Richard Durbin

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I noted that the shadow docket in the Supreme Court was a subject of the Senate Judiciary Committee last week. It is one of those esoteric subjects you wonder if anybody will even notice. We thought it was important enough to talk about it in light of the Texas abortion statute. We noted the fact that in the last 4 years, there were 36 times when the Trump administration asked for the shadow docket to be used. The Court granted 28 of those Trump Justice Department administration requests. In the previous years, under George W. Bush and Barack Obama: 16 years; 8 requests; 4 were granted--4 versus 28 out of 36. You can tell that something is happening in the Court. The day after our hearing, someone happened to notice. That person was Justice Samuel Alito. He made headlines for a speech he gave at Notre Dame Law School criticizing lawmakers--I suppose that is myself and the Presiding Officer--journalists, and scholars who raised concern about the Court's use of the shadow docket. There doesn't appear to be a publicly available transcript or video of the full speech given by Justice Alito, so I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Congressional Record an article from The Hill newspaper entitled ``Alito bristles over criticism of Supreme Court's `shadow docket'.''

Mr. DURBIN. In his speech, Justice Alito reportedly zeroed in on our Senate Judiciary Committee hearing last week and criticized one of the experts who testified, University of Texas law professor Steve Vladeck. He also reportedly criticized an article by a respected journalist who writes about the Court frequently for a major magazine. Justice Alito derided the phrase ``shadow docket'' as a ``catchy and sinister term'' meant to convey something ``sneaky and dangerous.'' In fact, the phrase ``shadow docket'' was coined by a University of Chicago law professor, William Baude, who, incidentally, clerked for Chief Justice Roberts and has spoken more than 30 times in Federalist Society events. Justice Alito dismissed concerns about the shadow docket. He said: The media and political talk about the shadow docket is not serious criticism. What he failed to mention, however, is that some of the strongest warnings about the Court's changing use of the shadow docket have come not from politicians like ourselves or journalists but from Justice Alito's colleagues on the Court. Our hearing in the Judiciary Committee highlighted how Justices Kagan, Sotomayor, Breyer, and even Chief Justice Roberts sounded the alarm about the Supreme Court's shadow docket ruling on the Texas abortion ban. Justice Sotomayor said of the Court's shadow docket decision on the Texas law: The Court's order is stunning. Presented with an application to enjoin a flagrantly unconstitutional law engineered to prohibit women from exercising their constitutional rights and evade judicial scrutiny, a majority of Justices have opted to bury their heads in the sand. That is from Justice Sotomayor. How about Justice Kagan? Justice Kagan expressed alarm that the Court's shadow docket decisionmaking ``every day becomes more unreasoned, inconsistent, and impossible to defend. The Justices made it clear that the Court's shadow docket handling of S.B. 8 in Texas raises urgent concerns that American people should be aware of. That is why we had the hearing. Chief Justice Roberts noted that Texas has now created ``a model for action,'' in his words, showing how States can undermine constitutional rights by using a bounty hunter enforcement scheme that avoids judicial scrutiny, thanks to the shadow docket. Lawmakers in a number of States are eyeing this procedure to try to copycat Texas's enforcement model. That ought to trouble anyone who cares about our Constitution. With its order on the Texas abortion ban, the Court's majority has also shown its willingness to use the shadow docket to allow ``flagrantly unconstitutional'' laws, in the words of Justice Sotomayor, to take effect, at least when the laws align with the majority's ideological beliefs. As a result, millions of Texans have had their constitutional rights stripped away, and the rights of all Americans are less secure. That is a major change that demands serious discussion. Justice Alito may bristle at perceived criticism of the Court's practices, but that doesn't mean the Court should be immune from scrutiny from the American people, a free press, even legislative branch of government. Historically, Congress has played an important and essential role in debates over the proper functioning of the courts. First and foremost is the Senate's advise and consent role that results in the appointment of men and women to the Supreme Court. In addition, many aspects of the Supreme Court's operation, including the starting date of the Court's fall term, are established by an act of Congress. In fact, much of the Court's jurisdiction is set by Congress. Congress is asked regularly by the Judicial Conference to pass new legislation governing the operations of the judiciary, and Justices have routinely come before Congress to discuss the requests and a wide range of other matters. In March 2019, for example, Justice Kagan testified before the House Appropriations Committee about such topics as whether the judicial code of conduct should apply to the Supreme Court. With her that day was none other than Justice Alito. The Senate Judiciary Committee has frequently and appropriately been the forum for many debates over the Supreme Court's operations. I remember in 2011 when Justices Scalia and Breyer appeared before the Judiciary Committee for a wide-ranging discussion of the role of judges under the Constitution. Our committee also has robust debates about the appropriate degree of transparency for the Court's operation. Earlier this year, the committee approved bipartisan legislation to allow cameras in the Supreme Court so that all Americans can see what is going on. We are going to continue this debate in the Judiciary Committee over the shadow docket. It is not politicizing the Court to do so. And Republicans have no standing to accuse Democrats of politicizing the Court, especially after their unprecedented, politically motivated blockade of President Obama's Supreme Court nominee in 2016 and their haste to confirm a third Trump Justice mere weeks before the 2020 election--both acts of raw, political power. