officer: the majority whip. mr. durbin: madam president, the republican leader comes to the floor regularly, with heartfelt concerns about the burdens facing america's families. i share those concerns. i think all senators share those concerns. inflation is a tough thing to deal with in the family budget. i go home to illinois to see the price of gasoline at the gas stations, i shop in my local stores and see what it costs for the basics, and i understand that although it's an inconvenience for me, for many people it's a hardship. for the republican leader to come to the floor and remind us of that problem which we're facing in our economy is certainly y understandable. yesterday, the bureau of labor statistics released consumer price index for june, higher than anticipated, prices rose 1.3% compared to june last year. up 9.1% since 1981. when you dive into the data you see that the prices jumped in categories that affect almost every household. food, energy, rent, gas. we know for many american families a break can't come soon enough. what are we going to do about it? give speeches? there are a lot of opportunities for us to do that. republican leader, democratic leader. are we going to do something? democrats think it's time to do something, and we picked one category of cost that is particularly important to american families. it's the category of cost that not only is the life and death issue, but it determines the cost of health insurance for families. we know that because we're told by the largest health insurers in the united states that the cost of prescription drugs is driving the cost of premiums for health insurance. democrats have decided to tackle this directly. credit should go to our democratic leader, senator schumer, who's in negotiation now on prescription drug pricing, with senator manchin of west virginia. i have been skeptical of the outcome of that negotiation, but i'm beginning to be encouraged by what i hear from senator schumer and from senator manchin, that in fact we can give relief to american families on the life or death inflationary cost of prescription drugs. wouldn't that be a breakthrough? wouldn't it be something if this 50-50 senate could ends up doing something on a bipartisan basis that american families actually feel? that seniors in our country would be able to say there's a limitation on how much i'm going to be asked to spend for prescription drugs. and beyond that, i won't have to pay. that's amazing, breakthrough. would it make a difference when it comes to the cost of living for families? of course it would. you would think that the senator from kentucky, who comes to the floor every day to give a speech on inflation, would be the leading cheerleader on our effort to contain the cost of prescription drugs. wouldn't you think so? no. no, he's announced that he would oppose the increase in pre-- the increased effort to lower the cost of prescription drugs, because it might raise taxes on the wealthiest people in this country. hard to imagine, isn't it? his sympathy for millionaires and billionaires gets in the way of his caring for working families. i think he should set it aside and he should ask his colleagues on the republican side of the aisle to join us in a bipartisan effort to contain the cost of prescription drugs. we recognize how these price increases are squeezing household budgets across america, and we take it seriously. we have plans to lower prescription drug prices, decrease the price of gas at the pump, help families with the cost of child care, and increase the supply of housing. all of which will address inflation. but item number one, priority number one, is prescription drugs. the senator from kentucky has said he will oppose that. i hope he changes his mind. i hope as he tells the stories of working families who tell him of the burdens they face with inflation that he will also ask them a question, how about drugs? how about prescription drugs? are those expensive to you, create a hardship? you know they do. it's time for us to do something, and we would certainly like to have the republican leader on our team to deal with one of the serious problems of the cost of living in america today. on a related topic, the majority leader comes to the floor and characterizes the supreme court as the best in history. he refers to decisions they've made and compares them to brown vs. board of education. for those who have forgotten, in 1954 the supreme court in brown brownv. boa board of education d separate but equal does not work in america anymore. we're going to provide real equality, real opportunity when it comes to eggs ca. it was an historic -- when it comes to education. it was an historic decision. the senator from kentucky compares it to the dobbs decision on a woman's right to choose. there's a critical difference. brown v. board of education expanded the constitutional protections of americans. it expanded the constitutional rights of americans. those are historic, and those are consistent with the most celebrated decisions in our supreme court's history. dobbs did just the opposite. for the first time ever in regarded -- in recorded history, the united states supreme court removed a constitutional protection for its citizens. what was that protection? the right of women to make their choices on their own reproductive health. so there's very -- it's very painful to hear a comparison between brown, which extended the constitutional protection and rights of individuals, and dobbs, which in overturning roe v. wade, went in exactly the opposite direction. it's interesting to me to hear the court described by the senator from kentucky as a court that is originalist. they just look to the constitution, they just look to history. well, they also look to something else. every single nominee on the supreme court installed under the trump administration, with the facilitation of the senator from kentucky, had to check one important box -- approved by the federalist society. what is the federalist society? you can search the constitution, you will see no reference to it whatsoever. but it's very real. president trump made no bones about it. he wouldn't consider a federal court judge, particularly for the supreme court, who'd not been approved by the federalist society. federalist society is an extreme right wing conservative group that approved judges during the trump administration, the three judges that were approved for the supreme court. so the loyalty of these justices may be to the constitution, but it's also to the federalist society agenda, and that agenda applauds, of course, the dobbs decision overturning roe v. wade. i also want to make a point about attacks on supreme court justices. unacceptable, unforgivable, and we should do something about it. now, here's what the senator from kentucky failed to mention -- the senate judiciary committee, which i chair, has enacted a law and sent it to the floor, which would extend the protection of the federal judges in the act so there are more resources put into their protection. it passed overwhelmingly on a bipartisan basis in the senate judiciary committee. and you would think with all of the speeches we're hearing on the floor about the safety of judges and how we should take care that they are not endangered, you would think we would have passed that law on the floor of the senate immediately, right? wrong. that bill, which gives more resources to protect federal judges, has been stopped by one senator, and he's announced publicly that he's done it. could you guess where that senator is from? the same state as the minority leader, kentucky. senator rand paul has held up this bill for additional resources to protect federal judges for weeks on end. why? why don't we want to protect them? he objects to the way we've done it, and he's held up the bill, won't even let us vote on it. so i would say to the minority leader, from kentucky, if you really care about the security of judges in the federal system, pick up the phone and call your colleague from the state of kentucky and ask him to withdraw his hold on this bill. we should pass that bill this week. if something terrible happens to a federal judge, god forbid, how in the world can we explain that one senator from kentucky has held up the bill that might have created the resources to protect that federal judge? that's the reality. so when you talk about judicial safety, start at home, start with the state of kentucky, one senator for it, the other senator blocking it. if both of them would be for it, we would do it this afternoon. madam president, i'd also like to address one of the aspects of the dobbs decision overturning roe v. wade, which will be addressed by our colleagues a little later this morning. our nation is in the midst of a health care crisis because of this dobbs decision. in the weeks since the supreme court overturned roe v. wade, erasing the long-standing constitutional right to abortion, pregnant women across america have been thrust into chaos. from the moment this decision came down, abortion was declared illegal in nearly 12 states. some of these state abortion bans make no exception, even for cases of rape and incest. and even when exceptions are made to save the life of the mother, they are confusing and leave medical professionals uncertain of their legal status. the sad reality is that these laws will most certainly result in pregnant women in danger. especially women of color, who are more likely to experience severe and even deadly complications as a result of the pregnancy. earlier this week, the senate judiciary committee held a hearing examining the damage that's been create bid overturning roe. during that hearing we heard from colleen nicholas, she is a gyn doctor and performs abortions. she told the committee, and i quote, when the supreme court joseph turned roe v. wade, they effectively created two -- nations, one where the reproductive freedom belongs to themselves and those that belong to a small group of politicians, who have appointed themselves as the decision-makers over the bodies and lives and future of women. she informed us that demand for care at her facility in illinois has tripled since the roe v. wade decision was overturned by the supreme court. she and said i quote, the supreme court has already pushed people, the people each one of you represent into extreme and sometimes dangerous circumstances in order to access one of the most safest and common health care procedures, the far-right majority on the alito supreme court has revoked a constitutional right which was on the book for almost 50 years, now members of the senate must protect another constitutional right related to this debate, the right to travel across statelines to access health care, in this case reproductive care. that's why i'm joining senators cortez-masto, whitehouse and gillibrand in the legislation for women's health care. women and health care providers are counting on us to pass this bill. they find it hard to imagine that state legislatures and even some federal officials would try to restrict the right to cross a state boundary for medical care. because the antichoice legislators who have already outlawed abortion in their state are not content with what they've done already. right now they're proposing legislation that would turn many state borders into checkpoint charlie. they are hell bent on taking away these women's rights freedom. how far will we let them go? we will allow them to provide penalties? are we going to allow these lawmakers to hold american citizens hostage in their own states, forcing them to give birth? does that sound like the america that we know? no, it doesn't and we need to draw the line here and now by passing the freedom to travel for health care act of 2022. madam president, i ask consent that the following statement i'm about to make be placed in a separate part of the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. durbin: madam president, during the first part of the july recess, i traveled with several of my senate colleagues to the historic nato summit in madrid, spain. on tuesday members of our bipartisan group, senators shaheen, tillis, coons, ernst, and blunt spoke on the trip. senator fischer was also with us at that summit meeting. senator tillis i think said it best, despite the policies differences, there was no daylight between us, we agree finland and sweden should be welcomed into nato and the attack on ukraine by vladimir putin should not be ignored. we met with a number of our allies, including leaders from the indo-pacific region who joined the nato summit. japanese prime minister was clear when he told us the security of europe and the indo-pacific are inseparable. and german chancellor scholz expressed they would take as long as needed to -- perhaps the most notable was the sense of common values found among our nato allies in the face of russian aggression. for that i want to give president biden credit. he spent an hour or more with our bipartisan delegation at the summit meeting. he and his able team, secretary of state blinken, secretary of defense austin and others, met with us and discussed in detail what was being debated at the summit. i've been traveling to eastern europe and meeting allies for many years, i never felt such a shared sense of purpose and determination to stop the russian threat. as senator tillis noted on tuesday, our safety at home is inextricably linked to the security of europe. our bipartisan delegation understood this. the leaders at the nato summit understood it and president biden certainly understands it. vladimir putin would serve his people well by understanding it as well. in the senate we can help putin understand the unbreakable unity and resolve of the world's democracies by being one of the first nato member nations to approve finland and sweden's membership. we should do that without delay. before aproviding at the nato summit in spain, i joined my colleagues by meeting one of the new nato aspraints, spain. for nearly 200 years it tried to maintain assemblance of nonalignment. that changed swiftly with vladimir putin aggression. it triggered an overwhelming swedish support to join nato and sweden began to help ukraine, something they have not done since 1989. they recognize russia's aggression as the same seen in europe in world war ii. they know that the collective nato security arrangement is critical to stop russia. i agree with them and look forward to their nato membership. putin thought he could fracture nato by invading ukraine, look at what he did. he stoked petty grievances against nato and in the end we are picking up two valuable important allies and incidentally, vladimir putin, you are now going to have 800 miles of new nato territory on your border. i was unable to join my colleagues visiting finland, as i was in lithuania, a baltic state with long years of russian tyranny. putin would no doubt like to forcibly return the baltic states to e utopian state. they are aware of the russian threat, but lithuania is undeterred in helping its neighbors in ukraine and belarus stand up to russian aggression and they're unafraid to stand up to the chinese bullies as well of. i was glad to spend time with a highly successful lynn wanian im -- lithuanian immigrant to chicago who returned to lithuania and ran for president. his historic leadership and foresight helped bring lithuania not only into the european union, but equally important into nato. quite simply, lithuania is safer today because of his vision. the awe and esteem lithuanians feel for him was clear by the reverence shown by the lithuanian people. i want to recognize the opposition leader who lives in lithuania after fleeing from belarus from the henchman of the strongman leader. two years ago her husband ran for president. we know from history anybody who is courageous enough to run against lukashenko will end up in prison. lukashenko worried that he couldn't win a failed election. rather than back down in fear, sletlana ran in his place. her husband was left to face an 18 year prison sentence. this is a picture of sergei serving a sentence in the prison because he had the temerity to challenge lukashenko and now his wife is trying to save his cause. thousands upon thousands of belarusians protested the stolen election. 1,200 were jailed as a result of it. lukashenko is now repaying putin by using belarus as a staging ground to attack and bill ukrainians. many brave belarusians still exist, sabotaging russian supply lines. they understand the fate of ukraine is tied to their own fate and that putin must not prevail. i introduced a resolution with senator police, markey -- senators tillis, markey, and others recognizing the continued heroic efforts of the belarusian people and those languishing in the nation's jails. their fight for freedom cannot be forgotten. and i urge the administration to continue its support for the effort by appointing a new special envoy. let me thank the many fine members of the state department foreign service who worked tirelessly to represent our diplomatic interest overseas. they, along with our military service members, serving around the world, are national treasures. i thank them for their service and i yield the floor. mr. thune: madam president. the presiding officer: the republican whip. mr. thune: madam president, is the senate in a quorum call? the presiding officer: it is not. mr. thune: madam president, yesterday morning june inflation numbers were released and as usual the news was not good. inflation rose in june to 9.1%, the highest inflation since november of 1981. november of 1981. i was in college the last time inflation was this bad. madam president, americans are suffering. everywhere americans turn, they're being asked to pay more. more for cleaning supplies, more for gas, more for health insurance, more for groceries. a new analysis yesterday from the joint economic committee found that it will cost american families a staggering 718 per month. madam president that will happen even if prices stop going up tomorrow. $718 per month. more than 8,$600 for the year. no working family can afford that. madam president, a major reason that we're in this crisis is because of democrats' decision to flood the economy with unnecessary government money with their so-called american rescue plan act. unfortunately, there is no easy solution to the crisis they helped create. but the first thing -- the first thing should be to do no more harm. incredibly, however, democrats are currently attempting to double down on the strategy that helped create this crisis in the first place by passing a version of the build back better tax and spending spree they tried force through last year. apparently democrats think, more government spending, like the government spending that helped get us into this mess, plus new taxes are a good solution for an inflation crisis in an economy tinkering on the brink of recession. if democrats want to help to get out of the inflation christ -- inflation crisis, new taxes are the wrong way to go about it. the biggest thing democrats can do to avoid making this crisis worse is flooding the economy with more government money. after that, the biggest thing democrats