The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“LEGISLATIVE SESSION” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Justice was published in the Senate section on pages S2853-S2859 on June 10, 2020.
The Department is one of the oldest in the US, focused primarily on law enforcement and the federal prison system. Downsizing the Federal Government, a project aimed at lowering taxes and boosting federal efficiency, detailed wasteful expenses such as $16 muffins at conferences and board meetings.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
LEGISLATIVE SESSION
Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to move to legislative session.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the motion.
The motion was agreed to.
The Senator from Maryland.
Justice in Policing Act
Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, I rise today in strong support of the Justice in Policing Act, introduced yesterday by my colleagues Senator Harris from California and Senator Booker from New Jersey.
I am proud to be an original cosponsor of this legislation. This legislation is urgently needed after the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minnesota, which has sent shock waves through the Nation and the world. I am pleased that the protests have been largely peaceful, and that where the Senate sits in Washington, our local leaders have moved to deescalate tensions.
I was pleased on Monday to hold a Facebook Live session with Hillary Shelton, the director of the NAACP's Washington bureau and senior vice president for advocacy and policy, as well as Marc Morial, the president and chief executive officer of the National Urban League and the former mayor of New Orleans. We talked about this legislation in some detail.
I received feedback from several of my constituents at my Facebook Live event on how to improve relations between police and the communities they serve and how to rebuild trust between them.
Before they first put on a badge, a police officer takes an oath to uphold the law. Most do so with the best intentions and carry out their duties with a willingness to help communities. But in far too many communities around the country, the system in which they work has been failing. People are dying at the hands of police, predominantly people of color. Accountability has been tied to public videos rather than doing the right thing. Incremental reform is no longer an option when it comes to police reform. We have been patient, but we must do better to protect the civil rights, human rights, and lives of men, women, and children of this country.
Congress must finally pass a comprehensive plan to improve training and community relations, hold police accountable, and rebuild trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve. To that end, I have been proud to work with my colleagues Senator Booker and Senator Harris in creating a package of reforms and accountability measures that shows where we need to be as a nation with a fair and just system of laws.
The package focuses on three major pillars: accountability, data collection, and training policies. I was proud that two major pieces included in the Justice in Policing Act are from bills that I have introduced for many Congresses: the End Racial and Religious Profiling Act and the Law Enforcement Trust and Integrity Act.
The End Racial and Religious Profiling Act is designed to enforce the constitutional right to equal protection under the law by eliminating racial- and religious-based discriminatory profiling at all levels of law enforcement by changing the policies and procedures. It allows police to focus their work more accurately rather than wasting resources on blanket stereotypes. It requires enhanced data collection for DOJ to track and monitor discriminatory profiling. It holds State and local enforcement agencies accountable by conditioning Federal funds on their adoption of policies and best practices to combat profiling by officers.
The Law Enforcement Trust and Integrity Act takes a comprehensive approach on how local police organizations can adopt performance-based standards to ensure that instances of misconduct will be minimized through training and oversight. The bill provides that, if such instances do occur, they be properly investigated. It requires the creation of law enforcement accreditation standards and recommendations based on President Obama's Task Force on 21st Century Policing.
This bill also enhances funding for so-called pattern and practice discrimination cases. In Baltimore City, for example, the police department voluntarily entered into a consent decree in 2017 with the U.S. Department of Justice to overhaul the police department after the tragic death of Freddie Gray in police custody in 2015, which led to civil unrest in Baltimore.
I might add, I am very pleased that we have seen progress in Baltimore, as evidenced by the types of protests after the Floyd tragedy. They have been almost all peaceful.
In Baltimore, the Department of Justice report had found a widespread pattern and practice of illegal and unconstitutional conduct by the Baltimore Police Department through targeting African-American residents for disproportionate and disparate treatment. The U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland is now overseeing a complete overhaul of the Baltimore Police Department.
We have made progress.
Other important provisions of the Justice in Policing Act will save lives. The bill bans choke holds at the Federal level and conditions law enforcement funding on State and local governments banning choke holds. It bans no-knock warrants in drug cases at the Federal level and conditions law enforcement funding on State and local governments banning no-knock warrants. It requires that deadly force be used only as a last resort and requires officers to employ deescalation techniques first. It requires better data collection on how and under what circumstances police officers use force. We need these standards. We have seen too many tragedies on the misuse of power and force by law enforcement.
The bill takes important steps to demilitarize our police forces--we are a civilian society; we are not run as a military state--and encourage more professionalism, consistent with changing our police officers' mentality from a warrior mindset to a guardian mindset.
The legislation limits the transfer of military-grade equipment to State and local law enforcement. It requires Federal uniformed police officers to wear body cameras and requires State and local law enforcement to use existing Federal funds to ensure the use of police body cameras.