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein) and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. Kelly) are necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to print the following letter in the Congressional Record.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, yesterday afternoon, the Senate Parliamentarian ruled that long overdue immigration reform could not be included in the budget reconciliation process. I respect the Parliamentarian very much, but I respectfully disagree. The pathway to citizenship has a substantial and direct budgetary impact, which makes it appropriate to be included in a reconciliation bill. The last measure which we put before the Parliamentarian literally was a date change. That was the sum and substance of the amendment--a date change that had a budgetary impact in it. We were not creating new categories of immigration. We were not creating any new laws other than the date change. I want to say to all of the Dreamers and immigrants and all of the mixed-status families who are desperately following the situation: We are not giving up, and you shouldn't give up either. America needs you, and I will keep my promise to keep working on this as long as it is my honor to serve in the Senate.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, earlier today, as we just heard from my colleague from Texas, the Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the abortion ban that took effect in the State of Texas earlier this month. I hope every American who tuned in to this hearing listened very closely--very closely--because here is what we heard: My Republican colleagues on the committee literally made no effort to defend the Texas abortion law, the Texas abortion ban--SB 8, as it is known in Texas--not a single effort to defend it on its merits. They made no effort to engage on the issue of the shadow docket process through which the Supreme Court allowed this bill to become law, and they made no effort to argue that women's constitutional rights should be protected. What we witnessed during today's hearing was the opening salvo on the fate and future of Roe v. Wade. Here are the facts: This Texas law is no ordinary piece of legislation. To quote Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, it is ``a flagrantly unconstitutional law engineered to prohibit women from exercising their constitutional rights and evade judicial scrutiny.'' This law has effectively banned abortion after 6 weeks in the Nation's second largest State, even in cases of rape and incest. The fact is, many women do not even know they are pregnant by 6 weeks. The architects behind SB 8 took an extreme proposal that clearly violated Supreme Court precedent and paired it with a new, disturbing private bounty hunter enforcement scheme, and they did so in the hope that the courts would not block the law because it wasn't clear who should be sued. At midnight on September 1, the Supreme Court allowed SB 8 to go into effect. As a result, millions of Texas women have had their constitutional rights challenged and suspended. This attack on women has already caused irreparable harm to countless women who lost their right to reproductive care in Texas. At today's hearing, we heard from Donna Howard, a State representative from Texas. In her written testimony, she shared the story of a woman who was denied the healthcare she was entitled to under the Federal Constitution. The woman went in to an appointment on August 31 of this year, and at the time, there was no heartbeat detected on the State-mandated sonogram. But when she came back the next day to have the procedure done, a cardiac motion was detected. Representative Howard said of this woman that at only 5 weeks--5 weeks of pregnancy--she was too late to receive an abortion under the provisions of this new law. She was devastated. She already had a child at home and knew that bringing another child into their lives threatened her family's situation and their financial security. As Representative Howard went on to note, having an abortion was ``the right decision for this mother's life and her family's well- being.'' But the Texas law went into effect, and the Supreme Court deprived this woman of her constitutional right. SB 8 marks a turning point in the decades-long campaign to undermine the Supreme Court's holding in Roe v. Wade. For years, legislative efforts to ban previability abortion have been stopped by courts. Until now. The legal architects behind this Texas law crafted a scheme to avoid judicial review. They lifted the responsibility of enforcement from the State and put it in the hands of private citizens. Listen to this: As a result of this Texas law, they have turned ordinary citizens into bounty hunters. I want to clarify something. I have read it