Richard Durbin

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. Booker) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I was just checking the Congressional Record. You see, we have a tradition here in the Senate. The tradition is that what we say on the floor is printed and available the next day right at our desk. It is kind of an amazing thing. It goes back to the Congressional Record being the record of the proceedings in this body, and the timely printing of it is part of the history. I wanted to check and see, based on the statements made by my friend and colleague the Senator from Wyoming, whether the Congressional Record printed yesterday contained the efforts of Democratic Senator Ben Lujan of New Mexico to fund the SNAP program. Here it is. The page number is S7808 for the beginning of the debate by Senator Lujan, who came to the floor and wanted to make sure that we wouldn't have any gaps in coverage when it came to the SNAP or food stamp plan across America. You see, the reason he did it was that 42 million people--1 out of 8 people in our population--need help putting food on the table. The SNAP program doesn't sound extremely generous--$6 a day. Imagine if you had to feed yourself with that amount of money each day, the sacrifices you would make. So Senator Lujan came to the floor. Why was he taking on this responsibility? It is because he is the chairman--or the ranking member now of the subcommittee that funds the SNAP program. He came to the floor to make sure that there would be no gaps in coverage and that people would still get their paychecks starting November 1. I call them paychecks, but they are basically SNAP checks that are a credit for purchases at the store. Do you know what happened when he came to the floor? There was an objection. The objection came from the Republican leader of the Senate. The Republican leader of the Senate yesterday, on the floor, page S7808 and 7809--you can find it in the Congressional Record--was asked if he would approve Senator Lujan's effort to protect all the SNAP recipients across the United States, and he said no. He objected. He wanted us to pass another bill. But he had a chance, with Senator Lujan's request, to make sure that there would be no suffering of anybody across America because of the SNAP program, and on page S7808, Senator Thune said no. Now we have the argument that was made by the Senator from Wyoming that one of the reasons that it cannot be done is it is illegal. Now, that is a real hoot, to use a technical term, as far as I am concerned. So the Senator from Wyoming said it would be illegal in a government shutdown to feed 16 million kids, 8 million seniors, and 4 million people on disability during the shutdown. Well, the last record shutdown under President Trump, in his first term, went for 35 days, and he kept the SNAP program going. Was he doing it illegally, I ask the Senator from Wyoming? I think not. In fact, the Trump administration, on their own website, acknowledged that they were going to make this payment under the SNAP plan even with the government shut down. They put that on their website, and we have copies of it. Guess what happened to that assertion on their website. It disappeared. Just a few days ago, it disappeared. So a program they used under Trump's first administration, a program that they said they could follow again under this second Trump administration and second Trump shutdown, disappeared magically from the website. So, across America, some 42 million people, 12 percent of our population, will not be able to put food on the table because of a decision by the Trump administration not to feed Americans. Of all the priorities, wouldn't you think that keeping our population--the poorest among us, the neediest among us--with food on the table would be the highest priority? Don't you think they could come up with the money for it? Well, it seems like the President can come up with money for Argentina, when he said Argentina is in a terrible economic situation and he was going to send $20 billion of American tax dollars to Argentina--that was a week or two ago--and then find $20 billion in the private sector to also go to Argentina. There was plenty of money for Argentina but not enough money to pay for the SNAP program. How can that be? And yet it is the reality. We have 2 million recipients of SNAP in my home State of Illinois, and we know we can take care of them. The Trump administration is making the choice. They have the resources. They have the authority. They just don't have the political will to take care of the problem. I was on a radio call-in show in Bloomington, IL, this morning, and we talked about the SNAP program. A lot of people really depend on it. A third of the recipients are kids, another third are disabled, and a third are seniors. They are needy people. Long before the government shutdown, Congress sent the U.S. Department of Agriculture funds for this purpose. The U.S. Department of Agriculture used these funds, as I mentioned, in Trump's first shutdown, his first decision to not fund the government. In fact, a month ago, as I mentioned, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's shutdown plan said this is exactly what they would do: They would pay the SNAP benefits. And then, when it became public that they made that claim, that vanished from the website--just a matter of a few days ago. Why? During this shutdown, the Trump administration did have the money for Argentina. The President seems to be able to find money for things that are important to him. Obviously, SNAP and the benefits are not important to the President. Well, I have news for the President. Because of his decision on the SNAP plan, millions of Americans are going to have to struggle to feed their families--Americans paying a price for this decision by the President. I recently heard from one of them: Michelle, from Hodgkins, IL. She had a message that goes beyond her letter to me--her email to me--and really is a message for all Americans. Here is what she said: You are forgetting about the seniors that are age 60 to 65. I already cut down my meals to two a day. I really don't want to try to live on one meal. I take medicine, and I need to eat. My size shows that I have not been eating. I know for a fact many eat cereal for dinner. It is filling and cheap. That is the plight facing poor people if the SNAP program is, in fact, shut down by President Trump. Here is another message, from Martin in Macomb: I am on SNAP due to a disability--epilepsy as well as some others. I rely on SNAP as well as [Social Security] and [Disability payments] to survive. Martin, of Macomb, IL, went on to say: Most of the people in my building rely on SNAP to pay for food. I am worried about how I will be able to afford food on November 1. And, sadly, there are millions of other individuals who will suffer in silence because they receive this assistance but basically are concerned about the stigma that might be attached to them if they say anything publicly. Meanwhile, for the past 6 weeks, Republican Members of the House of Representatives have been gone. I am not sure what they are doing. I hope they are home at least tending to their constituents, but they should be in Washington. If we would have passed Ben Ray Lujan's--the Democratic Senator's--proposal yesterday to fund the SNAP program, we would have needed action by the House of Representatives, but it is not here. And it hasn't been here for 6 weeks--6 weeks. We need them. We need the President, when he comes home from his trip overseas, to make this a high priority. The House has not held a vote since September 19. President Trump is tearing down part of the White House to build a new, lavish $300 million ballroom. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem found $200 million during the shutdown to buy two luxury Gulfstream jets for her and her top staff. The Trump administration sees those efforts as priorities, but it will not send our most vulnerable American citizens $6 a day to afford to eat. I suppose nobody should be surprised that is where we are. Under the President's leadership this summer, the Republican-led Congress passed their so-called Big Beautiful Bill, which made the biggest SNAP cuts in history. So the program that they are now refusing to fund at all was reduced dramatically to make it more difficult to pay out those payments--food stamp-type payments--to SNAP recipients under the Big Beautiful Bill, which I will refer to again in a moment. They made the biggest cuts in the history of the SNAP and Food Stamp Program, cutting the program by 20 percent, and now they are lamenting on the floor that they just can't pay anything at all; it is illegal for them to pay anything at all. We know that is not true. President Trump has decided we can't wait any longer. He wants to stop SNAP funding on Saturday and hurt 42 million Americans to teach the Democrats a lesson--another example of cruelty to people who are vulnerable by this administration. I appreciate the leadership of Ben Ray Lujan, my Senate colleague from New Mexico. He really believes this in his heart of hearts. If the Congressional Record, which I referred to earlier in my statement, can be referenced, you can read the words of Senator Lujan, which were touching because he does care about not just in New Mexico but across America what this is going to do. I hope my Republican colleagues will allow us the opportunity to vote on Senator Lujan's bill today before we leave. Let's make sure that there is no gap in the program, and let's put away this argument that was just heard on the floor that somehow it is illegal to feed people. This week, the Secretary of Agriculture appeared on CBS News to defend her Agency's refusal to fund SNAP. Here is what she said: Look at [the President's] record standing behind the ag community, rural communities. No one has done more than President Trump to date for those communities in [her] lifetime. Well, after abandoning vulnerable families receiving SNAP and helping South American farmers over U.S. farmers, President Trump and his U.S. Department of Agriculture has certainly had an unprecedented effect on American communities but not for the reasons she thinks. The bottom line as well is bad news for people who may not be receiving SNAP but are struggling to make payments for hospitalization insurance. The cost of living