This comprehensive legislation takes several important steps to hold police accountable in courts. It makes it consistent with standard practice to prosecute offending officers and enables individuals to recover damages in civil courts when law enforcement officers violate their constitutional rights by changing qualified immunity for law enforcement.
Finally, the legislation gives better tools to the Department of Justice and State attorneys general to investigate and prosecute police misconduct. It reinvests in our communities by supporting critical community-based programs to change the culture of law enforcement and empower our communities to reimagine public safety in an equitable and just way.
As I mentioned earlier, in Baltimore, after the Freddie Gray tragedy, we recognized that we needed to do a better job in working with communities and police, and we reached out. Part of our consent decree is to improve that relationship, that direct relationship between police and community.
The legislation that I have mentioned on the floor here establishes public safety innovation grants for community-based organizations to create local commissions and task forces to help communities to reimagine and develop concrete, just, and equitable public safety approaches.
Let me share with you two stories. I do this because there are so many people who have come forward and shared their experiences growing up and living in a society of discrimination.
I remember very vividly, after the Freddie Gray episode in Baltimore, I met with a group of community leaders in Sandtown, where the tragedy occurred, and listened to their accounts of how they grew up with the fear of police and the stories of how they were singled out or discriminated against by traffic stops and by other harassment just because of the color of their skin.
So let me share with you two stories that were reported recently in the paper. One is the story of Michael Turner, his encounter years ago with the Montgomery County police. Turner was only 18 years of age when this encounter occurred.
Officers had come to break up a party in the suburban county and quickly focused on Turner and his fellow African American friends. They checked IDs. No one was drunk. The cops asked them to move along. ``One officer looks at us,'' Turner recounted, ``and says, `Now go back to your projects.' ''
The broader context of the email, written eight days ago, was Turner's effort to explain why he wanted a protest in downtown Silver Spring. ``We come in peace, commander,'' wrote Turner, 36. ``March with us. It's time for a change. I'm ready to help, are you?''
The email set off six days of written and phone dialogue between Turner and Captain Darren Francke, who commands the Silver Spring police district for the Montgomery County department. It culminated Sunday afternoon when Turner, Francke and three other Montgomery County police officers took a knee in front of more than 200 protesters facing them and stretching half a block down Georgia Avenue.
Everyone sat still for 2 minutes 53 seconds, the estimated time George Floyd lay unconscious with his neck pinned below the knee of a Minneapolis police officer.
. . . . Turner's protest in the sprawling suburb just miles north of the District had a different twist: It was a demonstration put together with the active help of the police.
To Captain Francke, it all made sense. He had served in the Pennsylvania Army National Guard and joined the Montgomery police in 1996. A father of three, including a daughter who also came to the protest, he previously commanded the department's major crimes division--supervising murder investigations throughout the county.
``Thank you for sharing your story,'' Francke wrote. ``I don't blame you for having a chip on your shoulder. I am not proud of some things that a few officers did before and now.
. . . I am saddened and angered by what happened to George Floyd, and a number of other events over many years that were clearly violations of the values that the vast majority of officers have. My officers and I will march with you. With your assistance, we will also help to keep the event safe from those that would want to turn your message into something else. We want your message to be heard.''
By 1 p.m. Sunday, more than 200 people had gathered at Veterans Plaza in downtown Silver Spring. They marched 3 blocks to the corner of Colesville Road and Georgia Avenue, halted, and waited for Turner to lead everyone to one knee. He swayed back and forth, his head buried in a towel weeping as he thought of Floyd's family. Francke stood next to him, clapping. Next a quick prayer. Then the kneel. The crowd erupted with applause at the 2 minute 53 seconds mark as the group marched back to Veterans Plaza.
A series of speakers addressed the crowd. . . . About 3:30 p.m., Turner handed the microphone back to Francke. The commander told the crowd about Turner's encounter with the police 18 years earlier. And then the captain turned toward him. ``I'm sorry,'' he said.
That sorry, I think, underscores the importance that what happened in Minneapolis affects everybody in our country, not just the African-
American community.
Let me close with one additional story that was also reported and brings out a very familiar challenge for African-American families.
As the day drew to a close, DeShawn Rasberry, age 6, and his younger brother, Davian, age 4, were already tired. They had been at Pennsylvania Avenue and 13th Street since noon with their mother, Janessa Smith, age 28, handing out water, Gatorade, and granola bars as people were passing. The brothers had never seen so many people before, and neither had Ms. Smith. It was the family's first protest.
``Do you know why all these people are here?'' the mother asked her younger son. He stared at the crowd, munching on his granola bar that had crumbled to pieces in his hands. The mother said, ``They're out here for you.''
