Cory Booker

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Madam President, I rise today with a lot of joy. I get a chance to speak about someone I have known for decades. I am rising to speak about Julien Neals and my hope that he gets to serve on the U.S. District Court of the great State of New Jersey. I have spoken to many of my colleagues on the Senate Judiciary Committee about Julien Neals. He is someone I have not just known for a long time, but even though he is not quite my height, I look up to him. We worked together when I was mayor of the city of Newark. So today what I really want to speak about is not simply his impressive career, his distinguished resume, but I really want to talk a bit about who he is. I am not sure how many of my colleagues know this about the city of Newark, NJ, but when I became mayor in 2006, we inherited a lot of very complex, very serious challenges, and for the sake of our residents, we needed to make change quickly and very urgently. So I brought in this guy named Julien Neals, whom I didn't quite know that well, but he was so well highly recommended. He moved from the private sector, where he was with a very prestigious New Jersey law firm, and decided to lead the transformation in New Jersey's largest municipal court. He knew that it was a court system that had to change, and he stepped up. He changed it. He changed the way our court operated. He centered it in common community values and made sure that everyone who came before that court was treated in a way that affirmed their dignity, no matter what the matter was. He pioneered innovations that the whole State--in fact, many places in our Nation--took notice of. He created the first community court in the State of New Jersey, the first youth court, and the first veterans court. He realized that citizens all have, often, different needs, especially folks like our young people and our veterans, and that there is a different way to achieve a larger standard and a larger ideal of justice. Well, the problem is, when you do so well in one job, you get pushed to another opportunity. I quickly moved him from being my chief judge of New Jersey's largest municipal court to come in and be my corporation counsel in my mayoral administration. In the wake of the recession in 2008, he became the business manager, the person who runs the city day to day, and under the most difficult, savage of circumstances, he made challenging changes that helped us get through that very difficult period. Cities all over New Jersey were being crushed financially, making massive amounts of layoffs, and in those financial times, he was able to get our city to be dramatically more efficient, to bring in new ideas that helped us to create everything from environmental sustainability to expanding access to municipal services to the public. He brought in innovations that became really par for the course all over New Jersey, but Newark did them first. Today, now, Julien serves as the counsel for the largest county in New Jersey--a county that is bigger than some of our States. I have had the privilege of knowing Julien, as I have said, now for the past couple decades, and I have watched him handle challenge after challenge, from a global recession to Hurricane Sandy. He has stood in the saddle and helped with calmness, with coolness, with an equipoise that is enviable to all, including me. I have watched him lead. I have watched him care. I have watched his love of others be reflected in the decisions he made under the most difficult of circumstances. I have seen him in crisis after crisis rise not just to meet the challenge but to, in most circumstances, have us come out better off than we were before. He, in so many ways, is one of the great leaders I have had the privilege of working with in my life. Julien Neals is brilliant. He is thoughtful. He is deliberate in his decision making. He has all of the ideals that I think we want in a Federal judge. I have to tell you, most importantly to me, I know him. I know his parents. I know his family. I know his kids. He is one of those people who would make you proud not just in knowing but in ascending to a position like a judge. I know he will make us proud in the way that he leads from the bench. I want to thank President Biden for nominating him. I want to encourage all of my colleagues in a bipartisan way, as I said in the Judiciary Committee, to consider supporting him. I have had many privileges as a U.S. Senator. God, this is one of those jobs where you have to, like, give glory to God every day for just having the privilege of standing on this floor and getting to be a part of some things that, as much as we rancor back and forth, we should all be proud of, whether it is a global pandemic or just making sure we are funding critical parts of the government where public servants serve. But of all the privileges I have, I have to say this is one of the great ones, the chance to make a man whom I look up to in every way--make him a Federal judge, to try to encourage my colleagues to make him a Federal judge. I see that my senior Senator, my friend--another guy I look up to even though I got him by an inch or two--has come to the floor, and if the Presiding Officer would allow me, I would like to yield to the senior Senator of the State of New Jersey--more handsome than I am, but I think we are an equal tag team when it comes to serving our State I yield the floor with the fear that he does have the microphone last.