and the president can do to help alleviate the crisis is to unleash american production. energy prices have been a major contributor to our prices. gas prices are up nearly 60%. the current cost of a gallon of gas is $4.60, almost double what it was when president biden took office just 18 months ago. the price of diesel is even worse, which is a big concern for farmers and ranchers back home in south dakota and around the country. not to mention all of our truckers. electricity, that's up 13%. utility gas service is up 38%. americans everywhere are feeling the pinch. and of course high gas prices and utility prices don't just cause direct pain temple. they also -- at the pump. lowering energy prices is one of the most important things tweak do to help ease high prices on energy goods. the way to lower energy prices is to unleash american energy production, including and especially conventional energy production. unfortunately the president has shown and continues to show a clear hostility to conventional energy production despite the fact that our economy cannot function without conventional energy. i'm a longtime supporter of alternative energy from wind to biofuels and i come from a state that derives a substantial portion of electricity generation from wind. in 2021 over 50% of our state's generation came from wind and 30% came from hydro electric power on the missouri river. but if it weren't for traditional fossil fuels backing up that generation, we'd be left in the dark. the fact of the matter is no matter how much democrats might wish it were otherwise, alternative energy technology has simply not advanced to the point where our country can rely exclusively on alternative energy. and that means that unless we want americans to be permanently buried under the pain of high gas prices, we need to invest in responsible production of oil and natural gas. we have tremendous natural resources at home and the ability to extract those resources in a far more environmentally responsible way than frequently happens in other countries. but unleashing american production is going to require action from the president, who despite the current energy price crisis continues to display hostility to domestic production. he touts the number of leases oil and gas companies have available. but he fails to mention that just three months ago his administration made it harder for oil and gas companies to make use of the leases in question by increasing the regulatory burden for environmental reviews. on top of this, thousands of drilling permits which are required to actually begin drilling on oil and gas leases are currently stuck in the approval process at the department of interior. and at the beginning of this month the administration released a new offshore drilling plan which includes an option to offer at most a paltry 11 new leases over the next five years. it also leaves the door open for zero new leases. zero. if this proposed five-year plan doesn't make it clear that the president isn't interested in increasing our domestic energy production, i don't know what does. madam president, i could go on. i could mention the administration's proposed s.e.c. climate disclosure rules that are designed to discourage investment in conventional energy. or the president's quest to increase taxes on domestic oil and gas production. or democrats' efforts to impose a new fee or tax on methane that could cost consumers an additional $35 billion to $69 billion annually. but i'll leave it there. madam president, i hope, i really hope that the president and his administration will take a good hard look at their hostility to conventional energy production. inflation is at 9.1%. 9.1%. american families are paying nearly twice what they were paying on gas prices just 18 months ago. and utility gas prices have increased sharply. unless democrats want americans to be facing staggering prices at the pump and on store shelves for the long term, the administration needs to start encouraging domestic production of conventional energy. that means not just approving leases but making it easier for oil and gas companies to develop those leases and produce oil and natural gas. it means encouraging, not discouraging, investment in responsible conventional production in infrastructure like natural gas pipelines. and it means giving up attempts to discourage domestic energy production with new and higher taxes or burdensome e.s.g. regulations. american families are struggling, madam president. and the president can actually do something to help them. and i sincerely hope that he will. madam president, i yield the floor. a senator: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from minnesota. ms. klobuchar: madam president, i rise today in support of the freedom to travel for health care act, something that senator cortez masto, your colleague from nevada, is leading. i did want to take a moment, however, to note that there are many things that we need to do to reduce costs, and i appreciated the words of my colleague from the neighboring state of south dakota, and i think he's well aware that pharmaceutical prices are number one on the minds of people in many of our states. i ask republicans to join us in pushing medicare to finally negotiate lifting the ban so we can negotiate less expensive drugs under medicare part-d, something every democrat is committed to in our caucus and hope to get done in the next month. i also note that the president recently came out for e-15, something senator thune and i have worked together on for years, and that is now in place as one competitive fuel that should help not alleviate everything but be a major help, the release of the oil from the strategic petroleum reserves and so many other areas where we are working together. i don't think anyone thought we could emerge from a two-year pandemic and everything was going to be the same. obviously there is work for us to do together for the country to bring down costs and that is on all of our minds. but also on our minds is what has recently happened with the supreme court and the decision in the dobbs case. 20 days ago, only 20 days ago -- and you can see everything that's happened since that time -- the supreme court issued a ruling shredding nearly five decades of precedent protecting a woman's right to make her own health care decisions. now women are at the mercy of a patchwork of state laws governing their ability to access reproductive care, leaving them with fewer rights than their moms and their grandmas. over 20 states in just 20 days, over 20 states have laws in place that could be used to restrict access to abortion. 25 states in total are expected to ban abortion in the days and the weeks ahead. but, colleagues, i am afraid that the worst is yet to come. legislation was introduced in missouri to allow private citizens to act as vigilantes and sue people who help women cross state lines for reproductive care. vigilantes, just like we saw in texas. in texas, legislators are working on a bill to criminalize businesses that provide resources simply to help their workers obtain abortion services in other states. these proposals don't just hurt those in need of care. they are also creating an uncertain environment for doctors and straining resources at clinics in states like minnesota where reproductive rights are protected. two major states in the midwest, that's it -- illinois, minnesota. i spoke on the phone with the head of the red river clinic out of fargo, north dakota, who had to resort to a go fund me page to get the money she needs to move her clinic across the river to minnesota to a safe place. planned parenthood in morehead, minnesota, i met with them only a week ago about the services and the work that they're doing right now. in montana, clinics r have already begun requiring proof of residency for women seeking abortion pills because they're afraid they might be pursued by out-of-state prosecutors. of course we should never settle for a situation where women in minnesota have different rights than women in missouri or when women in illinois have different rights than women in texas. but with so many extreme republicans racing to state capitals to be the first to take away women's rights it's clear we must protect the right to travel to other states to access reproductive care. we don't have to imagine why this might matter. we don't need to conjure up hypotheticals. we already know what's happened. think about the heartbreaking, enraging story about the ten-year-old girl in ohio who had to go to indiana to get an abortion after she was impregnated by her rapist. and when that story came out last week, some people doubted it. and now in clear print, in the criminal complaint out of the state of ohio, we saw yesterday that, yes, this happened. this man raped a ten-year-old girl, and she got pregnant, and then she couldn't even get the care she needed at age 10 to get an abortion. she had to go across state lines to the state of indiana just to get her care. should the next little 10-year-old's right or 12-year-old's right or 14-year-old's right to get the care that she desperately needs be put in jeopardy? what about her mom? what about her doctor? where will this end? that's why we must not just codify roe v. wade into law with a bill that we voted on just last month, but we must also pass the freedom to travel for health care act by unanimous consent right now. that is a bill that our great colleague, senator cortez masto, is leading. our bill protects women and girls from being punished for traveling to another state to access abortion services. it also ensures doctors won't be punished for providing reproductive care outside their home state, as clinics across the country struggle to navigate this post roe nightmare landscape, they should not have to add to their list of worries whether they will be criminally prosecuted for serving patients in a nearby state. this is an issue, as i node that hit -- as i noted that hit close to home because minnesota being in a neighborhood that includes the states of north dakota, south dakota, iowa, wisconsin, all of which have various issues with the reproductive health care. the freedom to travel cannot be an empty promise. that's why the bill gives the department of justice as well as women and doctors the power to sue people who infringe on the right to travel for health care. women in states with abortion bans already face enough obstacles to care. we can't wait to see what anti-choice state leshts criminalize next -- ledges is slay tors criminalize next. who should get to make the personal decisions for a woman or for a 10-year-old girl? should it be her family? should it be a woman herself, or should it be politicians, our colleagues on the other side of the aisle who supported these justices, put them in place in the supreme court, got us to where we are right now? i think the answer is clear. today each and every one of my colleagues has the opportunity to show where they stand. will we come together, protect this essential right to seek health care across state lines for the sake of the women and, yes, the young girls across this country? i hope we do. i thank senator cortez masto for her leadership. i yield the floor. a senator: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from colorado. mr. bennet: thank you, madam president. i thank the senior senator from minnesota for her remarks and for what brings us to the floor today. this is the first time in american history, madam president, that a fundamental right, a fundamental constitutional right has been stripped away from the american people and especially american women by the supreme court of the united states. in dobbs, the united states supreme court demolished 50 years of precedent, half a century of democratic and republican-appointed justices upholding a constitutional right to privacy that has now been obliterated by the united states supreme court, a fundamental right that has been upheld over and over again by justices appointed, as i said, by both presidents of both sides of the aisle. madam president, if you had said to me when i was in law school in the early 1990's that this day would ever come that the united states supreme court using a radical, a radical method of constitutional interpretation called originalism that was invented basically when i was in law school, if you had told me that there would have been a president of the united states who would appoint a majority of the supreme court with that radical interpretation, i would never have believed it. i would never have believed it. and that's what's happened because of the justices donald trump put on the supreme court, and i want people to hear me that are republicans in this country and this chamber. look it up. i know it's called originalism. but it started in the 1980's and started in the 1990's. it's not the way our constitution has been interpreted all these years. this is radical. it is not conservative. in no sense is this a conservative decision. and it's happened, and now americans no locker have a -- no longer have a constitutional right to privacy to make their own health and reproductive choices. and i can tell you, i read every one of these opinions, and in justice alito's opinion for the majority, he never even had the courage to grapple with the nature of this fundamental right. what stripping it away would mean for millions of americans. and especially millions of american women like my three daughters. instead, what he said was, what he wrote was, if it wasn't right in 1868, it's not a right today. that was the depth of his analysis. an opinion dripping with hostility and a cavalier attitude toward what he was stripping away from the american people. i know, i live in a state where there are people that hold very sincere beliefs on both sides of this question. this is a question that's hard for many americans, and that's why i have always believed the right place for this decision to be made is by a woman with her doctor, not by the state, not by a state saying you have to carry your pregnancy to term, without any regard for the individual circumstances that you might face. and instead, as a result of this court's decision, madam president, state laws to ban abortion that are literally from the 1800's are coming back into being. politicians are writing new state laws to force a woman to carry a pregnancy to term, as i said, without exceptions of think about that. even for women and children who've been raped, like that 10-year-old girl in ohio, who had to travel to indiana for an abortion. she's living in a state where they're talking about passing a personhood bill. soldiers serving, and i have heard in my own state from women who have served in the armed forces, who are worried about women serving us in the armed forces today on u.s. military bases in states like mississippi that have banned abortion. what's supposed to happen to them? what's happened to their right to privacy? even if we paid for them to travel, everybody's going to know what's going on. pregnant women could easily find themselves in america today in an emergency room with life-threatening complications. it happens literally every single day. every day, with doctors unable to help because somebody has to go and consult a lawyer. doctors afraid to prescribe medications for their patients or even have a conversation about their reproductive health for fear of prosecution. all over this countries there are elected leaders, so-called leaders, politicians putting themselves between a woman and her right to choose. nothing i am saying here is fantastic. everything i am saying here is being talked about, contemplated, legislated in america today. all across this country as a result of what the supreme court has done. a woman with cancer could learn she's pregnant, happens every day, every day, and learn she can't get the treatment she needs for her cancer. this is literally crazy! it is literally crazy. as you've heard on the floor today, this isn't even crazy enough for some of these elected politicians around the country. now they're threatening to use the law to prevent women, american citizens, from exercising their right to travel across state lines to access reproductive health care. in the united states of america. it wasn't enough to strip women of this fundamental right and have the states force them to bring a pregnancy to term. that's not enough. now they want to use the law to prevent her from traveling from one state to another, in the united states of america. i see the pages sitting here today, who are the age of my daughter, one of them, who's 17 years old. i can't believe this is what we're handing over to the next generation of americans. i can't believe it! i cannot believe it. this is despicable! especially coming from the same people who can never stop telling us how devoted they are to freedom and liberty. what a lie that is! what a lie that is. i am coming to the end. i know my colleague from georgis next, but i want to say one last thing. i am so grateful to live in a state like colorado, a western, purple state, where we have already codified a woman's right to an abortion. a woman's right to choose. we understand, and we have always as a state understood, that protecting a woman's personal liberty to make these decisions is fundamental to her freedom to participate in our society. and if people from other states need to come to colorado to access the care they need, congress has the obligation to shield them from prosecution, and we need to make sure that health care providers, no matter where they are -- colorado and other states -- are safe from prosecution, to say nothing of the women themselves, to say nothing of teenage girls themselves. i can't believe we're even having this conversation on the floor of the united states senate. i can't believe it. but that's the america we live if now because of this supreme court, because of this radical ideology that they have perpetrated. and that's why i strongly, strongly support this bill from my colleague from nevada, katherine cortez-masto. on behalf of my three daughters, i want to thank her for her invaluable leadership on this issue. mr. president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from oregon. mr. wyden: mr. president, many colleagues want to speak, and i'm going to be brief. the name of senator. ms. cortez masto:'s bill -- the name of -- mr. wyden: the name of senator cortez masto's bill sums up what this is all about. the senator has proposed, she's a former attorney general, a very skilled lawyer, she has proposed legislation, the freedom to travel for health care act. and i just want us to take a second to think about the name of my colleague from nevada's legislation. and i would submit to the senate that you know something has gone horribly wrong in america when the senate is forced to consider a proposal entitled the freedom to travel for health care act. colleagues, just look at those words -- the freedom to travel for health care. my colleague has introduced a bill that is as basic as it get. and the fact is six republicans on the supreme court have ripped that freedom out by the roots. now state governments are moving toward criminalizing travel for health care. they are open moving towards -- they are even moving towards criminalizing helping, helping people travel for health care. that is unthinkable in my view, except millions and millions of americans are, in fact, thinking about it and being terrified every single day. now, in my home state of oregon we're fortunate to live in a state that protects women's health and women's basic freedoms. in my home state -- and my home state is going to be there for people to get the health care they need, including an abortion. but the fight cannot be left up to the states. so that is why i'm so pleased to stand with my colleague from nevada, senator cortez-masto, my partner from the pacific northwest, senator murray, to call for the senate to pass legislation with the name the freedom to travel for health care act. and what my colleague's legislation does is protect women and doctors, and she does it by protecting a institutional right, -- a constitutional right, the constitutional right to interstate travel. colleagues, even after these three weeks that overturned roe, it is shocking and appalling to see what has come next. we see states sprinting towards banning and criminalizing abortion outright. are you a victim of rape or incest? no exceptions. are you a child? you'll still be forced to birth the child. is your life in danger if you carry a pregnancy to term? you better get your affairs in order. that's the world millions and millions of american women are living in now that the republicans on the supreme court have ripped away roe v. wade. more women's lives are in danger. more american freedoms are disappearing. the legislation proposed by my colleague from nevada is as basic as it gets. the senate needs to act now, and it needs to act without any further delay. