Richard Durbin

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, last July, heavy rain in Illinois caused severe flooding that led the Governor to declare disaster areas in Lake, McHenry, Kane, and Cook Counties. Thousands of buildings, including homes, businesses, and schools, were damaged by floodwaters. Thankfully, there were no fatalities as a result of this historic flooding. Lake County was one of the areas most impacted by the flooding. When I visited two towns in this area--Libertyville and Gurnee--I saw street after street of flood damage to homes and businesses. It was heartbreaking. I spoke with residents who were concerned about being able to recover from the flood and resulting damages and who voiced the need to find long-term solutions that will mitigate the impact of future flood events. One year later, I am still awed by the dedication of the local first responders and county officials. State and local employees and volunteers came out to help at every level, from county emergency management agencies to the American Red Cross. Representatives from the Illinois Emergency Management Agency worked closely with local officials to make sure communities had the resources needed to protect critical infrastructure and clean up when the water began to recede. People from all around the region pitched in to help their neighbors and even strangers protect property and get back on their feet. It has been challenging for Illinois to receive Federal aid after a disaster occurs. I led the Illinois delegation in supporting the Governor's request for a Federal disaster declaration for the four impacted counties, but unfortunately, the State did not receive aid after the flooding last July. Currently, FEMA considers State population when reviewing States' requests for Federal assistance following a disaster. This puts highly populous States like Illinois at a disadvantage, relying on the premise that they can absorb more recovery costs after a disaster. Despite that, my colleagues in Congress and I will always stand ready to do whatever we can to provide Federal assistance to assist Illinois communities. I introduced a bill to fix FEMA's disaster declaration formula--the Fairness in Federal Disaster Declarations Acts--and I will continue to push this bill to try and help States, both small and large, in times of need. Families in Illinois deserve a fair and transparent disaster declaration process that allows them to access Federal resources when they are needed most. I want to thank everyone who was engaged in the response and mitigation efforts, and all those who were part of the recovery efforts since last July. Illinoisans always come together and rebuild, as we have done, and we are stronger for it.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I join the Senator from Arkansas in commending those who are involved in law enforcement, risking their lives for the safety of this Nation at all levels--Federal, State, and local. They put their badges on every single day and risk their lives for us, and that is a fact. Within the Department of Homeland Security, there are men and women who are conscientiously trying to keep America safe. I commend them as well. I believe they are doing their job as they understand it, and they are risking their lives many times to achieve it, not only to stop the illegal flow of drugs into our country but to deter crime and to ferret out criminals where possible. They risk their lives to achieve that goal. I have not joined in a call for the abolition of ICE, but I will not join in a call for the adoration of ICE because of one specific issue. The zero tolerance policy of the Trump administration resulted in our agents of the Department of Homeland Security forcibly separating children from their parents--forcibly separating up to 3,000 children from their parents. I saw some of those kids separated by that agency. They were toddlers and infants. Some were being held by the care workers whom I happened to visit in Chicago. They were little babies taken from their mothers-- toddlers, children 5 and 6 years old, separated by this agency under the President's zero tolerance policy. There were up to 3,000 of them, according to the administration's own estimates. Had that happened before? Only rarely, but it became the policy of this administration until there was such an uproar in the United States and around the world that President Trump reversed his position on zero tolerance. Reversing the position did not return the children to their parents. It took Federal courts to do that--one in particular, in San Diego, where the judge called the representatives of ICE, Health and Human Services, and all the other agencies involved in these children being removed forcibly from their parents and gave them deadlines to return the children to their parents. It was then that we discovered something about this agency. It was then that we discovered that they didn't keep a record of the parents and kids. If you place an order online to Amazon or some other source and the next day you want to check on the status of your order, you use your tracking number, and they will tell you where your package is. There was no tracking number when it came to these kids. If you decide that you are going to order a pizza and it seems to take a little too long and you call the pizza parlor, they can generally tell you where the delivery person is. The same thing is true in so many other areas. Why, then, did this agency, which my colleagues are now coming to the floor claiming such great praise for, ignore the obvious? This agency, the Department of Homeland Security, ended up setting free 3,000 children into care facilities