Davian was dressed in a Superman cap and a matching T-shirt and smiled and nodded. Ms. Smith had explained to her sons that they were here to ``protest,'' which means standing up for something, she said, and to help others. She hadn't told them that the protest was against police brutality, spurred by the killing of a man with their same skin color in police custody.
``They're so young now, still so young,'' Ms. Smith said. ``And right now they're in love with law enforcement. . . . I don't want to spoil that. Not yet.''
She pointed out that neither of her children were afraid of police. Ms. Smith looked at her sons, both just barely coming up to her waist, gripping cold water bottles. One day she will have to give them ``the talk'' about police officers, she thought to herself, but not today.
Let's rise to the occasion so that Janessa Smith never has to give that heartbreaking talk to her boys in Prince George's County, MD. I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to focus on our common humanity and respect for the rule of law.
There are examples of best practices in community policing that should be a guide nationwide. Let us work together to guarantee equal justice under the law and fulfill the promise of our Constitution in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, and ensure domestic tranquility.
Let this Nation finally guarantee ``Equal Justice Under Law,'' which is carved in the marble of the entrance to the Supreme Court, which is just across the street from our Senate Chamber.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Loeffler). The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Criminal Justice System
Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, since the death of George Floyd, the American people have once again been engaged in a passionate discussion about racial injustice, which has sadly existed throughout our Nation's history.
In many ways, the killing of George Floyd was the match in the powder barrel. It ignited long-overdue conversations about prejudice and discrimination that still exists in homes, workplaces, and in particular, institutions charged with keeping us safe.
There is no question that what happened to George Floyd was a failure of the Minneapolis Police Department. He was killed by police officers as one applied pressure to his neck and three others stood by and did nothing. We are going to leave that to the criminal justice system to make sure that the appropriate people are held accountable, but we are not off the hook. We have a responsibility, and we have experienced enough of these tragedies to know that it is not an isolated event.
Black men and women and other minorities across the country have died in custody for doing things that do not warrant the use of deadly force. In the case of Breonna Taylor, who was killed in March, she was asleep in her home when plainclothes officers with a no-knock warrant used a battering ram to enter her apartment shortly after midnight. She was asleep in her apartment, and shortly after midnight--no knock--just a battering ram, and her door is knocked open. Thinking somebody had broken into her home, which was a reasonable reaction, Breonna's boyfriend, a licensed gun owner, fired at them. He thought they were under assault. The officers returned at least 20 shots, killing the 26-
year-old emergency room technician.
Unfortunately, as in too many of these cases, the officers who were responsible were never held responsible, and that needs to change.
We are engaged in a discussion about how we can root out the injustices that exist in our criminal justice system. One terrible idea that has been floated is to defund or even disband the police. I can't even believe we have to talk about it, but we do because it has been proposed by a majority of the Minneapolis City Council members. Over the weekend, nine of them said they will begin the process of ending the Minneapolis Police Department. Well, I am amazed that we have to say it, but apparently we must. This is an extraordinarily reckless and dangerous path to go down. I was glad to see a number of our Democratic colleagues here in the Senate and over in the House reject such a crazy idea. I don't know how you can call it anything else.
While it is clear that bold action is required, disbanding institutions charged with keeping us safe would do more harm than good. You would think that would be self-evident. If you have a leak in your roof that suddenly causes your ceiling in your kitchen to crash down, the solution isn't to eliminate your roof. Sure, it would guarantee you are never going to have a leak again, but it is going to open you up to a whole new host of problems that would do far more damage. Our job here is to fix the leak and figure out how to move forward. The process in this case isn't going to be quite so straightforward.
Nationwide, we have some 18,000 Federal, State, county, and local law enforcement agencies. Some have 1 officer, while some have more than 30,000, so they are not all the same. The policies and procedures governing how the officers in each of these agencies interact with their community vary widely from one department to the next. By and large, that makes sense.
If you are in Mayberry with Andy Taylor, it may be a two-police-
officer town. Obviously, you can handle things a little differently than you can in a major metropolitan city like New York, Dallas, or Houston. That is why I believe that a one-size-fits-all approach does not make sense. We simply don't have the expertise, nor do we have the skill to try to write legislation that will treat 330 million people the same way.
Yet there are policies and practices that we can promote as best practices, and that is actually where I think the Federal Government's role is irreplaceable. It is very important. We can do that and provide good guidance to the States and local authorities.
One example is the chokehold. Chokeholds are already banned from a number of law enforcement agencies across the country but not all. In the past few weeks, State legislatures and city councils have taken action to ban this dangerous and controversial practice. I have no doubt more will follow suit. This is a great example of the type of action we can and should take in Washington to ensure America's law enforcement officers are helping, not hurting, the very people they are sworn to protect.
