Richard Blumenthal

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I move that it stand adjourned.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. I ask unanimous consent that the Tillis amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to; the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I am honored to join my colleagues in this colloquy and to support this measure. We are nearing the end of the debate for today. We are nearing a vote tomorrow. But the debate will continue, and we will have other votes. Whether this measure passes or not tomorrow, it is only the beginning of what we need to do. So that debate nationally and in this body will continue. And there will be votes on other steps that carry forward the effort that this bipartisan security act reflects. But we must act. Everyone agrees that we must act to make our border more secure, to fix our broken immigration system, to find a path toward earned citizenship for millions--tens of millions--of undocumented people in this country who are paying taxes and playing by the rules and, of course, for the Dreamers and for people seeking visas so they can work here and fill jobs that otherwise will be vacant. We often hear Republicans talk about the need to secure the border. I sit on the Judiciary Committee where it seems like my Republican colleagues want to talk and talk and talk about the border. Every hearing, every markup, regardless of our actual agenda, they want to talk. Republicans want to talk about the border so much that they sent us contrived Articles of Impeachment against a Cabinet Secretary for the first time in 150 years. More talk. Politics is the reason that this body failed to pass this measure just months ago. So for Republican colleagues who now claim politics is the reason we are here--yes, their politics, their presumptive Presidential nominee saying that they should not vote for it because of the political advantage they would have from keeping it as an issue. They made clear that all they want to do about the border is talk and use it politically. Democrats spent months negotiating with Republicans. I give great credit to my colleagues, Senator Murphy, Senator Sinema, Senator Lankford, and others, who have worked on this issue over the years. I remember well in 2013, the Judiciary Committee overwhelmingly approved a bipartisan measure that then was approved by an overwhelming bipartisan majority in this body, and it went to the House where it died, not because it was voted down but simply because it had no vote. The Speaker of the House refused to give it a vote. We will have a vote tomorrow on a measure that falls way short of what that one did in 2013. We provided a path to earn citizenship for 11 million then-undocumented--for the Dreamers. We provided billions of dollars for border security. And we reformed visa and asylum programs, among other ways, by enabling more fairness in that asylum system. This bill is the strongest measure in recent history. It was endorsed by the National Border Patrol Council and the union of Border Patrol agents. Let's be very clear-eyed. It was a tough compromise. It limited asylum claims in ways that many Democrats and I remain concerned about doing. But it includes some key Democratic priorities, including providing new pathways to citizenship for our Afghan at-risk allies, ensuring legal representation to vulnerable children under 13 attempting to navigate the immigration process on their own, and providing for new ways for family members to enter the United States legally for short stays to visit relatives and attend major life events. That is an issue I have worked with colleagues across the aisle for years as well as some of those other provisions. These are key parts of the Democratic vision for immigration: fix our broken immigration system to continue growing our economy and maintain America's international leadership at a time of severe global unrest. It will be tough for my Republican colleagues to vote for this measure. It will be tough for many of us. But that is why we are here, and that is the measure of why it is a compromise. A lot of what is here, we would not choose to include. Let me conclude by saying, Donald Trump wants to campaign on the border, not fix it. The question is whether my Republican colleagues are so beholden to him that they will follow that lead like lemmings off a cliff and, at the end of the day, take the country with them. My Democratic colleagues and I are not giving up. To the Dreamers, we will keep faith with you. To the undocumented millions around the United States who are paying taxes, working hard, following all the rules, we will keep faith with you. To businesses that want more visas so they can have workers, skilled and others, we will keep faith with you. We will keep faith with America on this issue. We are not abandoning this effort. We are not going away. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I am honored to follow my colleagues who have spoken so powerfully on this issue and grateful to my colleague from Connecticut for his leadership, as well to Leader Schumer. We are a Nation of immigrants, proudly and gratefully. Immigrants have made this Nation the greatest in the world, and yet we have a broken immigration system. Fortunately for our Nation, people want to come here. Every week, I try to go to the immigration and naturalization ceremonies in my State of Connecticut. They are held in the courthouses. And I tell new citizens on those occasions that they are to be thanked for wanting to become United States citizens. They will never take it for granted. They pass the test that most Americans couldn't pass, and they smile or laugh because they know it is true. They have already contributed to their communities. Some have served in uniform. I look at them, and I say: This is what America looks like. This is what my dad looked like in 1935 when he came to this country speaking no English, knowing no one, having not much more than the shirt on his back. My immigrant story is not unlike many in this Chamber--certainly in this Nation. And this broken immigration system is unworthy of our great Nation. We need to fix it. We tried with comprehensive immigration reform in 2013. I was part of that effort and helped to write the bill that was passed overwhelmingly in the U.S. Senate on a bipartisan basis with support on both sides of the aisle and never was given a vote in the House. We can do bipartisan immigration reform. And we know how to do it. In fact, Democrats and Republicans came together about 100 days ago and arrived at some solutions that put us on a path to fixing our broken border. It is not the 2013 bill because it is not comprehensive. That bill provided a path to earn citizenship for undocumented people in this country--millions of them. It provided a path for Dreamers. It provided for border security--literally, tens of millions of dollars-- and for more visas. The bill that was negotiated 100 days ago and that should have passed 100 days ago would have begun the painstaking, laborious, difficult, complex task of immigration reform. We often hear Republicans talk about the need to secure the border. At almost every Judiciary Committee meeting that I attend, Republicans talk about the border. And they want to talk about the border so much that they actually sent us contrived Articles of Impeachment against a Cabinet Secretary for the first time in 150 years, knowing that it would go nowhere. They are making border security a political weapon. Really, it is a political stunt. And that is why they refused to vote for the negotiated compromise that will be before us beginning tomorrow again and next week. The conversation on the floor tonight is a prelude to the battle that we will have again tomorrow and, I hope, next week when we will all be given a chance to go on record. All we are asking of our Republican colleagues is that they put their votes where their mouths are. America is angry--and America should be angry--about the lack of border security and about the lack of serious purpose on the part of my Republican colleagues and on their failing to do their job simply because of the political directive of one Donald Trump. It is another example of how the cult of Donald Trump has infected our political process to the grave damage and detriment of all America. Democrats spent months negotiating with Republicans and developed that compromised border bill, the strongest bill in a generation, endorsed by the National Border Patrol Council, and the union of Border Patrol agents. And it would have reformed our asylum system, as you have heard, and empowered the President to help manage challenges at the border. But it also would have expanded work opportunities and some legal pathways to enter the United States, including Afghan nationals who assisted our Armed Forces and our diplomats, stood by them at grave risk to themselves. It was a tough compromise. And it limited asylum claims in ways that many Democrats and I were wary of, because it was a compromise. As soon as the bill was released and after it was agreed to by Republicans' chosen negotiator, the Republicans torpedoed it. And they torpedoed it for one reason: Because they wanted it as a political issue. They killed the bill because Donald Trump demanded it. As we have heard tonight, Donald Trump said: ``Please, blame it on me.'' And we are here tonight to do it, because the blame is well-deserved. So Trump and his allies have repeatedly shown that they prefer talk over action, that they prefer political gamesmanship over the hard work of bipartisanship on this issue. But we are not giving up. We are not going away. We are not abandoning this effort. It will continue to be our work, my life's work as the son of an immigrant, dedicated to sensible and responsible immigration reform--comprehensive reform. This bill is not the last word, but it is a start. And we will pursue bipartisan action over political gamesmanship. Republicans need to decide if they want to take action or just continue to talk. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I rise today to recognize Daniel ``Dan'' Nolan, a courageous firefighter and dedicated public servant, inspiring community leader, and dear friend to so many-- including myself. Reflecting the enormous loyalty and love felt for him across the community--indeed, our State--thousands of mourners attended calling hours last Friday in Wethersfield, where I joined in thanking his beautiful family for sharing him with us. Born in Hartford, CT, on July 29, 1962, Dan joined the military upon graduating from Windsor High School in 1980 and served in the Army National Guard for 38 years. Dan quickly rose to the rank of captain and was deployed three times--to Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan. In Iraq, Dan was detached to the 130th Combat Engineer Battalion from Puerto Rico, where he performed route clearance missions to clear improvised explosive devices--IEDs--from the streets of Baghdad. While in Afghanistan, Dan served as commander of the 246th Fire Fighting Detachment at Forward Operating Base--FOB--in Zabul. Dan led over 300 outside the wire missions and was the recipient of many commendations including the Combat Action Badge and the Bronze Star. Always looking to help others, Dan also developed his own community outreach programs in Afghanistan to provide food, clothing, shoes, and toys to needy local villagers. Dan was a second-generation firefighter, first joining the Hartford Fire Department in 1984. He rose to become deputy chief of training and was one of the many Hartford firefighters who served at Ground Zero following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. Dan is remembered with deep affection by his fellow firefighters for his leadership, bravery, and encyclopedic knowledge and expertise in the firefighting profession. Dan was a longstanding active member of his local community. He was a lifelong member of the Irish American Home Society in Glastonbury and was a prominent leader of the Irish History Committee and the annual Hartford St. Patrick's Day Parade. He was also involved in countless charitable organizations, most notably Amy's Angels, as well as Lea's Foundation for Leukemia Research, where he served on the board of directors since its inception in 1998. So many of the remembrances offered by people close to Dan reflect a common theme: ``He was always trying to help people.'' One friend recalls working as a server at a local restaurant where Dan was a regular and always asked to put someone else's bill on his tab. A barber who cut Dan's hair every few months shared that he always arrived with advice about scholarships or access to veteran benefits. A neighbor remembered Dan helping her move into her new house amid frigid temperatures and snowfall. My friendship with Dan deepened when I worked closely with him during his years-long effort to bring his translator Mohammad and his Afghanistan family to the United States. Dan showed boundless, tireless compassion and persistence in this endeavor. Every week, or even more often, Dan would check on Mohammad's case. Dan refused to relent, and Mohammad and his family arrived in Connecticut at the end of last Veterans' Day weekend. Dan's determination and resolve are an enduring tribute to the difference that one person can make in the lives of others. Dan was truly an extraordinary man who touched so many lives so positively and enduringly. He was also a deeply humble man, who delighted in crediting others for his own contributions. His good deeds speak more eloquently than my words. I treasured my friendship with Dan and will forever admire his incomparable compassion and courage. My wife Cynthia and I extend our deepest sympathies to his family during this difficult time, particularly to his wife Jill, his stepdaughter Raven, his siblings and aunt, as well as his many nieces, nephews, cousins, and loyal friends. I hope my colleagues will join me in honoring Dan's life and legacy, both large and lasting.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I rise today to recognize the 50th anniversary of Connecticut Humanities, CTH. CTH is a trusted leader and public/private partner with the State of Connecticut, having supported vital, widely accessible humanities programming throughout its 50-year history. Founded in 1974 as the Connecticut Humanities Council at the request of the National Endowment for the Humanities, CTH has dedicated itself to connecting residents of Connecticut to the humanities through grants, partnerships, and collaborative programs. Over the past 50 years, CTH has inspired storytelling, lifelong learning, informed public dialogue, and civic engagement throughout the State of Connecticut and, in doing so, has strengthened communities and enhanced the quality of life for all residents. Connecticut Humanities has created and promoted a number of incredibly worthwhile projects in Connecticut. CTH created the Connecticut Center for the Book, a State affiliate of the Library of Congress that promotes the written and spoken word. Along with its partners, CTH created Why It Matters: Connecticut's Civic Reconstruction, a program that provides frameworks for meaningful discussion regarding often difficult and divisive topics, instruction on civic processes and participation, and avenues that safeguard participation in our democracy for all citizens. CTH has also participated in the Democracy and the Informed Citizen initiative, supporting connections between the humanities and journalism and fostering an informed citizenry and a democratic society. Connecticut Humanities has long been a champion of the enduring value of public humanities in our lives and civil society. By implementing and supporting strong, viable, and sustainable cultural organizations that play a pivotal role in promoting the educational, cultural, and economic vitality of Connecticut, and ensuring that their programming is widely accessible to diverse and new audiences across the State, CTH continues to play a central role in the preservation of the humanities and the promotion of civic engagement. It is my hope that Connecticut Humanities will continue to grow and expand their vital work in the years to come. I applaud Connecticut Humanities for their exemplary work and hope my colleges will join me in expressing our gratitude and admiration.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am very proud to be here today to join my great colleague from the State of Washington to support the Veteran Families Health Services Act. At a time when there are many, many complex and difficult issues-- some of them nowhere near black-and-white; a lot of gray areas of policy abroad and at home--there is one issue that ought to be absolutely clear, unequivocally, in terms of what we should do--the right thing to do--really, the obligatory thing to do. And that is to make sure that our men and women who serve in uniform and our veterans have access to the healthcare they deserve and, in particular, reproductive healthcare and, most especially, IVF treatment. The Alabama Supreme Court in the LePage decision is another step in the assault on women's rights and women's healthcare and, in fact, on women. The kinds of restrictions placed on IVF treatment have been, essentially, disowned and disavowed by many Republicans who want to run away as far as they can as quickly as they can from that decision and are saying: Well, we are in favor of IVF but not against laws that restrict IVF. They can't have it both ways. Here is a chance for them to show, in supremely important terms, that they are in favor of this kind of treatment for our men and women who, in some sense, have earned it and deserve it more than or as much as any other American because they are the ones who put on uniforms and defend our rights and our freedoms. And they are the ones who, afterwards, come back to their community as veterans and continue to serve us. This measure, essentially, provides guarantees for Active-Duty servicemembers and veterans access to IVF. It expands adoption assistance at the VA and counseling