and asked the Texas State representative to verify. It has been said that you can sue a person who aids and abets an abortion in Texas and recover $10,000 costs and attorney's fees. That is not what the law said. The law says you can recover not less than $10,000 in costs and attorney's fees. The first lawsuits have been filed already against doctors in these clinics, and they are seeking damages in the amount of $100,000 or more. You don't even have to live in Texas to receive this bounty. Consider Dr. Alan Braid, the first person to be sued under this new Texas law. Earlier this month, Dr. Braid, a practicing OB-GYN in San Antonio, penned an op-ed in the Washington Post explaining why he is continuing to provide abortions despite the law. As someone who has worked in medicine since 1972, the year before Roe v. Wade, Dr. Braid remembers a time when women could not safely access abortion care. He believes he has a ``duty of care'' to his patients, and he refuses to ``sit back and watch us return to 1972,'' in the doctor's own words. Well, as I mentioned, he is already facing the legal consequences of this new Texas law. Who is exactly the bounty hunter who filed the first lawsuit against him? You might guess it is a fellow Texan, right? You are wrong. It is a disbarred lawyer who lives in Arkansas, a bounty hunter; $100,000 is what he thinks this law is going to give him. That lawsuit being filed against Dr. Braid illustrates how irregular this Texas law's bounty hunter enforcement model really is. Anyone from any State can file a lawsuit against any physician. But when we include the categories of people who aid and abet the person receiving the abortion, the categories go wide afield, from the people who gave her advice, the folks who gave the transportation to the clinic, the minister who counseled her--all of these things makes them eligible to be sued for a minimum of $10,000 now in Texas. There is a reason why the Texas legislators designed the law this way. They sensed an opportunity on the Supreme Court. They knew an emergency legal challenge to this Texas law had a good chance of coming all the way to the Supreme Court. And they knew the Supreme Court has shown a willingness to allow sweeping changes to the law to take place on a short timetable without detailed explanation. It was interesting to listen to the Republican Senators go into orbit over the fact that we would raise questions about the shadow docket. It is a motions docket where the Justices on the Supreme Court can decide an issue on a very short timeframe without even explaining their position. That is exactly what happened with SB 8. When the law came before the Supreme Court, a majority of Supreme Court Justices, late at night, allowed it to take effect. The next day, the Court issued a one-paragraph opinion to explain it. It said they would not stay Texas's abortion ban because of the law's ``complex and novel'' procedural questions. In other words, the Texas legislators got their way. By designing SB 8 with a new bounty hunter enforcement model, Texas lawmakers managed to evade judicial review. In her dissent, Justice Sotomayor explained how this scheme worked. She said, ``The Court has rewarded the State's effort to delay federal review of a plainly unconstitutional statute, enacted in disregard of the Court's precedents, through procedural entanglements of the State's own creation.'' The Court's ruling on SB 8 is distressing for a number of reasons. For one, it has galvanized lawmakers across the country to undermine constitutional rights in their States. Over the past month, lawmakers and candidates in Arkansas, Florida, South Dakota, and other States have pledged to follow suit and copycat the Texas law. They saw what happened when this bill came before the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court basically said it can go forward. Additionally, the conservative majority on the Supreme Court has now signaled that it is willing to use the shadow docket to allow even laws unconstitutional on their face to take effect, as long as it aligns with certain ideological norms. Another witness we heard from today was Professor Steve Vladeck, an expert in constitutional law who has written extensively about the Court's shifting use of the shadow docket. The shadow docket, of course, refers to situations where the Court issues decisions outside the traditional merits docket. Historically, shadow docket orders are used to help resolve routine or procedural questions frequently without public deliberation, full briefings, or even signed opinions. But as Professor Vladeck testified, there has been a notable uptick in the Supreme Court issuing shadow docket orders that are ``having a far broader substantive impact, for better or worse, compared to [the] emergency rulings in the past.'' And many of these shadow docket orders appear to be driven by ideology. Let me tell why I say that. Listen to these numbers. During the 4- year Presidency of Donald Trump, the Supreme Court issued 28 grants of emergency relief on the shadow docket at the request of the Trump administration--28 grants of shadow docket relief out of 36 requests. Each of these orders advanced President Trump's political agenda, including one that allowed the resumption of Federal executions for the first time and in nearly two decades. Now, let's do a comparison. If there were 36 requests of the Supreme Court for shadow docket opinions and 28 of them were granted in the 4 years of Donald Trump, how about previous Presidents? During the 16 years of the George W. Bush and Obama Presidencies, from 2001 