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from colorado. mr. hickenlooper: mr. president, the senate should absolutely support the freedom to travel for health care act. currently, abortion is banned in ten states, and many more are set to follow. though not in colorado, where we acted strongly to support access to reproductive care, like other pro-choice states, we are seeing a large influx of patients. yet, we've heard tragic stories of women sleeping in their cars overnight outside of clinics after traveling hundreds of miles as they wait for appointments. after the texas abortion ban took effect, one woman had her water break at 19 weeks, actually on her wedding day, she'd moved up her wedding day. the doctors recommended terminating her pregnancy to protect her life, increase the possibility, likelihood she'd have children in the future, but it wasn't allowed in texas. so she flew to colorado for emergency care. her doctor had her make a plan for this travel, make a plan in case she went into labor on the flight. the plan was to sit near the bathroom. that's what it will soon come to for women in half of america. without this legislation, a woman could face prosecution for traveling across state lines. let that sink in. her choice would be possible jail or probable death. this bill will protect every woman's right to travel to seek reproductive care. oo basic freedom, but also protect doctors who would practice in states like colorado and protect them from prosecution and lawsuits for helping out of state patients. fundamentally, as my fellow senators have said, this is about freedom. in this new post roe era, women could be forced into government mandated pregnancy. they are stripping women the freedom over their bodies and their future. the least we should do is protect every patient traveling to receive care that just a few weeks ago was permitted nationwide. threatening millions of women and doctors with jail time for seeking or providing reproductive health care would be a true stain on this nation. i hope we can find 60 senators to support this bill. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: mr. president, i'm very glad to stand with senator cortez masto to support this legislation and also recognize the leadership of senator murray on this issue as we fight to protect fundamental rights belonging to the women of america. for nearly half a century women relied on roe's recognition that the constitution protects their right to decide if and when to have children. a radical and captured supreme court has revoked this constitutional right, disrupting the reliance and trust of generations of women to make fundamental decisions about their own health and their own futures. overturning roe is wildly unpopular, which is why extremists went to the captured court to get a change that they could not get through the democratic process. deep-pocketed extremist interests invested hundreds of millions of dollars over decades to build a court where that kind of stuff could get done. it is an outrage. women across this country are angry, democrats in congress are angry, and we are fighting back in every way we can. in addition to state abortion bans, emboldened legislatures are readying even more extreme restrictions on women, like proposals to investigate, prosecute, and sue women who travel out of state to get the care they need. you think i'm kidding? legislation to this effect has already been introduced in missouri. the constitution already protects the right to interstate travel, but as we now have seen, we can't rely on an increasingly extremist supreme court to protect our rights. remember, in a large number of reof -- pregnancies, abortion actually becomes medically necessary -- me medical medicaly necessary for the life of the mother and for the risk to other children. so it is extremely important to make sure women can get that medical care. it's extremely important to protect their right to make this choice themselves, and it's extremely important to protect medical professionals in states like rhode island, my home state, from punishment for providing care to women from states where state legislatures have made abortions illegal. i was proud to work with senator cortez masto from the outset to help draft the freedom to travel for health care act. it will protect women's rights to cross state lines and seek medical services and protect providers in states that they're traveling to. i urge my colleagues to join swift passage of this bill. this is one step. there is much more to be done to stop this continuing assault on women's constitutional rights. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from washington. ms. cantwell: mr. president, while our colleagues are joining us to speak on behalf of the cortez masto language, i want to thank the senator from nevada for her legislation and just emphasize how important this is to people all through the united states, including my state that happens to be a border state, but even in seattle providers are worried about a chilling effect. so i was wondering if the senator from nevada, while our colleagues have been talking about how this impacts individuals, people seeking health care in other states, what is happening now with the chilling effect to providers and their anxiety over people pursuing them for seeing patients from states in which roe v. wade is not fully protected. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from nevada. ms. cortez masto: thank you. i appreciate my colleague in washington and the question posed. it is part of the concern we have. i was in nevada recently and i'm proud that nevada is a pro-chase state. our providers are concerned. there is a chilling effect when they hear other states are criminalizing, looking to criminalize a provider for providing health care and a woman traveling across state lines. so what i hear from my providers is that we want to help women. we want them to come to our state but if their state is going to pursue legislation or criminalize or peenlize or prosecute us or a private citizen can come after them from that state, we have problems because they do not want to be embroiled in litigation. that is the part of this. thank you for the question. that's exactly what their intent is. these antichoice states, individuals who are taking away the liberty and freedom of children are also utilizing this chilling effect, this threat, this scare tactic for providers, employers, and anyone else who want to help women to get to states where they can seek this health care that they need and a that is the challenge we see and that's why this law is so important because it's having an impact for these providers in legitimate choice states like ours that want to provide health care. ms. cantwell: we were joined by the american medical association who also expressed this concern. they are speaking on behalf of the providers that want to provide reproductive choice in states that want to pass this law so we are concerned. we want to get this passed. i thank the senator from nevada. the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. brown: and i thank senator cantwell for her leadership and especially senator cortez masto for her legislation, will i'm about to address -- which i'm about to address. she was in the banking and housing committee and was on the floor and i thank her for protecting women's rights. i want to comment on some of the things that she said and senator cantwell said about this issue and one specific thing that happened in my state which is outrageous and immoral. the stream decision a few weeks ago of five judges took away women's freedom on their own decisions. we saw how this puts women's health at risk. my state, unfortunately, is worse in what's happened. less than ten years -- fewer than ten hours after the supreme court's announcement, ohio's six-week abortion ban took affect, they banned abortion in cases of rape and incest. that might women across ohio received calls from their doctors letting them know that their appointments have been canceled and need to travel to another state for health care. they are forcing ohioans time off work to find child care and use resources they may not have to get the lifesaving care they need. one group at a roundtable i did. i do this job much by listening to round tables of ten or 15 or 20 ohioans talk to me about veterans care, health care, or in this case women's health or jobs or all of the things that i learned and take back to washington. i am hearing from doctors that because ohio laws are so extreme -- so extreme that women and men -- especially women, but men too, young doctors that might do their residencies at some of the best hospitals in the world, cleveland hospital, nationwide children's and other hospitals that doctors are having second thoughts about wanting to move to ohio because these abortion laws are so radical, immoral and stream. i'm hearing that prestigious colleges, ohio has more small colleges and small universities, private, four-year schools than almost any state in the country. and we have great state universities in ohio and great community colleges. i'm beginning to hear from college presidents that students who are considering to come to ohio to go to school are having second thoughts again because of the extremism of this legislature on abortion and as the presiding officer, the senate's expert on this issue, the extremism on gun laws in ohio. one candidate was not -- was campaigning for congress in northwest ohio and he had a holster under -- under new ohio law, he had a holster with a gun in it as he was walking alongside of the street handing candy to children. it's just ludicrous. back to the issue that senator cortez masto is leading on the earlier this month, a 10-year-old girl, a child, a survivor of rape was forced to travel to indiana from ohio to get health care. she was past six weeks. politicians tried to deny it. they mocked her -- they mocked the story. they said it couldn't be true and then the man who did it was arrested. no real apology from these well-known republican politicians, members of congress, statewide officeholders many they had mocked this story to say it couldn't be true when it was true. yet, did they apologize? no. they should look into a camera and stand in front many of us and apologize and apologize to the little girl and her family and doctors and support group that she has. no ten-year-old should have to go through what she has been through. since may sexual abuse involving in -- 50 reports of rape or sexual abuse involving children under 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10. children that have been abused like that have been reported in columbus alone. i don't know, are the right wingers in the legislature that think that abortion should -- that no woman should be protected, rape, incest, life and health of the mother, that they just deny any of this happened? are they going to do that again and continue to attack these families? now, because of the ohio legislature fixation on controlling women's bodies, victims of rape in ohio will not be able to access the care they need. even in cases where it is allowed, doctors will be afraid to provide it. i heard the fear in the voices of the doctors at the roundtable in cleveland, and i heard senator mu talk about this. i heard doctors talk about the fear that their colleagues have even to get near a pregnant patient who might have another health care issue. women and girls shouldn't have to travel around the country to receive care. in many cases, care that will save their health or their lives. doctors shouldn't have to wait on lawyers if they can provide the care. the fear of these doctors, these were brave women, two women and a man. they were talking about the fear in others, other physicians that they are afraid they're going to have to wait on lawyers to tell them if they can provide the care their patients need. that's what happens when politicians insist on making medical decisions for women and girls that doctors and the women and girls themselves and their families should be making. now antichoice politicians attacking senator cortez masto's bill are trying to criminal interstate travel. politicians can't hold pregnant women and girls hostage. politicians should not be able to decide who can travel where. this is america. this is in my state, ohio. you're allowed to travel wherever you want, whenever you want, as long as you're doing it legally. interstate travel is a constitutional right. that's why this senate must pass the freedom to travel for health care act to protect that right, to protect ohio women and girls, to protect the health care professionals who serve them, all of them. when, how, and whether to have a family is the most personal and meaningful decisions we make in life. the freedom to make those decisions for yourself, free from political interference should be available to everyone, everyone. we can't accept a world where daughters and our granddaughters have fewer rights and less freedom. as soon as i heard about that decision, about -- over the dobbs case and roe v. wade, the first thing i thought about, my wife who will celebrate her 65th birthday in two weeks, i thought that my mother, my deceased mother and my wife have more rights than my daughters in their 30's and early 40's and my granddaughters are still too young to really understand what this is about. what kind of world is that where people of my generation had more rights than we're bequeathing to her children and grandchildren. i won't stop. i know senator murray won't stop working to protect women's freedom, all americans' freedoms to have families and live their lives how they want, when they want, free from meddling politicians. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from washington. mrs. murray: thank you, mr. president. yesterday i chaired a hearing focused on driving home the devastating repercussions of the health care crisis republicans caused by overturning roe and ending the right to abortion. at that hearing, doctors and patients and experts spoke directly to the chaos and harm republicans are causing. tens of millions of women across the country now live in states where abortion has been banned or is likely to be banned soon. republicans have ripped away every woman's ability to decide for herself whether or not to keep a pregnancy, and have forced them, forced them to be pregnant when they do not want to be. republicans are denying women control over their own bodies, endangering their health and putting patients and providers in impossible, indefensible situations. doctors unsure if they can save their patients without being punished. pharmacists unsure if they can fulfill a prescription. people unsure if they will be able to get plan b. unsure if they'll be able to use i.v.f. to start a family and afraid they could get reported or investigated or even arrested for having a miscarriage. and so many women forced to travel across state lines to get the reproductive care they need. people forced to drive miles and miles just to get the care that could save their lives. good god. this should be unthinkable. but as we saw yesterday's hearing, that's exactly the sort of oppressive regime, exactly the sort of nightmare reality republicans have chosen to champion. my colleague, the junior senator from kansas, actually said the fall of roe was, quote, a positive development. leader mcconnell even called it a, quote, jie gantically forward. -- jie gantically forward. you think the harm across this country is positive? that's despicable. of course another thing we saw at that hearing is that republicans will do anything they can to change the subject from the damage that we'll see, to ignore the reality of how deadly their policies are. news flash. when you force someone to be pregnant, they're going to notice. they're going to remember and they're going to be painfully aware of the difference between their personal decision and the reality republican politicians are forcing on them. and the horrifying thing is, republicans aren't just trying to mislead about the real impact of this cruel agenda. they are pushing for a national abortion ban. and republican lawmakers have already set their sights on ripping away the right to travel. let's be really clear what that means. they want to hold women captive in their own states. they want to punish women and anyone who might help them for exercising their constitutional right to travel within our country, to get the services that they need in another state. i hope everyone really observes how extreme and how radical and how un-american that is. i mean, just imagine what bans like that would mean for people. in my home state of washington, the city of clarkston is separated from lewiston, idaho, by a river. just a bridge. that's it. people across that -- people cross that bridge every single day without a second thought, and they cross state borders just like it every day, by the millions. surely we can all agree that crossing that bridge, crossing any state border to go to the doctor and get health care you need should not be a crime. surely that's common sense. surely every republican who has raid against big government could agree with me about that. i'll be honest. based on the shameless hypocrisy i've seen this week, i doubt it. but we are about to find out because we are about to request we pass a bill that my colleague from nevada along with senator gillibrand, senator whitehouse and i introduced on tuesday, the freedom to travel for health care act. it's telling that some republicans are already saying that this is a solution in search of a problem. well, let's be clear about the problem because it is real and it is imminent. conservative legal organizations are right now drafting legislation to ban travel for abortion. it was discussed at two antiabortion conferences already. republican texas legislators are saying out loud they are working with the national association of christian lawmakers to draft bills restricting travel modeled after their barbaric vigilante abortion ban. and there is already legislation introduced in missouri to ban abortion travel. anyone telling you this is not a threat, not paying -- is not paying attention or just trying to mislead you. so there is a problem. here's the solution. what this bill does is simple. it protects every american's constitutional right to travel across state lines and to travel in order to get or provide a lawful abortion. it prevents states from restricting or impeding americans' right to travel to access care. and ensures there is legal recourse in states' attempt to restrict that right. and it protects health care providers who are licensed to provide abortions in the states where they are practicing. this should not be controversial. we should all agree americans have a right to travel within the united states and get the reproductive care they need. so i urge my colleagues to support this proposal and to work with us to make sure that americans get access to the health care they need where they need it. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. daines: mr. president, recently the supreme court righted a historic injustice. and it was clearly written in the opinion by justice alito. said this is to return the power to the people, return the power to the people's elected representatives instead of nine men back in 1973 in black robes to decide this very important issue. he said the people should decide the right parameters to protect moms and their babies from the violence of abortion. and rather than use this opportunity to protect life, very soon the senate democrats will try to pass a very extreme, extreme abortion bill. remember how extreme our colleagues have become on the other side of the aisle on the issue of abortion. want to codify the ability to abort babies up until the moment of birth. in fact, we've seen my colleagues across the aisle reject trying to protect babies that are born alive as a result of an abortion. it's chilling. this bill is going to be presented -- that's going to be presented does nothing to help pregnant moms in crisis or their unborn babies. this bill as we've been looking at it which has been hastily put together in the last 48 hours, this bill would give fly-in abortionists free rein to commit abortions on demand up to the moment of birth and even it seems perform them within a state with strong pro-life laws. this bill also protects the greed, frankly, of woke corporations who see it's cheaper to pay for an abortion, an abortion tourism, than maternity leave for their employees. we must reject this radical legislation that will endanger pregnant mothers and endanger their babies. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from nevada. ms. cortez masto: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent to speak up to ten minutes prior to the scheduled vote. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. cortez masto: mr. president, i rise today along with my colleagues, and i want to thank my colleague, senators murray, whitehouse, and gillibrand for their good work with me on the legislation we are talking about today which is the freedom to travel for health care act. as you've heard from my colleagues and as we know in the past few mo months, we've seen women's right to choose taken away in states around the country overnight. less than three weeks ago, the supreme court explicitly overturned roe v. wade depriving women of a right they held for 50 years. when the court decided dobbs v. jackson, women's v. jackson's women's health organization, it repeatedly insisted its holding would, quote, return the issue of abortion to the people's elected representatives in the states. forget women. forget women's rights. but let's give it to the elected -- let's give it to the politicians. as a result in 18 states abortion is either effectively banned or will be been 30 -- within 30 days. ultimately around half of the states are expected to get rid of most or all of abortion services within their borders. in the face of these profound restrictions on reproductive health services, american women who are able to do so have had to travel to states like mine that still protect the woman's right to choose thanks to a 1990 referendum, nevada has enshrined the right to choose in statute in my state. that's why we're already seeing women make their way to nevada to get the health care that they need and they deserve. but radical antichoice policymakers have been emboldened by the supreme court decision and it's this court and it's shocking disregard for precedent. yet they are not satisfied with a country where abortion is only banned in half of the states. we know now they are working to introduce legislation in congress to ban abortion nationwide. and until they can pass it, they want to stop women from traveling for critical care and to punish people who support these women. antichoice state legislators in missouri, in texas, and arkansas have said they want to pass bills to fine or prosecute women who travel for health care, do the same to providers who offer abortion services, and the many employers who have said they will support their employees who need to seek reproductive care in another state. let me be specific about this, because this is devastating already to so many, including in my state. in missouri, a state legislator has repeatedly introduced legislation that would allow private citizens to sue those who help missouri citizens receive out-of-state abortion services. in texas, state legislators have said they will introduce legislation to ban businesses that help employees travel to receive abortions. they've also written cease-and-desist letters to companies and even law firms to tell them to stop helping employees who seek abortion out of state. and in arkansas, a state senator has called for a law targeting businesses helping employees travel for care. and let's not forget south dakota, because the governor of south dakota refused in an interview to rule out laws that target women who travel for abortion. but we're not done yet, because we also know that some antichoice groups are actively pushing for such bans. the thomas more society, an extremist antichoice group, is working on draft legislation. its vice president told "the washington post," quote, just because you jump across a state line doesn't mean your home state doesn't have jurisdiction. it's not a free abortion card when you drive across the state line. the national association of christian lawmakers led by republican state legislators is also reported to be working on similar legislation modeled after the texas law. there's no doubt in my mind that some states are going to continue to move forward with these kinds of legislation. and i want to note that, quite frankly, some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have tried to have it both ways for years, insisting that the right to choose was safe -- in my state they've done it -- at the same time they've supported increasingly extreme limits to it. we've heard nominees say that they would follow supreme court precedent, including roe and casey, yet we know those reassurances were all false. we've seen women's reproductive rights eroded for decades. and we know that antichoice activists won't stop. this is a form of gaslighting, to keep insisting that american women will be able to get care when we know that antichoice legislators and groups are working to stop them from doing so. what legislators are doing across the country to restrict women from traveling is just blatantly unconstitutional. they constrain the fundamental constitutional right to travel. they are antiwoman. they're antibusiness, and they're anti-provider. and let me just say, merely proposing this legislation -- merely talking about civil action or prosecuting a woman or a prior or even an employer that helps a woman to travel is having a chilling effect. in my state, we're already seeing that these proposals are having a chilling effect on my providers who are worried about offering quality abortion care in the face of potential lawsuits. and in montana, reproductive health clinics are even limiting care to in-state residents only. imagine traveling hundreds of miles for essential health care only to be turned away for fear of a lawsuit. that's why i and my colleagues have introduced this bill to make it crystal clear -- states cannot and must not prosecute women who travel across state lines for critical reproductive care. our legislation also protects health care providers in disten nation-states and -- in destination states and anyone who helps women travel to states. today we're calling to pass this legislation. if my colleagues on the other side of the aisle believe in states' rights and the liberty of freedom -- and the liberty and freedom of women in this country, they should support this bill. if they believe in the fundamental right of all americans to travel, they should support this bill. and if they fail to protect women who travel for health care and those who support them, then they need to go on record for the american people to explain why. and i'll tell you what, mr. president, it is not enough to stand there and say that somehow this legislation is a fly-in abortionist legislation. my colleague from montana failed to read this legislation and fearmongering at this point in time when women's rights, fundamental rights are being eroded in this country is not the answer that women and so many americans in this country now need. what we need is for people to recommend and support and identify with the freedoms that this country brings to all of us, whether you are a he a woman or a man -- whether you're a woman or man in this country. this is about a right to choose. it is a fundamental right, an important right for health care and our decisions. we are 50% of this population, and we deserve to be treated equally. with that, mr. president, as if in legislative session, i ask unanimous consent that the judiciary committee be discharged from further consideration of s. 4504 and the senate proceed to its immediate consideration. further, that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. lankford: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. lankford: reserving the right to object, this is my first time to be able to stand and speak since the court made the decisions in dobbs. i've been on this floor i actually don't know how many times talking about the value of every single child. the conversation today is not just about the right to travel and the right to health care, it's deeper than that. i.t. the right to -- it's the right to live. the conversation today is not just about women. there are two people in this conversation -- a child with ten fingers and ten toes and a beating heart and d.n.a. that is uniquely different than mom's d.n.a. or the dad's d.n.a. they have a nervous system. they feel pain. this is a child -- there's a child in this conversation as well. in my conversation when i've come to the floor over and over again has been to say at some point our nation should look at basic science and to say, when you have d.n.a., when you have a functioning nervous system, and you have cell division, in every health book everywhere in the country, they call that life. for some reason on this floor it's just tissue. i actually come to be able to thank millions of women and millions of men who for five decades have not written off children, who have walked out, who have marched, who have silently prayed, who have gathered in places and said, when are we going to recognize what is self-evident -- that child in the womb is a child. and that child may be inconvenient, but that's a child. when are we going to recognize that basic thing? and for 50 years that conversation has gone on with the simple statement of, at what point will we be able to speak out for the value of every person? and i do mean every person. including the mom. it's been interesting to hear all the misinformation in the past couple of weeks. i've read story after story and seen all these breathless news reports about women with an ectopic pregnancy will not be able to get care, they'll be doomed to die. except there is no state law that will prohibit someone from getting treatment that is lifesaving from an ectopic pregnancy in any state. i've heard all these reports that there will be miscarriages and you won't be able to get care, except that's not true in a single place -- not one. this over and over riling people up. what i have seen are 50 churches that of the been attacked. what i have seen are 57 crisis resource centers for pregnancy resource that have been attacked and firebombed. i have seen that. now, we don't seem to discuss that here on the floor. no one is actually saying all of this conversation, all of this misinformation, all this noise is actually leading to actual violence across the country. everyone is, like, no, no, no, that's not related. oh, really? so when a pregnancy resource center is firebombed and spraypainted on the side of it, if abortions aren't safe in america, neither are you, we should probably just ignore that. because that's what's actually going on across the country right now as well. to be very clear, no state has banned interstate travel for adult women seeking to obtain an abortion. no state has done that a now, am i confident there are some people that are out there talking? yes, but there's also in this senate 5,000 bills that have been filed, and how many of them are actually going to move? as it is in every legislature across the country -- and everybody in this body knows it, everyone knows it. but this seems to be just trying to inflame, to raise the what if's. it's interesting to me that there's another bill that's actually being discussed that would literally, if you are a crisis resource -- or pregnancy resource center, if you don't perform abortion,s, they would call that misinformation. in the other bill that's being discussed right now, it would fine you $100,000. i can't even begin to explain my emotion when i think, if you take the life of a child, there's pressure to say we want federal funding to take the life of a child. if you protect the life of a child, we're going to fine you $100,000. is that really where we are? is that really what this debate has become? this administration has quickly become the most pro-abortion administration in american history and has rapidly moved to accelerate abortions across the country. while millions of other americans just asked a simple question -- does that child in the womb have the right to travel in their future? do they get to live? to some, they would say no. they're terribly inconvenient. they need to die. others would say, why don't we actually live by our values, including the right to life. so while there's conversation about how to put a piece of legislation out that may very well protect individuals that are being trafficked to go to other states to get an abortion or all kinds of other issues that are there, i come back to the most basic thing -- there is a child in this conversation, and maybe this body should pay attention to children as well and to wonder what their future could be to travel in the days ahead as well. i look forward to the day when we are talking more about that little girl and less about misinformation. i object. ms. cortez masto: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from nevada. ms. cortez masto: thank you, mr. president. i appreciate my colleague from oklahoma coming here to talk. i disagree with his arguments but i do appreciate his profound belief in what he is saying. i think it is ironic that the issue here before us is really a states' rights issue. it's exactly what justice alito did in the dobbs case and referred this issue to the states to make that decision. and all my legislation says is, respect my state. we are a choice state. we've made that decision as a state, and if women want to travel to my state to seek services and my providers want to provide those services and employers want to help women travel, then let the states do that. we shouldn't be impeding those decisions. so it's kind of ironic, i hear my colleagues talking about, in this case, let's take the emotion out of it except when they want to put the emotion in it. or let's respect states' rights except when it's not convenient for the issue they're making a. the arguments that they're going to start making that somehow this legislation is an abortionist issue. it is a states' rights issue. the actual health care is already there. the other thing i have which is offensive to me is that somehow this is trafficking women. i know trafficking. i wrote the law to prevent sex trafficking, sexual exploitation in the state of nevada for so many who were being sexual exploited across this country, to hold the predators accountable to make sure they can become survivors. this is not trafficking. and for anyone to stand up and say this is has a complete misunderstanding and quite honestly i welcome you to the fight about human trafficking in this country that is sexual exploitation for women and children across the country. that is so offensive. but i'm not surprised because in this day and age, unfortunately some of these radical ideas coming out of this congress miss what is happening across the country. a majority of americans in this country support the right of women to choose because you know why? i don't know what it's like to step in their shoes and walk in their shoes and nor do you. nor does anyone here. i shouldn't impose my beliefs, my religion, any ideas on what they should do for their lives. none of us should. that's the freedom in this country. that's who we are when we stand for freedoms and liberty. it doesn't mean we get to pick and choose those freedoms and take away the rights of very individuals because we believe differently. or our religion thinks that we should do differently. that's what we do when we come into this congress and we all work together to the benefit of everyone, and not erode their rights and their future and their opportunities. that's what this is about. this legislation is very simple. let's protect those freedoms. let's make sure we protect those states' rights and allow women health care providers, and employers to actually support and help one another in this country. that's what this legislation does. and to say otherwise is misconstruing, it's fearmongerring, and a continuing erosion of the debate of the constitutional rights and the american rights in this country right now. and that's the problem with congress. mr. president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the question occurs on the heinzelman nomination. is there al sufficient second? there appears to be. the clerk will call the roll. vote: vote: vietnam la in a teak cannous skia. vietnam lana tikhanovskaya cannous skia vote: vote: the presiding officer: on this vote the yeas are 50, the nays are 41 and the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid upon the table, and the president will be immediately notified of the senate's action. under the previous order, the senate will resume consideration of the following nomination which the clerk will report. the clerk: the judiciary, julianna michelle childs much south carolina to be united states circuit judge for the district of columbia circuit. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senior senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, the senate is not in order. the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, inflation continues to batter american families at a rate we have not seen in 40 years. since last year, the price of items that texans use every day have increased more than 9%. that is if your paycheck is still the same, you have 9% less purchasing power just since last year. at the grocery store the price of bread is up nearly 11%. chicken's up more than 17%. and the price of eggs has jumped a whopping 33%. you know what i sense is a huge disconnect between the folks here in washington, perhaps in congress, that this does not have a dramatic effect on in terms of our daily lives, but the people we represent, the 29 million people i represent, this is real, it's happening now, and it's to the detriment of their quality of life. groceries aren't the only thing that are challenging family budgets. electricity is up 14%. i'll be traveling with some colleagues to the rio grande valley this afternoon. i looked at the weather forecast for today and tomorrow. it will be 104 degrees in the rio grande valley. and no, it will not be a dry heat. demand on our electricity is real because people cannot live without air-conditioning and climate control, but in order to run your air-conditioning you're going to have to pay 14% more for that electricity this year as opposed to last year. propane used at summer barbecues costs 26% more. and gasoline prices, they're about -- there are about 280 million cars on the road today that run using gasoline. the price has jumped 60% since last year. if people want to go on a vacation, they just commute to work, they want to take their kids to summer camp, they've got to pay 60% more for gas leeb than they did last -- for gasoline than last year. for the first time, the national average is a price that has exceeded $5 a gallon. over the last few weeks, thankfully, prices have fallen slightly, and i emphasize the word slightly, but there's no reason to celebrate. the national average is still about $4.60, about $1.50 lier than last year alone. the american people are looking to washington, d.c. to their elected leaders, wondering why aren't you doing something about it. they want to know what the biden administration's plans are to address these rising costs, especially when it comes to things that are not -- there are some things you can substitute for others. i even saw a woman on the news said she decided to become a vegetarian because she couldn't afford the meat, the cost in the grocery store. some things you simply are irreplaceable, and gasoline to drive your car is one of them. well, one of the most logical ways to increase the supply of gasoline, because it really is about supply and demand, would be to boost mesh production -- to boost american production of our domestic energy supply. that way we could reap the economic benefits of strong production here at home, along with the jobs that go along with it. we could continue to use our capability to export things lie natural gas to countries that previously were dependent almost exclusively on the russian federation. actually, the capacity of the united states to produce energy at home and export it around the world has changed the geopolitics of the planet in a very positive way. but unfortunately, we see the biden administration has taken a different approach. he knows that a part of his political base would have an absolute meltdown if the president showed anything other than contempt for the domestic energy producers. and so he's come up with a different strategy that frankly makes no sense whatsoever. so, he's on a trip to the middle east, going to visit with mohammed bin salman, crown prince of the kingdom of saudi arabia, and ask him to increase production of oil and gas from not the united states, but from saudi arabia. forget american energy producers. the president would rather go hat in hand and talk to an autocrat, an oligarch in the middle east than he would to take his boot off the neck of american energy producers. so, apparently the president is not anti-fossil fuels. he's just anti-american fossil fuels. president biden's trip illustrates a remarkable show of his priorities. he views the crown prince in saudi arabia as a more dependable ally than energy producers in texas. well, the decision to shop for oil in the middle east instead of harnessing what is in our backyard is absolutely baffling. the sooner the administration views domestic energy producers as a friend and ally rather than enemies, the better we will all be off. we are fortunate to live in a resource-rich country. growing up, i learned in school that countries that are endowed with great natural resources have an advantage over other countries that do not have those natural resources, and we do have them here in the united states, along with the technology to develop them. but for some strange reason we simply refuse to do so. take what is a gift and ignore it completely and go hat in hand and talk to autocrats in other parts of the world and ask them to do what we should be doing here domestically. well, mr. president, on another matter, i'm eager to head home this afternoon to texas, where as i mentioned the weather is a little warm. we've been having i think about 33 days of plus-100-degree temperatures. as i was telling some colleagues here, no, it is not a dry heat, which is usually the response when you tell somebody how hot it is. they say, well, at least it's a dry heat. it's not. it's very hot. but it's summertime in texas, so we expect it and we adjust to that. but we're going specifically to the rio grande valley, which is that 1200-mile strip of land that's contiguous to mexico, between texas and mexico. and we're going with some of our senate colleagues so they can see for themselves what senator cruz and i have seen before and come to learn as a result of talking to the world's best experts in what's happening at the board, and that is the people who live and work there. the men and women who live and work along our border are the experts and the best people to talk to and learn from which is one reason why are i continue to be disappointed that the vice president, having been appointed border czar or immigration czar has yet to make a substantive visit to the border to do what we will do this afternoon and tomorrow, which is to listen and learn. and maybe, just maybe, it would prompt a change in the failed policies which have created a huge humanitarian crisis. is well, the folks who live and work on the border know the strain this has placed on local law enforcement, on their hospitals, on their schools, and the danger it creates for their communities. and just to be clear, i'm not talking about safety concerns in those communities. cities in the rio grande valley and along texas' southern border are not dangerous and law less places, but the people who pass through there can be. amidst the three million people that the border patrol has encountered in the last year and a half, there unfortunately presents opportunities for people with criminal records and people who are members of gangs and drug traffickers to be obscured by the vast flow of these three million people. once people cross the border they want to get to places like chicago, san diego, new york, seattle, atlanta. these are all places that have a presence of the drug cartels. because what i don't think enough people realize is once the drugs come across the border, same drugs that took the lives of 108,000 americans last year through drug overdoses, once those drugs come across the border, the network by which they are distributed are largely criminal street gangs, who are also responsible for most of the violence in our communities across the country because they're fighting each other for territory, for market share, to sell these illegal drugs to unsuspecting consumers. this is another reason for the spiking crime waves that we've seen in recent months across america. people want to act like this is something just contained in cities like chicago. it's a local problem. no, this is a systemic problem that flows from the biden administration's unwillingness to provide any level of controls to people coming across the border, or to deter people from making the long, dangerous journey and perhaps dying in the process. i've been in brooks county, which is where the falfurious checkpoints is. what happens is the smugglers smuggle people across the border, they put them in stash houses, then periodically they'll get them in some vehicle and travel up the highway, but that's why we have border patrol checkpoints about 50, 60 miles inland. but what will happen is the smugglers will tell the migrants get out of the car and meet me on the north side of this checkpoint. maybe, if they're lucky, they'll get an old milk carton full of water, maybe a power bar or something to sustain them. i've seen the bleached bones of migrants left behind and simply died in the process. recognizing the extreme temperatures that exist, particularly at times like this in places like texas, it's no surprise a number of these migrants don't make it. our border patrol is simply the front line in our law enforcement efforts along the border, but due to the failed policies of the biden administration the border patrol is unable to do the job that they swore to do, which is to defend and protect our borders, because they're simply overwhelmed by the number of people coming across. last month the rio grande valley sector agents arrested 10 ms-13 members, one of the most violent gangs in the world and two other gang members within a four-day span. 12 gang members in four days, and that was in just one of 20 border patrol sectors. since october, the border patrol has arrested more than 450 gang members, and we've already surged past the total for the entire previous year. and the scary thing is these are just the ones who were caught, because we know with the volume of people coming across there are what the border patrol calls the getaways, and they estimate that as many as 300,000 more people are getting across the border unbeknownst to the border patrol because they're simply preoccupied with these huge numbers, and they get away into the interior of the country. once they get across the border, particularly if they are people who have an intention to do harm and commit crime in the united states, they will end up in boston, sacramento, detroit, miami, or oyer in city in the -- or any other city in the united states. somebody said well, every city is a border city now. for all practical purposes, that's true. folks who live thousands of miles from the border can't write this off as a problem for somewhere else. this is a national problem. gangs and cartels are sending their henchmen to our cities and communities. they're traffic being in fentanyl, heroin, methamphetamine and other debtly drugs, along with guns and huma, along with guns and human trafficking. they're what one person called years ago commodity agnostic. in other words, they're in it for the money. they don't care how they make the money. they don't care about the people. they're just in it for the money. and in doing so, they're ushering in crime and violence and creating unsafe communities all across our country. this administration has ignored the crisis at our southern border in an effort to apiece open -- to appease open border members of their political party. they created a gate withway for cartel and gang members to wreak havoc on our communities. criminal organizations are very sophisticated. their business model is to overwhelm our capacity to stop them and to make that buck by selling people, drugs, or other contraband in the communities all across our country. so the situation at the border is not simply about immigration, it's about security, it's about public safety, it's about knowing who's crossing the border and coming to live in your community. so i'm eager to get back home to the rio grande valley to talk to some of these men and women who are doing heroic work on the front line of this crisis, who are getting no help from the biden administration. as i said, i wish president biden would come to the border. we would welcome him and show him what we have learned ourselves from our frequent trips there. maybe if the president saw and learned about the impact of the failed policies of his administration in person he would begin to take this crisis seriously. so, mr. president, every state is impacted by the security breakdown at the border and something needs to be done before the situation becomes even more dangerous than it currently is. mr. president, i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator for illinois. ms. duckworth: thank you, mr. president. 2-year-old aiden mccarthy was laying bloodied and pinned under his unconscientious father when he was found. aiden had somehow lost one shoe and was down to just one blood-soaked sock with scrapes across his body. it was last monday, july 4, and aiden was resked from the -- rescued from the latest mass shooting and left scar all those who was witness. i was in a parade in illinois when i heard about the shooting. i was there the moment the police came in and told us two good samaritans found this young boy sheltered under his father's body. when aiden was rescued, he kept asking for his mom and dad. tragically, horribly, we later learned they were never going to be able to comfort him ever again. his mother and father were among the seven murdered in highland park. their names were irna and kevin mccarthy. they spent that holiday morning eager to take pride in our country and eager to celebrate our goodness and greatness since the first july fourth. eager to celebrate america at her best. instead they experienced the very worst of it. they saw first hand what could happen with the gun lobby is prioritized over american lives and aiden is an orphan because of it. i woke up today unable to get the image of 2-year-old aiden's one bloodied sock out of my mind. i woke up, like i did every day since then, unable to have his mom or dad put on his diaper that morning. i thought about how when the first shots of the military style rifle rang out, his parents' first thought was about she woulding him. i am here to say their names and my five other constituents. kath lynn goldstein, jacqueline sun hiem, nicholas toledo, and irna and kevin mccarthy. there are too many victims of the gun violence to -- to name them here. gun violence is the biggest killer of children. it happens in buffalo, chicago, uvalde, pittsburgh, in virginia beach, in two different auroras, in happens in low-income communities, in urban areas, it happens everywhere in america, but almost nowhere outside of this country. it happens so much here that we only hear about it in the national news when a large enough number of people are killed at one time and in one place. think about that. every time gun violence occurs, someone decides whether or not the number murdered is worthy of breaking news graphics on tv and too often the answer is no. because there have been more mass shootings in 2022 than days in the year and because we as a country have become number. we witnessed that last week in chicago as over the holiday weekend chicago's death toll climbed higher than the devastation seen in highland park. in chicago communities, gun violence is viewed as all too comofn and they've heard of toddlers in strollers killed by a stray bullet or parents killed when picking up their children from school. we've become desensitized even as elementary schoolers lives are being stolen and survivors' innocence are lost. every gun death is a tragedy that can and should be prevented. this is a uniquely american disease and it requires a national solution. so i'm here on the floor today to plead with my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to help keep another toddler having to cry out for his parents amid-gun -- amid begunshots, to -- gunshots, to keep another grocery store trip becoming a nightmare, i have legislation that would transfer manufacture and importation of military style assault weapons and high-capacity magazines for civilian use. i spent 23 years in the army, so i recognize a weapon of war when i see one. i know what -- why you would need to use them. the power they wield and what they can do to a human body. i understand that the m-4 and m-16, also known as ar-15 rifles were designed for the battlefield, for their portability and power and accuracy for the effective rain, these weapons were designed to rip apart the body so your enemy cannot fight. these are weapons that should be on the battlefield and should not be on our streets and schools. there's a reason the parents of uvalde had to submit d.n.a. to identify their murdered children. these ar-15 style rifles fire ammunition at a velocity that can penetrate body armor even at a distance. when an unprotected child is shot at close range, the results are horrific and as anyone who carried an m-4 under combat understands, the american people should not be misled into thinking that ar-15 rifles are safe for our communities or that a ban on machine guns is sufficient to protect our children from the most dangerous weapons. the victims are mothers in theaters, and children in school. for that reason a semiautomatic rifle is the perfect weapon because it is lightweight, portable and easy to load with high-capacity magazines. it couples the speed of cheam bettering -- chambering the next round to kill as many people as fast as possible as officially as possible. so the first thing i thought when i heard the audio of last week's tragedy that was that it sounded like war. the last time i heard the sound of gunfire that rapid and that many rounds going off on the 4th of july was when i was serving in iraq. i never thought i would hear on this holiday again or on this u.s. soil. i live like so many other moms in daily fear that my own daughters will be forced to hear that in their classrooms or local parade. a few weeks ago i went to talk to my daughter's class about memorial day. both girls teachers asked me to come and explain the meaning of memorial day. to talk about the sacrifices of our troops, what we have done to safeguard our freedoms and rights as a nation, including as the