continues to go up under the Trump administration. And the issue which we are trying to drive home to our friends on the other side of the aisle is it should be a bipartisan concern, what is happening to health insurance premiums across America. Take a look. If you are on an Affordable Care Act plan, you are going to see a dramatic increase. In Illinois and the city of Chicago, people who are under that plan, thousands of them, are going to see their health insurance premiums double--double. At a time when they are struggling to make grocery payments and electric utility payments, they are going to double. Why? Because the Big Beautiful Bill, the budget bill of President Trump, passed by all Republican votes--no Democratic votes--unfortunately, has eliminated the tax credits that were available to people in middle-income categories. Who are these people, these faceless people? We will put a face on them. One out of every four farmers--one out of every four farm families in our country use the Affordable Care Act. Half of the people who own small businesses use it. They are the ones who are facing these heightened premiums. What we are doing is begging the Republicans to correct the mistake they made in the Big Beautiful Bill; come forward with sensitivity not just to those receiving SNAP and food stamps but to the families who are struggling to make health insurance premium payments. These families need help. The cost of living goes up for them every single day, and this is going to be a hardship many of them can't endure. Millions--literally, millions--of Americans will lose their health insurance because of the Big Beautiful Bill. We have a chance to correct it, and we should do it as soon as possible. It is time to sit down at the table as soon as the President gets over his jetlag and comes home--to sit down at the table immediately. The Republican leaders have got to come back to Washington, from the House, and the Republican leaders in the Senate as well as Democratic leaders--on both sides. They are the only ones who can solve this. I have been in Congress for a number of years. I think I have seen every major shutdown, and I have seen how they all end. There will be some triggering device that does it. I hope that, whatever it takes, we get it done and done quickly. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Arizona (Mr. Gallego) is necessarily absent:

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I would like to clarify several points raised by my friend and colleague from Wyoming Dr. John Barrasso, my Senate colleague--and he is my friend. I disagree with him, and I think several things that he said were incorrect and need to be clarified on the record. First, the notion that we are providing health insurance for illegal immigrants is wrong. Let me tell you why it is wrong. You go back almost 20 years, I believe, to the Reagan Presidency when we had a phenomena in the United States that needed to be addressed. People were showing up at the emergency rooms of hospitals and being turned away. Some of them were bleeding out in the driveways of hospitals across America. We changed the law under President Reagan, and we changed the law to say that you must admit people coming through the door who need emergency medical assistance--women who were in labor to deliver a child, people who were literally bleeding to death. Do I hear the Senator from Wyoming say that we should be turning those people away? I hope not. I don't think that is what he really believes. He understands, as I do, that there are compelling human situations where you provide assistance. And I thank our hospitals for doing that. But to say that we are trying to make sure that we manufacture some coverage for illegal aliens is to overlook the obvious. We don't want these hospitals turning away people who are literally in an extreme situation. I will defend that to the death. I will just tell you, when President Reagan and others supported that, it was considered to be bipartisan, common sense, and still is today. When it comes to the SNAP program, it is true that one out of eight Americans counts on SNAP to provide $6 a day for food. A third of those Americans are children. Another third are disabled. And the other third are senior citizens. It is a valuable program in my State, where almost 2 million people receive this kind of assistance. Why are we stopping the decision to fund SNAP? It is a decision by the White House and the President and the Republicans in Congress. They have decided that, even though they posted on the website for this program, just a few weeks ago, that they had the money to cover it in case of a shutdown, they removed that language and now say they won't provide food for hungry Americans. That is not necessary. In fact, there is a way around it. It has been used before by this President and others, in a shutdown crisis situation, and should be used again. Let's not bargain this political decision we are making in Washington on the tables and health of Americans who receive the SNAP program. Now, let me say a word about the core issue that is at stake here. We have a problem we face that we need to correct, and we need to correct it now because the decision was made in the ``Big Beautiful Trump Budget Bill'' not to provide tax credits to millions of Americans who qualify under the Affordable Care Act. Many of them are seeing increased health insurance premiums that they never anticipated. Let me give you an example. In my State of Illinois, Cook County is the largest county and includes the city of Chicago. The average monthly premium on the Affordable Care Act now is $226--$226 a month. The projected increase, because of the Republicans' Big Beautiful Bill, goes from $226 a month to $441 a month--in other words, about $2,500 the individual would pay for health insurance, over and above what they paid this year. That is an increase of 95 percent. How is this affecting other States? Let's take one for example, South Dakota, with a population of about a million people, and 53,000 of them are covered by the Affordable Care Act. They are facing this kind of increase to their premiums. I am sure the Senators from South Dakota, both of them, want to protect their families from health insurance premiums they can't afford. They don't want people to drop coverage. In order to protect them, they have to change the law--the ``Big Beautiful Law,'' as they call it--and provide assistance for people to pay these health insurance premiums. That is at issue. Across the United States, some 24 million people are facing this reality. It is a hardship for them and can be taken care of, and should be, on a bipartisan basis. The problem is that it isn't just tinkering at edges that is at stake here with many Republicans. They want to do away with the Affordable Care Act. Under the first Trump term, I can still remember when Senator McCain came through those doors at 2 in the morning and voted no to save the Affordable Care Act. Trump, in his first Presidency, wanted to get rid of it, and many Republicans still do. What is their alternative? They have none. They have no alternative. They just are angry over this notion of Obamacare and want to see some other approach to it but can't put it on paper because it won't do the basics that Obamacare has done, which provides health insurance across the board to more Americans than ever in our history. So here is the bottom line. We can take care of the issues that face us--the government shutdown, as well as making sure that the Affordable Care Act premiums don't go through the roof--on a bipartisan basis-- that people of good will will agree to do that. We have spent now a month or longer at this impasse, and it is time to break it. Let's reach an agreement that provides for health insurance premiums that are affordable. Let's reopen this government, and let's do it sooner rather than later. As I have said repeatedly, there are plenty of tables in this building. Let's sit at that table as soon as the President returns, with the President. Let's have the House of Representatives--in their 6-week vacation--come back to Washington and do the business of the people in that Chamber, as well, and let's put our leaders at the table as well. This can be done and should be done quickly, as soon as the President returns from his overseas trip and the House of Representatives can reconvene, which could be tomorrow. Let's get down to business to do that. Immigration Mr. President, it is hard to explain what is going on in the city of Chicago and the State of Illinois that I represent. We have a President who insisted on sending National Guard troops in from Texas--from Texas. The Governor of Illinois said they are not needed; we have our own National Guard if we need one. And, instead, he is sending these troops and waiting for court approval to spread out across the city of Chicago. At the same time, ICE--the Department of Homeland Security--is creating a reign of terror on the city of Chicago. I do not exaggerate. Why are they in force in Chicago? Because the President has said, over and over again, that the immigrants are the problem in America. You have heard the speeches, waving his arms at these rallies, saying: We have got to stop the rapists, the murderers, the terrorists, the criminally insane, and the criminal predators who come across our border from committing all these crimes. So we are going to crack down on them, in cities who just happened to vote against me in the last election. What they have done--what President Trump has done--is send in these ICE agents who have created this reign of terror. It is hard to describe what is going on in this great city, when it comes down to these ICE agents. They have people afraid to leave their homes to go shopping, to go to church, to go to a restaurant, to meet with their family, to bring their kids to school. The stories come in, over and over, of what these ICE agents are doing. Do you know what happened last Saturday? In their effort to get the worst of the worst--the criminal elements of the immigrants--these ICE agents raided a Halloween parade for kids in Old Irving Park. Well, that is where you are going to find a lot of terrorists, I am sure. I jest, of course. We know what happened: Harassment, fear--and they left. They gathered on the sidewalk outside of the Lutheran church in Albany Park in Chicago and dropped tier gas canisters. The neighbors came out, blowing their whistles, and finally they left. These are men who are wearing masks so they can't be identified. Some of them are wearing uniforms that have no identification whatsoever. They travel about in vans with no markings on them, and they are harassing people in all sorts of ways. This is not America, and this is not how we fight crime in this country. Unfortunately, it is the reality of what is happening. But sometimes, in the worst of times, things emerge which are nothing short of incredible. It happened yesterday in Chicago. There is a section of the city of Chicago called Little Village in Lawndale. Yesterday, several hundred high school students from the local high school marched down 26th Street in Little Village, in the east section of Chicago. They were doing that to protest the treatment that they faced with these ICE agents. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this article from the Chicago Sun Times be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN. It says: Since the Trump administration's Operation Midway Blitz began in September, whistles have been used as warnings that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is nearby. But on Tuesday, the whistle-blowing-- That was yesterday-- on Tuesday, the whistle-blowing coincided with students carrying Mexican flags and signs during a staged walkout of local schools. Mr. President, this was a peaceful demonstration. I see the photograph of the parade of these high school students, several hundred of them. Two of them are carrying a large copy of the wording of the U.S. Constitution. Others are carrying American flags, some carrying Mexican flags. In an over 2-mile walk, hundreds of students [yesterday] made their way from Little Village Lawndale High School to the . . . Little Village Arch, denouncing recent ICE action and supporting immigrant communities. Immigration enforcement descended on Little Village last week, resulting in multiple people being taken into custody. The sobering effect the arrival of federal officers had on the community inspired the walkout [by these students] . . . Social Justice High School senior Lia Sofia Lopez said. And here I am quoting her: ``They hurt us like they've never hurt us before. They attacked our community, they surrounded the parks, they surrounded our school. I've never felt more unsafe in my life than that day,'' Lopez said. ``We need to protect our people's peace. We need to protect their freedom and dignity. Because if we don't, no one else will.'' Lopez and other students organized the walkout, which included her peers from the four schools on Little Village Lawndale High School's campus. These students walked peacefully through the community. With less than a week of planning, Lopez said she was pleased with the large turnout and made sure her fellow students knew the risks of protesting, including the presence of federal agents, telling them ``they will not stop''-- This is what she told fellow students. ``they will not stop because you are children'' and ``they do not care,'' she said. Still, fear did not stop these students yesterday. They were accompanied by Chicago police officers as they moved along the road. Chants of ``say it loud, say it clear, immigrants are welcome here,'' and ``the people united, will never be divided'' drew honks from cars stopped along the marchers' path. The march through the village drew people to the sidewalks, cheering and blowing whistles in solidarity with [these] students . . . Others hung out of windows that overlooked the streets or pressed themselves against storefront windows, smiling and recording. The community engagement was not lost on Lopez, who said her ``beautiful, vibrant home'' has gone quiet amid the recent federal action. And then she said: I've seen so many people come out smiling and feeling safe, which is something we haven't felt [in this area] in months. And that's what I want. That is all I want,'' Lopez said. ``This protest was just for us to get peace, to be able to walk down the street again without being scared, to be able to live your life.'' For Lopez, protesting was worth whatever potential consequences. When her peers and family expressed concerns, she pushed back. She said: ``I said to them, I don't care if I get expelled, I don't care if I get detained . . . I will do this for my people, for my community, because they deserve it,'' Lopez said. ``They deserve people to speak out for them. They deserve people to show the love and appreciation that they give to us and to our students, Social Justice and Little Village Lawndale High School as a whole.'' That was an extraordinary amount of courage from a high school student in the city of Chicago. She knows her parents and many other families are afraid of what might happen because of the ICE agents that are roaming through, showing their strength to bust up Halloween parades, showing their strength to drop tear gas canisters in front of churches when people come out after services. This extraordinary show of courage and commitment to our country is nothing new. I, 20 years ago, introduced a bill called the DREAM Act. And as I described this act, it said, if you were brought to this country as a small child, you should have a chance for a path to citizenship. I used to tell that story, and then I would wait afterward. And when I would go out to my car, outside of the hall, there would be young people waiting for me in the dark, looking in both directions, afraid that someone would see them, and say: Senator, I am a Dreamer. Thank you for this legislation. Though I have never been able to make it law, I am happy to say that President Obama used his Executive power to create DACA to protect 800,000 of these young people around the country. Now, this generation of young people is doing what happened next in the story of the Dream Act. After DACA was created, most of these young people--despite the advice and warnings of their parents--came out publicly and said: I am a Dreamer. I want to be part of America's future. It was extraordinary courage on their part. Now this generation is doing the same, marching down 26th Street to say they want an end to this harassment by ICE officials. This is not what America is all about. If you are engaged in stopping the worst of the worst--criminal elements among immigrants--count me in. But harassing innocent families that have not violated the law is not the way to do it. So far, 70 percent or more of those who have been detained by ICE as part of this venture have no criminal record whatsoever. It is harassment and terror, plain and simple. I salute these students in Little Village for the courage that they showed. I hope that the students across the Chicago area and beyond will stand in solidarity with them in peaceful protest of the intimidation that is taking place in Little Village. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, today, the Senate will vote to confirm Edmund LaCour to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama. Mr. LaCour is another judicial nominee selected by President Trump for his extreme views. As the solicitor general of Alabama, Mr. LaCour has repeatedly put politics ahead of the rule of law. He has resisted the orders of Federal courts--including the Supreme Court--after they ruled against him and the State of Alabama in voting rights cases. His role in that litigation was not confined to a courtroom. After the Supreme Court recognized that Alabama's voting maps likely violated section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, Mr. LaCour helped State legislators draw new voting maps. He pushed for the inclusion of so-called ``legislative findings'' and wrote talking points for lawmakers. Despite his best efforts, Federal judges again found that these maps violated the Voting Rights Act. Yet Mr. LaCour and the State continue to argue the case and challenge the rulings against them. Mr. LaCour has argued for extreme restrictions on abortion rights and the rights of transgender people. He has also aggressively advocated for the death penalty. Last year, Mr. LaCour argued in support of nitrogen suffocation--an untested and inhumane death penalty method-- which allowed Alabama to carry out the first execution in the world by nitrogen gas. And just last week, in another case that Mr. LaCour argued, Alabama executed Anthony Boyd by nitrogen suffocation. Mr. Boyd reportedly ``convulse[d] and heave[d] for about 15 minutes before being pronounced dead.'' In her dissent from the Supreme Court's denial of a stay of execution, Justice Sotomayor, joined by Justices Kagan and Jackson, concluded, ``Allowing the nitrogen hypoxia experiment to continue despite mounting and unbroken evidence that it violates the Constitution by inflicting unnecessary suffering fails to ` ``protec[t] [the] dignity'' ' of ` ``the Nation we have been, the Nation we are, and the Nation we aspire to be.'' ' '' Based on Mr. LaCour's record, I am concerned that he will continue to display his clear ideological preferences if he is confirmed to the bench. I oppose his nomination. I urge my colleagues to join me.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Arizona (Mr. Gallego) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Arizona (Mr. Gallego) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, today, the Senate will vote to confirm Jordan Pratt to the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida. Judge Pratt has repeatedly demonstrated his partisanship and extreme views over the course of his career. While working in the Florida Department of Legal Affairs, he argued in support of restrictions on abortion rights and voting rights. He later worked for the first Trump administration and a far-right legal organization, First Liberty Institute. In his role at First Liberty, Judge Pratt belittled abortion rights, opposed transgender rights, and argued against firearms restrictions. During his tenure with First Liberty, the organization was a member of the advisory board of Project 2025. Judge Pratt participated in meetings regarding Project 2025 and provided research as part of that effort. My colleagues may claim that Judge Pratt did these things during his time as an advocate and that he understands the difference between the role of an advocate and the role of a judge. However, following his appointment to the State bench in 2023, Judge Pratt continued to act in a fashion more befitting a political activist than an even-handed arbiter of the law. Earlier this year, he wrote an opinion in which he held that a Florida law allowing minors to seek abortions without parental consent was unconstitutional. In commenting on Judge Pratt's opinion, one lawyer said that ``[j]udicial overreach doesn't even begin to describe it.'' We do not need to wonder how this nominee will rule if he is confirmed to the Federal bench. We already know. Like other judicial nominees put forth by President Trump, Judge Pratt has strong ties to rightwing organizations. He is an active member of the Federalist Society, and he has stated his intention to remain affiliated with the Federalist Society if he is confirmed to the Federal bench. Judge Pratt's record clearly reflects a level of partisan ideology and judicial activism that is inappropriate for someone nominated to a lifetime position on the Federal bench. I will oppose Judge Pratt's nomination, and I urge my colleagues to join me.