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, it is a real honor to be rising today to speak in advance of the vote on Kristen Clarke's nomination to serve as the Attorney General of the Department of Justice. If she is confirmed, Kristen Clarke will be tasked with overseeing the Justice Department's work to protect the civil rights of all Americans. I have known Kristen Clarke for years. I have worked with her. I know her, and I can tell you that there can be no one better for this job. To say that Kristen Clarke has an impressive resume is a gross understatement. She started her career at the Justice Department in the Civil Rights Division. She worked with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. She led the Civil Rights Bureau for the State of New York Attorney General's Office and most recently served as president and executive director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. No one could blame Kristen Clarke, after this entire career of service and all that she has given, if she decided to take a step back and find a less demanding job, perhaps a far more lucrative job. But Ms. Clarke has dedicated herself to the highest principles of our Nation--indeed, to the founding ideals of our country, formed with the Bill of Rights, focusing on this idea of civil rights for all. This is not just her job. This has been her calling. This is her consistent conviction--to serve, to sacrifice for our Nation's most sacrosanct ideals. She has chosen to serve this country now at a time when we need her leadership more than ever. She is an asset to our country, and I believe she will serve with extraordinary distinction as a guardian of our civil rights. We need her experience. We need her expertise. We need her heart, her commitment, her deep thoughtfulness She is the daughter of immigrants, and after growing up in public housing, in a low-income household, Ms. Clarke made it to some of our most prestigious institutions and made it her cause to make the best out of herself. She is an incredible success story. She is a person who has overcome tremendous odds and advanced herself, not just for personal excellence but for public service. This makes her, in my book, a champion. Yet there are still those in this confirmation process who want to say that Ms. Clarke is the wrong person for the job. They are actually using smear tactics and lies to try to misrepresent who Ms. Clarke is as a person. There is a saying, ``Let the work I have done speak for me,'' and I wish folk would listen. She has prosecuted hate crimes. She has defended people's voting rights. She has fought against religious discrimination. She has dedicated her career to the cause of equal justice under law. Ms. Clarke is the right person for this job. She is exactly who we need. At a time when we are confronting rising hate crimes in America, dramatically more instances of vandalism and violence against Asian Americans, against Jewish Americans, against transgender Americans, we need someone leading the Civil Rights Division who will stand up for all Americans, who has experience prosecuting hate crimes and makes it clear in this Nation that all are created equal and endowed by their Creator with fundamental civil rights. That is who she is now and who she has been for her entire career. There are folks and forces working to strip away and weaken and undermine these fundamental rights. We see efforts to weaken our democracy, to threaten our principles. We need someone who will stand up and affirm who we are as a people--a nation that believes in robust voting rights, a nation that believes in the equal dignity of all people, a nation that believes in protecting religious liberty. We need a champion now as much as ever. We need Kristen Clarke leading the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice. And it is not just me saying that. It is just not Democrats saying that. There are over 70 bipartisan former State attorneys general. We see police leaders, law enforcement leaders endorsing her, prosecutors endorsing her, the Anti-Defamation League and 69 different local, State, and national Jewish organizations, all agreeing that Kristen Clarke is the right person to stand for us, to work for us, to fight for us, to champion for our precious civil rights at the Department of Justice. So many different individuals from all across the political landscape, from all different backgrounds, and so many organizations representing all of our diversity are speaking out in a chorus of conviction about not just how good Kristen Clarke is but how urgent her nomination is because of who she has shown herself to be time and again: an unassailable, impressive career of service, service, service. She is and has been a servant leader for all of her career; a person of profound integrity; someone whose passion, whose sacrifice, whose struggle in the pursuit of justice has already made this Nation better. I will say something on a personal note in closing. I have worked with Kristen Clarke for years now on things that we have done together, like a bipartisan criminal justice reform bill. I had the occasion years ago of meeting her when she was out in Washington with her son. He was a young guy, not that tall. Then, during her hearings in the Judiciary Committee, I saw her again present herself in an extraordinarily powerful manner, with grace and expertise, but I saw that young man now had grown up. He is a big guy. And it would be a leap of ego for me to say that I saw myself in this young man because he is probably a lot smarter than I was when I was his age and clearly is a better athlete, even though I will say for the record that the older I get, the better I am in sports. But I think about her career, and then I align it to what she has done in raising a young Black man in America. While I couldn't project myself onto him, I thought a lot about my mom in her. My mom raised my brother and me in a nation that strove to be who we say we are, a nation of liberty and justice for all. But where she knew we were falling short, she didn't raise us to be bitter; she raised us to be better. She raised us by setting an example, a woman who--from sitting in at a lunch counter to desegregate a restaurant, to helping organize the March on Washington, she showed me by example. As James Baldwin has said, children are never good at listening to their elders, but they never fail to imitate them. I want you all to know that in Kristen Clarke, we have an extraordinary American, an extraordinary person, and a great mom. And I know what she has done with her life. She has lived perhaps with the greatest principle of all, which is for us in this generation to make a better way for the next, for us to make a more perfect Union, for us to understand that the arc of the moral universe is indeed long but we must bend it more towards justice. I tell my colleagues and urge you to confirm her to this sacrosanct and urgent position today because I am confident to the core of my being that she will not just make us proud, she will not just defend those who are having their rights trampled or their dignity marginalized, but that she will make a better way for an America that fulfills its promise, still not yet achieved, for us to be a nation with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I am honored to join in a colloquy with some of my colleagues today on this urgent issue to really talk about the central function of our democracy, whether the ideals of this Nation are real for every American. Now, if you cut me, I am going to bleed Jersey. But let me tell you very plainly that I am proud to have grown up in Jersey, but I am also proud to have been born in Washington, DC. This is where my parents met after college. This is where they fell in love. Their first date was at the Jefferson Memorial, at the paddle boats there at the Reflecting Pool. They, there, remember--telling me--just the love they had for each other that was already dawning, but also this fierce allegiance to this incredible community that is Washington, DC. My mom talked about the activism that was here. She was working for the public schools as a speech pathologist, and she talked about this patriotic feel that she had, especially when she was helping to organize the March on Washington. The words on the Jefferson Memorial, where my parents had their first date, at the end of Declaration of Independence, say: ``[W]e mutually pledge . . . our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.'' That is what we are called to pledge to one another, but for too long the people of this city have not had the honor, the privileges, the equal citizenship rights that so many others in every State in our Union, in all parts of our democracy, enjoy. These are rights, as my colleague says, that Washington, DC--in fact, disproportionate to many other States--people from this community have bled for and died for. This city is an extraordinary place. It is a community. It outnumbers, in fact, in population other States. And we believe that the ideals of one person, one vote, no taxation without representation--that all of these are rights being denied fellow Americans. Where is the honor in that? Veterans and servicemembers living here in DC did indeed fight for us, put their lives on the line for us, but do not have equal citizenship rights. The people of DC pay both local and Federal taxes that go to help the people in red States and blue States. They are a city that pays more taxes than they are necessarily receiving back, but when the people of DC need help, when they need an advocate with voting power, they don't have one in this body or in the one across the hall. The lack of representation really has consequences--serious ones-- that significantly decreases DC's leverage in getting laws passed and securing vital resources for its residents. We saw this firsthand in the first COVID-19 stimulus bill. Washington, DC, received $725 million less in critical aid than other less populous States. That was funding needed for Washington, DC, first responders, for COVID-19 tests, and other important lifesaving services. They were treated as second-class citizens. How is this fair? How is this just? How is this sacred honor? And how can this be partisan? These are our sacrosanct values for those of us on both sides of the aisle. This is how our democracy was intended to function. These were some of the elements of the Revolutionary War. I am hard-pressed to believe that my colleagues on either side of the aisle don't recognize that to deny the people of Washington, DC, representation is contrary to the values that we state regularly on this floor. Making DC a State is truly a civil rights issue, and it is also an issue of racial justice. DC is a majority-minority city, and the people of this city deserve the same opportunity that other less populated States have to make their voices heard in Congress. This is especially urgent as we are seeing so many States around the country enact sweeping voting laws intended to make it harder for the DC majority--Black and Brown folks-- to even vote. As U.S. Senators, we have an obligation not just to pass laws but to be stewards of democratic ideals and principals. We took an oath to that. Making DC a State is not just a matter of civil rights for DC. It is about all of us because our democracy will only survive as long as its true representation is that of all of its people. Truly, we know in this Nation--it has been said by greater leaders before us--that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. The people of DC have made clear what they want, saying it loudly. They deserve full citizenship rights. They deserve the right to vote. They deserve the right to have representation. They want to be the 51st State. They should be the 51st State. My parents lived for many years in this city, and I heard about DC statehood as a little boy growing up in New Jersey. For them, it was a matter of dignity and respect. It was a matter of valuing this community and the richness of its people. To them, it is a shortfall in the evolution of our democracy that the people of this great city should be denied the very ideals that are written on the Jefferson Memorial. I urge my colleagues to move on this and to grant this DC statehood and to afford them the sacred honor that all Americans deserve. I yield the floor.

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Reserving the right to object.

Mr. BOOKER. I am deeply grateful to my colleague and friend, the Senator from Arkansas, for bringing this to the floor of the U.S. Senate. There is an urgency he described that I agree with. One hundred Senators here, and not one State has not been touched, devastatingly, by the fentanyl epidemic. These analogs present a crisis to our country. Lives are at stake so I share his sense of urgency. I am hoping we can work together to find a way to stop, as he put it, these cartels and these drug labs from wreaking such havoc on our country. I believe that together we can find a solution. In fact, there has been constructive talk across the Capitol--bipartisan talk about finding a way to come to some kind of accord. In addition to that, I am hopeful that there are other bills out there that have the same ambition, the same goal, the same sense of urgency that I believe should be part of the discussion; for example, policies like the ones in the STOP Fentanyl Act, which I understand Senator Markey will be introducing in the Senate very soon. I believe we should have time in the Judiciary Committee to work on a longer term solution that cannot just deal with the international cartels, not just deal with these horrific drug labs but also empower people who are addicted to begin not to be punished simply with the criminal justice system but to find ways to provide treatment and support to people who are struggling with addictions to this horrific drug. So with that, I would like to object.

Mr. BOOKER. Madam President, I want to say, in conclusion, before I switch to another topic, that I appreciate the willingness of the Senator from Arkansas to look not just at his bill but a powerful potential bipartisan extension however we can deal with this. The urgency does exist. We are in a crisis.

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I appreciate that. I want to acknowledge my speaking time was far earlier. I am supposed to be presiding right now, but I did not want to get between. I am but a mouse in the U.S. Senate, as a junior person. Those are two elephant titans over there.

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I appreciate Senator Durbin quickly wrapping up his remarks and indulging me. I had some prepared remarks, but I want to break away from them.