to 2017, the Supreme Court issued four--four--orders in 16 years. In this last 4-year period of time, they granted 28 out of 36 with the Trump Justice Department. With its handling of Texas's abortion ban, as well as other shadow docket orders, the Supreme Court's conservative majority has indicated a willingness to change substantive law in sweeping ways without due deliberation and public reporting. In doing so, they are undermining confidence in the Court, and the conservative majority has opened the door for ideologically driven legal schemes to rewrite laws from the shadows, like SB 8. This is a five-alarm fire for due process, as well as our constitutional rights. And as I expressed during this today's hearing, I hope every Member of the Senate--Democrat or Republican--will join together to protect and preserve independent, transparent, and reasoned judicial decision making based on the rule of law. At a time when the public's confidence in our governmental institutions has been greatly eroded, we must restore it. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Reserving the right to object.

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, more than 680,000 Americans have died from COVID. The majority of these deaths occurred before we had viable, effective, and safe vaccines. Doctors were begging for these vaccines to save lives, and now we have three safe, effective, widely available vaccines in America. All three have been proven successful and safe. However, one in four adults in America still refuses to get the vaccine. According to the CDC, these unvaccinated individuals--listen to this--are 10 times more likely to be hospitalized from COVID, 10 times more likely to die from COVID than those who got the shot. And as long as large numbers of Americans remain unvaccinated, this virus is going to continue to spread and raise the risk of mutation and more deadly variants. We have tried approaches to incentivize people. What more can we do? We created a lottery in Illinois and said: If you are vaccinated, you are automatically buying a lottery ticket; you don't even have to pay for it. The head of the Federal Bureau of Prisons union for employees, with only 50 percent of those working in Federal prisons vaccinated, said they were going to set up a popcorn machine at the prisons in the break room in the hopes of getting people to be vaccinated--trying everything to get people to try the vaccine. We have tried every approach to incentivize them, but the vaccine numbers are not where they need to be. So, facing this reality, the President accepted responsibility to try harder. He has directed Federal Agencies and OSHA to mandate vaccination for Federal employees and certain private workers. These directives were issued under the OSHA Act and other established legal authorities; and, listen, they have been welcomed by the Business Roundtable and other employers who were waiting for a signal from the White House that we were serious, and they are supported by a majority of the American people. I recognize that some of my colleagues disagree with that action, and that has prompted this bill from my friend and fellow Senator from Utah. His bill, the Don't Jab Me Act, would create a private right of action for any ``aggrieved individual'' to sue the Federal Government ``for injuries sustained as a result of a COVID-19 vaccination mandate.'' I know that the Senator is careful in his words. I would ask him to look carefully at that word ``injuries.'' It is misleading. COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective. They were evaluated in tens of thousands of clinical trials. They meet the FDA's rigorous scientific standards for safety, effectiveness, and quality. They have undergone and will continue to undergo the most extensive, intensive safety monitoring in history. In an extremely rare case that an individual suffers an injury, a harm, from a COVID-19 vaccine, there is a system in place to provide compensation. Under the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program, a person can already seek to recover damages for physical injuries suffered because of COVID-19 vaccines. The Senator from Utah's bill appears to go beyond compensating individuals for physical injuries caused by the vaccine. It lets people sue the government for ``injuries sustained as the result of a COVID-19 vaccine mandate.'' Now, what kind of injuries might there be? Well, we surely don't know. The bill does not define the type of injuries that a person could sue for. The entire bill is two and a half pages of very vague language. What we do know is that the bill, if enacted, would authorize a flood of lawsuits by individuals claiming that a vaccine mandate injured them in some physical, maybe nonphysical way. We don't know. It is ironic. For more than a year, my Republican colleagues claimed the pandemic would create a tsunami of COVID lawsuits. Remember all of the times Senator McConnell went to the floor and said: Hang on tight. The trial lawyers are just going to be hell-bent now, filing lawsuits all across America. There will be a tsunami of lawsuits. Well, it never happened. Despite that fact, the Senator from Utah is apparently urging a new set of lawsuits to be filed. I am a former trial lawyer. I made a living at it. When people have been harmed, I support their day in court, but liabilities laws need to be carefully calibrated to promote the right behavior and incentives. This short, vague bill does not even try to strike a balance between health and safety. It is a shot across the bow to entities that are using vaccine