around the United States of America and didn't keep records of the parents. We asked them several weeks ago, downstairs--all of the agencies, including ICE, referred to by the Senator from Arkansas: OK, let's get down to basics. How many kids are we talking about? They wouldn't give us a number. How many kids are under the age of 5? Those are the ones whom you have a deadline to reunite under the Federal court order in San Diego. They couldn't give us a number. Then, how many parents can you identify who actually had their kids taken away? ICE said: We can identify 10. Ten parents, 3,000 kids--I am not making this up. This is exactly what they said. They said: We have 10 parents in custody. Those are the ones we can identify. Two weeks passed, and we had another briefing this week. The numbers are now more complete. There are some 2,500 kids separated from their parents, spread around the United States. What happened to the parents who lost their children? The explanation from ICE was that they abandoned their kids and left. Does that sound reasonable? Does that sound honest? You take the child away from the arms of a parent and then the parent says: I am leaving the country. That might have happened in some cases, for reasons I don't know, but it is an outrageous suggestion. What it reflects is incompetency. How in the world can you take a child away from a parent, forcibly take them away, and not keep an adequate record for their reunification? How can you do that? Common sense and common decency suggests that you would do it. I am not going to join in any resolution applauding that action by any Federal agency--the Department of Homeland Security, ICE, or other agencies. To me, it is a stain on the reputation of this Nation, one that we need to quickly resolve by reuniting these children with their families as quickly as possible. You see, it isn't just a question of a holiday for these kids. Pediatricians have come forward from the American Academy of Pediatrics and have said that what we have done is institutional abuse of children. This separation is not just another day in the life of this 2-year- old, 5-year-old, or 8-year-old. This separation is something that is causing trauma within their own minds. Have you read the stories about the reunifications, where some of the parents come back, finally get their children, and the children will not even come to the parents? They don't quite understand what just happened to them. They think the parent might have just decided to give them up. There they were alone and by themselves at that tender age. Can you imagine that for your children or your grandchildren? I can't. We did it as part of the official government policy of the Trump administration under zero tolerance. When some of us come to the floor to question the actions, the conduct, the management of ICE, we have good reason to do it. I hope for the people within that agency who are doing their jobs conscientiously that we can at least be honest in saying that this policy is one which doesn't deserve praise and doesn't deserve our adoration on the floor of the Senate or the House. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I rise in strong opposition to the nomination of Ryan Bounds to be a judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. Bounds, who, if confirmed, would serve on a Ninth Circuit seat in the State of Oregon, has received zero blue slips. He is opposed by both Senators from the State in which he would sit if confirmed. Never before in the 100-year history of blue slips has a nominee been confirmed over the opposition of both home-State Senators. The Republican majority is setting a precedent here, and all of our home States are at risk of being impacted by this. By moving this nominee without blue slips, Republicans are diminishing the voice that home-State constituents have through their Senators in the process of selecting judges in their States. Let me make it clear to my Republican colleagues: If you vote to confirm Ryan Bounds, you are consenting to a precedent that is likely to affect your state someday. Consider your vote carefully. It is hard to understand why my Republican colleagues would abandon the blue slip for the sake of this particular nominee. Mr. Bounds has written and published articles that should disqualify him from consideration for a Federal judgeship. Consider how the Multnomah Bar Association in Oregon--a bar association that Mr. Bounds has belonged to for 12 years--described Mr. Bounds' articles in a statement after the writings were revealed. The association said Bounds' writings ``express insensitive, intolerant, and disdaining views toward racial and ethnic minorities, campus sexual assault victims, and the LGBTQ community.'' The statement went on to say that the bar association ``strongly disavows the views expressed in those articles as racist, misogynistic, homophobic and disparaging of survivors of sexual assault and abuse.'' Mr. Bounds' writings, which he published in college, included his discussions about the ``more strident racial factions of the student body.'' His writings mocked LGBTQ students for being sensitive when a group of drunk athletes vandalized a statue celebrating gay pride. He mocked Latino students for being overly sensitive when they complained about the termination of a Latino administrator. Then he wrote this, in an article about sexual assault on campus: ``There is really nothing inherently wrong with the University failing to punish an alleged rapist--regardless his guilt--in the absence of adequate certainty; there is nothing that the University can do to objectively ensure that the rapist does not strike again. Only the legal