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, thank you very much for the recognition. I think--I am not sure, but I think I am the only Senator here who lives in a low-income, Black and Brown community in the U.S. Senate. I live in a beautiful neighborhood in the beautiful Central Ward of Newark, NJ. We don't mistake wealth with worth. In fact, I went off to get a fancy education. I may have gotten my B.A. from Stanford, but I got my Ph.D. on the streets of Newark, learning from some of the most incredible people I have ever encountered in my life. If there is one lesson that I have learned early in my days, in the 1990s, living in the Central Ward of Newark at the height of the drug war, it is that this War on Drugs was not a War on Drugs; it was a war on people--and not all people but certain people. It was a war on poor people. It was a war on Black people. And it was destroying lives. People were getting criminal convictions for doing things that two of the last four Presidents admitted to doing--simple possession, getting criminal convictions for it. And here is what is even more anguishing at a time in the opioid addiction where everybody now is on the same page that people who are addicted deserve to have treatment. Back in those days, churned into the criminal justice system were African Americans, for simple possession, who were in desperate need of compassion and care and love and treatment. And this gets me to Vanita Gupta. I watched the two statements that my friend and colleague from Texas put up, there--screaming--the difference between those two statements: I don't support the legalization of all drugs, but I do support the decriminalization of small amounts of drugs and getting people help and not a lifetime scarlet letter of being a convicted criminal. She does not support the decriminalization of all drugs. I am glad to see that she is looking at the challenge that we have in this country of arresting people who need help. And my friend Senator Durbin, with great patience and not relying on raising his voice like I do, a real gentleman, said it simply: Vanita Gupta is not a partisan. She is a patriot. Look at her career. I mean, my mom used to tell me: Who you are speaks so loudly I can't hear what you say. In other words, judge a person by what they have done in their life, how they have lived, where they have sacrificed, what commitments they have made. You chart Vanita's career, from her activism in law school to defend the Constitution, from her very first assignment as a lawyer in Texas defending an outrage of injustice--and winning. Where are the people lining up to criticize her in those days working in her nonprofit work? And then, for the great high salaries of Department of Justice workers, she goes to lead the Civil Rights Division. Are there people coming forward from their experiences? Are there police officers, are there police agencies, are there police groups coming forward to say: When she had that high and vaunted position in the Department of Justice, did she do something that so showed her partisanship? Not one. In fact, quite the contrary to that, group after group of police organizations are coming forward and saying: She is not a partisan; she is a patriot. I stand by her. She is not a Democrat or a Republican; she is an honest broker, a fair actor who pursues justice. She has conservatives who are partisans supporting her. I mean, that is the thing that gets me. We see partisan appointees all the time in here, but here is a woman who actually got people--Mark Holden from the Koch brothers organization is supporting her. So I understand that maybe people are taking words and twisting them. There is not a Member of this body who hasn't had that experience, when the intention, the good will, the honesty behind the words is distorted and twisted by millions of dollars from outside organizations that somehow want to destroy this woman. I know Vanita Gupta. She is not just somebody I have a professional relationship with. I confess to the floor of the U.S. Senate, she has been my friend for years. I had occasion to talk to her dad, not during this time when she was nominated--months ago. God, the stories he related about her, the pride that beamed through the telephone about her, about how he came from India with $8 in his pocket, with an immigrant's dream, and now he gets to see his daughters living lives of service, and how his children were wired this way, to so appreciate this Nation as immigrants, to know that this Nation was formed around the highest ideals of humanity, and to see his two daughters pursuing the cause of our country to make this a more perfect Union around the ideals of liberty and justice. That is Vanita Gupta's life. I have had private conversations with her for years about these issues that now she is being accused on. And she is not some radical partisan. She has a heart and a compassion for human beings that, to me, inspires my actions. And this is what hurts the most because somehow I have seen it in our society, when a woman stands up and is strong and defiantly dedicated to ideals that are not made real in reality, they are attacked again and again and again. I have seen it in my own party between Presidential candidates. The treatment that the public and the press gives one who is the woman is far different than the same standards they put to the man. And then--God bless America--there is something about women of color that seems to really get them outrageous attacks. I have seen it through my culture's history. They hunted Harriet Tubman. They despised Sojourner Truth. They belittled Rosa Parks. There seems to be something about strength, something about talent, something about being willing to tell the truth that generates something, that tries to relegate Black women and women of color to be hidden figures in history. I see it in every element of our country--even in the medical profession, for God's sake. Even when you control for income and education, Black women giving birth, their pain is not attended to; they are underestimated for the struggles they are in; and they die four times more often than White women. So with this woman I have known for years, I have seen her in private and public. I have seen her go to work with Republicans, join arm in arm with them in bettering our country. I have seen her serve from her twenties and thirties. I have seen her be, in every step of her career, committed to our country, sacrifice for it. Here we stand on the Senate floor. And I tell you, on the day after the verdict of George Floyd, where I saw other patriots tell the truth on the stand, police officers break with the waves of history, the streams and currents, to tell the truth, this is a moment that I have to tell the truth. This is a good American, a great American, honest, committed, who has sacrificed for her country. And in a time of injustice still, where our jails and our prisons are filled with people who are hurt, when we, the land of the free, have one out of every four incarcerated people and, get this, one of out of every three incarcerated women on the planet Earth in our jails and prisons--where almost 90 percent of them are survivors of sexual assault--this is the time we need more compassion; this is the time we need more empathy; this is the time we need more civic grace toward one another. And Vanita embodies that. She stands for that in every fiber of her being. Her career echoes with that spirit. Should we confirm her to this position, I promise you here on the Senate floor before the flag of my country, she will do this Nation proud, committed. She will never mistake popularity for that purpose. She will never be distracted by the partisan games going on in the Capitol. She will be committed to the higher calling. I ask my colleagues to step back for a moment and see the truth of who she is, who police organizations say she is, who prominent conservatives say she is, to see the person her dad says she is and elevate this incredible person, this incredible woman of color, to a position that desperately--to a nation that desperately needs this kind of leader. I yield the floor.

Mr. BOOKER. I appreciate the indulgence of the Presiding Officer. I wanted to just give general remarks about Vanita Gupta, but I would love to weigh in and maybe pick up exactly where Senator Durbin left off.

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I have 9 requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority Leaders. Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate: Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry The Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 25, 2021 at 9:30 a.m., in 106 Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, DC, in order to conduct a hearing entitled ``Child Nutrition Reauthorization: Healthy Meals and Healthy Futures.''