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, for the last 2 months, the people of Illinois have been living under President Trump's so-called Operation Midway Blitz. I have watched it up close. I have seen its victims, and I have seen its methods. I want to tell you that this Operation Midway Blitz is trampling over Illinois residents' constitutional rights and civil liberties. This reckless campaign is not aimed at public safety; it is a calculated show of political theater and force that is designed to spread fear and terror in our communities. Every weekend since this operation began, I have returned to Chicago to visit these communities and to meet with members and leaders who have been targeted by Donald Trump with Federal, militarized agents. I have reported back on what I have seen and heard on this floor for weeks now. What I see time and time again are good people whose only desire is to raise their children, go to work, and contribute to their communities. These same people are now afraid to leave their homes, to walk to school, to church, to the grocery store, or to a restaurant out of fear of being caught in one of these cruel raids. The President insists his immigrant enforcement operations focus on the worst of the worst. Oh, you have heard him over and over again. At his rallies, he would give the speeches, and he would rail about the rapists, the murderers, the terrorists, the criminally insane: These immigrants, we have got to stop them. Well, I can tell you this: More than 70 percent of the people who have been detained have no criminal records whatsoever. They are American citizens--some--and they are workers and parents with clean records. They are peaceful protesters and community members who are carrying whistles. They are even children. Federal agents have been sweeping up anyone they encounter, including bystanders who pause to record their activities. Then they scramble later to justify the detentions. When you ask what happens to an individual who disappears from one of these scenes, you wait--sometimes for hours, sometimes for days--to find out where they have been taken. These actions violate due process--full stop. A democracy cannot survive with a law enforcement strategy of ``arrest now and ask questions later.'' The reach of these actions is only growing more brazen. Federal agents have confronted people outside of childcare centers and schools. Some Head Start Programs have moved online to protect families. Children have been zip-tied and yanked away from their families. In many cases, peaceful protesters have been met with tear gas. At Funston Elementary School near Logan Square, an entire playground had to be evacuated. Residents who locked arms to protect their neighbors were gassed in their own streets. U.S. district court judge Sara Ellis issued a temporary restraining order earlier this month that prohibits agents from using tear gas indiscriminately on peaceful protesters, journalists, or anyone else not posing an immediate threat to law enforcement. The orders of the court for these people--for these law enforcement agents sent in by President Trump--to wear video cameras, like so many police do every day, routinely, have been largely ignored. It is time for this court order to be enforced. Just this weekend, chemical canisters were thrown into a crowd of residents who had gathered in the Old Irving Park neighborhood of Chicago. For what reason? Was it a terrorist meeting? No. It was a children's Halloween block party, and they threw in tear gas canisters. Concerned onlookers and their children watched as Border Patrol agents tackled a landscaper to the ground and arrested him on a resident's front lawn. Agents then deployed multiple tear gas canisters at the neighbors without warning and even arrested one unsuspecting resident in his late sixties who had just returned from a morning run. The video footage shows the agents' recklessness, their seemingly disregard for the court order, and their ongoing violations of due process. It is hard to describe what is happening here, but I don't have to; it is all captured on videotape. Our Armed Forces are banned from using tear gas on the battlefield, but ICE and the CBP have no problem using it on Main Street in Chicago, IL. Recent footage even shows Gregory Bovino, the Border Patrol commander-at-large, who has been tasked with leading Operation Midway Blitz, deploying a tear gas canister on a crowd of peaceful protesters in Little Village with no advance warning-- despite a court order, with no advance warning. DHS was quick to publish statements on social media regarding the incident. They stated that a ``mob of rioters'' provoked the attack, but the video shows that was a lie. Judge Ellis called Mr. Bovino to court this morning to answer for the Federal agents' continued indiscriminate use of tear gas in the streets of Chicago, pepper spray, and other excessive force. She opened the hearing by reading her previous order out loud. Given recent events, she wondered whether her order wasn't clear. Immigration agents didn't bother to read it, or if they read it and understood it, they decided to ignore it and challenge the authority of the court. Judge Ellis said: [K]ids dressed in Halloween costumes, walking to a parade, do not illicit an immediate threat to the safety of a law enforcement officer. They just don't. At the hearing, she instructed Bovino to appear before the court to provide daily reports moving forward. Bovino also agreed to undergo training for body cameras and begin wearing one as soon as Friday. In light of these alarming abuses, I am working to fulfill my role under the Constitution as a Member of Congress with the authority to conduct oversight of the executive branch. The Trump administration claims to be the most transparent in American history, but when Senator Duckworth and I recently arrived at the Broadview ICE processing center to provide oversight, we were barred from viewing it. If this were truly a lawful operation targeted on public safety threats--the rapists, the murderers, the terrorists, and the criminally insane--they wouldn't stop us from seeing who was being held. DHS would welcome the oversight. Instead, they hide. What do they not want us, the American people, to see? The Trump administration has turned Federal Agencies into tools of political intimidation. They have targeted cities and States run by Democrats who didn't vote for the President in the last election. Operation Midway Blitz is a desecration of all the basic liberties guaranteed by the Constitution. But Chicagoans and Illinoisans are not backing down. We have survived a flood; we have survived a fire; we have survived disco night in Comiskey Park, and we will survive this as well. They are linking arms and demanding accountability, and they are refusing to be silent in the face of intimidation and injustice. I am going to continue to be part of that effort. There is a guarantee under this Constitution of freedom of speech. As long as we are engaged in nonviolent activity, that Constitution protects us. The people of Chicago and Illinois deserve so much better. They deserve a Federal Government that honors one of its highest duties, the duties to defend the rights and freedoms of all people. I will continue to do everything I can to try and ensure our government once again lives up to their promise, and I hope my colleagues will join me. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, a few weeks ago, the Catholic cardinal and archbishop of Washington, DC, gave a homily on the occasion of the annual celebration to honor and support immigrants. He made special note of what is currently happening across America, what he called an unprecedented assault upon millions of immigrant men and women and families in our midst. He said: This campaign [by this administration against immigrants] relies on fear and terror at its core, for the government knows that it cannot succeed in its efforts except by bringing new dimensions of fear and terror to our nation's history and life. ``Its goal is simple,'' the cardinal said, ``to rob undocumented immigrants of any real peace in their lives so that in misery they will `self-deport.' '' Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this homily be printed in the Record in its entirety.