mandates. Remember, courts have long rejected challenges to vaccine requirements imposed by public entities. And the Senator might take a look at his home State. In Senator Lee's home State of Utah, there are public actors, like Salt Lake Community College, the University of Utah, and Utah State University, that are using COVID vaccine mandates to promote health and safety. And I want to show the Senate this chart because it tells an amazing story. Remember the report about all the attorneys general who were going to file lawsuits, in keeping with the Senator's message, against Joe Biden for these mandates for these employees? Well, we took a look at their State. Twenty-four States threatened lawsuits against Joe Biden for the very reason stated by the Senator from Utah. How are they doing compared to all the other States, the 26 States that didn't file a lawsuit? Well, it turns out the infection rate for COVID-19 over the past 3 months is more than twice in those States as it is in the States not filing these lawsuits. Since mid-June, the death rate is almost three times the rate of those States that didn't file the lawsuit, and the vaccination rates are significantly lower. So for those who have an idea about guiding the State to the right outcome, shouldn't public health and safety be important? I am sure we all understand the issue of liberty and how important it is to America, but there was a word before liberty that the Founding Fathers used: life. Life. These vaccine mandates are about saving lives in America, and it is for that reason that I object.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I have 6 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:

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I am glad that the Democratic leader came to the floor after the Republican leader. He certainly clarified some of the statements that were made by Senator McConnell and brought a dose of reality into the picture. I listened carefully to Senator McConnell's speech, and I was waiting for one word. I knew he would say it at some point, and yet I don't think he did. I might have missed it, but I don't think he ever used the word ``filibuster''--``filibuster,'' the requirement of 60 votes to proceed with the business of the Senate. The reason why that is essential is the Democrats are prepared to accept the responsibility of funding the government and dealing with our national debt, acknowledging our debt ceiling. And if the Republicans don't care to be part of that conversation--or to engage in it, that is their wish--that is what they can have. But Senator McConnell has put in a filibuster, a requirement of 60 votes, which makes it literally impossible for the Democrats on their own to accept their responsibility. He didn't mention that the entire time. I think we have reached a new low point in the U.S. Senate, where the Republican leader and his followers, to a person, are prepared to jeopardize the economy of the United States for purely political reasons. We know that this filibuster means we need Republican votes to move this measure. And he has made it quite clear that he won't give those votes, at least as of yesterday. I can only hope that Republican Senators going home, maybe this weekend, hearing from their constituents and businesses, will have second thoughts about this and accept that bipartisan responsibility that we all face. There is a second you had to listen very carefully to catch with Senator McConnell's opening statement. He went on to say at great length that the last time we passed a debt ceiling extension was in August. And, he said, incidentally, all the spending leading up to August was covered by that debt ceiling. Well, that may have been true. What did he fail to tell us? There was another bill that he voted for, Trump supported, the Republicans supported, and the Democrats voted for, too, in December for $900 billion in spending. That wasn't covered by the earlier August debt ceiling. He knows that. So to say all the debt of the Trump administration has been taken care of just isn't the fact. And I am glad we have a chance to clarify that. He seems to think that we are going to ``hurt families and help China'' if we press forward with the reconciliation bill. Does it hurt families to find an affordable way to have quality daycare for their kids? I don't think so. Does it hurt families when children get a chance for pre-K education so they are ready for school when the day comes? Does it hurt families when we extend education from K-12 to K-14 and say to our community colleges, We are going to give you a mission: Prepare the workforce for the 21st century? Give these Americans the skills they need for a good paycheck and a home and a family and a future. According to the Senator from Kentucky, that hurts American families. I think he is just flatout wrong. It helps them in critical ways. It really addresses expenses and challenges they face and need a helping hand to succeed. And in terms of helping China, a competitive American workforce, investment in research and innovation does not help China. If we invest in this country, in its people and its ideas, we have always succeeded and led the world. So I disagree with the Senator from Kentucky completely. His approach--tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans, corporations that, frankly, can escape any tax liability--hasn't worked. And it won't work. It is fundamentally unfair, and it fails to invest in the people that need it the most: working families, middle-income families, children and their future. (Mr. PADILLA assumed the Chair.)