In the Republican caucus, Senator Tim Scott is leading the charge to develop a package of bills that will make much needed and long-overdue reforms to our criminal justice system. We have done this before. We did it with the FIRST STEP Act, bringing State-proven remedies to prison reform and rehabilitation and safe reentry into society to the national scale. So we have done this before.
I have been in close discussions with Senator Scott and Leader McConnell and a handful of other Senators who are interested in trying to come up with the most effective ways to create tangible change. This is not going to be a matter of political grandstanding; this is about practical problem-solving. It is certainly not going to be an effort just to serve as a political marker. I think there is actually enough common ground where we can do something constructive on a bipartisan, bicameral basis and get a Presidential signature on it.
One provision in the list of provisions that Senator Scott is putting together involves legislation that has already received broad bipartisan support. This provision, which I recommended, included a bill that Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat from Michigan, and Senator Graham of South Carolina, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and I introduced and passed last year to create a National Criminal Justice Commission.
I know sometimes people will say ``Well, creating another committee or another commission doesn't solve the problem,'' but this is not mutually exclusive. I think this is to supplement the other things we do here in the near term to come up with a comprehensive view of what we need to do in our criminal justice system to make it more fair and to make sure our law enforcement officers receive the best training and understand the best practices when it comes to community policing.
This is based largely on the same model as the 9/11 Commission. You recall that after the 9/11 Commission--there were roughly 14 people appointed by the White House in both political parties here. They studied the vulnerabilities we had that led to the 9/11 terrorist attacks and made concrete recommendations to Congress that we took up and passed. I think that is a sensible way for us to approach the problems with our criminal justice system writ large. It could include things like policing reform. That is an obvious one given the concerns of the day, but it doesn't have to be limited to just that.
We haven't done this sort of top-to-bottom review of our criminal justice system in America since 1965. This is the legislative version of finding the leak in your roof. This is the critical first step to figuring out the full range of problems that exist so we can begin the repair process.
A similar version of this bill passed the Senate unanimously late in 2018. I hope it can be a part of the conversation we have in the coming days and weeks about how to respond.
I know minorities across America are hurting right now, and there is a deficit of trust between many of their communities and the police departments. That is because too many families had to bury their sons or daughters who were killed without justification. While we can't turn time back, we can take action to prevent history from repeating itself.
A couple of days ago, I had the honor of talking to George Floyd's family as they were preparing for his funeral yesterday in Houston. I told them that at times like these, I know how inadequate words can be, but if there was some comfort that I could offer, it is that his death is not in vain, that something good will come out of this. I think that is true.
This repair process isn't going to be quick or easy. It is not something we can turn to next week and take off our plate and forget about it. This has been a long march since America was founded when we committed the original sin of treating part of our population--our African-American population--as something less than fully human. We fought a civil war over slavery, and in the 1960s, we had pretty controversial and chaotic times, which led to legislative work that protected the vote of minorities and protected civil rights writ large.
This is going to require a long-term, bipartisan commitment, not just from us in Washington but folks in the State capitals, city halls, and police departments across the country.
Because ultimately it is the local officials who have the responsibility to hire and fire the police chief, to make sure that bad police officers are removed from the force, and that is where the near-
term responsibility needs to lie because we don't have that capability here.
But we do believe--I do believe there are concrete steps we can take right now to address the racial injustices that were exposed once again with the death of Mr. Floyd. I appreciate Senator Scott and Leader McConnell for responding to this crisis with the urgency that it deserves, and I am proud to be part of this effort in the Senate.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Perdue). The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. BLUNT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
H.R. 1957
Mr. BLUNT. Mr. President, this week we are considering the bipartisan Great American Outdoors Act. I think it is fair to say that this is one of the most important packages of conservation legislation that we have seen in a long time. It might be fair to say that it is the most important piece of legislation since President Theodore Roosevelt dramatically made additions to the National Park System just a little more than 100 years ago.
The bill essentially combines two important provisions--the Restore Our Parks Act and the Land and Water Conservation full funding act. I am a cosponsor of both of those. We have been trying to do the things that those two bills both do for a long time, and here we are.
During World War II--we are just within a few days of D-day--
President Eisenhower--at that time General Eisenhower--had a view that sometimes if a problem is too big to solve or seems to be too hard to solve, you solve it by making it bigger.
Interestingly, what we have done here with two things that we have been trying to do for a long time--to have full access to the reason the Land and Water Conservation Act was created and to do a better job maintaining our parks--that has all been combined into the Great American Outdoors Act.
The first thing this act does is, frankly, make a significant investment for the deferred maintenance we have on all kinds of Federal land. It is one of our challenges as a government generally. It has been specifically one of our challenges as it relates to the National Park System, to the Forest Service, to the Fish and Wildlife Service, to the Bureau of Land Management--every one of those has deferred maintenance issues that have been there for a long time. In fact, some of them have been there for decades.