Mr. DURBIN. A few days ago, some Jewish rabbis in the Chicagoland area sent a letter to the editor of the Chicago Sun-Times on the same immigration crisis. They wrote: On behalf of Jewish clergy serving communities across Chicago and Illinois, we write in opposition to the escalating campaign of fear and repression carried out by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in our city and suburbs. In recent weeks-- These rabbis wrote-- ICE has disappeared people, used tear gas in residential neighborhoods and shot at least two residents with live rounds, one fatally. At Broadview, agents fired rubber bullets on demonstrators, including clergy members. In South Shore, ICE and Border Patrol staged an overnight raid on an apartment building, dragging families from their beds, separating children from parents and leaving them handcuffed outdoors for hours. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this letter to the editor from the Jewish rabbis in Chicago be printed in its entirety in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I make a point now, since the arrival of the military from President Trump into the Chicago area, to go home each weekend and visit the neighborhoods that are under assault from the ICE agents. I did that last weekend. I visited a suburb of Chicago known as Elgin, IL. People have heard of it, I am sure. It is the sixth largest city in our State. The mayor, Dave Kaptain, is a true bipartisan man. It is no surprise that he has been mayor for almost 12 years. He is a good mayor and a good person. We met in his office and talked about what is going on. Elgin was one of the first targets of President Trump and ICE. They sent in the agents in the early morning hours, along with Secretary Noem of the Department of Homeland Security. They broke down a door to a home, raided it by removing the family and accusing one of the occupants of being undocumented. There was no allegation made that these people were dangerous criminals, nor was there any question that they are the ``worst of the worst,'' in Donald Trump's words. Do you remember how many times he gave speeches at his rallies talking about these people who are now being disappeared by ICE? Remember how he referred to them--rapists, murderers, terrorists, sexual predators, criminally insane? It turns out that of all of the people who were arrested, detained, and disappeared by ICE, 70 percent of those have no criminal record whatsoever. So what is actually happening? The cardinal from the District of Columbia and the Jewish rabbis know, and we all know. It is a reign of terror--a reign of terror from this administration--not to make America safer but to make sure that people who weren't born here leave. But, unfortunately, if you are a student of history, you know that is the story of America: immigrants who came to this country seeking freedom and opportunity and making this a great nation. My family tells that story, and I am sure most of the people listening to my voice can tell the same story. But what is going on now is a reign of terror. I went to a section of Chicago known as Little Village. Little Village is primarily Mexican American. It is a great community--miles and miles of shops and stores and restaurants. When I visited with them on Friday, they were largely empty. One fellow at the grocery store told me 50 percent of the customers have disappeared. Why? Because they are afraid. They are afraid to leave their homes. For what? To be arrested, to be detained, to disappear. Oftentimes, we are asked to try to find someone who has been detained and get little or no cooperation from the Federal Agencies. These are the tactics of dictators in faraway countries, not American due process, but that is the reality of what we are facing. I asked the mayor of Elgin what he thought about the population--the Hispanic population--in his town. He said: Senator, 50 percent of the people in my city of Elgin are Hispanic. Many of them are immigrants. They make for a great community. We just had a beautiful festival, with 10,000 people showing up. It has been a tradition in Elgin for a long time, and one we are proud of. He made a point of telling me that they are changing the ordinances in Elgin so as to make those who are protected by DACA eligible to apply to be firefighters and policemen. The one for policemen has been on the books for a while. Now they have expanded it to firefighters, and they have a long line of people interested--immigrants who are prepared to risk their lives to keep their community safe. That, I think, is a great story of a great town, and I am proud to represent them. But we cannot be proud of the tactics that are being used by ICE and by the Department of Homeland Security. If you are going after serious criminals, ``the worst of the worst''--the litany that is often given by President Trump in his rallies--count me in. I will be part of that. But to terrorize people in their homes, to make them afraid to go to church, afraid to go to the market, afraid to go to a restaurant, is not what this country is about. There is only one parallel in history that I can think of that has occurred in my lifetime, and that, of course, would be the internment of 120,000 Japanese Americans during World War II. It was a discriminatory policy in the midst of a war that took these people from their homes and their businesses and held them in camps scattered around the West of the United States. We look back on that, years later, and say: That was a terrible mistake. That is not what America is all about. I was a Member of the House of Representatives when the U.S. Government, under President Clinton, issued a formal apology to Japanese Americans for that policy. Sadly, we are building up another occurrence in the United States with the actions of ICE and the Department of Homeland Security, when it comes to Hispanic Americans. Profiling is part of the process, and it is a disgrace that it is. That is the reality of what we face in Chicago, and that is the reality of what they are going to face in other States to come. It is time for not only the clergy to speak up but the people who care to speak up, who believe in human life and the value of it and who believe that people need to be treated with respect. Russia Mr. President, on an unrelated issue, over the weekend, we witnessed another brutal Russian onslaught against Ukraine--a scene brazenly repeated after overtures made to Russian President Putin to end the war. I do not begrudge President Trump for trying to engage with Putin. I have met with my fair share of autocrats in my political career. But Putin is not serious about negotiating an end to the war in Ukraine. He is not driven by real estate or personal financial motivations but by deep personal grievances and twisted readings of history and nostalgia for the Soviet Empire--so much so that Putin has been willing to slaughter thousands of innocent Ukrainians, kidnap children, and send more than a million Russians to become war casualties in pursuit of his myopia. We should also be under no illusions that this is just a Russian assault on Ukraine. It is an assault against the United States' values, and it is an assault against NATO and its allies. Last week, again, Russia entered NATO airspace--this time, in Lithuania. The move followed years of increasingly provocative Russian incursions. And Russian planes have entered the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone at least nine times this year. I welcome President Trump's recent decision to tighten sanctions on Russia. He can and should take further steps to increase military and economic pressure on Putin, and we in Congress should finally pass sanctions legislation, which has 80 cosponsors from both political parties, and we should do it soon. Healthcare Mr. President, on an unrelated topic, today, my constituents in Illinois will begin to receive letters from health insurance companies outlining the prices for next year's health insurance premiums. For many Illinois families, these letters will inform them that their premium costs will double. Do you want to know why we are in a government shutdown? It is because of that letter that is being sent around by insurance companies to residents of Illinois and many other States this week. They are going to learn, unfortunately, that the cost of their health insurance, in many instances, is going to double--$1,000 or more for each one of these recipients--all because congressional Republicans have chosen to allow the Affordable Care Act's enhanced tax credits to expire. These credits have helped millions of people in every State, but the Republicans want to get rid of them. They want American families to have to pay more for health insurance. Last week, I sent a letter to the health insurance companies in Illinois, asking them what it will mean to lose these tax credits. Major health insurers, like Blue Cross Blue Shield and United, told me that the expiration of these tax credits will be a disaster. In Illinois, these tax credits lower premiums by an average of more than $500 a month--$6,000 a year. Families who are struggling to try to pay electric and utility bills, struggling to pay grocery expenses, now face up to $6,000 a year more for the same health insurance they enjoyed this year. When Illinoisans go online at getcoveredillinois.gov, today, to check their health insurance premiums for next year, they are going to see two devastating things: First, nearly 400,000 Illinoisans will have to grapple with the reality that they may no longer receive the premium assistance they received this year. These losses could reach hundreds to thousands of dollars a month, depending on the family size. Second, they will see that, across our State, health insurance premiums are going up approximately 30 percent next year, fueled by these expiring tax credits and the ``Big Beautiful Trump Budget Bill.'' It is a double hit--loss of the enhanced tax credits and underlying costs skyrocketing--all because the Republicans in Congress refuse to sit down with us now--now--and fix this problem. Listen to what Melanie from Elmhurst shared with me. She said: I receive a $379 monthly tax credit . . . without the tax credit [my insurance] is unaffordable, plain and simple. She is not alone. She is 1 of 100,000 people in my State and more than 4 million nationwide who stand to lose their health coverage because of this Republican decision. Democrats tried to address the expiration of these credits this year, but the Republicans have refused to cooperate. Now is the time to get it done for families. Republicans, Democrats, and Independents, whether they vote or not, should have access to health insurance. If you are looking for leadership from the White House, we have to hope that the President will return from his trip and take up this cause. I hope that the House of Representatives will actually come to the Capitol for the first time in 4 or 5 weeks. Their presence is long overdue. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Pennsylvania (Mr. Fetterman) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Pennsylvania (Mr. Fetterman) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I am sure that those who are following the opening remarks of the Senate today can sense the frustration, bordering on anger, with the current situation, the current status quo. It is shared on both sides of the aisle. I have had the good fortune of serving in the House of Representatives and the Senate, representing parts of Illinois and then the entire State, for a big part of my life. I have watched these institutions, the House and the Senate, face frustrating, disappointing, challenging situations. I have found that the rule of thumb is, basically, if reasonable people will sit down to the table and put the items on the table and say, ``Let's see if we can find common ground,'' it usually works. It could work here too. We could reopen this government by the end of the day. I believe it. It is going to be even more difficult because the House of Representatives is not in session. I believe it has now been 3 weeks--maybe even 4 weeks--that they have been out of session. They need to be here, doing their job, helping to work to find a solution to this frustrating situation. What exactly is behind the shutdown of this Federal Government? Let me tell you. It is a serious issue that affects virtually every American. Do you have health insurance? I do. Most of us do. Is it expensive? Yes. Do you still need it? God, yes. Without it, it would be even worse. With one automobile accident, one broken bone, one serious diagnosis, you could wipe out the savings of most American families. That is the reality. So health insurance is critical. People need it. Do you know what is going to happen soon? I am sorry to say we are going to see a dramatic increase in health insurance premiums. There was a debate here several months ago on what the President called his big, beautiful budget. The big, beautiful budget did many things, but in addition to some spending decisions, it made the decision that we were going to give a tax break to the wealthiest people in America, people like Elon Musk. His tax break, if I remember correctly--I don't have it written down here--was $230,000 a year. I would say that is a lot of money for most Americans. Mr. Musk, though, is so rich--a multibillionaire--he probably wouldn't even notice it. But the $230,000 tax break for the wealthiest Americans meant that other programs needed to be cut. One of the programs that President Trump and the Republicans in Congress decided to cut--one was Medicaid. Medicaid is a pretty universal program that affects millions of Americans and the services that they receive from clinics, from hospitals, even living in nursing homes. Medicaid is an important part. The Republicans, in order to provide the money for tax cuts for people like Elon Musk, needed to cut $1 trillion out of Medicaid over the next 10 years. What does it mean in my State? Well, we worry. Will rural hospitals or inner-city hospitals survive if Medicaid is cut? Will the nursing home people be able to stay in the nursing homes? Those are important and critical questions. The second part of the decision by the Republicans in the big, beautiful budget to provide a tax break for the wealthy was basically to eliminate the tax subsidy that is available for middle-income families under the Affordable Care Act. What does that mean? Well, for some people, they are going to see the results in the mail in just a matter of days. The target date in Illinois, which I represent, is October 27. Watch for the mail then because on October 27, you will receive a notice about what is going to happen to your health insurance premiums January 1. They are going to go up an average of 114 percent. So take a look at what you are now paying for health insurance and anticipate that it is going to go up. How much? I am not sure, but it could easily double. For a lot of families who are struggling to survive, that is going to become a difficult challenge. How are we going to pay this premium? These are the same families who come back from the grocery store every Saturday and Sunday and say: I can't believe what has happened to the price of beef. I can't believe what has happened to the price of produce. Across the board, people see the cost of living going up. And now an essential service--health insurance premiums--we are going to see this dramatic increase. It is this increase that is going to affect millions of Americans-- over 20 million Americans--that is at the heart of this decision about whether this government is going to reopen. We have said to the Republicans that we believe the American families need a helping hand and need it now--not something we talk about later but now--so that we can do something to stop these premiums from going up dramatically. You know what is going to happen. When the premiums go up, some families will say: No problem. Making plenty of money. Hate it, but we can pay it. Other families are going to say: How in the world are we going to do this? We are going to have to get a health insurance policy which has more copays and deductibles that are paid by us for virtually everything. So we are going to pay through the course of next year for this increase in premiums anyway. Some will walk away and say: I just can't afford it. Can't make ends meet. Can't pay utility bills. Electric bills are going up and other things that we face, and this health insurance premium too. We are just going to have to drop the insurance and hope for the best. I am sorry for those people because it not only means that they are facing risks in life without the protection of health insurance--we know statistically that when you don't have health insurance or any basic health insurance, that you forgo treatment and examinations. That is not good, it is not healthy, and it doesn't lead to a good result. Is that an important issue for your family? I bet it is. It is an important issue for every single family. That is what is at the heart of this government shutdown--the need for Republicans and Democrats to sit at the table and say: How can we spare American families from this premium increase that they are going to face inevitably--millions are going to face--with bad consequences? Can we do it? Of course, we can. People of good will can reach a conclusion that they are going to find a way to compromise and see this issue come to an end. We need to do it now--not next week, not the week following, but now. There is too much hardship going on with this government shutdown, and it should not continue. So my appeal is to the President: Delay your trip overseas. My appeal to the Republicans in the House: Come back home--I shouldn't say ``home''--come back to Washington. Leave your home, come back to Washington, and go to work with us on a bipartisan basis. Is that what America wants? You bet it is. To address this issue of health insurance premiums--do it on a bipartisan basis, and end this government shutdown. We can do it today. There is a lot of furniture in this Capitol--I have seen it over the years--and there are a lot of tables. There are many tables big enough for the leaders in Congress and the President to sit down and reach an agreement. That sitdown ought to happen sooner rather than later. Illinois Mr. President, on another issue unrelated, last Friday, the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to green-light the deployment of National Guard troops in my home State of Illinois after the lower courts had temporarily blocked the deployment. In her decision, District Court Judge April Perry said the Trump administration has produced ``no credible evidence that there is a danger of rebellion'' in Illinois. Rather, Judge Perry found that ``the unnecessary deployment of military troops, untrained for local policing, will escalate tensions and undermine the ordinary law enforcement activities of state and local entities.'' Three judges on the Seventh Circuit Appeals Court, including one appointed by President Bush and another appointed by President Trump, considered that decision by the lower court and agreed with Judge Perry. They found that ``the facts do not justify the President's actions in Illinois. . . . Political opposition is not rebellion.'' That panel is right. Last Saturday, I was part of the No Kings demonstration. We estimate there were 100,000 people in Grant Park at the Petrillo band shell. It was nonviolent. It was orderly. Oh, they were loud once in a while, but no one was involved in any sort of rebellion. They were exercising their constitutional right to express their opinion about the policies of this government. I have been honored to represent the great State of Illinois for over 40 years in the Senate and the House. And, yes, like every State, Illinois has its challenges, such as addressing crime. But for the last two decades, the murder rate in Illinois has been lower than murder rates in Republican-led States like Missouri, Louisiana, and Alabama. Violent crime is down dramatically in the city of Chicago. We should work together to build on this success and reduce the crime rate even more. But the President's actions in sending in National Guard troops even from the State of Texas to Illinois is not about public safety; it is about politics. His unjustified and unlawful attempts to deploy troops to Chicago and other American cities are a threat to our basic democratic institutions. The Supreme Court should reject the President's petition to use these troops in America. There is no emergency that justifies bypassing the regular appeals process and resolving this issue on the Court's shadow docket without the full public scrutiny this issue deserves. Just last week, I received a heartbreaking message from one of my constituents, PO2 Jessica Wendlandt--a hard-working provider at Lake County Health Department in Waukegan, IL. In her letter, Officer Wendlandt mentioned that some of her patients have stopped showing up for their appointments because ICE officers are camping out in front of the facility. Picture it, if you will: People, families, taking their children in for a doctor's appointment--afraid to go, leave their car, and walk the short distance to the clinic because ICE officials, in their combat uniforms and masks, in unmarked vehicles, were lurking outside the clinic. She said in what she wrote to me: My patients have not been able to come to their medical appointments out of fear of being taken. These raids are impacting the ability of medical providers to provide basic family treatment. Jessica also mentioned that she was treating a mother at the health center when the mother ``received several phone calls and messages that ICE [agents] had raided the