services for couples navigating that process. There is very little to be said that wouldn't repeat the basic common sense of this proposal, and it shouldn't even be needed to be said that military families don't choose where they live. They are assigned to one State or another, one country or another. When they answer the Nation's call, they don't sign up for service in Connecticut at the subbase. They sign up, and they raise their right hand. And their access to IVF shouldn't be dependent on the State where they are assigned or the country. It ought to be available to every servicemember regardless of their posting. They defend our rights every day, and we must protect theirs with this bill. And veterans who have completed their service honorably deserve the same protection and access to family planning services. Our veterans who receive care at the VA deserve the highest standard--the gold standard--not some diluted standard because of a State law that restricts access to IVF. Their lives are already complex and challenging enough. We shouldn't complicate them further with administrative barriers. I will just repeat what I said on the floor the other day in favor of IVF treatment. There is nothing so moving and so profound as a family who wants a child and is having difficulty having it. There is nothing so moving as two parents or people who want to be parents. And in our military, that predicament is especially moving because they have committed to give up a part of their lives--one could say their lives-- to serve our country, and we should make sure that they have access to this fundamental right. Again, I thank my colleague from the State of Washington, and I thank other colleagues who will be here today and all who are supporting this important measure, which we should be proud to support. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I have been really awed and humbled by the eloquence of the women Senators who have preceded me, and I hesitate to add to what they have stated so powerfully already. But, of course, I am a man, and this bill is about women's reproductive care and women's rights, but it is also about the rights of all of us. The name of the act is the Access to Family Building Act. It is about families. It is about men, like myself, whose most awesome moment in life was the time they held their newly born child. Men have an equal stake in the issue that brings us here today. Men should be as scared and angry as women are about this trend, which is so destructive to basic rights and liberties. Women's rights are human rights. The rights at stake here are rights that are American. What could be more American than wanting to bring a child into the world? And what could be more heartbreaking? We have all been through it, through friends, neighbors, maybe our own family. A man and woman in love, wanting to have a child, miscarriages, other obstacles that prevent it, and there is a hole in their hearts, a hole in their homes and their families, as they struggle with issues of fertility and childbirth. This measure very simply guarantees the right for women and families everywhere--in Alabama, in Connecticut, in every State in this country--to access the fertility care they need to bring children into the world. You know, over 3 years ago, before Dobbs was decided--and we never could have imagined that Roe v. Wade would be overturned--and the Republican Party eviscerated access to abortion care, I posed what I thought was a really easy question to a Supreme Court nominee, Amy Coney Barrett. I asked: Is it constitutional to criminalize IVF treatment? She dodged. She dodged. She refused to answer. I thought it was self-evident. It is not constitutional to criminalize IVF treatment. That was before Dobbs. That was before the legal landscape was volcanically uprooted by this Supreme Court, which has been captured by a far-right fringe. Some may have wondered why at that time I asked what seemed like a very far-fetched, obtuse, arcane question. A lot of people probably didn't even know what it meant, and they may have also wondered why Justice Barrett refused to answer such an obvious question with such a self-evident answer. Wasn't it settled that IVF treatment is not only legally protected but also a scientific miracle? Think of it for a moment, the science here that is now accessible to every American, everyone in the world. Wasn't IVF pro-family, having children, parents who wanted a child? And they may have wondered as well, wasn't IVF the last, best hope for so many people struggling with infertility, desperately seeking to experience the miracle of childbirth for themselves? Who could possibly object to that miracle in the lives of a family who would not only relish but raise a child to contribute to our great country? What has become devastatingly and tragically clear is that the Republican Party's animosity toward women's health and women's rights doesn't stop at abortion. It is why I asked that IVF question in 2020, and it is why I didn't get a clear answer from a Republican nominee for the Supreme Court. The war on women and on reproductive choices by women and the war on families hasn't stopped at abortion or even IVF.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. So I conclude by thanking my colleagues who have brought this measure to the floor, particularly Senator Duckworth, and I regret that Republicans have blocked this measure.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, as part of what we are doing here today, I ask unanimous consent that the following Senators be permitted to speak for up to 5 minutes each prior to the scheduled votes: myself, Senator Kaine, Senator Warren, and Senator Wyden.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am grateful to my colleague Senator Shaheen of New Hampshire, as well as Senator Bennet of Colorado, Senator Cardin of Maryland, and I will be followed by Senator Peters of Michigan. We are among the group, but we are hardly the only ones who feel so passionately about this issue. For anyone who has visited Ukraine--and I have been there four times over the last couple of years--seeing and hearing are so powerfully inspiring, so deeply moving. I will never forget my first visit after the invasion when I went to President Zelenskyy's office--really a bunker--and spoke to him about what it was like to have the Russians literally 10 minutes away by car from his door. Then I went to Bucha, where I saw the remains of Russian tanks where they were stopped by Ukrainians using handheld missiles in the snow against these huge weapons of war, but simply by dint of their courage and indomitable spirit, they stopped the Russians--but only at Kyiv's doorstep. President Zelenskyy told me then and he has told me since: We will fight with pitchforks if we need to. We don't need your soldiers. We need your help. We need the military equipment that you can provide. He told us they needed more Javelins, and we provided them later than we should have. He said: We need HIMARS artillery. He said: We need ATACMS. We provided them later than we should have. Bradley and Stryker vehicles. Again, we provided them later than we should have. Of course, Abrams tanks and F-16s. They are there or on the way--later, but we did the right thing. Winston Churchill once said America always does the right thing after it tries everything else--an exaggeration, but there is a kernel of truth in Winston Churchill's comment, which is, we are often late in doing the right thing. Now we have no more margin of error in Ukraine. Deliveries of weapons are one-third of what they were only 7 months ago, and the failure to appropriate funds here means that supply of arms will be at 10 percent of what it was. I have met those veterans, Ukrainian soldiers who have fought on the front, who described to me what it means to be fighting against the entrenched Russian forces--landmines, their artillery pouring onto the Ukrainian troops, shells and drones that keep them at constant risk and force them back when they have sought to make advances. And they have made advances, and they have been successful on the front, both in the east and in the south. It has been yard by yard, mile by mile, moving forward, sometimes pushed back, and the Russians laying waste to whole cities. I have also visited Bucha and Irpin. We know what happened in Mariupol. The killing in Bucha was an atrocity that the world should never forget--men and women and children, hands tied behind their backs, shot in the head, and then buried in mass graves that I saw. Talking to people who live in Bucha whose memories will be seared forever and their children traumatized by these Russian atrocities. Vladimir Putin is a war criminal. There is a warrant for his arrest, rightly, from the international court of criminal justice. There should be warrants for arrests for all of the Russian officials who have participated in taking children from Ukraine, by the thousands--tens of thousands--and then indoctrinating them, reeducating them in Russia or Belarus. Russia has launched an