I mentioned earlier that the Park System as we now know it is a little more than 100 years old. Some of these maintenance issues are decades old, maybe 50 years old. Maybe half of the life of the entire Park Service we have had these issues on a list of something that needs to be done.
In Yellowstone, the high bridge that thousands of cars go over every summer--that bridge needs to be repaired. The water maintenance systems in our parks where particularly they have overnight accommodations and other things--many of those systems are almost as old as the parks themselves. There are buildings we have in all those locations where the access is no longer appropriate and hasn't been for a long time. Sometimes that meant you just closed the visitor center. You closed that part of the park that people previously had a way to get into and see a display, look at an exhibit, but because of disability issues that should have been fixed long ago, they haven't been able to.
We have been saying--I have been saying certainly for several years now that the second century of the Park System needs to be different from the first century of the Park System.
We need more private-public relationships. We saw a great example of that at the renewal of the arch and the museum and the area in St. Louis that just had a significant effort made, almost all by either local or private funds--very few Federal dollars there. But if you are going to have a private-public partnership, the public needs to do its part, and we are talking today about how the public would do its part in maintaining the parks, expanding the parks, building a new facility, repairing a facility, changing access to a facility.
But a lot of this deferred maintenance will not be all that obvious. It is just something that has to be done. And because it is not all that obvious--the bridge hasn't collapsed yet, and the water system still appears to be producing water that people can use, so let's worry about that at some future time. Well, the future time is here.
This act will work to help improve the visitor experience at the park--certainty at the units in my State and, Mr. President, your State. I have been to a number of the facilities in Georgia that will be impacted by this.
In Missouri, there is the westward expansion that is celebrated at the arch, and we just made a significant investment in that facility. The Truman home in Independence will be a National Park Service facility. The first park in America dedicated to an African American, a national park, the George Washington Carver park at Diamond, would be a place that would potentially benefit from this. The new park that we have established in Ste. Genevieve, MO, that has more of the original French architecture left--vertical log architecture and big porches that would have looked like a farmhouse in Normandy with a Caribbean porch put on it--numbers of those are going to create one of the best walking historic parks in America. That park would benefit.
So the Federal Park System benefits, but this legislation also includes permanent annual funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund.
When you think of the title of the fund, why would you have to do permanent funding to be sure that the Land and Water Conservation Fund got spent on land and water? It doesn't seem to be a genius move to do what we are doing here. What we are doing here with this fund is taking about $900 million a year that has been going in many cases for other purposes and saying: No. We collect the fund for this purpose. Let's use it for this purpose. It is not like we ran out of things to do with the money, and so we decided to put it somewhere else. But this does what the fund is supposed to do with the fund.
In our State, again, in Missouri, over the past 50 years we spent about $150 million out of that fund. The fund is being used to protect historically significant sites like the Mark Twain National Forest, the Ozark National Scenic River, and the Big Muddy National Fish and Wildlife Refuge. They have all been beneficiaries of that fund to some extent. The Wilson's Creek National Battlefield has been a beneficiary of that fund. The fund was created for the purpose that this legislation will ensure it largely serves.
We know that we have to build important relationships between local communities, between the Park Service, and between the American public to ensure that these sites are managed in the right way, that they are preserved for the future, and that they are safe to use for the millions of Americans who are going to use them this summer and next summer and the summer after that, and this winter and next winter and the winter after that.
In addition to the preservation and conservation efforts, the bill will help, frankly, bolster Missouri's outdoor recreation industry, and it is significant. The Outdoor Recreation Industry Association says that we generate about $14 billion--almost $15 billion--in our State in consumer spending, and about 133,000 jobs are created in Missouri because of outdoor recreation. About 5 million American jobs are created and around $800 billion of economic activity are created because of the ability to use these and other outdoor resources.
This is obviously not a normal year. So anything we can do to encourage people to use these facilities in a better way is important, as is anything we can do, as we look to the future, to maintain them and hand them over. And we have a chance here on all of these areas, whether it is the bureau of public lands or the national forests or the national parks, we have a chance to hand them to the next generation in better shape than we got them. We have a chance to look at projects that have been on the ``we need to do this'' list for 40 and 50 years and do what is needed to be done for 40 or 50 years.
I am proud to be an original cosponsor of this bill. I am proud of the leadership, particularly of Senator Gardner and Senator Daines, on our side on this effort, and the best bipartisan support that this bill will have. I look forward to voting for it. I urge my colleagues to vote for it, and, even more importantly, I look forward to seeing this bill have the impact that it absolutely will have and has to have on the important resources that we need to make the right kind of investment in.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont
Issues Facing America
Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, as everybody knows, our country today faces an extraordinary set of crises--unprecedented, in fact--in the modern history of this country. Over the last several weeks, hundreds of thousands of Americans from one end of this country to the other, from big cities and small towns, have rightly taken to the streets to demand an end to police murder and brutality and, in fact, to rethink the nature of policing in America.