apartment buildings right behind the facility.'' The patient was so distraught and in tears that treatment could not be completed that day because she needed to rush home to her other children. Imagine for a moment the fear that a mother must have felt receiving a call from her kids, scared and screaming that masked men are trying to break into their home. Is this America? Can you imagine the confusion and fear those children must have felt seeing those men at their door, wondering who they were and if they were there to help them or hurt them. It is not just at health centers in Illinois; ICE is camping out in front of city halls, schools, churches, regularly outside of Home Depot, where they detained a father who was the sole provider for his two children, including a daughter with stage IV cancer. Do you remember what led us into this situation? You heard it over and over at President Trump's rallies. Rapists, terrorists, murderers, the criminally insane, sexual predators were coming across our border. Let me tell you, I will sign up with the President. We don't want those people coming into this country. And if they commit a crime while they are here, they should be gone, period. Now let's talk about the others, the 11 million who have been in America working jobs, raising families, going to church, paying their taxes. They are the ones they are targeting. Seventy percent of the people who have been stopped by ICE in the State of Illinois--70 percent of them have no criminal record whatsoever. They are not rapists and murderers and terrorists. They are people who overstayed a visa. And they may be American citizens. The ICE officers obviously don't distinguish any difference there. When will my colleagues on the other side of the aisle decide that the cruelty and fear tactics of this administration must stop? This is America. When will they choose to put an end to the racial profiling which is going on and the detention of even American citizens, including veterans of children? This is all supposed to be about violent crime? It is not. Enough. If this was actually about reducing crime, President Trump would not be slashing programs that actually help local law enforcement. This cruelty is all for show. While Americans continue to pay inflated prices at the grocery store and face the prospect of skyrocketing healthcare premiums, this is what the President is focused on: tearing families apart and separating kids from their parents. Our country is better than this. It is better than this cruelty and lawlessness. Now is the time for us to stand up for the rule of law and our Constitution. President Trump's claims of ``invasions,'' ``rebellions,'' or ``emergencies'' to justify calling the military into American cities are shameless attempts to bypass our constitutional checks and balances. It was the Republican Governor of Oklahoma who said last week that if Governor Pritzker of Illinois tried to send his National Guard troops to Oklahoma, the people of Oklahoma and that Governor, a Republican Governor, would resist it. But that is exactly what is happening in my home State of Illinois. This President, without invitation, is sending National Guard troops in from Texas. The Supreme Court should stand up to this administration's attempt to cut both Congress and the courts out of decisions squarely given to them by the Constitution. Political opposition, peaceful protests, and nonviolent civil disobedience are not rebellion; they are the bedrock of our democracy. Local law enforcement officials have proven they are capable, in Illinois and most places, of handling any unlawful or unruly behavior. Illinois State Attorney General Kwame Raoul explained to the court: No protest activity in Illinois has rendered the president unable to execute federal law. If the Supreme Court enables President Trump to deploy troops to American cities over the objection of State officials before the courts rule on the legality of the actions, I fear it is going to cause lasting harm to America. I ask my Republican colleagues: Are you really prepared in your home State for the next President after President Trump to send in troops to your State without permission, without the consent of your government? Are you ready for masked soldiers to grab your constituents from their homes? My constituents elected me to represent them in this fight. I implore you to do right by your constituents and push back against the President's illegal power grab before your State is the next victim. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I strongly oppose the nomination of Stephen Chad Meredith to serve as a judge on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky. Like several of President Trump's other judicial nominees, Mr. Meredith has a long history of taking extreme positions on women's reproductive rights. As a Republican political appointee in Kentucky, he sought a functional ban on the most common second-trimester abortion procedure and attempted to shut down what was, at the time, the last remaining abortion clinic in the State. And he insulted women everywhere when he argued, in court, that doctors should be required to provide certain information to female patients because these women ``don't understand'' their own medical needs. In addition to his extreme record on reproductive rights, Mr. Meredith's involvement in pardoning a host of violent offenders--and his total lack of candor on this issue--is disqualifying. Then-Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin pardoned hundreds of violent offenders during his last days in office. Mr. Meredith served as Governor Bevin's chief deputy general counsel during this time. There is incontrovertible written evidence that Mr. Meredith worked on at least some of these pardons. Yet, during his hearing, he swore to this committee, under oath, that he had no involvement. He testified, ``I learned about the Governor's last minute controversial pardons in the media after we left office.'' He also testified that he didn't have anything to do with Governor Bevin's controversial pardons. This is demonstrably untrue. In written questions, Mr. Meredith admitted that, at Governor Bevin's request, he had personally gone to a prison to inform two inmates, in person, that they had received pardons. One of those inmates had committed vehicular homicide. The other had been convicted of sexually abusing his six-year-old stepdaughter. Mr. Meredith has radical views far outside the mainstream and was not forthright with this Committee about his record. I cannot support his nomination.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New Hampshire (Mrs. Shaheen) and the Senator from Hawaii (Mr. Schatz) are necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Virgina (Mr. Kaine), and the Senator from Virginia (Mr. Warner) are necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, local papers are the lifeline of our communities. They inform citizens of not only what is going on in their city halls, but their wedding halls as well. These papers connect Americans and remind us that we are part of a community greater than ourselves. This was something that Bruce Sagan understood well, and for more than 70 years, he saved newspapers, theatres, and helped preserve Chicago's cultural vibrance. Bruce was the embodiment of an engaged citizen; he was someone who constantly strived to support his community, and it is with great sadness that I share the news of his passing. Bruce was born in Summit, NJ, and at just 16 years old, he moved to Chicago to study at the University of Chicago in Hyde Park. While professors may have missed Bruce in the classroom, they could not miss him in the pages of the Chicago Maroon, UChicago's newspaper. Bruce was an avid writer and supporter of the Maroon, constantly working to ensure that the paper covered the important issues of the day. On UChicago's campus, the issue of racial discrimination was dominating the discussion. A group of students were working to expose the medical school's practice of rejecting Black students, and while students lined the streets in protest, Bruce was busy behind a typewriter, working to publicize their efforts and shine a light on discrimination. His work at the Maroon in support of integration was an early sign of the values Bruce brought to journalism. Bruce's passion for journalism couldn't be satisfied by a student paper, so he left college and the Chicago Maroon to go work for the City News Bureau. Known across Chicago as the ``reporter's boot camp,'' City News was a consortium of newspapers that coordinated routine coverage. It was an incubator of journalistic talent that helped launch the careers of legendary Chicago journalists like Mike Royko and Seymour Hersh. At City News, Bruce was one of the overnight editors, working from midnight to 8 a.m., or as he described, ``the mafia assassination beat.'' But 2 years after he joined City News, Bruce received an offer that would change the course of his career. One of Illinois' oldest local papers, the Hyde Park Herald, was failing, and a group of concerned citizens asked Bruce if he would buy the Herald to keep it in circulation. While the prospect of buying and saving a paper was daunting, 24-year-old Bruce charged ahead and took out a $2,500 loan to purchase the Herald. Thanks to Bruce, the paper did not miss a single issue. This began Bruce's long career as an owner and manager of local papers. Soon after Bruce purchased the Hyde Park Herald, he acquired the Southtown Economist, which he grew into dozens of local newspapers spanning across the Chicago suburbs. Under Bruce's leadership, these papers reached hundreds of thousands of Illinoisans as Bruce modernized their printing processes and pushed them to take a moral stand on the issues. What made Bruce so successful was that he recognized the civic value of newspapers. In a Time Magazine interview, Bruce once decried how it was harder for someone to know what is going on in their own city than to find out what Khrushchev is doing in Cuba. Bruce wanted to demystify what was happening in Illinois. He took on topics that impacted every part of civic life, ranging from the corruption of political machines of Springfield to the protection of Frank Lloyd Wright's famous Robie House. Anyone who worked at the Herald often would see Bruce's office light on late into the night, a symbol of his tireless work in