constitution says, our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. as i was talking, i happened to look outside the window of my older girl's classroom only to see my younger daughter walking in a line, following behind the other kids in her class in the middle of a shelter-in-place drill and i watched as a little row of 3 and 4-year-olds crouch down as small as they could get and my daughter, with her head against the wall, with her hands over her head learning to protect herself should there be a mass shooting. she was 4 years old and she has been taught how to survive if someone with a weapon of war comes into a classroom where she is beginning to learn her a, b, c's, believing that how to survive assault rifles matters more. i felt horror and i know other parents felt the same. i'm far from the only mom who will hug her kids tighter rather than looking for the worst case scenario becomes reality. the horrible truth is even ballistic backpacks may not stop these rounds. other survivors were gathered at the capitol. these people, mostly moms are recovering from major trauma and they have jobs and child care responsibilities and no experience lobbying congress, yet they made the trip to weashth because they -- washington, d.c., because they know that their children's lives depend on it and they're beyond furious of the lack of action to ban these weapons of war that have terrorized all of our communities. what these moms isn't impossible. it wouldn't be that difficult if more folks would grow a conscience. these parents want us to do better for them, their kids and for all those in highland park last week and every person who lost their life to gun violence, whether in a mass shooting or a tragedy involving a single bullet. the folks at that parade last monday were there to celebrate life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. seven of them will never be able to do so again. we have to stop this. we have to end the cycle and we can take a step forward -- a step towards doing so right now by getting these weapons of war off our streets and passing this bill immediately. to anyone who says no, to anyone who objects to passing this bill, i want to know how you can show off taking pride in our country on a holiday and turn your backs on these citizens. i want you to say the names of every person from these tragedies, i want you to think of the sound of the begunshots that the children in uvalde heard, to -- and to those teenagers gunned down on our streets. explain to them why the dollars that you get from the n.r.a. are worth their pain, their tears, their tragedy. please, i'm asking. explain how that campaign contribution is worth this endless cycle of blood and death. explain how your gun lobby campaign funds are worth another parent having to bury their first grader in their favorite pair of converse sneakers, if you don't believe the checks are worth or or value your political self-interest more than those americans' lives, then, please, join me in passing this bill. it's that simple. thank you, i yield the floor, mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator for iowa. mr. grassley: just a minute. i'm here in the senate today to sound the alarm about one of america's guiding principles. everybody knows about this. the constitutional principle of civilian control of our military, very much a cornerstone of our republic. this fundamental principle of self-government may have been in jeopardy during the final days of the trump administration. but before i get to that, i will provide an historical context. that principle became part of the american fabric on june 14, 1775, when the congress of the continental congress appointed george washington commander of the continental army. his commission ordered him to report to civilian authorities. it specified -- and i want to quote -- you, meaning the new general washington, you are punctually -- you are to punt punchually observe such orders and directions from time to time as you shall receive from this or a future congress of these united colonies. end of quote. well, he followed that. at war's end, general washington gave this principle lasting purpose and he did it with power and grace. on december 23, 1783, in a solemn ceremony at the state house in annapolis, george washington voluntarily surrendered his commission as well as his military power to civilian authority, the president of the continental congress. the scene is memorialized in a dramatic john trumbull painting that is displayed in the rotunda not far from here, and all of my colleagues go through that part of this capitol every day, probably don't pay a lot of attention to it, but it's an important description of a basic constitutional principles. we know that there's other ways of doing these things in other countries. we know that dictators rule their nation with an iron fist because they control the sword. washington selflessly laid down that sword to ensure america's destiny for generations to come. he chose to disband the army and return to private life at mount vernon. and one scholar explained it this way. quote, the virginian went home to plow. end of quote. by this noble act, washington cemented a crown jewel of self-rule, civilian control of the military. five years later as washington was elected president, this bedrock principle was enshrined in our constitution. while this governing rule is essential to the preservation of democracy, it has been challenged with grave consequences. the truman-mcarthur dispute over conducting the korean war is a case in point. president truman wanted to limit the war. general mcarthur disagreed. general macarthur defied orders and general macarthur crist sized his -- criticized hi commander in chief truman's decision and he did that publicly. so truman fired him for insubordination. now i want to get to the main purpose of coming to the floor. recently several books including a book entitled peril by bob woodard and robert costa suggested the chief of staffs general milley may have trampled on this principle. the book peril provides an alarming account of his words and deeds. milley told the authors he was quote, unquote, certain that the commander in chief was, quote, in serious mental decline and could go rogue and order military action or the use of nuclear weapons. end of quote. now milley -- i'm quoting again from the book. milley felt no absolute certainty the military could control or trust the president. so -- end of quote. so milley -- further quoting in his words, took any and all necessary precautions. his job he said was, and i quote, to think the unthinkable. in his words, pull a schlesinger to, his words, contain trump. he had to, quote, inject a second opinion, end of quote. his opinion was then injected into the command structure. in doing so, he may have stepped out of his lane as the president's principle military adviser and into the statutory chain of command where law doesn't allow him to go. because by law the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff has no command authority. when president nixon faced a crisis over impeachment and resignation, secretary of defense schlesinger feared that he might order an unprovoked nuclear strike. so he, schlesinger, reportedly took extra legal steps to prevent it. now that's the same schlesinger that milley referred to as he was being interviewed for this book. now, it happens that pulling a milley as opposed to a schlesinger is a very different kettle of fish. a four star general can't, quote, unquote, pull a schlesinger. schlesinger was at the top of the chain of command just below the president. he kept the president's constitutional command authority firmly in civilian hands as the constitution requires. milley allegedly placed military hands, his hands on control that belonged exclusively to the president. according to peril, that's the book i'm referring to, he summoned senior operation officers in the military command center to his office. he then -- he had them take, quote, unquote, an oath not to, quote, unquote, act on the president's orders without checking with him first. these brazen words and actions if accurate strike at the heart of our democracy. civilian control of the military. they turned this guiden rule upside down and show utter contempt for the commander in chief. coming from the nation's top general, they're dangerous and contrary to military code 10 u.s. code 888. after describing military's action, the book's authors regularly ask this question. quote, was he subverting the president, question mark. had he overstepped his authority and taken extraordinary power for himself, question mark. end of quote. milley assured this senator in a letter to this senator that his actions were on the up and up. the book, however, seems to imply a different story. now at a hearing where the general was, senator blackburn asked him about the mismatch. he replied, quote, i haven't read any of the books so i don't know. end of quote. she said to him, read them and report back to us. he said absolutely. he agreed. quote, unquote, happy to do that. nine months later he is still dodging the question with the same lame excuse. to crank up the pressure, i joined senators paul and blackburn a few months ago in a letter pushing for a straight answer. when none came, i began sending handwritten notes to the gen general. i soon received a ten-page letter from general milley that ignored the question. my second note sparked an e-mail. it claimed that our letter did not raise, quote, unquote, a direct question, and asserted, quote, general milley answered the specific questions, end of quote. now i think i can legitimately ask is that pentagon baloney or what is it? after my third note, general milley responded with the same old smoking mirrors routine, quote, unquote, i have never read the books. years of oversight have taught me this lesson. evasive answers usually offer revealing clues about the truth. i think general milley knows better. he knows the score. if those books and all press coverage of those books had contained gross misrepresentations, we would have heard about it a long time ago. he would have hammered the authors and corrected the record. however, to date not a peep from the general. his silence speaks volumes. something doesn't smell just right. as the pentagon watchdog when i get a whiff of wrongdoing, i sink in my teeth and don't let go. so congressman jim banks, a member of the house armed services committee, and i upped the ante on april 11 with 12 pointed questions that we gave general milley, a second bite at the apple to clear the air. now two and a half months later, we still have no response. general milley, you said you were going to answer for senator black burn's -- blackburn's question. honor your word. answer the questions. come clean with the american people. we are all ears. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator for virginia. mr. kaine: 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 july 4th 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 health care. i'm a strong supporter of that legislation. i understand it will be proposed for floor action later today. but 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'm 64 years old -- has the supreme court taken away constitutional rights that have 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 casey v. h.h.s., took away those rights for women to make reproductive health care 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 process taken -- or property taken from them without due process, the court ruled that the 14th amendment of 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 united states 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. and the 50 states could have very different laws and 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. sanford in 1856 where the court ruled that no person of african descent, even a free person, could be considered a united states 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 is define what it is to be a citizen of the united states. there was a definition for the first time. if you're 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 according 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 1920's, the family of an instructor challenging this state law. and under the 14th amendment due process clause, in an opinion by justice reynolds, the court said, wait a minute. what is it to be an american? the 14th amendment does not in effect 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 a native language or practice an occupation, illicit 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 is 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 activity, the state of oregon midit a criminal offense to send your children to parochial schools. there was anti-catholic sentiment being drummed up by the klan in oregon and elsewhere, so now the criminal law was being -- 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, the 14 segregate amendment was used to strike -- the 14th amendment was used to strike down a bar on parochial schools. if you get convicted of a crime three times, you will be sterilize you had. making a false statement on a loan application, you would be sterilized. for years people were sterilized if the state judged that they were, quote, 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're imprisoned for an offense that might be just an offense that would have you there for a few years? even though the 14th amendment didn't specifically state sterilization, you have the right to make decisions for your own life without mapling your body and making you unable to -- descendants forever. in 1966, loving v. virginia, loving made it till legal to marry someone whose skin color was different. loving got married 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 your only path out of jail is to move out of virginia. they moved to d.c. but they couldn't come back to visit their family. 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, yeah, the haveth amendment doesn't say anything about -- the 14th amendment doesn't say anything about marriage. but there is something about being an american that gives you the right to marry who you choose without the long arm of the criminal law forcing you to leave the state of your birth and exiling yourself from your own family. so in loving v. virginia, the supreme court struck down antimiscegenation bans that still exist in virginia and many other states. in griswold v. connecticut, the state made it a criminal offense to use contraception. the supreme court, well, there's nothing in the 14th amendment about contraception, but clearly there is this zone where americans can make decisions without the long arm of government throwing enemy 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 uted the same rational. 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've 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's been casey reaffirming that right. since roe there's 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 intimate is or -- intimacy or sexual relations. there are decisions that we are allowed to make that the criminal law cannot intrude upon. oweberger felled, you can marry someone of the same sex, same rationale. so when the supreme court said there's nothing about abortion in the 14th amendment, well, they're right. the word abortion is not in the 14th amendment. but it has been clear now for more than 1 should years -- 100 years and it was really clear when the 14th amendment was added to the constitution that we're no longer just citizens of 50 states. we're 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 in the most intimate areas of your life. that is why the supreme court's decision in dobbs is so destructive. it's as if they do not understand the history of this country before the 14th amendment when there was no definition of citizenship, and it's 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 suddenly suggests -- subtly suggests that, don't worry, abortion gets no constitutional protection. but this can be reinvolved 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 a 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, okay, there's 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% women. that's our north star in our history. that's 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 nearly 50% 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 legislatures -- you can go there and they'll give you a fair shake is to put on blinders instead of looking at reality. the 14 segregate amendment was put in the -- 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 that looked like them or not, and to say that being an american gave you that's rights and those rights couldn't be taken away by the long arm of the criminal law in statutes that were elect -- enacted by state legislatures where you were not represented. that is why this rule something so destructive and that is why my colleagues and i must work so hard to make sure that weigh 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. durbin: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from illinois. mr. durbin: let me thank my colleague from virginia. every member of the united states senate should have heard his words and, if not, read his words to understand the gravity of the decisions by the supreme court and the threats that have been made by justice thomas to venture into even more areas depriving us of our basic constitutional rights in the name of states' rights. i want to thank the senator from virginia. he gave a big part of his life to civil rights litigation, and if you're a lawyer and heard his presentation today, you would not want to be on the other side in a courtroom. he has -- he is convincing, he is well-prepared and explains with clarity with this is a moment in history which we should not ignore. mr. president, i move to proceed to legislative session. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. mr. durbin: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar number 1035. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk will report. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary. nina wang of colorado to be united states district judge for the district of colorado. mr. durbin: i send a cloture motion to the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: cloture motion: we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the nomination of executive calendar number 1035, nina wang of colorado to be united states district judge for the district of colorado, signed by 17 senators as follows -- mr. durbin: i ask consent the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. durbin: i move to proceed to legislative session. the presiding officer: question is on the motion. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. mr. durbin: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar number 988. the presiding officer: question is on the motion. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary. nancy l.maldonado of illinois to be united states district judge for the northern district of illinois. mr. durbin: i sandy cloture motion to the desk. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate do hereby move to bring to a close the debate on the nomination of executive calendar number 988, nancy l. maldonado of illinois to be united states district judge for the northern district of illinois, signed by 17 senators as follows. mr. durbin: i ask consent the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. durbin: i ask unanimous consent the mandatory quorum calls for the cloture motions filed today, july 14, be waived. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate do hereby move to bring to a close the debate on the nomination of executive calendar number 968, julianna michelle childs of south carolina to be united states circuit judge for the district of columbia circuit signed by 16 senators. the presiding officer: by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. the question is, is it the sense of the senate that debate on the nomination of julianna michelle childs of south carolina to be united states circuit judge for the district of columbia circuit shall be brought to a close. the yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. the clerk will call the roll. vote: vote: vote: the presiding officer: on this vote, the yeas are 58, the nays 33, and the motion is agreed to. [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] itical issue that conto take a heavy toll on the health and financial well-being of americans. mr. cardin: high prescription drug prices. this uniquely american problem has u.s. families paying the highest price compared to other countries leading to millions of americans having to leave their pharmacists without their prescription drugs left on the table. no one should have to go into debt to buy prescription drugs that they need to stay healthy, productive, and have a healthy life. 29% of americans either cannot afford their prescription drugs or are ranging them. and the u.s. stands alone in this among the developed nations of the world. the u.s. spends approximately $575 billion annually on prescription drugs or about 14% of the total health care expenditures. in 2019, the u.s. spent on average 11 -- $1126 per capita on prescription medicines, twice as high as the comparable amount spent in the industrial world. americans and marylanders are struggling to pay their prescription drug medications, and its long past the time for congress to remedy this problem. prescription drugs have been lifesaving for millions, but if they're not affordable, then their benefit is moot. high prescription drug prices drive health inequalities that we're flooding to eradicate which -- groups struggle to afford their medications. for years congress has been working on commonsense solutions to increase access to affordable prescription medication, reducing costs for patients and taxpayers. it is now time to act. u.s. prescription drug prices are set through an opaque process by manufacturers, pharmaceutical benefit manufacturers and payers. prices are often disconnected from the health impacts of the products being purchased. opponents of addressing the high cost drug price claim that more affordable prices will come at the expense of innovation. i say and the research agrees this is a false choice. to ensure access to innovative treatments and prescriptions, the united states government makes significant investments in biomedical research and the presiding officer knows that very well from his position on the appropriations committee. no greater example of this investment is the national institutes of health located in our home state of maryland which is the world's largest government funder of biomedical research. almost all drugs rely on n.i.h. supported basic research and the returns on these investments are very high. researchers from the massachusetts institute of technology have found that for ever 125 -- $125 million of n.i.h. grants leads to 375 million more in private market value. 33 more patents and one new drug. another study estimates that the rate of return on n.i.h. investments is 43% and that each dollar n.i.h. funding leads to an additional $8.40 in private research and development spending. so the government investments are well done. it leverages a lot more but the government is the key player. further, the small business innovation research and the small business technology transfer also support inno innovation. s.b. "owe sbir currently is the largest u.s. federal government program supporting small businesses to conduct research and development. sbir began in 1982 and currently requires that each federal agency spending more than a hundred million dollars annually on external research set aside 2.3% of those funds for awards to small businesses. sbir is very selective with only about 22% of the accomplish cantses receiving funding. for many small firms the sbir serves as the first place many entrepreneurs are involved in technology innovation where they get their funding. through the sbir, sttr program, n.i.h. supports drug innovation by setting aside more than 3.2% of its overall intramural research and development budget specifically to support early stage small businesses through the nation. many companies leverage this n.i.h. funding to attract the partners and investors needed to take an innovative -- innovation to the market. for example, mgin which was founded in 1980 received sbir investments in 1986. today is a multinational biopharmaceutical company with over 20,000 employees. despite these significant taxpayer investment, prescription drugs are often priced at levels that limit access to lifesaving drugs, particularly among those who are underinsured or uninsured. even after accounting for the costs and risks, the research and development, evidence shows the returns to new products exceed normal rates of return. drug companies continue to raise prices on consumers without justification. and we must crack down on price gouging and enforce transparency and drug pricing. that's why i strongly support the policies the senate finance committee recently released which comprise of comprehensive reform to lower prescription drug prices for americans. one policy included in this package that i've long supported is empowering medicare to begin negotiating directly for the price of prescription drugs. this is just common sense. this is what businesses do. this is a free market. we negotiate. in the private sector no planned sponsor or manager would ever accept responsibility without the ability to decide how to negotiate. no private sector company would parcel themselves out in order to negotiate. they would use their full size as a market force. we don't do that in medicare. medicare negotiations would ensure that patients get the best deal possible on high-priced drugs. another policy i support in prescription drug affordability is capping medicare patients' out-of-pocket costs to no more than $2,000 per year. today there is no cap on spending for prescription drugs for seniors on medicare. this policy will prevent merit beneficiaries from paying tens of thousands of dollars to purchase lifesaving drugs prescribed by their doctors. the policies i've just outlined along with additional ones, several others included in this package including putting a required rebate if a drug manufacturer increases their price beyond inflation. there's also issues here to protect the solvency of the benefits of medicare beneficiaries, this will make prescription drugs affordable for individuals and families who desperately need it. i urge all my colleagues to come together to address this urgent issue. we have done the work. now it's time to vote. getting these savings back into [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] [silence] mr. van hollen: madam president. the presiding officer: the mr. van hollen: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate consider the following nominations en bloc -- calendar numbers 924, 979, 982, and 983, that the senate vote on the nominations en bloc without intervening action or debate, 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 immediately be notified of the senate's action. the presiding officer: without objection. the question occurs on the nominations en bloc. all those in favor say aye. those opposed nay. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nominations are confirmed en mr. van hollen: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate consider the following nominations en bloc -- calendar numbers 987 and 1039. that the senate vote on the nominations en bloc without intervening action or debate, 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. the presiding officer: without objection. the question occurs on the nominations en bloc. all those in favor say aye. those opposed nay. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nominations are confirmed en bloc. van hollen madam president, i ask unanimous consent that the --. mr. van hollen: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without mr. van hollen: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to the consideration of s. res. 710, submitted earlier today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: s. res. 710, congratulating the university of mississippi rebels baseball team for winning the 2022 national collegiate athletic association division 1 be baseball championship. the presiding officer: without objection, the senate will mr. van hollen: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without mr. van hollen: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to the consideration of s. res. 711, submitted earlier today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: s. res. 711, expressing the condolences of the senate and honoring the memory of the victims of the mass shooting at the fourth of july parade in highland park, illinois, on july 4, 2022. the presiding officer: without objection, the senate will mr. van hollen: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without mr. van hollen: madam president, i have four requests for committees to meet during today's session of the senate. they have been approved, they have the approval of the majority and minority leaders. the presiding officer: duly mr. van hollen: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that all postcloture time be considered expired on executive calendar number 968 and that the senate vote on confirmation of the nomination at a time to be determined by the majority leader or his designee following consultation with the republican leader. further, that when the senate completes its business today it adjourn until 3:00 p.m. on monday, july 18, and that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour deemed expired, the journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for use later in the day, and morning business be closed. that upon the conclusion of morning business, the senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of calendar number 1035 and that the cloture motions filed during today's session ripen at 5:30 p.m. on monday. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. van hollen: finally, madam president, for the information of the senate, the 5:30 p.m. vote will be on the motion to invoke cloture on the wang nomination to be u.s. district court judge for the district of colorado. if there is no further business to come before the senate, i ask that the following remarks of senator sullivan -- that following the remarks of senator sullivan, the senate stand adjourned under the previous order. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. van hollen: thank you, madam president. mr. sullivan: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from alaska. mr. sullivan: madam president, is the senate in a quorum call? the presiding officer: no, it is not. mr. sullivan: thank you, madam president. madam president, i just had the opportunity to host a lunch, the thursday lunch for a number of my senate colleagues. this is the opportunity that senators get to essentially brag about their state, kind of like what i do with the alaskan of the week speech that i give. i know we have new pages here. i'm going to be putting out a facebook post on the incredible bounty that we just had at the lunch, salmon, halibut, peonies flowers, which are growing in abundance in alaska. really, really incredible meal, if i do say so myself, from alaskans. so we're going to talk about that. next week i'll be back to my alaskan of the week series for the new pages. i promise you this is going to be your favorite speech of the week because it's interesting and it tells stories and it's exciting about what's going on in alaska. but, madam president, i want to talk about two other issues today that i care deeply about. i think most senators do, and certainly americans do, and that is two things that our country desperately needs -- infrastructure and energy. infrastructure and energy. and we all know that this is what's needed. we talk about it here a lot in the senate. however, some, especially in the biden administration, talk a lot about these issues but then when it comes to taking action, maybe not so much. maybe that's starting to change. maybe not. but, madam president, i'm going to talk about something i introduced in the senate yesterday that is going to be action, especially on infrastructure. so let's talk about infrastructure first. yesterday i introduced the joint resolution of disapproval under the congressional review act. it's what we call the c.r.a., which will nullify the biden administration's new regulations that are remarkably going to bog down the ability to permit infrastructure projects, that's going to add to the red tape that every single american who cares about this issue knows is a problem, and it's a new reg from the biden administration, remarkably because they supposedly are for infrastructure -- and i'm going to get to that -- a new reg to make it harder to build infrastructure projects. so let me unpack a little bit of that because it's something that i think all americans care about. i know they care about it, but it can kind of be boring and technical and permitting and things like that. so when the national environmental policy act, nepa, was passed late 1960's, it required an environmental impact statement, an e.i.s., as we call these things. in -- in the old days, you would do an e.i.s., you would get maybe 100 pages, the process worked. people were engaged, it didn't bog down things and you'd have a couple of hundred pages the average american could read and then you build, which is what we all want to do in a responsible way. fast forward to today. nepa has been completely abused. this is a huge passion of mine because it hurts everybody. too many people, too many americans now know the numbers. four to six years, on average, to complete any e.i.s. in america. most costs millions of dollars. most e.i.s.'s are thousands of pages, so no one reads them. how can you read them? and it is undeniablably killing our ability to build infrastructure. the only people, in my view, who really like this new system, a, radical far-left environmental groups who don't want to build anything, that's a group. it's not a big group in america. unfortunately, they've got a loud voice and the communist chinese party when they know it takes five-to-ten years to permit a bridge in the united states of america. let me provide some examples. g.a.o. did a study quite a while ago on new highway construction to build a new highway, nine to 19 years, on average. in america -- it's about eight years, federal permits to permit a bridge, a bridge in america. the gross reservoir in colorado which is going to offer clean water to the people of that state, it's been two decades, 20 years to permit that important infrastructure project. california bullet train project, approved in the 1990's, still not built. the pipeline in virginia and west virginia, began in 2019, 2e to say it, it will probably not be built, nepa and environmental radicals stopping it. this is not the way it should work. my state, unfortunately, has been the epicenter of groups that try to stop any resource development projects, any projects, a road, a bridge, a ggold mine, the kensington mine supplies over $400,000 a year, took almost 20 years to permit if you include the litigation. 20 years. who is that benefiting? so, madam president, i worked with the trump administration on their nepa executive order. i worked in the environment and public works committee on this infrastructure bill that president biden supported. we got good, not great, but we got some pretty darn good permitting reform based on some of what we did in the trump administration to bring projects to be able to be built in a timely, efficient manner. not cutting corners. so one federal agency in charge of decision, time limits on nepa requirements to two years, limitations on pages for nepa. these are commonsense reforms. we got them in the law. okay. that's pretty good. bipartisan, the president hailed this as one of his big signature achievements. i voted for it in part because of nepa reforms, because of permitting reforms. so what am i upset about? about four months ago the biden administration's counsel on environmental quality not only revised the trump-era executive order on permitting, which the average american, democrat, republican, thought was good, they actually undertook new regulations for nepa that are clearly, clearly intended to make it harder to permit infrastructure projects, particularly energy infrastructure projects. just ask anyone. go look at the regs. go look at what they put out. what i find remarkable is that the president let this come out of his white house. he is supposedly mr. infrastructure, mr. building trades, mr. joe six-pack union guy. this is a product of the radical elite coastal democrat special interests that's going to make it harder to build things. that's a fact. it's a sad fact. especially because a lot of us came together as democrats and republicans to pass permitting reform. so what did i file yesterday? a congressional review act resolution says that if congress doesn't like a big regulation coming out of the legislation branch, we can vote to rescind it. we can vote to rescind it. so yesterday i filed one of those resolutions targeting this new rule from the biden administration meant to slow down the building of infrastructure. and here's the thing, madam president. you don't see this a lot. but every single republican senator is a cosponsor of my resolution. 