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein) and the Senator from Arizona (Ms. Sinema) are necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein), the Senator from Connecticut (Mr. Murphy), the Senator from Arizona (Ms. Sinema), and the Senator from Michigan (Ms. Stabenow) are necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, you remember the day--you will never forget it--January 6. Here we were in this Chamber in the process of certifying the electoral college votes. It was a pretty solemn occasion because this happens once every 4 years. We have documents coming from the States telling us what happened in the election of last year for President of the United States. It is our job to make sure that those reports are documented and that the ordinary process of the democracy proceeds. This January 6 was not an ordinary day by any means. Before we set about our task here in the Senate and the House, the President of the United States, Donald Trump, held a rally, claiming that, in fact, he didn't lose the election, that he won the last election, and he alleged all sorts of fraud and misconduct on the part of Democrats and others that resulted in this faulty report that somehow or another he had lost the election. Well, his crowd got so fired up that they decided to march on the Capitol as we were counting the electoral college ballots. I can remember it well. Vice President Pence was sitting where you were, I say to the Presiding Officer. We were going through the regular process, and it was a little after 2 o'clock in the afternoon. All of a sudden, that door opened over there, and people came in in suits I had never seen before and literally yanked the Vice President off the podium and pulled him out that door. It was only a minute or two later that a member of the Capitol Police--the men and women who guard us and guard the visitors to this Capitol--a member of the Capitol Police stood where you are sitting and reported to us that there was a demonstration outside and that we should remain in this Chamber, in this Senate Chamber, because they were going to make it a safe room in the Capitol. At that time, I noticed staff people were being brought in and lined up along the back of the room itself. It wasn't 10 minutes later until the same member of the Capitol Police stood up and said: Change in plans; everybody leave as quickly as possible. And we all did, filing out toward the back of the room, every Member of the Senate. Luckily, the Parliamentarian or some other office decided to grab the boxes with the electoral college votes in them to preserve this important piece of history from possible mob action. As we were filing out of the Capitol, I couldn't help but look out the window and see the mobs coming on the Capitol, converging on the Capitol, carrying Trump signs. We went to a safe location and waited it out and later that evening resumed our activities on the floor of the Senate, counted the votes, and made it official, with the Vice President present. It was an important part of history. You would think that would be enough of an embarrassment to President Donald Trump that he would drop his claims that the election was stolen. He has done just the opposite. He has intensified these false, malicious claims that somehow or another the vote was rigged or stolen, whatever his term might be--a fraud on the public--despite clear evidence to the contrary. He pointed to a number of States that he said proved his point, where he just could not have lost--Donald Trump could not have lost these States--so clearly, he argued, something happened there that was criminal or wrong, and an investigation would show it. Well, one of those States was Arizona. Joe Biden carried Arizona by roughly 10,500 votes. Forty-five thousand Biden votes came from Maricopa County, so it was obviously crucial to his win. So the Republicans in Arizona decided they were going to zero in on Maricopa County and prove once and for all that Donald Trump didn't lose that county by 45,000 votes. Well, they went to great lengths to do it. First, they gathered all their rightwing groups and Trump's defenders and raised $5.7 million in donations. Then they hired a group with the unlikely name--I am looking for it here; something to do with ninjas. I am sure it will pop up. Oh, Cyber Ninjas. This group has no experience analyzing an election. Yet they turned over all the ballots from Maricopa County to them to recount. Well, they pursued many bizarre theories, one of which I think was promulgated by the ever-reliable Rudy Giuliani that somehow or another there were bamboo fibers found in these election ballots, and those were an indication of wrongdoing and can connect the conspiracy maybe even to international sources. The Cyber Ninjas rolled up their sleeves, pulled in the boxes of ballots, and started their count. They were determined to prove, once and for all, that the result that was announced that Biden carried the county by 45,000 votes was wrong. And they proved it. Through all their hard work and all the money that was spent, it turns out the draft report from the company, Cyber Ninjas, found that there were 99 additional votes for Joe Biden, rather than the amount presented by the 261 fewer votes for Donald Trump in Maricopa County, just the opposite of what they had predicted. Well, you