support of his city. But Bruce's commitment to public life in Chicago did not stop at the edge of the bullpen; he also was a passionate supporter of the arts. In 1965, Bruce bought the Harper Theatre to create an ``off-Broadway'' experience in Chicago. Bruce moved the Hyde Park Herald's offices to the second floor of the theater and renovated the space as a ``monument to urban renewal.'' For decades, the Harper Theatre supported local musicians, dancers, and actors as they honed their crafts and shared their talents with the city. The Harper Theater was also where Bruce saw the Joffrey Ballet for the first time as part of the first modern dance festival in the Midwest, which he organized. Three decades later, Bruce helped facilitate the Joffrey Ballet's move from New York to Chicago. While mentioning all of Bruce's contributions to support and save Chicago's various cultural institutions would be difficult, his efforts did not go unnoticed. In 2022, then-President Biden awarded Bruce with the National Medal of Arts. Cheering that selection was David Axelrod, who got his start working as a cub reporter for Bruce. I can think of no one more deserving of this honor than Bruce, a man who spent seven decades fighting to strengthen the ties of community and the richness of cultural life in Chicago. But Bruce did not work alone. His wife Bette Cerf Hill was Bruce's faithful partner as they both engaged in and supported every aspect of Chicago's art scene, from literature festivals to architectural centers. Loretta and I send our deepest condolences to Bette; their five children Paul, Alex, Catherine, Teresa, and Diana; their 12 grandchildren; and their 9 great-grandchildren. Chicago will be forever grateful for all that Bruce has done to enrich our cultural heritage. While we will miss Bruce dearly, his legacy will continue to benefit our city for generations. Whether someone watches a play at the Steppenwolf Theatre or reads the latest article in the Hyde Park Herald, I hope they take a moment to remember Bruce.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, my friend and colleague from Wyoming believes that he knows who was in the streets last Saturday. I don't know where he was, but I was in the streets of Chicago. We estimate over 100,000 people were there. Were they the Marxists? the radical left? the anti-police? the pro-criminal? No. They represent the families of the State of Illinois who believe that the situation with this government is unfair to them, and I agree. Why is this government shut down? It is basically an issue that goes to the heart of why we occupy these chairs, why we run for these offices. Are we listening to the people who send us to Washington? If we are listening, they are telling us that something is about to happen to them that they cannot manage and control. What is it? It is that health insurance policy costs are going to go up dramatically. On January 1, those costs are going to go up an average of 114 percent. That means double--double--your health insurance premium. Now, some people are comfortable and well-off, and they can live with it, but others cannot. That is the bottom line. When you look at what happened here--the passage of the big, beautiful Trump budget--it ended up eliminating a tax credit that was available for people in middle-income categories to pay for health insurance. We know that is going to happen. In my State of Illinois, on October 27--just a few days from now-- everyone who is in the Affordable Care Act is going to receive notice of the increase in premiums--like I said, an increase of 114 percent. So if you are paying $1,000 a month for health insurance now, on January 1, it goes up to $2,000 a month. That is the kind of thing that people have to cope with. We want to save them from that. All we ask is that Congress do its job. Listen to the people you represent back home who are going to tell you: You just added a burden on my home budget that we can't handle. Senator, do something to help. That is not unreasonable. I have done this job for a few years. Many people come to us asking for help, just like this. How many people across America are going to be affected by this increase in premiums--this dramatic increase in premiums? Some say 24 million people--24 million people. We say, on the Democratic side of the aisle, we were sent here to fix it. Let's fix it. When we say that to the Republicans, they say: We would rather shut down the government. Shut down the government? It was your vote that created this premium increase. Can't you join us now, Democrats and Republicans, and fix it? Of course we can, and we ought to do it as quickly as possible. Republicans control the House, the Senate, and the Presidency, but our government has been shut down for 21 days over this issue. We have taken show vote after show vote on the Republican-crafted plan to fund the government. All of them have failed. There is an obvious way out of this. I have been in Congress for a few years, and I know how this problem is solved. It is when people of good will sit down at the same table. There are thousands of pieces of furniture in this Capitol Building and lots of tables and chairs. Why is it we can't sit down and do it? One of the problems is that the House of Representatives has gone AWOL; it has gone on vacation. I believe this is the fourth week that they have stayed on vacation instead of coming to Washington to help solve this problem. How do you explain that? How do you explain men and women elected to the House of Representatives who face a looming deadline on the increase of health insurance who don't even show up for work? I talked to a number of Democratic Congressmen this morning. They said that you can't explain it. Everyone on the committee has important work to do, but the Speaker of the House refuses to call them back. As for the Republicans in the Senate, well, today is going to be a spectacular day for them, I guess. They have been invited to a meeting--maybe even a lunch--in the Rose Garden of the White House with the President. If one or two of them would break off of that lunch and sit down with one or two Democrats, maybe we could start the conversation to solve this problem--and it is a real problem. In Illinois, a 60-year-old couple with an income of $82,000 a year can see their annual health insurance premiums increase by $17,000 a year--more than 254 percent. That is $1,400 more a month for health insurance starting on January 1. A family of four earning $64,000 could see their annual premium increase by $2,571 a year. That is a 226- percent increase. We ought to be concerned about that; we ought to care about it a lot more than any political position. Ask any American if they can afford to pay double for their healthcare insurance, and most of them will tell you that they can't. These looming premium spikes are causing Americans to panic. Don't take my word for it; listen to the people I represent. Karissa wrote and said that she has chronic conditions and takes several medications every single day. Karissa gets cancer screenings several times a year for breast and GI cancer because she is at risk, but if Republicans allow the increased premium tax credits to expire, Karissa said that she ``won't be able to continue those [treatments].'' Think about that. What a choice to make--your money or your life. What is going to happen if she is not able to get screened for cancer? Karissa may have been able to prevent a serious issue early on by that screening, but now she may not know until it has progressed and costs even more to treat, if it can be treated at all--all because of this political difference wherein Republicans in Congress say that her health insurance premiums, even though they are unaffordable, are not a worry to them. Ingrid from Springfield wrote to me, and she said she is ``in distress'' because she is afraid she won't be able to afford her medical treatment next year. She has a disability. She is retired. She struggles to pay a mortgage, utilities, student loans, and other debts. Ingrid is also fighting cancer right now and needs ongoing medical treatment. When she checked her health insurance premium for next year, her jaw dropped. Ingrid wrote that all the options were quite impossible for her. The cheapest option for her health insurance came with a $1,400 a month premium and a $14,000 deductible. Ingrid is worried that she may lose her home just to pay for basic coverage. No American should be forced to choose between their home and healthcare, their money or their life, but if my Republican colleagues continue to ignore this issue, more Americans are going to be facing just that decision starting this next year. If Republicans in Congress fail to extend the enhanced premium tax credit before the end of the year, premiums for 22 million Americans will more than double. If we do nothing, premiums for 22 million Americans will more than double, and more than 4 million Americans will become uninsured, including more than 100,000 people in Illinois. What is it like to live without health insurance? I faced that at one point in my life. I never want to face it again. It is a horrible feeling. This isn't rocket science. Republicans do not have 60 votes in the Senate to pass their partisan bill that fails to do anything to lower healthcare costs. They must work with Democrats to fund the government and to prevent Ingrid, Karissa, and millions of other Americans from losing their healthcare. We can do that today. Instead of a vacation for the House and a picnic for Senate Republicans, we should be sitting down to get to work. Senator Thune and Speaker Johnson need to go not to the picnic table at the White House but come to the table to bargain and do it sooner rather than later. Instead, Senate Republicans are heading to the White House for lunch. I am sure it will be nice, but if a couple of them could peel off and actually sit down and bargain, that would be a much better day for America. It is unfathomable that Speaker Johnson has chosen to give the House a 5-week vacation amid this crisis. House Republicans must return to Washington and go to work or they will have to explain to an increasingly large group of constituents why health insurance premiums have doubled under the Republican leadership in Congress. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Illinois (Ms. Duckworth) is necessarily absent.