system can do that, and if it lacks the certainty to do so, it is not necessarily up to the University to stick it to the suspect, anyway, just in case. Expelling students is probably not going to contribute a great deal toward a rape victim's recovery; there is no moral imperative to risk egregious error in doing so.'' Not only did Mr. Bounds publish these writings, but he chose not to share his writings with Oregon's judicial selection committee even though the committee had asked him to disclose any potentially controversial materials. Mr. Bounds said he didn't think he needed to disclose any information to the committee that preceded his time at law school. As Senators Wyden and Merkley pointed out in a letter to Chairman Grassley, Mr. Bounds did share with the Oregon committee information about his high school days. He just conveniently left out his intolerant publications from college. As Senators Wyden and Merkley said in their letter, ``Mr. Bounds' failure to disclose these writings, and the nature of these writings themselves, demonstrate a substantial lack of judgment that is unsuitable for a nominee for a lifetime appointment.'' This is not a close call. The Senate should not be moving forward with Mr. Bounds' nomination on process or substance. Republicans are failing to be responsible stewards of nominations. The fact that Senate Republicans are moving forward with this nomination is a troubling sign for how Republicans will handle the Supreme Court vacancy. All too often, Senate Republicans are failing to serve as a meaningful check and balance on President Trump when it comes to nominations. Last week, 50 Senate Republicans voted to confirm an unqualified lawyer who had represented a suspicious Russian bank as the head of the Justice Department's Criminal Division. This week Republicans already voted to confirm Andrew Oldham, a 39- year-old circuit court nominee who refused to say whether he thought Brown v. Board of Education was correctly decided and who has described the Supreme Court as ``the most dangerous branch.'' Now, Senate Republicans are looking to confirm Mr. Bounds, who has shown terrible judgment with his published writings and with his failure to be forthcoming about them. Senators have a constitutional obligation to scrutinize these nominees and to vote no if the nominees lack the experience, temperament, or judgment to be a fair and impartial judge. The Senate should not be a rubberstamp, but under President Trump, all too often, it has been. I know Senate Republicans like to say it is unfair to nominees if we hold them accountable for their records. My Republican colleagues have been coming to the floor, day after day, complaining about what they see as unfair scrutiny of the Kavanaugh Supreme Court nomination. Do they have amnesia? I would remind them that no Supreme Court nominee in history has ever has been treated worse than Merrick Garland was treated by Senate Republicans in 2016. Senator McConnell wouldn't even allow Judge Garland a hearing or the courtesy of a meeting. The treatment of Merrick Garland was unprecedented, and it was disrespectful. His record and reputation were torn apart by Republicans who never gave him a chance to respond in an open hearing. Even Judge Bork got a hearing and a vote. I hope my Republican colleagues are not going to simply rubberstamp President Trump's nominees. So many of these nominees are extreme. We need to review their full records and consider them carefully before voting to confirm them for life. I have carefully considered Mr. Bounds' nomination, and I will vote no. I urge my colleagues in both parties to join me.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I oppose the nomination of Andrew Oldham to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. Oldham is only 39 years old. He checks the Federalist Society box, having been a member since law school of that rightwing legal group that vets all of President Trump's nominees. Mr. Oldham has spent much of his career litigating on behalf of Republican elected officials in Texas State government, where he worked on challenges to the Affordable Care Act, the DACA and DAPA programs, the Voting Rights Act, Fair Housing Act regulations, ``Ban the Box'' regulations on job applications, and Clean Air Act regulations, among many others. Mr. Oldham's extreme ideology is apparent from statements he has made in his personal capacity. At his nomination hearing, he refused to say that the landmark Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education was correctly decided. That was an astonishing moment. Every Supreme Court nominee who has been asked this question has said he or she believed Brown v. Board was correctly decided. In recent hearings before the Judiciary Committee, nominees have answered yes to this question without hesitation; yet Mr. Oldham wouldn't answer. If a nominee refuses to say that Brown v. Board was correctly decided, it certainly raises questions in my mind about the nominee's judgment, but that is not all Mr. Oldham has said. At his hearing, he refused to say whether he agreed that voter discrimination still exists in the United States. He gave an interview in 2016 where he described the Supreme Court as ``the most dangerous branch'' and said ``they often fail to enforce our sacred rights that are in the Constitution, while creating rights that are not.'' Keep in mind, this is a Supreme Court where the majority of justices were appointed by Republican Presidents. He gave a speech to the Federalist Society in 2016 where he said, ``I have particular things that I think are illegitimate in the way that we conduct modern American law.'' He went on to say, ``It's not