would think that President Trump would at least be quiet or maybe even acknowledge that he was wrong. Come on, you remember him. Here is what he said in a statement after the review was announced. He said the review ``has uncovered significant and undeniable evidence of FRAUD! Until we know how and why this happened, our Elections will never be secure.'' He just won't quit. And the problem, of course, is that so many Americans are buying it, primarily Republicans, increasing their numbers, believing his Big Lie about the election being stolen from him. God forbid this man could lose an election. Who would ever dream of that? He can't think of the possibility. And they are joining him in the chorus, despite hard evidence that proves time and time and time again that he lost. It was a spirited election--Joe Biden and Donald Trump--and when it was all over, the American people made their choice. They accepted the reality of change. Now it is time for Donald Trump and his followers to do the same. I don't know if the cyber ninja turtles, or whoever they are, are going to go at it again in some other State, pick another State to do some investigation. More power to them. They are building up the majority for Joe Biden--just the opposite of what was predicted. Debt Ceiling Madam President, I would like to speak on another topic, if I might. We are going to have a vote later this afternoon, and it is not an ordinary vote in the U.S. Senate. We are voting on what is called the debt ceiling. The debt ceiling is the acknowledgement of the government's debt. It looks backward, and it says: Over a period of time since we last expanded the size of the debt, we have incurred more debt, and, therefore, we have to acknowledge the new debt ceiling in order to establish that the United States is going to pay that debt--which, of course, we want a reputation for paying just bills. And, in this situation, these were bills for debts incurred during the Trump administration. It should be a rather routine thing. In fact, one might make the argument that the Senate and the House should not even be involved in this acknowledgement; it is simple accounting and should be announced to the American people. But for the time being, it is subject to a vote in the House and the Senate, and that is where the problems arise. Senator McConnell, the Republican leader from Kentucky, is hoping that the American public will not clearly understand the gravity and the importance of this vote. He has announced that he is going to boycott this vote and not a single Republican will vote to acknowledge the true debt of the United States of America. I don't know if he will be able to keep his word and whether every Republican Senator will march blindly behind him. They did once before, under the American Rescue Plan, when Joe Biden proposed that we do the things necessary to bring this pandemic to an end and get America back on its feet. Not a single Republican would vote for it. We promised cash payment of $1,400 for every family in America. It was in the American Rescue Plan. The Republicans all voted against it. We passed the money, billions of dollars, so that we could actually administer the COVID vaccine across America. We had discovered the vaccines, but, of course, there is a huge infrastructure needed to make sure that they are safely administered to the American people. That was in the American Rescue Plan, and all the Republicans voted against it. There was also a provision in there to deal with helping businesses reopen their doors. Saturday night in Chicago, I spoke to a restauranteur who told me about problems he had faced and the debts he incurred to get back on his feet. The American Rescue Plan helped Americans. And every Republican voted against it. Not a single Republican Member in the House or the Senate would support it. We are getting the same threats that the Republicans will walk out of the room. Resolving the debt ceiling is necessary to pay for decisions made. This is debt incurred during the Trump administration. And lest you think that this fiscally conservative Donald Trump was a good Republican when it came to debt, think again. The greatest increase in America's national debt in any 4-year period in our history, a 36- percent increase. Let me repeat. Raising the debt ceiling has nothing to do with future spending. We are paying Donald Trump's bills. We are acknowledging what was done by the House and Senate, Republicans and Democrats--what was spent and now has to be repaid. This is about paying what we already owe, and it is also about averting an economic catastrophe. As a candidate, Donald Trump used to brag that he was ``king of debt.'' How about that. ``King of debt'' is what he says. Well, he proved it. His reckless spending as President, with America's credit card, added nearly $8 trillion to our national debt--$8 trillion. This is a third of the entire debt. It was incurred during the Trump administration. And now the Republicans, his party, refuse to acknowledge that debt and the fact that we have to pay it back. He racked up all that debt in 4 years. Two trillion of that $8 trillion in Trump debt, incidentally, was spent on tax cuts for the richest people in America. Yes, that was the Trump plan, supported by the same Republicans who today are saying they won't even cast a vote