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, Member after Member has come down tonight to speak, and the conversation, as we all have come down here, was to come do something that I think is extraordinarily poignant. This is the floor where policy is debated and where ideas of governance are discussed. It is a deliberative body, but we are in a democracy, and we represent people. So, tonight, the idea was that we would come down here and talk about people, but the pain is that they are not alive; that we would discuss the deceased, the dead, the murdered, the killed. I believe that if America has not broken your heart, then you don't love her enough. Name after name tonight has been spoken by colleague after colleague, and, dear God, every single name is a son or daughter. It is a brother or sister. It is a family member. They are a person, part of a community, and they are dead. But this is not just any limited list. It seems to grow like a cancer on the soul of our country. You take my age, 51 years old. Well, in just the time of my life, the death in our country has been something like has never before been seen in even a country at war because the people who have died, the human beings who have been lost, the family members who have been slain, their total number, in just my lifetime, add up to more than all of the Americans who have died in every single war from the Revolution to our current wars in the Middle East. So my friends and my colleagues have read name after name after name, but the painful, heartbreaking reality is we could have taken hour after hour over days after days to name the total who have died in my lifetime. And the heartbreaking stories have to stagger you when you hear the testimony. On March 1, Kaiden Alex Peak, who was 4 years old, and his brother, Mayson Paul Peak, who was 3 years old, were gunned down, killed in Warsaw, MO. Jennifer Garcia, 21 years of age, and Charlie Borbon Lopez, 20 years, both killed in Portland, OR. Say their names. Say their names. Say their names. Cobe Hilliard, 19, killed in Temple, TX. April Williams, 21, and her mom Tammy Briggs, 46, killed in Augusta, GA. Say their names. Say their names. Christine Ruffin, age 61, was killed with a gun in Palm City, FL. Delquan Daniels, 23 years old, was killed with a gun in Rochester, NY. Say their names. Say their names. Gerson Aleman Velasquez, 19, was killed with a gun in Myrtle Beach, SC. Lionel Darling, age 39, and Rayneesha Dotson, age 30, were both killed with guns--killed with guns. Say their name. Say their name. Maritza Remijio Paniagua, age 20, was killed with a gun in Los Angeles. Merlyn McCallister, age 51, was killed with a gun in Chicago. Mishealia Marie Meredith, age 19, was killed with a gun in Eldorado, IL. Victor Brooks, age 20, was killed with a gun in Phoenix, AZ. Ronald Jeffery Laroy Jones, Jr., age 25, was killed with a gun in Columbus, OH. Say their names. Say their names. This is the question of our country. What is the quality of our mercy? How courageous is our empathy? How destitute is our compassion? How anemic is our love for one another that this many Americans are dying hour after hour, day after day, month after month, year after year? Carnage in our country like never before seen in humanity, and we do nothing as a society and a government that was formed for a more perfect Union, for domestic tranquility, and for justice. At the top of our Federal Government's Constitution is the very ideal that we are for the common defense. Say their names. Do we honor them? Do we love their survivors? Love is not sentimentality. It is not words. It demands something. It necessitates sacrifice. And I can tell you I am one of those folks who, serving in an American city, would have my police officers show me the films of murders from our cameras--human beings being shot and killed. How could it not shake the core of your soul? How could it not rip open wounds that cannot be healed? My colleagues reading names of people, children lost, kids lost to suicide, bodies mangled, people paralyzed, how could it not call to your conscience? How could it not demand from all of us not to sit idly by and watch and witness? We are wounded as a society. We are hurting. There is pain that is unspoken, and that is so dangerous. In 2018, Shahad Smith, I knew him well. I used to live in high-rise projects at the top of my block. There was a group of boys there, led by this young man named Hassan Washington. Hassan was brilliant. He was funny. He had a sharp wit. He had charisma. Shahad was one of the young men in high school who hung out with him in the lobby of my building. I would come home and I would see them there. And I tell you, in 2018, I make it to the U.S. Senate, and I get a call from Jimmy Wright, a police officer from those buildings who--he is a beautiful man, and he was shaken. They killed Shahad on my block, where I live as a U.S. Senator, at the top of my block, and I will never forget how Jimmy described it. He said: Cory, I talked to the police officer. He was killed with an assault rifle. And he said: Cory, the police officer told me his head exploded. And I--I had to hold onto something because most of those kids from that lobby, the children I watched grow up in my 8 years living in those projects, in those buildings, Black boys in a world where there is so much assault--the first of them to die. In 2005, I would come home at night. I was chasing my dream to be the mayor of the largest city in my State. I was getting ready to run for office, and I came home and I smelled marijuana in the lobby. Now, we live in a country where it is a lot different watching kids at Stanford, Yale smoke pot and have no worries. But for inner city Black kids, I will tell you right now, they have no margins for experimentation. And I said to myself: Oh, I have to intervene here. So I started asking them: Let's get out of this lobby. Let's go do something. Let's go to the movies. Let's eat. And I will never forget. I made a mistake, y'all. I said: You guys choose a movie. That was a mistake because they took me to something called ``Saw II.'' Do not see that movie. And we went out to dinner at a diner, Andrew's Diner. I remember the conversations with them. I asked them what their dreams were. And this moved me because their dreams, they were humble dreams. And I said that I would connect them with mentors, and I had all these plans about how to help these young men get out of the danger zone. Then I got too busy with my campaign. And I remember feeling a little guilty that I was too busy to follow through on the commitments I had made. And I consoled myself that I was running for mayor: When I become mayor, God, I will be able to help all children in the city. I will step up then. Let me just get through the campaign. Well, I would still come home at night, and the boys weren't mad at me or anything like that. They would still greet me and cheer me on when I came into the lobby, Shahad and Hassan. It was amazing. They would lift me up. One day they had lawn signs, my lawn signs, waving them, and formed a parade line. And I walked out and waved and got in the elevator until I realized, where did they get those lawn signs from? They are kind of expensive. I ended up winning. And I had death threats on me. And when you are elected to office, get death threats, you have security. And next thing you know, I had police officers stationed in the lobby, and the boys weren't there anymore. They didn't want to hang out where the police officers were. And I didn't think too much about it because I was running at full speed as a new mayor. I was 36, 37 years old. The violent crime in our city was peaking. There were too many shooters in that hot summer. I will never forget. And I would run to every street corner I could where there was a shooting in our city. And I would stand there, and I would say: This is not who we are. This is not America. This is not Newark. We are going to overcome this. And I would give street-level sermons telling people about the vision for our city. And, God, we would eventually turn down the violence. But in those early days, a month into my office, I show up on a street corner, and there is a body covered by a sheet and another one being loaded on the back of an ambulance. And I barely paid attention to the humanity on the street. I didn't even ask for the names. I was too busy ministering to the living. I get home that night to steal a couple hours of sleep in my early days as mayor. And I will never forget sitting in my bedroom with my BlackBerry, going through it, and I saw the name on the homicide report. At that moment in my life, something broke in me that will never fix. It wasn't an anonymous name that I didn't know. It wasn't just a cold issuance of another crime in a big city. The name was Hassan Washington. Four floors below me he lived with his grandma, a kid I promised to help with his dreams. I will never forget his funeral for as long as I live. Perry's Funeral Home--God bless them, those professionals. I entered that funeral home as the newly minted mayor. And I was so upset when I saw it was in their basement room because going in that room was like descending into the bowel of a ship, a narrow staircase. And I get into this room. We were piled in on top of each other like we were chained together in grief, and people were crying. Everybody was showing up. Everybody was there for what is an American tradition: almost every day, another boy, another Black boy in a box killed by a gun. And I wish I could tell you that I was strong in that moment. I wish I could tell you that I was mayoral, that I was a leader and the father of a city, but I wasn't. I felt shame. I felt hurt. I felt embarrassment. I tried to lean on other people in that room. There were folk I had known for years, but, finally, I had enough. I had to run. I left there. I jumped in my SUV, drove to my new office in City Hall. And for the first time--not the last but for the first time as the mayor of New Jersey's great and largest city, I sat in that office, and I wept over a dead boy. And all I could think about was climbing through the feelings of shame and hurt and pain. All I could think about was that funeral in that basement room, packed full of people. All of us were there for his death, but where were we for his life? What a morbid thing we have been doing here tonight, reading the names of dead people killed in our country, hoping that somehow-- somehow we could change. Well, I will tell you this right now: We are in a distraught moment in our Nation, where most of us agree on solid steps. It won't solve all the problems, but it would make a difference. It would save a Hassan. It would save a Shahad. It would save the 3- and 4-year-olds, the names I have read. The question is, How courageous are we? How much do we truly love one another? What will we do? This is a moment in American history that could be the inflection point. If we act now, we could end some of this nightmare. If we fail to do anything, we will be back here again. The list of the dead will be longer. The heartache and the pain and the wounds and the grief and the sorrow and the shame will be deeper in America, the world's greatest country. We must demand of each other a greater love. We must end the poverty of empathy. We must free ourselves from this prison, from this dungeon. We must release ourselves from these chains. We must demand that this Nation be the Nation we want it to be, be the Nation we hope it should be, be the Nation that those in military uniform died for--a nation where we make real the greatest principles of humanity, the greatest calling of every faith that there is--not words, but real, true, manifestation of the principle and the call. Will we be silent? Will we be ignorant? Will we avoid? Will we do nothing? Will we be passive? Or will we truly be a nation that loves one another? I yield the floor