that I disagree with a particular Department of Labor regulation or a particular IRS regulation; it is the entire existence of this edifice of administrative law that is constitutionally suspect.'' He also wrote in a law review article that ``the Sherman Act, as it is currently understood, is unconstitutional.'' The Sherman Act is one of our foundational antitrust laws; it prohibits monopolies and restraints of trade. Mr. Oldham's views are clearly outside the judicial mainstream. His own words and writings show an extreme ideological agenda. Of course, like all of President Trump's nominees, he has promised he would cast all his views aside if confirmed and simply follow the law. But time after time, we have seen these nominees get confirmed to the bench and then start interpreting the law to produce outcomes that align with their preexisting, Federalist Society-approved views and side with corporations and wealthy elites over working Americans. Mr. Oldham is ideologically extreme, he has shown instances of terrible judgment, and he has said things that would make litigants question whether he could be a fair and impartial judge. I oppose his nomination.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Will the Senator from Hawaii yield?

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I would like to thank the Senator from Hawaii for joining in this statement about the agency of ICE, which is in the Department of Homeland Security. There are certain things that I think Democrats and Republicans can come together to agree on. Let me tell you what I think they are. Border security--the United States needs security at its borders. There is no question about that, whoever the President may be. The second thing we agree on is, nobody who is dangerous should be allowed to come to this country. Anyone here who is undocumented and dangerous should leave, should be removed. We all agree on that, do we not? The third thing, which 68 Senators agreed on, is comprehensive immigration reform. Our immigration laws are a mess--an absolute mess. That is why we continue to debate the topic, and 68 of us came to vote on a bipartisan measure 5 years ago to fix the whole system. It passed the Senate and died in the House. Where are we today? We are here today debating on the floor the future of ICE. There are parts of the function and responsibility of this agency of ICE that all of us would agree on. ICE has important responsibilities combating serious criminal activities, like smuggling, bulk cash, drugs, weapons, human trafficking, violent criminals and others who would do us harm, and enforcing immigration laws against terrorists. There is no argument about that. But what has become controversial is the Trump administration's new immigration policy. You see, we don't have the resources to deport 11 million undocumented people nor do we have the resources to arrest all who present themselves at the border. What this administration has done, though, is say that they are going to criminalize--charge as criminals--everyone who shows up at the border. By doing that, they take limited resources and focus them on a mass of people, most of whom are no threat at all to the United States, instead of focusing their resources on the drug smugglers, the traffickers, the would-be terrorists. Those are our priorities for the safety of our homes, our families, and our communities, are they not? Here we have this resolution that was brought to the floor to commend ICE in all its functions. I can just tell you, I don't join in that resolution. I specifically don't join in it when it comes to the President's zero tolerance policy. It became the policy of the Trump administration and the U.S. Government to forcibly remove 3,000 children from their parents. That is bad enough, is it not? The notion that you take a baby out of the arms of a mother--a toddler, an infant--separate a young child--we did it under President Trump's zero tolerance policy. Now let me state what added insult to that injury. At that point, there was no effort made to make certain we could reunite the parents with the children. Time and again, we would meet downstairs for a briefing from ICE and other agencies, and they would tell us: We don't know where the parents are. We really don't know where the kids are. We are going to have to go looking. Imagine separating up to 3,000 children from their parents, and the U.S. Government did not keep a record of what happened to those kids. Ship something by UPS--they give you a tracking number. Go online, and you can track that package wherever it may be. Order a pizza from Domino's. Call them after 15 minutes and ask: Where is the pizza? They will tell you. Check your coat at a restaurant before you go to the table. When you come back and hand them that little piece of paper, they give you your coat. It is pretty simple, is it not? But when it came to children and families, this agency, ICE, along with other agencies of this government, lost them. In one agency in Chicago, they told me that the search for the parents of the little kids they had was like a scavenger hunt. They just started calling right and left to try to figure out where the parent might be. Yesterday, we had a briefing, and finally these agencies came up with some numbers. There are 2,550 children still in our custody who are not reunited with their families; 1,800 parents we haven't linked up with their children. And we want to put a resolution on the floor to commend this activity--to praise them for their great work? Not me. They do good work in a lot of important areas, and I will be happy to join in that chorus. But we stand here and ignore the obvious--that this zero