to acknowledge that they did it, and it added to the deficit. By 2027, 83 percent of the benefits of the Trump tax cuts, supported by Senator McConnell and the Republicans, will go exclusively to the top 1 percent of wage earners in America. Republican Senators passed those tax cuts all on their own through reconciliation. I will tell you this. I didn't vote for it. No Democrats voted for it. What we are doing today is paying the piper, acknowledging that this is a legitimate debt of this country. We can change policy going forward, but since we enacted those tax cuts 4 years ago, it has added to the national debt. And we acknowledge it today, and Senator McConnell and the Republicans refuse to acknowledge it. During Trump's one term in office, the national debt increased by almost 36 percent--4 years: 36 percent. Our Republican colleagues voted to raise the Federal debt ceiling once and to suspend it twice during Donald Trump. And the Democrats stood with them because we understood that this is just basic requirement 101 of constitutional government. We shared the responsibility not because we agreed with his policies-- we don't--but because we understood that defaulting on the national debt could cause real damage to America. What would the costs of defaulting on our debt be exactly? According to some economists, we would see an estimated $15 trillion of household wealth wiped out, 6 million jobs lost, and a 9-percent unemployment rate. Every last American would feel the pain. If it continued for any period of time, it would threaten retirement funds, Social Security checks, even job security. Mark Zandi, a pretty well-respected economist with Moody's, warned that a default on America's debt would trigger ``financial Armageddon,'' threatening America's status as a world reserve currency, all because the Republicans refuse to acknowledge debt they voted for and created under Republican President Donald Trump. Even toying with the notion of default would have severe consequences. Back in 2011, House Republicans initially refused to raise the debt limit. America's credit rating was downgraded because of it. The result: higher borrowing costs and confidence in American leadership shaken globally. We will see if every Republican will fall under the dictates of Senator McConnell when it comes to defaulting on America's debt for the first time, and we will also see what the reaction to that is going to be. This measure we are going to vote on in about 2 hours suspends the debt ceiling to avoid default by the government, and it keeps the government open, just that basic. After all that we have been through and what we are going through with the pandemic, how can the Republicans play with this deadly economic strategy? Without a continuing resolution, the Federal Government will shut down in less than 4 days. With the Delta variant still taking 2,000 American lives a day, this is no time to shut down the Federal Government. With victims of hurricanes and floods and wildfires desperate for help, this is not the time to close the doors of the Agencies that can help them. With our economy still recovering, now is not the time to damage it, intentionally, for political reasons. Right now, our No. 1 priority is keeping our Nation's economy on a path to recovery and helping families through a difficult time. We need to come together and fund the government. That is our fundamental responsibility. We need to pay our bills on time. We need to provide financial relief to Americans who are battling disasters, whether they are in California or Oregon, Louisiana or Illinois, or Hawaii. And we need to grow our economy for future generations, increasing funding for childcare and healthcare and help for working families. President Biden's Build Back Better plan is a proven investment in our economic future. It includes the largest middle-class tax cut in history. Do you know what the Republicans call the largest middle-class tax cut in history? Socialism. Socialism. I heard Senator McConnell say it: They just want to pursue socialism. The largest tax cut for working families and children in American history. Unlike President Trump's tax giveaway to the rich, which Senator McConnell voted for and doesn't want to pay for, the Build Back Better plan will have the corporations pay their fair share. No one--this is a promise by President Biden to be held to--no one who makes $400,000 a year or less will pay more in taxes. He has been pretty clear on that, hasn't he? So this notion that we are going through some socialist tax-and-spend scheme here just isn't true. Seven months after he signed his tax cut into law, Donald Trump told the effervescent Sean Hannity of FOX News that: ``When [the Trump tax cut] kicks in, we'll start to pay off the debt like it's water''-- Donald Trump. That was a con. Now the bills are coming due, and the Republicans are racing for the exits. It is time to stop this ruse and fraud on the American people. We need to pay our bills, act responsibly, and actually help working families. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, it is my understanding we have three rollcall votes left and there is a 10-minute rule on the rollcall duration. Is that correct?

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Feinstein) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.