unprovoked, criminal, murderous attack on a nation. That constitutes genocide. Those people in Bucha and in many other places around Ukraine were killed for one reason alone: They are Ukrainian. The world's outrage is well-founded. Many of my colleagues have expressed that same outrage. Senators are good at summoning outrage in words that are far more eloquent than mine, but we will be judged not by our words but by our actions. We will be rightly judged by history as to what we do or what we fail to do here. And we have missed opportunities in Ukraine before. The Senator from New Hampshire will recall well our efforts after the first invasion, when Russia seized a huge part of Ukraine and a bipartisan effort was made in the Armed Services Committee to provide more lethal aid to Ukraine so that it could use it, before this second invasion, to push back the Russians and show that we could deter them. And after my first visit to Ukraine, which was a little bit before the second invasion, I came back, and I said to anyone who would listen, including the President of the United States: The only way to deter Putin is with force, delivery of what Ukraine needs to defend itself. Vladimir Putin is a thug. He understands only force. And, unfortunately, we missed that opportunity. The second invasion occurred 2 year ago, and the effects in Ukraine are visible, again, to anyone who would visit: bombed-out buildings; transformers for power, destroyed; Ukraine's delivery of grain to a world that needs more food, blocked. These effects are not abstract, and they are not limited to Ukraine. There are a lot of people in the United States who watch what they see on TV, and the images are horrifying. And their reaction is, of course: Thank goodness it isn't here, and thank goodness it doesn't affect us. Well, the fact of the matter is, it affects Americans. It affects all of our allies. It affects the supply of energy and the cost of it--and the effect on the world economy. It affects the availability of grain-- Ukraine is the bread basket of many parts of the world--and the cost of food. It affects the diplomatic relations of nations, and, ultimately, it will affect our men and women in uniform. Right now, President Zelenskyy can fight and win without men and women from America on the ground. But if he keeps going--and he will keep going, if he wins; he has told it to us. We have only to listen to him. It will be Poland or Romania or Moldova or Finland and Sweden. Does anyone have any doubt about why Finland and Sweden want to be part of NATO? After years of neutrality, it is simply fear of Russia and Vladimir Putin's savage indomitable appetite for more territory and his long-range vision for restoring the Russian Empire and the old Soviet Union. So anybody who thinks that what happens in Ukraine has no effect on America, you are in denial. Anyone who argues that we should be repairing our roads or building more schools or providing more food and heat for people who need it in America, you are right, but not at the expense of our national security. We can do both. We have done both. And throughout American history, there have been people who have said: Let's pull back; let's care only what happens within our shores. And they have been proved wrong by history because of their denial, and, ultimately, America has done the right thing, as it did in World War II, and as it has done again and again and again by defending freedom and democracy. This imperative is a moral obligation. It is a political necessity, but it is also a national security imperative. The arms that we deliver to Ukraine already have helped degrade the Russian military by one half. Talk to our military leaders about the effects on Russia's military of Ukraine's defense. It has degraded the Russian Armed Forces by one half, and we have invested less than 5 percent of our military budget, without a single American casualty--not a single American in uniform killed or wounded. That is an investment that we need to continue, because the alternative is for us to be putting our troops on the ground there to defend, under our NATO obligation, those countries that will be invaded next--whether it is Poland, Romania, Moldova, or Finland and Sweden. Let me say, finally, I was very proud yesterday to vote for a supplemental that serves our national security--our national security in Ukraine, our national security interest in Israel. It is defending itself against a terrorist organization that wants to eradicate Israel and annihilate the Jewish people, and it is doing so at our urging, with pressure from the United States, with reduced civilian casualties, more humanitarian aid, and maybe, most importantly, working toward a pause to bring home the hostages. Some are American. And our security interest in Taiwan, in the Southeast, where, again, an aggressor threatens the rule of law and the order that we have established. And, of course, national security at the border--we need to control the border. Our immigration system is broken. We need comprehensive immigration reform, but we need steps now to reform a completely shredded system at the border. But this cause of Ukraine should bring us together and has brought us together. When we first started 10 years ago in the Armed Services Committee, one of our leaders was John McCain. I have traveled to Ukraine with Senator Graham. We have been part of a bipartisan movement. It should bring us together as Republicans and Democrats. There should be no red or blue part of it. And I know--let me just say finally--that the people of America, at heart, are with us. I know that the Ukrainian community in Connecticut has stood steadfast and has been such an example. When I have told President Zelenskyy about the strong support in our Ukrainian community, his eyes have lighted up. And that is true throughout America. Ukrainians have remained steadfast in their loyalty to the freedom of their country, and they have been inspired, as have we. Vladimir Putin is counting on us to fail. He believes democracies are decrepit and corrupt. He thinks that an autocratic dictatorship is superior, that everyday people don't know how to govern themselves, that he can continue to divide us by misinformation and disinformation. He is wrong. Let's prove him wrong. Let's do it without delay. Let's do the right thing, without doing everything else first. I thank my colleagues, and I am proud to stand with them today to urge that both Chambers pass this supplemental as quickly as possible. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I rise today to recognize my friend and fellow Connecticut resident, Chris George, on the occasion of his retirement from Integrated Refugee & Immigrant Services--IRIS-- after 18 years of remarkable leadership in resettling individuals and families seeking to build a new life in our country. In 2005, Chris joined the organization that would later be known as IRIS, which operated out of a small office in New Haven with an eight- person staff. Over the following 18 years, Chris guided an enormous expansion of the organization, with 150 employees now helping to resettle 1,000 people per year across Connecticut. During Chris' tenure, IRIS has been at the center of Connecticut's response to refugees and other immigrants fleeing from persecution and violence, working with those displaced from Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ukraine, and many other places worldwide. Chris and IRIS performed lifesaving work to accommodate refugees, especially through the expansion of their community cosponsorship program. The success of IRIS under Chris' leadership has made New Haven and Connecticut national leaders in refugee resettlement. In January 2023, the organization was selected by the U.S. Department of State as one of five agencies to lead a consortium of nonprofit organizations as a part of the launch of the Welcome Corps program. In this role, IRIS is responsible for coordinating and managing the newly created Welcome Corps program infrastructure, which includes vetting, certifying, and training private sponsors, as well as monitoring and evaluating the overall success of the program. I have been deeply honored to work with Chris over the years and witness his incredible accomplishments firsthand. I will always remember collaborating with him closely during the evacuation of Americans and allies from Afghanistan in 2021. From the outset of the crisis, Chris worked tirelessly, oftentimes communicating with those trapped in Afghanistan directly in order to secure their safe evacuation. Chris was quick to recognize the complexities that the evacuation from Afghanistan presented and was able to secure humanitarian parole for hundreds of refugees resettling across Connecticut. Chris has also been a key contributor and spokesperson for the Afghan Adjustment Act, aiming to affirm the legal status of the refugees who have been able to make it to the United States. Chris and IRIS were critical in not only advocating for and assisting in the safe escape of these individuals from the Taliban, but also in helping them to find housing, connect with healthcare, enroll in school, find jobs, and learn English. Chris has been a fierce advocate on behalf of all fleeing oppression across the world, and his remarkable career is a testament to his diligence, leadership, and compassion. Although he is stepping down from IRIS, he plans to continue advocating for humanitarian causes, including working at the newly created Welcome Corps. I applaud Mr. Chris George for his incredible work and hope my colleagues will join me in expressing our gratitude and admiration.