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I rise today to speak in support of sections 1005 and 1006 of the American Rescue Plan Act. These sections provide loan forgiveness and other critical assistance to Black farmers and to other farmers who are members of racial or ethnic groups that have for many decades suffered discrimination by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. According to USDA data, in 1920 in the United States there were nearly 1 million Black farmers, and they represented nearly 15 percent of all farmers in our country. Today, as a direct result of a brutal legacy of discrimination by a Federal agency, there are less than 50,000 Black farmers left and they represent less than 2 percent of all farmers in our country. It is estimated that during the past century, Black farmers have lost between 15 and 20 million acres of land and the hundreds of billions of dollars of generational wealth that land represented. The cause of the loss of so much Black-owned farmland and the loss of so many Black farmers is not a mystery. Federal court decisions, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and the USDA itself have all told us that a primary cause of that loss was long standing, pervasive discrimination by the USDA. In his opinion in Pigford v. Glickman, Federal District Court Judge Paul Friedman stated clearly that USDA and their county commissioners discriminated against Black farmers when they denied, delayed, or otherwise frustrated the applications of those Black farmers for farm loans and other credit and benefit programs and that USDA and the county commissioners bear much of the responsibility for the dramatic decline in Black farms and Black-owned farmland. Judge Friedman wrote his decision in 1999, but the systemic discrimination by USDA against Black farmers and other farmers of color by USDA was well documented beginning many decades earlier. A 1965 report by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights found that Federal, State, and local officials discriminated against Black farmers in agricultural programs and that this discrimination actively contributed to the decline in the Black ownership of farmland. In 1968, a follow-up report from the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights found that Black farmers continued to face discrimination when seeking farm loans and other forms of assistance. In 1970, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights again found that discrimination continued in USDA program administration. The 1970 report stated that only 2 out of more than 4,100 USDA county committee members in the South were Black farmers, even though there were 58 counties in the South where Black farmers comprised a majority of the farm operator population. In 1982, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights issued another report entitled ``The Decline of Black Farming in America'' which found that the prevailing practice at the USDA was to follow local patterns of racial segregation and discrimination when providing assistance and that longstanding discrimination in USDA programs contributed to the decline in farms operated by African-American farmers. In 1997, the USDA formed a Civil Rights Action Team to hold nationwide listening sessions to hear from socially disadvantaged and minority farmers. A report published after the listening sessions documented Black, Hispanic, Asian-American, and indigenous farmers who told story after story of USDA hurting minority farmers more than helping them. This 1997 report acknowledged that discrimination in USDA program delivery continued to exist to a large degree unabated and recommended 92 changes to address racial bias at the USDA. In 1998, the USDA National Commission on Small Farms further described and documented the longstanding discrimination of USDA towards socially disadvantaged farmers. USDA stated that ``discrimination has been a contributing factor in the decline of Black farmers over the last several decades.'' The Commission's report also notes the ``history of under-allocation of resources to institutions that have served minority farmers.'' During the period between 1997 and 2000, Black farmers, Native American farmers, and Latino/Latina farmers filed lawsuits alleging USDA discriminated against them on the basis of race in processing their farm program applications and that USDA failed to investigate their complaints of discrimination. But settlements resulting from these lawsuits did not provide the relief necessary for these farmers of color to participate fully in the American agricultural economy. On March 2, 2021, a group of full-time professors who work in agricultural, food law, and related subjects wrote in a letter to Majority Leader Schumer and Minority Leader McConnell that these court settlements were severely flawed because of the adversarial nature of the settlement process and because they attempted to define the problem in terms of discrete incidents of individualized discrimination without correcting the systemic problems that led to that discrimination. These professors noted that while some farmers received a payment, many remained indebted to the USDA, and the system itself remained broken. Mr. President, I would ask unanimous consent to have this letter printed in the Record following my remarks. In 2001, we then have a report by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights documenting the continued discriminatory lending practices against minority farmers. The Commission found that Black farmers waited four times longer than White farmers for USDA farm loans. The Commission recommended that USDA resolve the backlog of civil rights complaints and document and alleviate discriminatory lending practices. However, USDA continued to struggle with resolving its backlog of civil rights complaints. In 2008, the Government Accountability Office, or GAO, reported that USDA's difficulties in resolving discrimination complaints persisted and that the USDA had not achieved its goal of preventing future backlogs of discrimination complaints. In 2019, a GAO report observed that socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers had proportionately less agricultural credit than non- socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers. This report found that farmers and ranchers of color continued to face more difficulties in obtaining farm loans and highlighted the historic, systemic discrimination against such farmers. So now let's look at where we are today. USDA spends billions of dollars each year to provide much needed support to American farmers. The Market Facilitation Program and Coronavirus Food Assistance Program are recent USDA programs designed to bolster the farm economy. In both programs the majority of funds went to nonminority farmers. For example, the Environmental Working Group reported that nonminority farmers received nearly 97 percent of the $9.2 billion provided by the USDA's Coronavirus Food Assistance Program. Additionally, the Farm Bill Law Enterprise reported that 99 percent of market facilitation payments went to nonminority farmers. Just last week the USDA stated ``there is a lot more that needs to be done and accomplished at USDA to make programming equitable and to root out decades of systemic discrimination that disproportionately affects Black, Hispanic, Indigenous and other farmers of color.'' Early this week Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack recognized the residual harm that decades of discrimination have caused to farmers of color when he stated: ``Here's the challenge: We're not only dealing with the specific issues of discrimination, but we're dealing with the cumulative effect of that discrimination over a period of time.'' And what is the cumulative effect of that discrimination over time? The cumulative effect of all the past systemic racism and discrimination is that Black farmers and other farmers of color were in a far more precarious financial situation before the COVID-19 pandemic hit us, and so many of them have simply not been able to weather the storm. Approximately 13 percent of borrowers with FSA direct loans are currently delinquent on their loans and could lose their farms to foreclosure. But for Black farmers, 35 percent of those with FSA direct loans are in default and could soon lose their farms. And it is not only Black farmers--approximately 24 percent of the FSA direct loans to Hispanic, Asian-American, and Indigenous farmers are currently in default. What this means is that we are facing yet another wave of foreclosures and potential land loss by farmers of color. But the debt forgiveness and other assistance in the bill we are considering today can prevent this and can begin to turn the page on this shameful history of discrimination by the Federal Government. I want to close by giving you one specific example of the discrimination I have been talking about. Eddie and Dorothy Wise were residents of Whitakers, NC. A retired Green Beret, Mr. Wise's dream was to own a pig farm, and so in 1991, Mr. Wise purchased land and started to raise swine. But then came the discriminatory actions by USDA: failure to handle his loan applications in a timely manner, denial of loan applications, change of interest rates and escalation of monthly notes, and other misdeeds. In 1997, a loan for improvements to the property was approved, but the receipt of the funds was delayed for 7 months, and his 400 pigs froze to death, destroying his operation. Later, he discovered that his original plan had been approved at the State level but that his loan officer never told him. In the early morning hours of January 20, 2016, at least 14 Federal marshals descended with guns drawn on Eddie's farm and forcibly escorted him and his wife, who was still in bed and suffering from a debilitating medical condition, out of their home and off their property. Forcibly evicted from their home and their land and forced to live in a cheap motel, Dorothy Wise died shortly thereafter. The 106- acre farm was sold to an adjacent White farmer for the miniscule price of $260,000, and Eddie Wise had lost the one thing that he had always wanted--to own a pig farm. This story is just one example of the discrimination that literally destroyed the lives of hundreds of thousands of Black farmers and their families over the last century. Today we have the opportunity to take a step towards justice for those families. I urge all of my colleagues to support sections 1005 and 1006 of the bill before the Senate today.