In the midst of that--that rising up for police department rethinking and police department murder and brutality--our country continues to suffer from the COVID-19 pandemic, which, in a number of locations in this country, is actually getting worse and which has, up to this point, killed over 110,000 people and infected over 2 million Americans.
Then, on top of all of that--the struggle for racial justice and dealing with a pandemic in the midst of all of that--we have the worse economic downturn since the Great Depression of the 1930s. In the last number of months, as you know, over 32 million Americans have lost their jobs.
In the midst of the struggle for racial justice, in the midst of this horrific healthcare crisis, and in the midst of this economic meltdown, the American people are demanding to know what their government is doing in response to these crises. We were elected as Senators and Members of the House to respond to the needs of the American people. All over this country the American people are looking around them. They see the struggle for racial justice. They see a pandemic. They see an economic meltdown. And many of them are asking what the Republican leadership here in the Senate is doing. There is crisis after crisis after crisis, and what is the leadership here in the Senate doing? Tragically, the answer is nothing--nothing.
Historians have suggested that in the year 64 AD, while Rome was burning, the Emperor Nero played his fiddle. At least he did something. He provided entertainment to his court. But here, in the U.S. Senate, Republican Leader McConnell and his leadership team are doing nothing. Sadly, tragically, this is the worst do-nothing Senate in modern American history, and every Member of this body should be deeply ashamed at the degree to which we are failing our constituents.
Enough is enough. The U.S. Senate must respond to the pain and the suffering of the American people. Let us quickly wrap up debate over the Land and Water Conservation Fund act, which is on the floor right now. Let us wrap up debate, and let us vote on this bill. It is a good bill. Let's pass it. Then, let us begin to work on the unprecedented crises that are facing our country.
If there is anything that the torture and murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police has taught us is that we have to rethink the nature of policing in America and reform our broken and racist criminal justice system.
Let us be clear. The murder of George Floyd is not just an isolated incident. It is the latest in an endless series of police killings of African Americans--including Eric Garner, Sandra Bland, Laquan McDonald, Tamir Rice, Alton Sterling, Breonna Taylor, Freddie Gray, Rekia Boyd, Walter Scott, and many, many, many others. If anyone thinks that these police murders have just begun to take place in recent years when people had cell phone cameras, you would obviously have been mistaken. This has gone on forever.
The American people are rightly demanding justice and an end to police brutality and murder. The U.S. Senate has got to act now. We have to hear the cries for justice that are coming from the streets of this country, that are coming from the African-American community, from the White community, from the Latino community, and from all of our people. We must act and we must act now.
Let me just suggest some of the items that must be in the legislation that we pass. This is a limited number. We can do more.
In my view, every police officer involved in a killing must be held accountable, and those found guilty must be punished with the full force of law. That includes officers who stand by while these brutal acts take place. Every single killing of a person by police or while in police custody must be investigated by the Department of Justice. We must create a process by which police departments look like the communities that they serve and not look like invading armies.
We need to abolish qualified immunity so police officers are held civilly liable for abuses. We need to prohibit the transfer of offensive military equipment to police departments. We need to strip Federal funds from departments that violate civil rights. We need to provide funding to States and municipalities to create a civilian corps of unarmed first responders to supplement law enforcement.
For too long we have asked police departments to do things which they are not trained or prepared to do and have criminalized societal problems like addiction, homelessness, and mental illness. These are not problems solved by incarceration.
We need to make records of police misconduct publicly available so that an officer with a record of misconduct cannot simply move two towns over and start again.
We need to require all jurisdictions that receive grant funding to establish independent police conduct review boards that are broadly representative of the community and that have the authority to refer deaths that occur at the hands of police or in police custody to Federal authorities for investigation.
We need to ban the use of rubber bullets, tear gas, and pepper spray on protesters. We need to make certain that when people go to the street to protest, they are not treated like criminals and their basic constitutional rights are not denied. The struggle for racial justice is just one of the crises that we have to address.
Today, we are looking at a pandemic unprecedented in the last 100 years, and I would tell you that New Zealand, a very small country of about 5 million people, did something rather interesting--not surprising but interesting. They listened to their scientists. They acted boldly at the start of the pandemic, and they had political leadership trusted by their citizens. The result is that just the other day, New Zealand was able to announce that the COVID-19 virus was virtually eliminated in their country and they could reopen their economy safely--safely.
On the other hand, in the United States, under President Trump, we have a President who downplayed the crisis from the very beginning, who ignored or attacked scientists, and who most people recognize is a pathological liar, not to be trusted.