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, as I listen to the objection of my colleague from Utah, I am really struck by the absurdity and exaggeration involved in opposition to these commonsense measures that would simply save lives. The idea that we haven't debated background checks--what could be more untethered to reality? We have debated background checks for as long as I have been in the U.S. Senate and before then, when I was attorney general seeking to champion universal background checks. We have debated them in the Judiciary Committee ad nauseam. And we have shown, through the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, that we can break the hold of the gun lobby that is the source of those absurd and ridiculous arguments. Background checks take no guns away from any law-abiding citizen. They simply assure that people who are dangerous to themselves or others don't have them. That is the purpose of red flag laws, which I have also championed, and many of the other measures that we seek to pass--the repeal of PLCAA, which guarantees unbridled immunity to gun manufacturers; ghost guns, which we seek to ban because law enforcement finds them so dangerous; and numerous other commonsense measures. I am here on behalf of a bill, Ethan's Law, S. 173, which ought to be common ground for everyone. It simply requires safe storage. And we know that 500 Americans every year, including more than 100 children, die from unintentional firearm injuries, many of them involving weapons that are unsafely stored. There are loaded and unlocked guns in the homes of 4.6 million American children, and many of them perish because their parents or their neighbors' parents fail to safely store those weapons. Nobody knows it better than Kristin Song. Her son died as a result of an unsafely stored weapon just after his 15th birthday. He was with a friend, and a firearm stored in a Tupperware box was used in play by these two young boys. Ethan Song died, and Ethan's Law, which I am seeking to pass by unanimous consent today, is in his memory. It was passed by the State house of representatives in Connecticut and our State senate. And 26 States--red, blue, purple--already have some form of safe storage and child access prevention laws on the books. We know from the record of these laws in Connecticut that they work; they save lives. And we know also that gun owners believe that safe storage ought to be the law, ought to be required, ought to be mandated so that lives are saved. In fact, even the firearms industry--including the National Rifle Association and the National Shooting Sports Foundation--agree that safe storage is a critical part of responsible gun ownership. The NRA tells gun owners that ``[s]trong boxes and security cases . . . are inexpensive and give . . . quick access to . . . firearms in a defensive situation.'' The NSSF tells gun owners to ``[a]lways make absolutely sure that firearms in your home are securely stored out of the reach of children and . . . unauthorized persons.'' Ninety percent of the guns used in unintentional shooting deaths by children were left unlocked and loaded. The numbers are outrageous and depressing, but we can do something, and we should do something. And that is why I am here today to urge that we pass a bill that ought to be common ground--bipartisan common ground--and show that, in fact, democracy can work. We can pass measures that save lives that should be bipartisan. There ought to be no Republican versus Democratic debate on this floor or anywhere else. It ought to be a matter of common sense and common agreement across the aisle. Mr. President, so as in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration of S. 173 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; I further ask that this bill be considered read a third time and passed and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. No single gun owner will lose a gun--none--as a result of this measure.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I want to thank Senator Whitehouse for his leadership on this issue--persistent, consistent, constant in seeking the truth; very simply, seeking the facts. We are here about the authorization of a subpoena to three individuals--Harlan Crow, Leonard Leo, and Robin Arkley--who have engaged in, we know for sure, a pattern of gift-giving, including lavish vacations, private jet flights, school tuition, and even a luxury RV. These wealthy political activists have given those gratuities, we know for sure, but we know very little else because the Supreme Court has no code of ethics. The U.S. Supreme Court could defuse a lot of the degrading rumor and speculation if it were simply to do as every other branch of government, as every other judge except for the U.S. Supreme Court does and impose a code of ethics. Its refusal to adopt a code of ethics lies at the core of our reason for being here today. But, in my view, these subpoenas are part of an effort to save the Court from its own self-inflicted ethical crisis. It is an ethical conflagration of its own making. The Supreme Court Justices are the only Federal judges who are not subject to a binding and enforceable ethical code, and that leads to the next point. The Judicial Conference is a creation of this body, the U.S. Congress. We are looking into what the Judicial Conference should be doing and what it may know and should be held accountable for knowing. Our investigative effort directly concerns a creation legislatively of the Congress. It is perfectly proper. It raises no constitutional issues. All this stuff about the independence of the Supreme Court--yes, it is an independent branch of government, but it is not nonaccountable. Funds for it are appropriated. Rules of evidence are created. There are numerous ways that it, in effect, is held a part of an overall and overarching Government of the United States of America. The small circle of individuals here who have engaged in these gifts--all of them far-right, wealthy donors; some of them having cases before the Court--raises issues that are profoundly important to the credibility of the Court itself. So, again, we are seeking to save the Court, in a sense, from its own potentially self-inflicted continuing degrading and diminishing. The fact that the polls show the Supreme Court has plummeted in public opinion is not the reason for us to investigate, but they reflect a secrecy, combined with these potentially improper gifts, that is undermining the Court as an institution. I say it sadly because I was a law clerk on the U.S. Supreme Court to Justice Harry Blackmun--who, by the way, would not even go to dinner with someone who might at some point in the future have a case before the Court. I have argued cases before them, before the U.S. Supreme Court. I have real reverence for the Court as an institution. So I am especially sad but also particularly angry that the Court is failing-- totally failing--to take action that it owes the American people and itself, because the Supreme Court as an institution will be diminished by its continued refusal to create an ethics code and the refusal to disclose the truth about these financial relationships. These twin refusals bring us here today. Authorizing a subpoena is not a step that I take lightly. None of my colleagues do. But the weight of the Court's ethical crisis makes it necessary. The American people deserve a Supreme Court that is ethical, impartial, and accountable. The highest Court in the land is not higher than the law. It is not above accountability. It may be independent, but it is not unto its own, as it seems to believe it is. We are past Halloween. All of the charades and shams that have been offered as arguments are about as valid as the costumes people were wearing the other day, October 31. The Supreme Court has a commitment and a promise under our Constitution. It has to deliver on that promise or its credibility will be further diminished, and the Supreme Court as a pillar of justice-- and it must be a pillar of justice--will be eviscerated in the eyes of the American people. I look forward to authorizing these subpoenas and helping to restore the reputation of our United States Supreme Court. I yield to my colleague from Hawaii, Senator Hirono.