tolerance policy has given our Nation a black eye, has raised questions about our values as Americans, has created situations we cannot morally defend, such as separating children from their mothers. Do you know what the American Academy of Pediatrics tells us? The doctors tell us it is an institutional form of child abuse to remove these children. I have seen them, these poor kids, 5 and 6 years old in these settings. The place I visited in Chicago was doing its best to help the children, but two little girls walked into the room where I was sitting. They were holding hands--cute little kids. It was my opportunity to meet about 10 or 12 kids who were separated from their parents under the zero tolerance policy. These two little girls were holding hands, and I thought they were sisters. We asked in Spanish. ``No, amigas,'' she said. They had become friends to one another. It turns out that the one who was 5 years old was from Guatemala and the one who was 6 years old was from Chiapas, Mexico. They were holding on to one another. All they had was one another because our government had separated them from their mothers. Now this agency is struggling to find these mothers. In some circumstances, they cannot even link up the children with their parents. No, I am not going to join in a resolution of congratulations for the work they have done. Many of the things they have done have been courageous and important for the security of this country, but when it comes to the zero tolerance policy, it is not. I do want to make one last point. Listen to what the top agents at ICE's Homeland Security Investigations agency, which focuses on serious transnational criminal activity, had to say. Last month, a majority of the agents focusing on transnational criminal activity wrote a letter to the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Kirstjen Nielsen, asking that Homeland Security Investigations be removed from ICE because of ``the political nature of civil immigration enforcement.'' These are men and women who are focusing on serious crimes, and they asked to be removed from ICE. They are tired of the politics. I am weary of it as well. We need to start solving these problems--border security, dangerous people kept out of this country and removed, comprehensive immigration reform. And for goodness' sake, reunite these children with their parents. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I am at a loss for words to describe what happened yesterday in Helsinki, Finland. I am disappointed, as well, by the stunning silence of some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle in response to it. When each of us is elected to serve in Congress--the House and the Senate--we are asked to take an oath, a very serious oath. In it, we swear to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. The President of the United States similarly swears to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States. Yesterday in Helsinki, Finland, the President of the United States was engaged in an appalling display. What we saw at that press conference--standing just several feet away from Vladimir Putin, the leader of Russia--was the President's decision to turn his back on the organizations and agencies of the U.S. Government, to question their credibility, and to affirm, incredibly, that Mr. Putin had given a powerful denial to what they have found when it comes to the Russian interference in our last election. Just days after bullying our key NATO allies and failing to publicly accept that Russia attacked our country, attacked our democracy, this administration and its enablers here in Congress are failing that oath. President Trump refuses to accept the findings of American intelligence professionals, the Department of Justice, the Department of Defense, and virtually every agency of our government that is tasked with keeping us safe and instead accepts Vladimir Putin's absurd, self- serving denials. Many of my colleagues here in Congress refuse to even speak up to denounce the President's actions. Consider what happened months before the 2016 election when our Nation's top intelligence officials came and told key congressional leaders about the Russian cyber attack on the United States. The administration at that time, under President Obama, was deeply concerned. President Obama was looking for a bipartisan response condemning Putin's efforts in the closing days of the elections so as to avoid any hint of partisanship in the public announcement and to present a unified deterrent. What was the response of Majority Leader Mitch McConnell after hearing this alarming revelation that Vladimir Putin was actively interfering in our elections and trying to undermine our democracy? Senator McConnell's response: No thanks. We are not going to help. And incredibly, neither the Senator nor his party did. Is there anyone in the Senate--anyone who took the oath to protect our Nation against enemies, foreign and domestic--who thinks any of us, regardless of political party, should receive help from a foreign adversary to get elected? I hope we all agree that country must come before party. So then why do so many of my Republican colleagues remain silent in light of President Trump's open denial of the reality of Russia's involvement in our election? Yesterday, we watched in disbelief as the President not only refused to even acknowledge the act of cyber war against the United States but, incredibly, blamed America first for our poor relationship with Russia. We watched our American President refuse to stand up to Vladimir Putin, a former KGB official, who executed one of the most breathtaking cyber attacks in history aimed at the United