Mr. BOOKER

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

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, in the Christian faith, there is a saying: ``Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.'' I rise today to talk about that kind of sacrifice, that kind of love, and ultimately that tragedy in the death of a man who is a hero. Officer Brian David Sicknick was many things. He was a loving son to his parents, Gladys and Charles Sicknick; a loving brother to Ken and Craig Sicknick; and a loving partner of 11 years to Sandra Garza. He loved his two dachshunds, Sparky and Pebbles, and he took great care of them. Many of us got to know Officer Sicknick because he served in the Capitol Police Department. He was someone who loved his job and understood that every day when you put on that uniform, when you come to the Capitol of the greatest power on the planet, the United States of America, that wearing that uniform, wearing that badge, you had a sacred duty to protect this sacred space. I am proud to say that Officer Sicknick was a Jersey guy through and through. He was born in New Brunswick, NJ, raised in South River, and he lived a life committed to the greatest calling you can have, which is to serve others, to protect others, to defend not just your Nation but her citizens. He was a member of the New Jersey Air National Guard. He loved his country. And I am proud to say he loved Jersey too. He was a New Jersey Devils fan. He proudly, in his work and commitment, served his country in the 108th Security Forces Squadron in Saudi Arabia and Kyrgyzstan. Officer Sicknick was a reliable and cherished colleague. If you talk to those who knew him, they knew that he was a man of honor and decency and kindness. They knew he loved this job. He loved being a Capitol Police officer. He loved serving this Nation. He loved helping people. He loved his work. That love is evident in so many stories shared by his family and friends, people who, in this time of painful grief, are still celebrating the life he lived even though it was cut short by hate. People speak to his character and the qualities, the values that made him so special. He was kind. He was patient. Like many of those who rise in their service to this country, he was humble. And he was selfless. You talk to people who knew him really well, and they remember him as the kind of officer who would go out of his way, not just in his service to those of us who frequent the Capitol but to make sure that his colleagues, his fellow Capitol Police officers, were also doing OK. He was not just a leader; he was a servant. And they remember him living with that sense of honor and that sense of duty. They remember him as the kind of person who would stand courageously in the face of a colleague, who would sacrifice for them, who believed that service meant commitment, meant bringing your grit and your guts and your love. And that is what he did. On January 6, 2021, when a violent mob attacked this Capitol, Officer Sicknick stood for America. He stood for this Capitol and all of its inhabitants. He was steadfast. He was courageous. He stood in the breach to protect the lives of the Members of this body, their staffs, personnel. He faced down terrorist attackers and sacrificed himself, his own safety, his own security, and ultimately his life in the name of love of country and of the countrymen and--women. Officer Sicknick is the very definition of a hero, and he deserves to be remembered for the richness of his life, the way that he loved, and the devotion that he gave this Nation. That he is no longer with us today is a grievous tragedy, and it is also a crime. This great man was murdered. This crime demands the full attention of Federal law enforcement officials. Anyone who still harbors doubt about what happened here on January 6 should think of him. On January 6, when extremists, when terrorists, when White supremacists attacked our Nation's Capitol, they took the life of one of our officers. They spilled his blood. They took a son away from his parents. They took a sibling away from his brothers. They committed this treachery while waving flags, claiming solidarity--some of them-- with law enforcement, but it was hate--it was hate; it was hate--that brought terror to our Capitol and the death of one of our sons. So many of the words that led up to that day, the lies that were told, the incitement and the encouragement, came from the highest office of our land to dotted members of authority across our country-- these collective actions that led to the moment, the terrorists who are directly responsible as well. In the aftermath, a hero, a Capitol Police officer, is dead-- a champion, a hero. This is a senseless tragedy, an awful crime. I am not alone when I say to Officer Sicknick's family and loved ones that we-- that I vow to hold those responsible for this heinous crime accountable. We must honor Officer Sicknick's heroism and sacrifice not just with our words but by what we do here in the coming days, what we do as a nation, how we all take responsibility in the aftermath of a horrific moment. Officer Sicknick died for this country. He did not die in vain. We, the living, must--must--continue with his level of courage as we tell the truth, as we hold others responsible and for account, as we try to live in the spirit that he lived: with humility, honor, courage, kindness, love, decency. May Officer Brian Sicknick always be remembered for his service to the country he loved, and may we rise to his example and honor him. All those who have fallen in defense of this Nation, may we honor them in how we live for this country. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. Vice President, I can only think of two times in American history that individuals laid siege to our Capitol, stormed our sacred civic spaces, and tried to upend and overrun this government. One was in the War of 1812, and the other one was today. What is interesting about the parallel between the two is they both were waving flags to a sole sovereign, to an individual, surrendering democratic principles to the cult of personality. One was a monarch in England, and the other were the flags I saw all over our Capitol, including in the hallways and in this room, to a single person named Donald Trump. The sad difference between these two times is one was yet another nation in the history of our country that tried to challenge the United States of America, but this time, we brought this hell upon ourselves. My colleague from Texas said that this was a moment where there were unprecedented allegations of voter fraud. Yes, that is true. They were unprecedented when the President, before the election even happened, said: If I lose this election, then the election was rigged. That is unprecedented. It is unprecedented that, before the night of the counting of the vote was even done, that he called it rigged. It is unprecedented that he is fanning the flames of conspiracy theory to create a smokescreen in this Nation to cover what he is trying to do, which is undermine our democratic principles. But it is not just that. The shame of this day is it is being aided and abetted by good Americans who are falling prey, who are choosing Trump over truth, who are surrendering to the passion of lies as opposed to standing up and speaking truth to power, who are trying to fundraise off of the shame of conspiracy theories as opposed to doing the incalculably valuable, patriotic thing: to speak truth to our Nation. Our democracy is wounded, and I saw it when I saw pictures of yet another insurgency, of a flag of another group of Americans who tried to challenge our Nation. I saw the flag of the Confederacy there. What will we do? How will we confront this shame? How will we confront this dark second time in American history? I pray that we remember a Georgian and his words. All I can say is we must, in spirit, join together like those Georgians on a bridge called the Edmund Pettus, who joined hands, who were called threats to our democracy, who were called outrageous epithets when they sought to expand our democracy, to save it, to heal it--when they joined arm in arm and said what we should say now, commit ourselves to that ideal, that together, we shall overcome. (Applause.)

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. But I do want to let him know that, indeed, the five people are nonpolitical individuals with the State Department. I wish we could just move them and get confirmed. But I do have an objection to the sixth that he would seek to add, so I will not modify my request.

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I just want to say I appreciate my friend and my colleague, and truly, when he invoked the spirit of cooperation and the spirit of bipartisanship, I felt lucky that he didn't invoke the spirit of Christmas as well.

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I appreciate the recognition. I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be discharged and the Senate proceed to the en bloc consideration of the following nominations: PN1938, PN2024, PN2101, PN2030, and PN2025; that the Senate vote on the nominations en bloc with no intervening action or debate; that if confirmed, the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table en bloc and the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action.

Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, it is good to see you in that seat, sir. The post of Ambassador to Pakistan is one that is highly relevant to American national securities, as I think all 100 of us understand. The person selected to implement the U.S. foreign policy and engage diplomatically with the Pakistani Government must be someone who understands that American-Pakistani relationship and the complex and evolving challenges to regional stability in South Asia. That person must also be someone who can be trusted by the American people and by their colleagues at the State Department to carry out U.S. foreign policy decisions. Unfortunately, there is a disturbing and documented pattern of behavior from Mr. Todd that I believe makes him unqualified to serve as our Ambassador to Pakistan. From 2017 to 2019, Mr. Todd served in a variety of management positions at the State Department, including as Acting Director General and Assistant Secretary for Human Resources and as Acting Under Secretary for Management. During that time, the House Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee opened investigations into allegations that senior State Department officials, including Mr. Todd, were engaging in prohibited personnel practices against other members of the State Department's career workforce. As a result of these investigations, multiple State Department officials told the committees that the administration wanted to punish career officials at the State Department often for doing their jobs, for following procedures and protocols, and also punish them for just raising concerns about policies that they believed sincerely would be dangerous or deleterious to American interests. Mr. Todd was one of the people political appointees turned to to help carry out a lot of those actions. When asked about those allegations in the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, it was reported clearly that he was unreasonably agitated, even raising his voice when asked about just these routine issues. The incoming administration has an enormous task. We know the challenges in that region. In the entire State Department, there have been challenges as well. We should give that new administration a chance and not promote someone for what is a really critical ambassadorship in a very complex and challenging region. We need to make sure that we have someone prominent in the role who can command the confidence of State Department officials, and that, in many ways, gives the incoming administration a chance to deal with that vacancy, which has been, I will note, vacant for 2 years without a nomination. He clearly does not have the temperament or the track record of standing up for his own employees or for the institution of the State Department. We should be doing everything in our power to restore credibility to American leadership, not just overall in the world stage, which I know we all agree on, but also in that region, and work to repair a lot of the harm that this individual may have been involved in creating that hurt morale so much. I have a lot of confidence in the chairman's leadership. We have a committee that often works in a bipartisan manner, and I am grateful for that. It is one of the pleasures I have in serving in the Senate. This role is critical to the country--the U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan. Ambassador Hale left the post in September of 2018, and it was a year before the administration nominated someone to the post. So, again, I just find it, on top of my previous remarks, odd that the chairman and others are now saying that we need this Ambassador now. I believe that is not the case, and I believe that there hasn't been an urgency from the administration to fill this ambassadorship until today. So it is for these reasons that I oppose Mr. Todd's nomination, and I hope that my colleague will move the other five. They are deserving Foreign Service officers and should be confirmed. They should not be held up because of objections to the nominee we have been discussing. So we agree on these five nominees. I truly urge my colleague that we should not obstruct them because of our differences over one. There is a true urgency, I believe, in this season to get what we can agree on done, and disagreement rooted as substantially as I believe this one is should not hold up the other ones. That is why I think the nominees to Ethiopia, Mauritania, Malaysia, and Sierra Leone--I do really believe they should be confirmed today. I yield the floor.