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am pleased to follow my colleague from Rhode Island and join him in urging confirmation of these highly qualified and experienced men and women to positions of great trust and responsibility in our military, but they are just a fraction of the total whom we have an obligation to confirm. Rather than looking at the transcript of my remarks today, I urge my colleagues to view or read the record of last night. There were 3 to 4 hours of eloquence and intransigence--eloquence on the part of a number of our colleagues, including Senator Graham, Senator Young, Senator Ernst, and Senator Sullivan, seeking to persuade one Member of the U.S. Senate whose intransigence is preventing the Nation from having the benefit of military leadership that it needs and deserves. Again and again and again, Senator Tuberville objected to confirmation of individual nominees for the highest and most responsible position in our U.S. military. Make no mistake, he said repeatedly that he would permit those nominees to go forward as long as they were considered individually, and our colleagues gave him the opportunity to allow them to go forward. But he has continued to change the goalposts, to alter the conditions of approving their confirmation, simply because of a personal preference on policy that those nominees had nothing to do with. Our colleagues made that point repeatedly, as well as the damage to our national security that is resulting from his intransigence. Our military readiness is undermined. Morale is reduced. Recruitment is severely damaged. The health and well-being of military families, including, most prominently, the Commandant of the Marine Corps--our prayers are with him. Our hearts are with his family. We hope for General Smith's speedy recovery. But, right now, our military is lacking the leadership that it needs in key positions around the world, and it is impacting not only their professional abilities but also their personal lives: kids going to school, selling homes. We are making life more difficult for men and women who serve and sacrifice to keep us safe. As one of our colleagues said last night--and I am quoting--I think I am done with this. I hope this body will be done with the intransigence of the Senator from Alabama and move forward with a resolution. I am proud to say I participated in drafting it. It is narrowly tailored to fit this situation, applying only to this session, for key positions in our military that are essential to confirm, seeking to surmount the obstructionism that has gridlocked and paralyzed this body in moving forward. It is time to reform the rule. That time is, in fact, overdue. The regrettable illness of our Commandant, the threats around the world, in Israel and Ukraine, make it no longer a matter of choice. We must move forward with this draft resolution, and I hope my colleagues will recognize the importance of doing so. As one of our colleagues on the other side said last night, this intransigence, this resistance to allowing the body to move forward and confirm these nominees is going to ``wreck'' the military. That is not some hypothetical fear; it is a real prospect that we need to avoid. The precedent of an individual Senator using a policy preference to stop confirmation is one that will potentially wreck this body's credibility and ability to move forward with key nominees for a variety of positions in the military and outside it. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am grateful to follow my friend--and he is a friend--the Senator from Kansas, who stated very eloquently a number of challenges that lie ahead and the reasons we do have to come together on a bipartisan basis to make America and the world more secure. Like him, I found last week to be both frustrating and discouraging, but I have been heartened, first, by the overwhelming bipartisan votes in this Chamber in favor of aid to Ukraine--in fact, in support of a bipartisan compromise that included aid to Ukraine and provided a temporary extension of funding, which eventually became the core of the measure adopted by the House. I have been encouraged as well by the leadership of Senator Schumer and Senator McConnell in coming together with Senator Collins and Senator Murray to say that we will fulfill our obligation to Ukraine and that we will do it promptly. That is why I am on the floor of the Senate right now--to emphasize the urgency of making sure that we provide Ukraine with the tools, the financial support, the humanitarian assistance, and the arms that it needs to win. And it can win. It is making solid, steady progress. I have seen the maps. I have visited Ukraine four times in the last 18 months. Ukraine can win, and it will win if we provide Ukraine with the tools it needs, but it must be done now. We owe it to the men and women who are in those trenches right now, bleeding and dying, and who are watching America. We owe it to the leadership of Ukraine, President Zelenskyy, who has asked me on each of those four visits: Will the United States stay by our side? And I have assured him that, yes, we will be solid. We owe it to our allies who are also watching--our allies and our adversaries. And, make no mistake, the Chinese have changed their view of whether they can count on the United States to fail and falter, because, so far, we have stood strong, sending a message to China about what we would do if China invades Taiwan. The world is watching, and history is watching. To my colleagues, there are few, if any, votes you will take or actions by which you will be measured more intently and importantly than what we do right now--not months away but days away--on what we must do in the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative. I urge the administration to take whatever action is necessary-- again, not just in statements, not just in words, but in deeds. Ukraine is waiting for the longer range artillery, the ATACMS, that it needs to pound targets where the Russians gather intelligence, where they store supplies, where they conduct their leadership. Those ATACMS are necessary--not just the HIMARS but the longer range artillery. We need to train the pilots. That can be done under existing authority and financial support. They need to provide munitions--we are producing more, but Ukraine continues to use them at a rate of roughly 10 times or 15 what we are providing; drones, which have become the new fulcrum of the battlefield not only to gather intelligence but to deliver the kind of ordnance that we need to provide. These actions by the administration can be done with existing funding. But the fact of the matter is that, as of this week or just days afterward, the Pentagon may well run out of funding for new weapons platforms. Without an immediate replenishment, it cannot, over the longer term, provide Ukraine with critical systems, like the air defense platforms, that Ukraine needs to protect its civilians as well as its military targets. Winter is approaching, and Russia will continue to bombard its infrastructure unless it has that air defense. Those systems, the hospitals, the schools, the grid for electricity are now supremely susceptible to that kind of air bombardment. We know Patriot air defense works. I have seen it myself in the midst of air raids on Kyiv, where I went to the bunker and Kyiv's air defense successfully fended off those missiles and drones that were coming after it. We know the urgency of those ATACMS. We have heard it from the Ukrainians. We have heard it from our own military about how important they can be. I urge the administration to provide that longer range artillery as soon as it can do so. But we have a larger task ahead of us. The supplemental at $24 billion is a necessary start right now. We can take advantage of the bipartisan agreement that we have expressed in this Chamber and in the House to make it happen, to move quickly and promptly. I recognize there is turmoil in the House of Representatives. I am clear-eyed about the possibility of growing fatigue among the American people. But it is on us in the U.S. Senate. It is on us as leaders to make the case and convince America that it is on us and in our interest because if we fail now to make this investment, the costs will be far greater when Putin wins. We will have the need not just to provide weapons platforms but troops on the ground because that will be our treaty obligation if Putin then goes against Romania, Poland, Moldova, Finland, and Sweden. He will pick one of them. We know he will be on the march if he wins in Ukraine, and we will have proved him right about our faltering and failing. It will encourage not only him but also China, and we will have a far greater cost. It is our national security on the line. Ukrainians are fighting for our future, not just theirs; for our independence and freedom, not just their own. We have a national security interest in this fight, and we need to make the American people understand it. Sometimes history is personal. Sometimes it is shaped by a leader who has the courage and strength to step forward and put his life on the line. That is what Volodymyr Zelenskyy has done. He has inspired the people of Ukraine and the people around the world by staying in Ukraine and providing that leadership that is so