States and aimed at undermining the Western security alliance and our country's democracy. An American President stood on the world stage next to a tyrant--a tyrant who denies that he attacked us--and then the President of the United States repeatedly agreed with that adversary and dismissed criminal indictments of Russian Government officials responsible for the attack. The President closed with a rambling preening about his great election victory. We have an American President who seems to be utterly incapable of saying the obvious to Vladimir Putin. The President should say: Don't ever interfere in U.S. elections again. I don't want your help, and I don't believe your absurd denials. He refused to say that. Compare his bizarre and dangerous comments in Helsinki with what President Ronald Reagan said before the 1988 NATO summit. Instead of bullying our closest allies, Ronald Reagan said: Our first priority is to maintain a strong and healthy partnership between North America and Europe, for this is the foundation on which the cause of freedom so crucially depends. Again, Ronald Reagan said: Our first priority is to maintain a strong and healthy partnership between North America and Europe, for this is the foundation on which the cause of freedom so crucially depends. There is at least one Republican Senator who is not silent. My friend and a great American patriot, John McCain, said this yesterday about the Helsinki press conference: Today's press conference in Helsinki was one of the most disgraceful performances by an American President in memory. The damage inflicted by President Trump's naivete, egotism, false equivalence, and sympathy for autocrats is difficult to calculate. . . . President Trump proved not only unable, but unwilling to stand up to Putin. He and Putin seemed to be speaking from the same script as the President made a conscious choice to defend a tyrant against the fair questions of a free press, and to grant Putin an uncontested platform to spew propaganda and lies to the world. I could not agree more. It is obvious. We, all of us, Democrats and Republicans, should agree with what John McCain said. Despite President Trump's shameful denials of Russian interference at yesterday's farce of a press conference, the evidence is clear: Russia did interfere in the 2016 election. Our intelligence agencies and the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee have concluded that not only did Russia interfere in our elections through cyber attacks, but they did so to harm Hillary Clinton, help elect Donald Trump, and undermine our democratic process. When Donald Trump hears those words, it sends him into a rage. He denies any Russian interference for fear that it might reflect on his victory in the election. There is no evidence that has been produced to date that shows that Russian interference changed the outcome of that election. I am not questioning whether Donald Trump won the Electoral College and became President, but I don't think he should question whether the Russians were trying to undermine that process. During his ongoing investigation into Russian meddling, Special Counsel Mueller has so far indicted 32 individuals and 3 companies on a total of 191 criminal charges. This includes the February indictment of 13 Russian trolls who engaged in a multiyear effort to influence our election, to support the election of Donald Trump by sowing discord and inflaming social tensions online. The Mueller investigation includes 12 members of the Russian military intelligence, specifically named, who were indicted last Friday for engaging in a sustained operation to hack into the emails, accounts, and computer networks of the Democratic National Committee, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and Hillary Clinton's Presidential campaign. These Russians also created online personas and worked with WikiLeaks to publish the stolen documents. To cover their tracks, they committed identity theft, engaged in money laundering, and at one point leased a computer in my home State of Illinois to store and move the stolen documents through encrypted channels. Additionally, the Russians hacked into the computer networks of election officials and vendors in order to steal voter data and other information. The indictment, produced by Special Counsel Mueller, mentions that the Russians ``hacked the website of a state board of elections . . . and stole information related to approximately 500,000 voters, including names, addresses, partial social security numbers, dates of birth, and driver's license numbers.'' This was, presumably, in reference to the Illinois State Board of Elections, which we already knew was one of the first victims of a successful Russian cyber attack--a Russian cyber attack that President Donald Trump refuses to believe ever happened. We know that Russia meddled in the 2016 election, and we know that we should be gearing up for Russia to interfere with the 2018 midterm election as well. Just this past weekend, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, my former Republican Senate colleague from the State of Indiana and a man for whom I voted for this position and whom I respect very much, reiterated the ongoing threat that Russia presents, saying: ``In regard to state actions, Russia has been the most aggressive foreign actor--no question--and they continue their efforts to undermine our democracy.'' What a departure from what President Trump said in Helsinki yesterday. His own Director of National Intelligence has refuted the statement he made to the world yesterday, agreeing with the ``powerful statement'' of Vladimir Putin's that he had nothing to do with an attack on our