50 -- 50 cosponsors of our congressional review act resolution on infrastructure. the other good thing with the c.r.a. law, congressional review act law, it's a privileged resolution. what does that mean? it means majority leader schumer, even if he doesn't like it, has to take it up. and here's the other thing. under the c.r.a. law, you only need 51 senators -- 51 senators to make it pass the senate. so my democratic colleagues are going to have a tough choice here. i don't think it should be tough. i think it should be 100-0. if you gant infrastructure for -- if you want infrastructure for america and you want to stand with the men and women who build things in america, then you're going to vote for my resolution. simple. let me quote what the labors international, the biggest construction trade union in america, led by a great american teri o o o sullivan, when the bn administration was putting out the nepa rule, the union asked what are you doing? here's what they wrote about that rule. quote, once again communities in need of infrastructure and the hardworking men and women who build america will be waiting as project details for infrastructure are subjected to onerous reviews by these new rules. that's the laborers. that's the men and women who build america. americans will continue to bear the expense of nepa-related delays which cost taxpayers millions of dollars annually. lengthily review processes and legal challenges which will result from these new regulations will have a chilling impact on private investment in infrastructure. that's what the laborers said. so, madam president, this is going to be an interesting vote because i've said this a number of times. i think some of my democratic friends have gotten a little upset at me, i think it's a fact. it's a fact in alaska. whenever the national dems have a choice between the radical far-left environmentalists, the coastal elites and the men and women who build things and made our country great, they always choose the radical environmentalists. so i mentioned this in a commerce -- this in a commerce committee hearing the other day. some of my colleagues got upset with me. i said, guess what, i'm going to have a c.r.a. i'm going to put it as a test vote. i know were the 50 republicans are going to stand. we're going to stand with the men and women who support stuff. if you support my c.r.a. like the laborers did or will, the resolution, you're going to support it. if you support infrastructure for america, you're going to support our resolution. if you support energy for america, you're going to support our resolution, if you support the men and women who built stuff in this country, good wages, you're going to support my resolution. if you stand with the coastal and environmental elites who want to shut down this country, you will vote against it. i think it's going to be really interesting to see what the men and women of the united states senate stand for. the far-left environmentalists who want to stop anything and shut it all done or the men and women who build stuff. that vote's going to come in the next few weeks, madam president, and i'm going to be down here on the floor a lot talking about it. i hope my colleagues do the right thing because we all know what the right thing to do is. to move this country forward, to build on the infrastructure bill and to get working and support the men and women who do that hard work. so, madam president, i want to turn to energy now. and, you know, the president's in saudi arabia. there's a lot of irony here, i believe, because his administration has clearly, clearly made it harder for americans to produce american energy with american workers, with american infrastructure. that's a fact. that is a fact. okay. i see it in alaska every day. every single day the federal government trying to stop the production of american energy. and what are we seeing, inflation, super-high prices at the gas pump. literally you have senior administration officials going to wall street, senior administration officials who are federal regulators for finance all trying to choke off cap cap. so the president it going to saudi arabia to ask them to produce more. he should send an envoy to texas or alaska and say, hey, how can we produce more here? how can we produce more here? i hope they're starting to change their tune that we don't need to beg the saudis, dictators like iran and venezuela and all of these autocratic regimes in the world to produce, we should produce in our country. the highest in the world. high standards of labor in the world. so the biden administration in my state has been a disaster. they've issued 26 executive orders or executive actions solely focused on my state. solely focused on alaska. none of which have been helpful. lately -- latel there has been -- lately there has been constructive discussion on construction in alaska, called the willow project. and the biden administration is showing signs that they want to support it. now, it makes sense. the country needs energy. this is -- would be done in the national petroleum reserve in alaska, set aside decades ago by congress for oil and gas development. high standards in the world. i pitched this project to the president over a year ago in the oval office. the lowest emissions in the world of any big energy project and i'm going to talk about who supports it. this has been in permitting, madam president, for years. i won't go through the timeline, but this project, the willow project, has been in permiting for years. -- permitting for years. we can start building it this winter. as a matter of fact, we tried to start building it last winter. like i said, i pitched the president on this, 2,000 construction jobs, enormous support from the building trades, labor unions, lowest greenhouse gas emissions for a project this type and size in america and it would help us not have to go beg from other countries. but madam president, there's been a lot of press in the last week on the willow project. of course, our mainstream media doesn't get it. they love to tell their kind of slanted story on the willow project. so i'm going to push back and, boy, if you're a reporter, i really hope you write down some of the stuff that i'm going to talk about here. because it's all factual. and with all due respect, most of you guys never write about these things. i'm going to start with this chart. this is a really important chart, in my mind. and it's important, madam president, because this chart goes to an issue that really, really strikes at the heart and soul of why resource development in my state in particular is so important. this chart is from the american medical association, and it looks at life expectation from 1980 to 2014. 25 years, okay? and in different parts of america, you see different life expectancy in these different colors. the blue, carper blue -- darker blue, purple is where life expectancy increased dramatically in the last 25 years. unfortunately, there's yellow, orange, and even red, life expectancy is slowed or even decreated -- decreased in a few places. that's mostly due to the horrendous opioid epidemic we had as a nation. if you look at this chart, the one state where life expectancy increased the most, by far, is the state of alaska. the one area engineer the state of alaska that's increased the most in terms of life expectancy are many of the north areas, allusion island chain -- aleutian island chain. 10, 11, 13 years. in 25 years, people's life expectancy went up that much. i've asked many times my senate colleagues, give me a policy indicator of success more important than are the people you represent living longer, living longer. give me one. there isn't one. that's about as important as it gets. in my state, it's happened sph. it's happened. why has it happened? why has it happened? well, i'll tell you why it's happened. first, in a lot of these rural areas, unfortunately, the life expectancy in the early 80's was quite low. these are primarily alaska native communities, and they have some of the lowest life expectancies of any american, sometimes of any people in the world, because they didn't have things, like good jobs, flush toilets and clinics. they lived in real poverty. okay? so we started really low. then what happened? what happened that these mostly alaska native communities, people started living longer? i'll tell you what happened. they started getting jobs. resource development happened. responsible resource developmen, fishing. so when i talk about these issues, when senator murkowski talks about these issues, it's not just some kind of pie in the sky issue of oil and gas. this is about life and death, which is why i come down here a little bit riled up sometimes, because people don't have a clue. people don't have a clue. the radical enviros, who try to shut down the economies of my state all the darn time, and some u.s. senators, primarily the senior senator from new mexico, who come down here and try to shut this down, they don't understand. okay? so people are living longer in alaska, much longer, more than any other part of the country, because we've had responsible resource development. which brings me back to willow. so, again, you'll see all these articles in "the washington post," all these stories. heck, there's three this week, i think, about this one project. and they're all slanted, and you got some lower 48 environmental group in new york city or san francisco, oh, my gosh, climate bomb, all this rhetoric that's hot air, pardon the pun, but not accurate. who's supporting this project? who's supporting? you have an incredible diversity of people supporting this project. first the unions. every major union in america -- building trades, afl-cio, they're all supporting this project. they're all supporting this project. madam president, what i really want to emphasize is another group that's very special to me that supports the willow project. and you see here some of the symbols of these groups right here. some are the alaska chamber, oil and gas association, resource development council. but most of these symbols here are the alaskan native people, the alaskan native people, the leaders of a really important constituent in alaska, the first peoples of alaska. why am i saying this? because our national media never talks about this. they'll pick one group, one leader, oh, we're against it, so they write about it. that's baloney. the leader of the alaska communities, the native communities, are overwhelmingly supportive of this project. here's my point -- this administration loves to talk about environmental justice, environmental equity, communities that have been discriminated against, to make sure they have access to proper environment. but you know what they do? they've been doing it for a year and a half. when they talk about environmental justice, environmental equity, they always forget about alaska natives. they purposefully forget about alaska natives. i see it all the time. they can't do it this time. this project -- and come on, media, write the story -- this project has overwhelming support by the native leaders and native communities in alaska. so if you're for environmental justice, racial equity, all the things that the biden administration says they're for, you better be a willow supporter. for those in the biden administration, gina mccarthy and others, someone should ask her why you discriminated against alaska native people, because that's exactly what you're doing. you have right here some of our alaska native leaders in this statement -- the administration cannot proclaim to support meaningful tribal consultation and environmental justice while at the same time killing a critical resource project that supports the inupiat communities of the north slope. that's right there. from our great alaska native leaders. the alaska federation of natives. i have their letter. that's the group representing every single alaska native organization in the state, the biggest group in the state. fully supports the willow project. the regional corporation leadership fully supports the willow project. the inupiat communities of the arctic slope fully supports the willow project. senator murkowski just put out a press release. madam president, i'd like to submit it for the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sullivan: alaskans voice strong support for the willow project. she has a huge list of alaska native groups and others who are supporting the willow project. i'd like to submit for the record the a.f.n. project supporting the willow project. the presiding officer: wrowx. mr. sullivan: i'd like to it submit for the record the anxa regional letter. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sullivan: i'd like to submit for the record the inuppate arctic slope supporting the project. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sullivan: madam president, here's my point -- the next time the media writes a big story on willow and environmental justice and racial equity, which they love to do, in alaska, they need to include this. this is the truth. they need to include the strong union support. go talk to the laborers and the building trades. talk to shawn mcgarvey, terry o'sullivan, see what they think about willow. there's one group that doesn't like willow. it's the same group that doesn't like anything in america. it's the radical far left environmental groups trying to shut down my state and keep a native american -- native americans and alaskans impoverished in alaska. i'm not going to let that happen, madam president. one thing thing -- it's funny -- not funny, amusing? not amusing. again, this is really important. this is about life and death. you have all these stories about willow in the national media. but what really, really kind of burns me up is there's a story, you know, they talk about the climate bomb, whatever the heck that means, it's not factual, but the one story i never see about federal lands, real big increases in oil and gas production, real big increases in emissions that never gets written about -- again, for our friends in the media, never -- is what's going on in new mexico. what's going on in new mexico? well, we know some of the members, senior senator from new mexico, he loves to come after alaska projects. i don't know why. shut them down. maybe to divert the media's attention from what's going on in his state. i want to give a couple stats. since 2019, new mexico has increased production in its oil production by 700,000 bearls a day. that's pretty -- 700,000 barelis a day. pretty impressive. they've increased by almost 700,000. they've increased more than alaska even produces. in three years. it's now the second largest oil producer in the country. senior senator from new mexico recently bragged that's up 400%. okay? good for him. still amazing to me he comes down here a lot, writes letters to try to shut down my state, but whatever. i don't go after new mexico. but i do wants our friends in the media to just kind of ask the questions. boy, oh, boy, you want to talk about climate bomb? 700,000 barrels a day? they have more carbon emissions in alaska, by way -- than alaska, by far. nobody is writing that story. it's also how we do our environmental standards in different states. my state has the highest standards in the world on energy production. new mexico? not so much. let me give you a couple of examples. the average well in alaska is 28,000 barrels a day. because it's conventional. we're actually -- where actually the resource is so rich there, we're not fracking like they do in the unconventional area. the average well in new mexico produces 100 barrels. 100 barrels to 28,000. so what does that mean? you have to drill 280 wells in new mexico just to reach the equivalent of one in alaska. so, the environmental footprint is much bigger. the carbon emissions, much bigger. new mexico flares its gas of we reinject our gas. again, highest environmental standards in the world. okay? we conduct our exploration and drilling activities only in the winter. you have to build ice roads, ice pads, zero impact. i used to be in charge of this. okay? very expensive to do that. one little drop of anything, chewing tobacco on the tundra, you got to report it. so where's the story about what's going on there? where's the carbon bomb story on new mexico? where is the story that the secretary of interior has directed almost half the federal permits to drill in the country to one state? do you think it's alaska? no way. they're trying to shut us down. texas? nope. north dakota? nope. it's new mexico. golly gee. isn't that interesting? i sure hope -- look, it's terribly suspicious from my perspective that one state has received more federal energy permits in the last 15 months than all other states in america combined. secretary of interior is from new mexico. okay, maybe there's something there. here's the bottom line, madam president -- there have been barrels of ink spilled on every single project in alaska. willow this week. but reporters shrugged their shoulders, looked the other way, maybe it's because it's a blue state, we don't want to touch those guys, when it comes to new mexico. no wonder americans don't trust the media. i'm going to conclude with this quote. it's from a "wall street journal" editorial written by the north slope burrow mayor harry bow ir, inupi at leader and josiah pukatuk, the state rep. two alaska leaders elected. they are fully supportive of willow. it it was in the "wall street journal" entitled "let america sell alaskan energy to the world." it was written in march as russia was invading ukraine. they said, quote, even as russian tanks lined up on the ukrainian border in february, the biden administration froze u.s. drilling on federal lands and issued rules making it harder to build natural gas pipelines. by the way, that's the rule that i'm putting forward the c.r.a. resolution to rescind. they continued, we may be inupiat eskimos 5,000 miles away from the washington policy machine, but we know crazy when we see it. and this is crazy. and the american people know it. now look, the president is in the middle east meeting with allies, asking for the saudis to produce more oil. but as he would say, come on, man, you got to start at home. you got to start at home. the willow project in alaska supported by the native communities, supported by the unions, i would guarantee supported by probably 90% of americans. it's time to get things like this done. so our nepa congressional review act and our advocacy for commonsense projects like willow, supported by every single group in my state -- and i sure hope the media writes about this -- especially the native people, if they shut this down, that will be the ultimate injustice to indigenous people in alaska. and they know it, and that's one of the many reasons why they shouldn't do it. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the senate stands adjourned until 3:00 p.m. on monday. >> c-span is your unfiltered view of government funded by these televisioncompanies and more including cox . >> homework can be hard. squatting in a diner for internetwork is even harder. that's why we are students access to affordable internet some homework and just be homework . cox connect and compete. >> cox along with theseother television providers, giving you a front row seat to democracy . >> earlier today witnesses testified on justice thomas's concurring opinion in dobbs versus jackson case that stated the court could look at things the on roe versus wade as gay marriage and contraception. once the hearing at 9:30 p.m. eastern on c-span2, onc-span now our free mobile video or online at c-span.org . >> for a conversation on the latest trends of variants were joined by the executive director, washington journal viewers throughout the pandemic. doctor benjamin, i want to start with ba-5 outlaw, 65 percent of

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