important. I once asked him how he thought it would end. He said: In the end, it will be fine. And if it is not fine, it is not the end. They are determined, as he told me, to fight with pitch forks, if necessary. But we can't let them fight with pitch forks. We need to give them what they need to be successful and to vindicate the losses they have suffered. I have seen them in Bucha, the mass grave sites, where women and children had hands tied behind their backs, shot in the head, hundreds of them--a repeat of Stalin and Hitler in their killing of innocent people in exactly those ``bloodlands,'' as Professor Snyder has called them. We have all seen images of cities leveled, literally destroyed, not just Bakhmut but Mariupol. We have heard about children kidnapped from areas that Russia has occupied. I have talked to the prosecutor general about those thousands of children--literally thousands--taken from their parents, supposedly orphans, but their parents were still alive and parents taken away from children to Belarus. There is a reason why the International Court of Criminal Justice has issued a warrant for the arrest of Vladimir Putin and why he would be judged a war criminal if he ever were brought to trial--because he has committed atrocities that have no match in recent history for their scale and scope and their brutality. We are dealing with someone who has no respect for human life--either Ukrainian life or Russian life--because he will continue to send his people into the maw like cannon fire. In the face of that evil, the Ukrainians are determined. But we need to match their courage and strength with the resources that they need and with the arms that they need. Sometimes history is personal in what it means to us. My own dad left Germany in 1935. He came to this country at the age of 17. He spoke virtually no English. He had not much more than the shirt on his back. He knew no one. He left Germany alone at the age of 17 because he saw what was coming. He succeeded in bringing over his parents and his siblings and lost the rest of his family to the kind of brutality and atrocity that we are witnessing right now at the hands of Vladimir Putin. History doesn't repeat, but it often rhymes. Evil often does repeat, even if it is not by the same people against the same people. What we are seeing now is evil. There are very few places in the world or conflicts or circumstances where there is, in fact, no gray area--black and white, good and evil. The world is watching now to see how we will keep faith: keep faith with our allies that have invested along with us at our side, keep faith with the people of Ukraine, and maybe most important, keep faith with ourselves and with our values. We are being watched not just by the world but by history. And our values and our self-image, our ability to look ourselves in the mirror and say, ``Yes, we did our job,'' is now what is at stake. History will remember us either as paragons of liberty or ineffectual bystanders. We can't wait for 45 days. We need a supplemental now. The men and women in the trenches of Ukraine can't wait 45 days for bullets and bandages. The people in Kyiv facing this winter without, potentially, food and electricity can't wait 45 days to know that we will stand by them. They are fighting for their future, for the dreams of independence and democracy. We are the most powerful, wealthiest, and the greatest Nation in the world not simply because of the example of our power but the power of our example. There are a lot of folks--and I was one of them--who are discouraged and frustrated, as I said right at the start, about the ability of our democracy to work, given what we went through over these past days. But we can show our values and our democracy at its best if we help the Ukrainians at this moment of unparalleled crisis for them. If we delay and falter, we lose time, and the loss of time and delay essentially means defeat. I urge my colleagues to join me to find a way forward, a path to vote as soon as possible to make that aid available to Ukraine. It is our obligation and our opportunity, at this critical moment in our history, when the world is watching and when others, long from now, will look back and watch what we did or failed to do. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted to complete my remarks prior to the scheduled vote.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I join my colleagues in mourning the passing of a great and good colleague, someone we knew not only as a fellow worker here and a colleague but also as a friend. Every one of us had a personal connection to Dianne Feinstein. She had no enemies. She had adversaries, she differed, but she could differ and disagree without being disagreeable, as the saying goes. She established personal connections with all of us over her many years of service. I have listened to my colleagues on the floor this morning, and coming through to me is not only a sense of pain in her passing but also joy in knowing her. What strikes me is that she leaves a legacy--yes, a legacy--in legislation, in good works in California that impacted people's lives there, but her real legacy is people. Her legacy is the people who regard her as a role model, the people who were inspired to follow her into public service, the people who stood up and spoke out--and often it was truth to power as she did--because she was there. She blazed the trail. She showed how to do it. I first became aware of Dianne Feinstein in the early 1990s as a newly elected State attorney general, advocating for an assault weapons ban in the State of Connecticut--the early 1990s, and she was doing it at the Federal level. Connecticut and the Congress did it together. Then I defended our Connecticut law in the Connecticut courts with many of the same arguments that we used to challenge Federal law. She stood alone in those days as an advocate and a champion of gun violence prevention, and she modeled the curve that has led to the modern movement of gun violence prevention. And it is a movement now because she knew it would require the American people to be as outraged as she was and saddened by the death that she personally witnessed in San Francisco. And she would often recall it in very personal terms. For her, all of these causes were personal. Her service and her helping people were personal. And she understood that service and results, accomplishments, required that we be bipartisan, that we work across the aisle, that we work with people who disagreed with us and try to find common ground. That is what she did relentlessly and tirelessly. So her service, her grace, her generosity, her sensitivity, her caring will continue in the people that are her legacy, in the people who will and should, always, preserve her memory as a motivation for continued service. I am proud to have been her friend as well as her colleague, and I will always treasure the great and good model and mentorship that she provided for so many of us, as we go through these next days of grief and pain but also joy in knowing her. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I am very pleased and proud to speak to my colleagues today about Vernon Oliver, whose nomination is before us. We will vote on it shortly. I anticipate that he will be approved, and I hope it will be with bipartisan support because Vernon Oliver represents exactly the kind of jurist, lawyer, public servant whom we want on the Federal bench. Judges on our Federal trial courts are often the face and voice of justice. All too often, litigants are there for justice, and it is the end of the road for them one way or the other because they don't have the resources to appeal to the courts of appeal, which sit in other States, far away often, requiring expenditure of resources. So that district judge sitting in the court where, often, they live is the person who represents justice--the face and voice of justice--for them. Vernon Oliver is exactly the kind of person who will be trusted to give justice. He grew up in Bridgeport, with not a lot in his home in the way of financial resources. He worked hard, went to the University of Connecticut for his B.A. and then for his J.D. The University of Connecticut prepared him for a life of public service, and that is what he has done, with a brief break for private practice and as a temporary assistant clerk for the Hartford Judicial District. He joined the Connecticut Division of Criminal Justice, serving in the Office of the Chief State's Attorney, and then as a prosecutor in the Bristol Superior Court. Then I had the great honor to hire Vernon Oliver to be an assistant attorney general. And I say I had the great honor because when I knew him first, when I met him, I knew he was the kind of person who would be a really superior, extraordinary assistant attorney general. He went to work in the child protection unit, which essentially tries to protect children from abuse and neglect, tries to hold families together or reach some resolution when there is violence or other kind of dispute that divides