election. Our President is cozying up to Vladimir Putin at the expense of the credibility of his own Director of National Intelligence. Why is this happening? Instead of condemning President Trump and supporting the Special Counsel's efforts of getting to the bottom of this, sadly, the vast majority of congressional Republicans are actively working to undermine the investigation. Just last week, Senate Republicans confirmed the nomination of Brian Benczkowski to serve as Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice. They voted for Mr. Benczkowski to be in charge of 600 Federal prosecutors despite the fact that Mr. Benczkowski, as a lawyer, has never been in a trial--never. He has never been in a courtroom and has never been in a trial. He was named by President Trump to head up the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice. That may not be the worst part. Mr. Benczkowski, in his private law practice in Washington, also chose to represent a Russian bank, the Alfa-Bank, which has deep ties to Vladimir Putin. This is despite the fact that when he was called on it, he said he would not commit to recusing himself from this Russia investigation. Furthermore, this vote occurred as President Trump and House Republicans had been looking for an excuse to fire Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein, who is overseeing the Mueller investigation. Should Rosenstein be fired, Mr. Benczkowski could be easily tasked by the President to oversee the Russia investigation. That would be an unmitigated legal disaster. Enough is enough. Today is the day that, I hope, my colleagues-- Democrat and Republican alike--will step forward and speak up. The world is still reeling from the comments that were made yesterday in Helsinki by the President of the United States of America. There are serious questions from our longtime NATO allies--those who count on the United States for the safety and security of their republics. There are serious questions in their minds about who we are, what we stand for, the relationship between this President and Vladimir Putin--a relationship which is absolutely inexplicable in that President Trump would refuse to concede the obvious--that Vladimir Putin is setting out to undermine our values in the world. President Trump should stand with the brave men and women of law enforcement, intelligence, and the Department of Defense who have warned him about Vladimir Putin, and he should not be so easily swept away with these meetings he has. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, back in the day when I was a trial lawyer and we had had a witness come to the stand who had made a big mistake-- who had said something that would hurt your case or, maybe, even decide it the wrong way or who had misrepresented someone--you went through a period of rehabilitating the witness, which meant, basically, asking friendly questions and trying to get that witness back into a credible position. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. This afternoon, President Trump attempted to rehabilitate himself for his performance in Helsinki, Finland. The President said: While I had a great meeting with NATO, raising vast amounts of money, I had an even better meeting with Vladimir Putin of Russia. Sadly, it is not being reported that way--the Fake News is going Crazy! I don't think that comment is going to rehabilitate President Trump from his performance in Helsinki. It was sad, heartbreaking, and, in many ways, infuriating to think that he stood within a few feet of this Russian tyrant and said he believed that man, Vladimir Putin, more than he believed the intelligence agencies--the Department of Defense and the Department of Justice--of the United States of America. That was what he said, and it was a moment that will not easily be forgotten. It is not something he can talk his way out of. He made similarly incoherent and jarring comments moments ago in an apparent damage control event. He went so far as to say that our NATO allies ``were thrilled'' with his recent visit during which he bullied and belittled them. In some moments, the President loses touch with reality. He believes that we are suffering from national amnesia and that we can't remember what happened yesterday or last week. We remember. The reason we remember is that it is such a dramatic departure from the conduct of previous Presidents and that it is such a dramatic departure from the history of the United States. I think our President's sense of history reaches back to the day before yesterday and not far beyond. He does not realize, as President Reagan said so often, that our NATO alliance is critical to the security of the United States and to our European friends and to the world. He just doesn't get it. He doesn't understand why that alliance is so critical. He belittles it. He bullies the members. He picks some of our strongest allies and decides to make them spectacles of his performance. That doesn't make it any easier for them to continue to stand by our side, and it, certainly, doesn't put them in a position of trusting us in the future if they desperately need us. My mother was born in Lithuania, in the Baltics. I have been there many, many times. They are great little countries--Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania--and next-door, Poland. They have seen a lot over the years. They have been overrun by Nazis and Communists, and they have seen their freedoms be eliminated under autocratic rule. They believed, when they finally restored democracy about 25 or 30 years ago, that their only chance--their only guarantee of any future--was going to be with the NATO alliance, with becoming part of