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. Madam President, I come to the floor today in support of my senior Senator's unanimous consent request to pass the Daniel Anderl Judicial Security and Privacy Act. As Senator Menendez pointed out, this is a bipartisan piece of legislation. It is bicameral. It will take important steps to safeguard the personally identifiable information of Federal judges and their family members from individuals who wish to do them harm. As Senator Menendez said, it is named after Daniel Anderl, the son of Judge Esther Salas and Mark Anderl, who was senselessly murdered in July of this year by a hate-filled gunman. The gunman was able to access personal information, as Senator Menendez said, by going to Judge Salas's information, getting it--including where she lived, the routes she took to work, and even her place of worship and her home address. As a result, Judge Salas and her husband have gone through something that no parent ever, ever should have to go through. No person who takes on the responsibility of serving as a Federal judge should ever have to live in fear that they or their family could be targeted by someone wishing to do them harm, who is able to easily access their personal information. Passing this bill today in memory and in honor of Daniel Anderl will mark a commitment of this body to safeguarding the privacy and security of our Federal judges and their families so that we can make sure we are doing everything in our power to prevent this from happening to another family. Our bill, as Senator Menendez said, has broad support. It has been endorsed by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, Federal Judges Association, the Federal Magistrate Judges Association, the National Conference of Bankruptcy Judges, the Federal Bar Association, the National Association of Attorneys Generals, and others--people from all backgrounds, people from both parties, Independents. We have a unanimous chorus of support of people who believe that this is justice and will help keep judges safe. James C. Duff, the Administrative Director of the U.S. Courts, said in his statement of support of this bill: ``It is crucial in our system of justice that judges can decide cases without fear for their safety and that of their family.'' He is absolutely right. I echo Senator Menendez's request to pass the Daniel Anderl Judicial Security and Privacy Act. I yield the floor.

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. So I appeal, again, one last time to the conscience of the Senate. This is not a time to proceed. This is a time for grace. It is not a time to proceed. It is a time to firm up the foundations of our Republic. It is not a time to proceed. It is a time to listen to the American people. It is a time to listen to the voters lined up now. It is a time to listen and wait. I know there are a lot of Americans who are concerned right now, not with the one nominee but with how this process has gone. It is a process that is eroding people's trust and their faith in the institution. They don't see fairness in this. They look at the own words of Republican Senators and don't understand how hypocrisy like that can stand--one standard for one President, another standard for another. But I want to tell everyone who is hurting right now, everyone who is worried about our Republic, everyone who is concerned in this moment about their healthcare and their voting rights and their Nation that this is not a time to give up. There will be difficult days ahead, but it is not a time to give up. We know that healthcare is at risk, but it is not a time to give up. We know that women controlling their own bodies, sacrosanct as that idea is and as under threat as it now is--it is not a time to give up. LGBTQ rights are under threat, but it is not a time to give up. We cannot give up in the cause of our country. It is not a right cause or a left cause. It is a right and wrong cause. We can be a nation that builds for posterity a functioning republic that can elevate the best of human ideals like grace. We cannot give up in this moment. We cannot meet darkness with darkness. We cannot surrender to cynicism about our systems. We have to keep pressing forward. I still believe that our Nation's history, as speckled as it is with wretchedness and pain, is still a story that is a testimony to the overcoming of injustice and the better securing of it. I still believe that we do live in a nation where the truth does prevail in the end. I still believe that even when wrongs are done, they can be righted. I still believe that though this may become, today, a moment of shame, we can reclaim in this Nation the ideals of our Founders--those testimonies to grace, the commitment to each other of their sacred honor--that we still can take a body politic, wounded and injured, and in our country find healing, find redemption, and find grace. I yield the floor.