In New Zealand and in many other countries, bold and intelligent action saved lives, and in our country, incompetent leadership cost us lives.
Well, we cannot bring back those who unnecessarily died or who have become ill, but what we can do is take action now to do everything possible to minimize unnecessary deaths and illness in the future. First and foremost, we need a national protocol based on science to address this pandemic and not have 50 States and hundreds of communities going forward in different directions. There is a way to effectively deal with this crisis, and that leadership should be coming from the Federal Government. What we are talking about is the need, among other things, for increased testing and how to best utilize that testing as we talk about opening businesses and schools. We need, through the Defense Production Act and any other approach, to make certain that all medical personnel have the necessary personal protective equipment that they need.
Even today, months after the pandemic erupted, doctors and nurses still lack the equipment they need to protect themselves. I was on the phone just a couple of weeks ago with people in Vermont who work in clinics. They still do not have the protective equipment they need.
We need to produce hundreds of millions of the most effective masks that we can so as to protect all Americans, above and beyond medical personnel. Masks are an important part of fighting this pandemic, and every American should be able to have the best quality masks possible.
Working with the international community, we need to make certain that a safe vaccine is produced as quickly as possible and that it is distributed to every American for free. I have asked the Trump administration on several occasions. God willing, that vaccine will be produced soon--as soon as possible. We all want that.
As you know, the Federal Government is spending billions of dollars to help develop that vaccine, giving money to the drug companies. That is fine, but after that vaccine is developed, it must be distributed to every man, woman, and child in this country at no cost. I don't want to see people dying because they can't afford to pay for a vaccine. I don't want to see the drug companies profiteering from this Federal investment.
When we are talking about responding to the pandemic, we are talking about workers who are on the frontlines, whether they are medical professionals, workers in transportation, grocery stores, drug stores, meatpacking plants, or whatever. They must receive hazard pay for the dangerous work that they do. I get a little bit tired of seeing these TV ads from big corporations thanking the heroes who are out on the frontlines. Well, that is great. Thank them, but pay them. Pay them hazardous pay for the dangerous work that they are doing. We can no longer allow multi-billion dollar corporations like Amazon, Walmart, and Tyson Foods to treat essential workers like expendable workers--
like sacrificial workers. We can no longer allow multi-billion dollar corporations to run advertising calling their workers ``heroes'' while paying them starvation wages and treating them disrespectfully.
It is not just the racial justice crisis we face, not just the pandemic we face, but we are in the midst of an unprecedented economic crisis, and we must act boldly and aggressively to protect the American people in the midst of this crisis. As we speak, tens of millions of people have lost their jobs. They are worried about being evicted from their apartments. They are worried about losing their homes. They are worried about putting food on the table. In Vermont--and, I suspect, in every State in this country--there are people lining up at emergency food banks to get the food they need to feed their kids. Anyone who thinks that this is not a moment of urgency does not understand what the word urgency means. When people in America go hungry, we have to act. When people are being evicted from their apartments or losing their homes, we have to act, and we have to act now, not a month from now, not 2 months from now.
No, President Trump, this is not a time to take a victory lap. The real unemployment rate remains over 20 percent, the highest it has been since the Great Depression. Unless we get our act together boldly, over half of small business owners in America will be forced to close their doors for good within the next 6 months. We need to respond vigorously to the economic crisis that we face and the pain and suffering of the American people.
Now, what does that mean? Again, these are just a few of the provisions that have to be passed. We need to pass a paycheck security act which does what many European countries do, and that is to provide workers with 100 percent of the paychecks and benefits they previously received. According to a recent study from the University of California Berkeley, if we had adopted a paycheck guarantee program similar to the one in Germany, 24 million Americans would have a job today. Instead, we are seeing President Trump and Senator McConnell taking a victory lap because we created some 2 million jobs last month. That is good, but when we have 32 million people who have lost their jobs in recent months, we have to act, and we have to act boldly.
In my view, during this crisis, we must make sure that every American gets the healthcare they need by expanding Medicare to cover the underinsured, the uninsured, and the needs of people who have private insurance but inadequate private insurance. In my view, in the midst of this crisis with so much economic suffering, we need to provide every working-class person in this country with a $2,000 emergency payment each and every month until the crisis is over, so that they can pay the rent, feed their families, and deal with their basic needs.
Furthermore, as a top priority, we have to make sure that nobody in America goes hungry, and that means substantially expanding the Meals on Wheels program, the school meals programs, and SNAP benefits.