them. Here is what I learned about Vernon Oliver: He has a strong mind, he has a big heart, and he has a passion for justice. He handled dozens, hundreds, thousands of those cases over the time that he served as an assistant attorney general, and each one of them required him to focus his mind and his heart and that passion for justice. He took every one of them seriously, the same seriousness for every one. They are often extremely demanding, not just intellectually but emotionally, and he stepped up. He showed the fiber of his character. He was nominated in 2009 to be a judge on the Connecticut Superior Court. His nomination was done by a Republican Governor, Jodi Rell. Throughout his 15 years on the bench, he has presided over numerous civil and criminal cases, including approximately 30 bench trials, approximately 20 jury trials, and thousands of hearings. You don't really need to listen to me about Vernon Oliver; you can go to his colleagues, the legal community of Connecticut. A group of Connecticut attorneys, many of whom have practiced in front of Judge Oliver, wrote that he has ``an exceptionally keen legal mind'' and ``is committed to the fair and impartial administration of justice.'' The George W. Crawford Black Bar Association noted that ``[Judge Oliver's] decisions are well reasoned and thoughtful'' and that ``[p]ut simply, he is a phenomenal judge.'' He is a phenomenal person, not just an extraordinary judge. That is why Connecticut State Representative Christie Carpino, a Republican, wrote this to the committee, our committee, the Judiciary Committee: ``[Judge Oliver's] breadth of knowledge in both criminal and civil law, as well as the diversity of his judicial assignments, makes him uniquely qualified to be appointed to the federal bench'' and that ``he has the demeanor one could only hope all jurists possess.'' I take this time to talk to my colleagues because I think we need to be mindful of a standard, a standard of excellence on our Federal bench. I thank and commend President Biden for this nomination because he has recognized the importance of diversity, as well as high performance intellectually, and he has enabled us, I think, to raise that standard. Judge Oliver is a perfect example of that standard, and he is the gold standard we are seeking to achieve and I believe we are achieving when we confirm him and others who have those same qualities. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am honored to follow my colleague from Kansas and engage in this bipartisan colloquy for a measure that truly has bipartisan support. My thanks to Senator Klobuchar for her leadership as well. And I am going to be followed by Senator Coons, who has dedicated himself to civil rights and liberties around the world. This issue is one that rises above politics. Every so often in this body, we are able to rise above politics, never often enough for many of us. But here is an opportunity to put down a marker, to make a statement, to show with our votes that a great Nation keeps promises. America is the greatest Nation in the history of the world. We need to keep our promises. And I know about those promises, not only as a member of the Armed Services Committee who has visited Afghanistan several times but also as a father. My two sons served during this period of time. My oldest son Matthew was an infantry officer in the Marine Corps, in Helmand Province. My second son is a Navy SEAL. And let me just put it very bluntly: As a dad, as a public official, as an American citizen, I want Americans who are deployed overseas to be helped by people in the country that we are fighting to serve. Not only in America and our self-interest here, but also abroad when our troops are deployed and put in harm's way, they depend on exactly the kind of Afghan allies whom we promised we would not abandon. And if we want to count on those kinds of allies all around the world--not only in Afghanistan and Iraq and that part of the world, but in Africa, in South America--we need to keep our promises. If we lose that credibility and trust, our troops will be in danger. Our sons and daughters will be at risk when they depend on those interpreters, the guards, the guides, the security aides, and all of the kinds of allies that we enlist--Afghan allies--who put their lives on the line and now have targets on their backs if they were ever to return. It is bad enough that many of those allies are still in Afghanistan and at risk of torture and murder, but we need to keep faith with the Afghan refugees who have come to this country. I want to salute the veterans, as did my colleague Senator Moran. They have been heroes in this fight. Their championing this cause has made a tremendous difference, and I thank them for recognizing that there is a moral imperative here. That is the reason that our promise needs to be kept. And I will just close--and there is much more that I could say, but I know colleagues would like to comment, as well, in the limited time we have--by saying that these families, these Afghan refugees, are coming to this country, and they are flourishing here. They are contributing to their communities. They have jobs that matter. They are learning our language. They are imparting to our people the rich cultural heritage that they bring with them, the tastes and the colors of their country, as well as their incredible history. They are enriching the United States of America. We need to keep them here, and we need to give them the security and sense of permanency that is essential for them to continue to flourish. They can't have jobs, they can't put their children in schools, and they can't keep housing if they are in limbo. So as a practical matter, we must move. We should have done it last session. We have the opportunity now. It is an obligation. Let's vote on this amendment to enable our Afghan allies to stay in this country as they deserve and need to do.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I have but a few minutes to speak to my colleagues and to the Senator from Alabama, but, more important, to the American people. I have only minutes, but the damage of this hold will be years. Be aware, America. Be angry, America, as I am angry, as a member of the Armed Services Committee, as a dad of two veterans--a Marine Corps officer who served in Afghanistan and a Navy SEAL who served during these last 20 years. And all of the veterans of America who are angry that our U.S. military is being used as a political pawn, is held hostage; that brave, determined professionals who want to lead and take our military to the fight that lies ahead--they are in limbo. And it isn't just the 273. It is all who report to them, all who depend on them, all who look to them for leadership. I had breakfast this morning with the Acting Commandant, General Smith, of the U.S. Marine Corps. For the first time in 100 years, the U.S. Marine Corps has no Commandant. Vice Admiral Franchetti, who was chosen to lead the Navy, the first woman to be in that position, has been held hostage. Gen. Charles Brown, uniquely accomplished aviator and leader, unable to assume his responsibility as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And under them, men and women like Lt. Gen. James Bierman, nominated to be Lieutenant General of the United States Marine Corps and Deputy Commandant for Plans, Policies, Operations; and Maj. Gen. Bradford Gering, to be a Lieutenant General in the United States Marine Corps and Deputy Commandant, Aviation. These men have served 35 years. Maj. Gen. Gregory Masiello, to be Lieutenant General of the United States Marine Corps and Director, Defense Contract Management Agency. These men and women have put their careers, their lives, their families on the line, and now they are waiting because our colleague from Alabama wants to make a political point. He has a political policy, and he is using these military nominees as pawns and hostages. It is nothing short, in effect, of an assault on our U.S. military. So nothing I say here may persuade him, but what is happening is a travesty and a tragedy for our Nation, because it undermines not just our readiness now but our recruitment in the future. The Marine Corps is the only service that is making its recruitment goals. The Army, the Navy, the Air Force, all are down significantly. And this action, which disgracefully and shamefully puts our readiness at risk and serious danger, also undermines our ability to attract the best and the brightest in this country as our military has always done. It is the reason we have the greatest military in the world. We have all of the weapons systems. We have the kinds of hardware that we need. But, most importantly, we need the great men and women who will be discouraged by this action by the Senator from Alabama. So I plead with him; but, most important, I ask the American people to be aware and be angry, as we all should be. And I hope that my colleagues will join the American people in persuading him that this kind of hold is shameful and disgraceful and should be rejected. I yield the floor.