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

Mr. BOOKER. Thank you, Madam President, my colleague from Iowa. I am grateful. Madam President, I rise today to speak on the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett. I rise in the midst of a pandemic, in the midst of an election process in which over 50 million Americans have already voted, to speak with a simple call that we should wait. We should not be doing this as a body. Now, that is not a radical statement. It is a statement that has been said by pretty much every Member of the Democratic side, but it is also a statement that was made by many people in the Republican Party before we got to this juncture. It was said around the time that Merrick Garland was up for nomination by President Barack Obama 269 days before an election, and people said that we were in an election season; that we should wait. But this is not a typical election season. This is an election that is going on where the people are coming out to speak on an array of issues. There is a profound urgency in the air--not a partisan urgency. America has seen record turnout because they know what is at stake in this election. There are issues that are driving people to the polls, and in this context, our President is doing what has never been done before. The only time this had a chance to be done before was when Abraham Lincoln had a vacancy on the Supreme Court in the midst of an election--this close to an election. Abraham Lincoln--one of our greatest Presidents of all time--made a powerful choice. He had the power to move, and he had the power to nominate, but he showed a restraint on power. He showed, in a sense, what we would call an act of grace. He knew that in the midst of an election, when people were coming out to speak, that it was better to wait. This grace is also what was called for by Ruth Bader Ginsburg on her deathbed. She didn't know who would win this election, but she thought it was best to call to the better angels of our nature; that sometimes the greatest demonstration of power is when we do not use it; that this precious democracy, this great experiment that has endured for this period of time, has sustained itself on acts of decency and grace and most importantly on trust--trusting people, trusting Americans, and trusting voters. We haven't always gotten it right, but this fundamental ideal that when people are exercising their voice, the people in this body should listen. Over 50 million Americans. We are days--in fact, hours--away from the actual election day, but the process has started already. People are speaking, but we are refusing to listen. I fear that what is driving many people to the polls are some of the very issues that this Supreme Court Justice will be in a position to hear. We know that Donald Trump spent the last 4 years trying to overturn the Affordable Care Act. He made a promise to only appoint Justices who would overturn it. He promised that he would nominate a judge who would ``do the right thing unlike Bush's appointee John Roberts on ObamaCare.'' This is clear. We know that the majority leader, Mitch McConnell, controlling this floor, has spent years trying to overturn the Affordable Care Act. In fact, between the House and the Senate, there have been over 70 votes to overturn the Affordable Care Act. We know there is a case that will come before the Supreme Court on November 10 that could very well determine whether over 600,000 people in my State and 20 million people across the country can keep their health coverage. So this is not a secret. The American people know what is going on. They see what is happening here. Many of them, I believe, are going to the polls to speak about the issue of healthcare, and instead of waiting and trusting to hear and listen to the will of the people, we are here right now. Folk are scared. We are, in a sense, walking through the valley of the shadow of death--the fourth largest mass casualty event in the history of our country, and the death rate is rising every single day. That is why so many Americans have been speaking out and calling out, because they know what this nomination could very well mean for their lives and for the lives of their family members. They know what a world without the ACA would be like. For a President to nominate someone--a President hostile to the ACA-- a Supreme Court Justice who has spoken to this, they know what this might mean. We know that for 3.8 million New Jerseyans and 130 million Americans who have preexisting conditions--people with diabetes; cancer survivors; people with diseases like my dad had, Parkinson's--it could mean being charged more or being denied coverage completely. This is a terrifying reality. Folk who are going to the polls, waiting hours in a line, know what it could mean--that once again more people are going to be bankrupted by outrageous medical bills. They know what it could mean for lifetime caps on care for children with complex medical conditions. They know what it could mean for a family with a child who survived a medical procedure and another medical procedure and another medical procedure, surgery after surgery, being told: If you want your child to live, pay for it yourself. So many Americans know what it would mean for seniors not being able to afford lifesaving prescriptions, making the dangerous decision to cut pills in half or ration their insulin. So many Americans know that losing the ACA could mean real tragedy. In New Jersey, over 600,000 people are losing their healthcare in the middle of a pandemic that in my State has already killed 16,000 of our first responders, our neighbors, and in many cases our friends and our family members. These are numbers, these are data, and these are statistics, but each one is a human life. Each one has dignity, and each one has family. I know, for example, Michelle Lewris from Palisades Park, NJ. When Michelle lost her husband John suddenly last year, she also lost the health coverage she had through his job. But she was able to get coverage through the Affordable Care Act's marketplace and qualify for a subsidy that made it more affordable for her. Today, she is insured, and she can manage her diabetes and her heart disease and her autoimmune disease because of her coverage. She said that if she lost her affordable healthcare, she would have to sell her home and would be in financial crisis. Losing the ACA for Merritt Bowman, who is a 49-year-old dad with twin boys and a football coach from New Jersey--he said that before the ACA was passed, he didn't even go to the doctor because he was afraid he couldn't afford it, putting his own health in danger. After the ACA, he was able to get affordable coverage. When he felt sick a few years back, he made a doctor's appointment and was diagnosed with diabetes. Today, thank God, his condition has improved, but, he said: Now I have a preexisting condition. My insurance covers my medication and my equipment to monitor my diabetes. If that is taken away from me, what is going to happen? I can't afford those things on my own I know this reality. We must know this reality. We must listen to Americans right now who are saying openly: I am going to the polls because of my fears on healthcare. Yet we are going through--instead of waiting to listen to our fellow Americans, showing that grace that they should decide, we are rushing forward. What about protections that are granted people like those under Roe v. Wade? What about that? Those are decisions that we should let voters decide. We should listen to the American people. What about protections for workers? What about protections for organizers? What about voting rights? All of these issues in the midst of an election deserve to be decided by the people. The American people know what is at stake right now because we know that Donald Trump nominated Judge Barrett with a very specific agenda in mind. He told us very clearly. We know that Donald Trump wants the Affordable Care Act to be overturned, and he would appoint judges he believes would do that. We know that Donald Trump wants Roe v. Wade overturned. He has explicitly told us that. We know that Donald Trump wants us to question the validity of an election because he has questioned the validity of an election that is ongoing right now. I never imagined I would have a day in my life as an American citizen--I have watched other countries, but I never thought in my own we would have a leader who would question the validity of an election, going as far as to say: If I lose, this election was rigged, and it was illegitimate. That does real damage to not just this moment in time; it does damage to our very institutions and our processes that are essential for this democracy. It is dangerous language. The behavior of this President is so dangerous that his own Cabinet members--former Cabinet members--have called it out. I know the strength of our Nation, but our institutions must be protected, and they must be preserved. The processes that ensure this democracy continues to go on so that our truth goes marching on--all have to be protected. When you have a President who calls into question our very election processes and literally says ``If I lose, it is illegitimate'' and then says ``I won't even commit to a peaceful transfer of power,'' that should raise alarms. That is why people within his own party, people who served in his own Cabinet, people respected in this entire body, like General Mattis, former Secretary of Defense, have said that Donald Trump is a threat to our democracy. It is in that context, in the middle of a national crisis, that we are in the midst of an election, and we can't even get a Supreme Court nominee to commit themselves to the idea of the peaceful transfer of power, who the President himself has said he is rushing to the highest Court in the land because he believes that this election may be decided by that judge. That judge won't even commit to being recused under these circumstances. Is that strengthening our democracy? Is that girding trust in our country's processes, or is it weakening them? Because it clearly is doing damage to what is necessary for the endurance of our country and our ideas. These aren't just my words; these are the words of people on both sides of America's political divide. Yet we are not showing restraint in this moment. We are not showing that grace. We are rushing for short-term gain for one political party and long-term damage to our Nation. I don't understand why this is not something that raises worry and concern--a President who so easily trashes some of our most valued and sacrosanct ideas. I remember the hurt I felt when peaceful protesters in Lafayette Park were turned upon. I remember a note I was forwarded from a college classmate--if I have it correct--about her son being hit with a rubber bullet. I remember journalists whom I had gotten to know in these very hallways telling me about the horror of seeing the panic and the screams and the running as the gas and the rubber bullets hit. I saw how a President seemed to utilize the military to menace what is one of our most important constitutional protections--the right to protest peacefully. I have seen 4 years now of too many people who have remained silent in the face of erosions to our constitutional norms as the President has so willingly trashed that which people on both sides of our political divide have worked so hard to build up. I stood right there down near the Presiding Officer and raised my hand, like so many of us have--like all of us have--to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. To not see us right now, in the midst of a potential constitutional convulsion; in the midst of a potential constitutional crisis where a President himself is not committing to the peaceful transfer of power; where there are people organizing to do harm to elected leaders, kidnap them; when you could go online right now and look at groups calling out to people with Special Forces training to go to polls and perhaps cause mayhem--I don't understand why we don't share a bipartisan, deep concern for what is happening right now in our country and how this moment in American history fits into the concern that moving forward right now causes danger and causes harm. I would be remiss to not mention that in the midst of it all, we are also in the midst of a racial awakening in our country. We saw what are perhaps the largest demonstrations in our Nation around issues of racial justice--all 50 States, towns and communities from all backgrounds, people marching and protesting around race issues. It has led millions of Americans to learn more about our own history, discovering things like the Tulsa massacre, discovering things like the Colfax massacre, going to the incredible museum in Alabama for lynching, where thousands of Americans were lynched in our country, discovering our history and how it ties directly to the President. In the midst of all of this, we know that issues of race and the law will continuously come up before the Court until we have justice rolling down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream. In the midst of all of this, even in my conversations with this nominee, I was surprised that they could not speak to one article, one Law Review article, one column, or one book they have read about issues of race in the law, when we are still in a nation that has such bias in its outcome, where just by the color of their skin they are directly correlated with longer sentences, more likely to get the mandatory minimum, more likely to get the death penalty, where we see no difference between Blacks and Whites in America for using marijuana or selling marijuana, but Blacks are almost four times more likely to be arrested for possession of marijuana, getting criminal convictions for doing things that two of the last three Presidents admitted to doing. And in the midst of all of this that has activated so many Americans and many even in the polls today, I couldn't get even a dialogue going about issues of race. When I specifically asked about a case, Judge Barrett's case in Smith v. Illinois Department of Transportation--this case involved a Black traffic patrol driver who had been fired by the Illinois Department of Transportation. This employee claimed that he had been the subject of a hostile work environment and that his supervisor had called him the N- word. Judge Barrett ruled against him saying that despite documenting being called the N-word by his supervisor, the employee had failed to make the case that he had been fired in retaliation for complaints about race discrimination. When I asked Judge Barrett why she ruled that a supervisor using a vial and derogatory term, one that carries with it a history of racial subjugation and violence like the ``N-word,'' did not constitute a hostile work environment--I mentioned that Judge Kavanaugh, in a similar case, ruled that it did--I was surprised after her answers to go back and read the case. She had muddied the facts in the case. In fact, she blatantly mischaracterized a key fact in the case. Judge Barrett said: ``He didn't tie the use of the N-word into the evidence that he introduced for his hostile work environment claim.'' When, in fact, the employee's reply brief states: ``Appellant's position is that the combination of the N-word and the acts identified immediately above did create a hostile work environment.'' She mischaracterized her own ruling claiming, ``So the panel very carefully wrote the opinion to make clear that it was possible for one use of the N-word to be enough to establish a hostile work environment claim if overplayed that way,'' when, in fact, her opinion stated something different: The N-word is an egregious epitaph. That said, Smith can't win simply by providing that the N-word was uttered. Again, even Justice Kavanaugh stated that being called the N-word by a supervisor suffices in itself to establish a racially hostile work environment. Again, in this context, at a moment that our country is moving in numbers we have not seen before, we have a Justice that mischaracterizes a case, doesn't speak directly to the facts, as plain as they were, and can't engage in a substantive conversation about any scholarship whatsoever around race in America. I would like to read an excerpt of the letter from Derrick Johnson, President and CEO of the NAACP. He writes: ``It is disturbing enough that Judge Barrett declined to rule that use of this vial epitaph constituted a racially hostile work environment, but her misrepresentation to the Judiciary Committee about the basis for her ruling raises serious questions about her truthfulness and candor under oath that extended far beyond this particular case.'' I ask unanimous consent that a letter from the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation signed by 18,000 Americans in opposition to the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to serve as Associate Justice on the Supreme Court of the United States be printed in the Record

Mr. BOOKER

Mr. BOOKER. I am really grateful, Madam President. It has been said, and it is quite true, that the only thing necessary for evil to be triumphant is for good people to do nothing. Here we are at a time where we know our history. Since 9/11, the greatest terrorism we have seen in our country, actions from a church in South Carolina to a synagogue in Pittsburgh, to a Walmart in El Paso, time and time again, the violence that we have seen and the greatest terrorist activities since 9/11 have been domestic terrorism-- rightwing extremists, the majority of them White supremacists. The warnings we are now getting from our intelligence officials, according to one Judiciary hearing from the Department of Homeland Security, are that the most significant threat right now to the security of our country is White supremacy and violent White supremacy. The FBI has given a number of warnings. We now are heading toward an election where we are seeing signs of increased activity, increased hate, increased focus. This body--this good body, friends on both sides of the aisle--this is not a time where we can do nothing. We must act. We must take measures and steps to end this kind of violent scourge in our country. Obviously, this will not accomplish everything. But in a time like this, we must do something. I join my colleagues in support of this legislation. I want to, again, affirm the fact, quite encouraging, that it passed in a bipartisan manner in the U.S. House of Representatives. That is so encouraging. We should do the same here.