Here we are. All over this country people are demanding an end to police killings and brutality and demanding racial justice in this country. All over this country, people are being infected with a virus and continue to die, and all over this country, people are wondering how they are going to pay their bills because they have lost their jobs and have, in some cases, no food in the cupboard. If there was ever a time in the modern history of this country that the Senate and the House are called upon to stand up for families, for the working families of this country, who are struggling, who are living in emotional anxiety, who are scared to death about what is going to happen in the future, and if we are to reaffirm faith in government in this country to know that we are seeing and hearing that pain, now is the time. So today, I just call upon my colleagues. I know we have disagreements, but let us understand the urgency of the moment. Let's deal with the pandemic. Let's save lives. Let's deal with the economic crisis. Let's put people back to work. Let's deal with the issue of racial justice. Let's fight to end racism in this country. There is an enormous amount of work to be done. Let's do it. Thank you.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
Coronavirus
Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I come to the floor today having just heard the Senator from Vermont talking about the Nation in its effort to recover from the coronavirus crisis and the economic crisis as a result, and other important issues affecting our country. I heard him say that we have not done enough and need to do more, specifically with an economic recovery, with a coronavirus recovery, and it sounded like almost a liberal wish list of government providing for food, clothing, shelter, and income for every American.
I come to the floor today to tell you what we have done, in a historic way, because we passed the largest economic rescue package in the history of this country--trillions and trillions of dollars. This Senate, the House, and the White House went all-in to respond to and help us as a nation to recover from the coronavirus crisis.
Last week, the Senate passed and the President signed another bipartisan bill to help small businesses across our country. It is the Paycheck Protection Program Flexibility Act. That is what the people of Wyoming were asking for--this very successful Paycheck Protection Program, with flexibility, so it would be easier for our small businesses to use the relief funds. And 1,000 businesses in Wyoming took over $1 billion in loans, and it is keeping our economy alive, breathing life into the economy, and allowing paychecks to continue to be paid as our businesses reopen.
All across the country, this jobs-saving effort is working, because last month the U.S. economy added 2.5 million jobs. It smashed all expectations. It was the largest single month of job growth in this Nation in the history of our great country. Americans literally ran out the front door and back to work. Unemployment was down in May. It defied all of the forecasts and defied what we just heard the Senator from Vermont talking about and what his expectations have been.
We are headed for a faster economic rebound than anyone has imagined. Across the country, the State lockdowns have been ended. States have started to safely reopen. Small businesses are reopening. People are going back to work. I thought I heard the Senator from Vermont say that he was thinking that half of all the small businesses in America wouldn't be able to reopen again ever.
Young people are going back to school. K-12 schools and colleges are planning to reopen this fall. Of course, I don't think any of us were surprised to see the University of California system say that they are going to stay closed until 2021--until next year, all 10 campuses--
because in California, one size fits all. But for the rest of our Nation, the schools and the colleges are reopening and students will be heading back to campus.
There is a return-to-normal routine that is going to boost our communities. As the American recovery begins, we are going all in to keep people safe. That is a big part of it. That means more virus testing, more treatment, and better treatment and vaccines.
Innovations are rapidly expanding testing. The country has now performed more than 22 million coronavirus tests. Nearly a half million tests are done every day, including today. Our researchers, our scientists, and our doctors are making record progress on a vaccine. We are calling this effort Operation Warp Speed. It is a public-private partnership with companies producing a vaccine for the American people that will then be used around the world. The private sector finalists will soon be announced. The government will support their vaccine work, will assist with clinical trials, and will prioritize review of the most promising vaccines.
One of the companies, called Moderna, is in phase 2 trials and plans to start phase 3 in July. The Food and Drug Administration approval is then the final step. Another company, AstraZeneca, plans to end phase 2 and phase 3 trials over the next few months.
AstraZeneca just announced a new partnership with the Biomedical Research Authority and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. So our military is joining in this public/private partnership. This project may deliver emergency vaccines as early as October, which would certainly be record-breaking. The pharmaceutical company Merck will conduct trials in July. Johnson & Johnson plans phase 1 and phase 2 trials for July as well. Pfizer hopes to have a vaccine ready by October. The goal is to make a safe, effective vaccine and make it available to all Americans by January of 2021.
Operation Warp Speed partners want to beat this, and they want to make that their most ambitious goal--beating timelines that have never been beaten before, breaking the records. At the same time a number of other companies are pursuing a vaccine independently. America's researchers, scientists, and doctors have dropped everything and are working in overdrive. They have gone all in.
One major drug company CEO said yesterday that there will be no big price for the coronavirus vaccine. Every company should make that same pledge. Every company should make that same pledge. This is a tremendous opportunity for companies to do the right thing, to make the vaccine as accessible as any vaccine in the history of our Nation.
As we begin to recover from this crisis, the goal is clear, and it has been clear: We want to keep Americans safe and get them back to work. Together, that is what we must all endeavor to do.
Thank you.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Boozman). The Senator from Louisiana.
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