Of their choice, including abortion, Voting Rights, the Affordable Care act, and religious liberty. [gavel banging] good morning, everyone. Welcome back. Judge, thank you. A good day yesterday. Your family did great. Cleanup well. You look good. The game plan for today is to do our first round of 30 minute questioning. Each senator will have 30 minutes to interact with judge barrett and then we will follow up with a second round of 20 minutes. We will not get it done today, but we should get through the first 30 minutes and then come back wednesday and finish up and then we will go about our business. I will make sure i stay within 30 minutes and if i can shorten it, i will. Let us get to it. You can start the clock. You can relax a bit, judge, and take your mask off. Yesterday, we had a lot of discussion about Affordable Health care. What i am going to try to do briefly this morning is demonstrate the difference between politics and judging. All of my colleagues on the other side had
Her confirmation to the highest court in the land could put health care for hundreds of millions of americans at risk. As youd imagine, taking away health care is deeply unpopular with the American People. So it seems the strategy from the republican majority is to invent some new distraction of fresh outrage to talk about. My colleagues on the other side would rather talk about anything besides the fact that their president , their party, and their Supreme Court nominee poses a dire threat to Americans Health care. Today, the outrage from the republican leader was directed once again at the idea that democrats would attack the nominees religious beliefs. But, of course, in their zeal to manufacture this issue, republican senators began telegraphing this line of attack even before a nominee had been named. One republican senator wrote me a letter to warn against anticatholic attacks that happened yet against a nominee who hadnt been named. Thats how transparent this republican diversio
For 45 years, 45 years that every Supreme Court vacancy under a republican president was going to bring about the apocalypse. John paul stevens, they said was antiwomen. David souter, they said, wanted to hurt vulnerable people. John roberts was out to get health insurance. And wouldnt you know, the president had barely finished saying judge Amy Coney Barrett before the same old attacks begin rolling in. Our 77yearold male for Vice President and our 69yearold male senatede democratic leader have tried to inform american women that this 48yearold working mama wants to roll back her own rights as as a woman, l back her own rights as a woman. Democrats have tried to fearmonger around a fouryearold academic paper tthat reinforced one unfair penalty in obamacare which congress by the way has already eliminated three years ago. As an aside, madam president , if the American People are interested in which senators are serious about protecting americans with existing conditions, they can s sim
Regarding a democratic motion to begin work on a bill dropping the Justice Department from supporting lawsuits to strike the Affordable Care act. Live now to the floor of the u. S. Senate on cspan 2. Eternal god, our heavenly father, we cry to you, but sometimes you seem so far away. In our despair you sometimes seem distant, and we are tempted to surmise that we are all alone. When we shout, we seem to hear the echoes of our anguish. Nonetheless, we know that you are holy, mighty, and good. We have trusted you too long to let go. Empower our senators for these challenging times. Remove from their minds all bitterness and contempt for one another. Keep their hearts clean, their spirits courageous, and their minds clear, as they face these daunting times. We pray in your omnipotent name. Amen. The president pro tempore please join me in the pledge of allegiance. The pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation unde
Their Supreme Court nominee poses a dire threat to Americans Health care. Today the outrage from the republican leader was directed once again at the idea the democrats would attack the nominees religious beliefs. But, of course, in their zeal to uenufacture this issue, republican senators began telegraphing this line of attack even before a nominee had been named. One republican senator wrote me ar letter to warn against anticatholic attacks that happened yet against the nominee who hadnt been named. Thats how transparent this repalin conversion, ruse is. It appears that the republican majority will crank up the outrage machine to any level of absurdity the avoid talking about Americas Health care. The health care so many caericans desperately want and need. In fact, all week the republican leader has mocked the idea that a farright Supreme Court majority might strike down the Affordable Care act and that judge barrett might play a decisive role. Of course President Trump nominated, p