Europe--with becoming part of this great alliance with the United States. Last night, I was with Gordon Smith, a former Senator from Oregon. We both remembered a visit to Lithuania in 1999 where there was this rally, this small rally, in one of the public streets in Lithuania. It was a NATO rally or, as they called it, ``GNAT-OH.'' They were chanting in Lithuanian how much they wanted to be part of NATO. They understood then and they understand today that the NATO alliance is Lithuania's ticket to freedom, that the NATO alliance is its insurance policy. The NATO alliance gives it hope that there will not be another generation of Lithuanians who will live in suppression and chains. When the President belittles this and suggests that, perhaps, the Baltics are on the table when he talks of Vladimir Putin, it strikes fear in the hearts of God-fearing people who basically can still remember what it means to be under the heel of the Communist leadership of Moscow. The President just doesn't get it. He does not understand the importance of it. He, certainly, doesn't understand Vladimir Putin. To think that he would allow Putin to use what he called ``powerful words'' and deny what we already know to be true says that the President is very gullible. What is it about this relationship between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin? How can you explain this? Why would a President of the United States be bowing and scraping to this Russian tyrant--to a man who has a dismal record when it comes to human rights, to a man who led his troops in the invasion of the nation of Georgia and who invaded Ukraine and who took over Crimea, to a man who set up a situation in Syria in which innocent people would die and in which their own tyrant would succeed, to a man who invaded our election process as he did? I guess what we are looking for now, as our minority leader, Senator Schumer, said earlier, is an accounting of what actually happened in Helsinki. This disastrous meeting between President Trump and Vladimir Putin needs to be fully explained to the American people. I join with Senator Schumer in calling for hearings with the President's Helsinki team--with Mike Pompeo, the Secretary of State, and with Dan Coats, the Director of National Intelligence and a man I greatly respect, who showed a steel spine this last week as he witnessed the President's turning on him and the intelligence community, and with Mr. Huntsman, our Ambassador to Moscow. They should all be coming to Washington quickly to explain what happened and how to repair the damage created by President Trump. We need to see a transcript of the one-on-one meeting with President Trump and Vladimir Putin. If he were so deferential in his public press conference with Vladimir Putin, what did our President say to Putin behind closed doors? It is not too much for the American people to ask for an accounting. We need to make sure that the Republicans will join us in protecting the Office of Special Counsel. So far, Robert Mueller's investigation has led to the indictments of 32 individuals, and 5 have already pled guilty. The latest included 12 Russian intelligence agents who were specified by name as being involved in the efforts to undo our election. We also need something that is very basic and, I think, that all of us have now come to realize is essential. President Donald Trump can no longer refuse to disclose his income tax returns. He did it throughout the campaign. He has refused to make a disclosure since. We need to know his financial relationship with Russia and Vladimir Putin's oligarchs. There has to be more to the story than we know today, and it is time for this President to come clean. Finally, we need to press for election security legislation. We live in a dangerous moment. I also agree with former Senator Dan Coats. It is a moment at which the Russians will try to take advantage of us. My last plea will be to my colleagues who have not spoken out clearly on this subject--not to the Presiding Officer, because he has spoken out, and I respect him so much. We need them to come forward and make it clear on a bipartisan basis that we stand together when it comes to foreign policy, the values of this Nation, and the security of the United States. We understand that Vladimir Putin has been a tyrant who has really made life miserable and who has killed many innocent people in his rage against the West and against the United States. Most of all, we need more Republican Senators who will join with those in the past who have stepped forward and put country first over party. I remember reading the history of the Nixon years and the breaking point. The breaking point finally occurred when people like Republican Senator Barry Goldwater, of Arizona, stood up and said: ``There are only so many lies you can take, and now there has been one too many.'' He joined with several other Republican Senators and went down to the White House and sat face-to-face with President Richard Nixon. They sat directly in front of him and explained that enough was enough. It will take that. It will take that again for Republican Senators to have the courage to meet with this President and tell him he has to stop giving away the heritage, the values, and the legacy of the United States of America. Those courageous Americans back in that day were, of course, talking about lies, corruption, obstruction of justice, and dangers to our democratic system. They took the oath of office. It is the same one we have taken to protect the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and to, certainly, put party second to our obligations to our Nation. For their courage, we and history owe them a debt of gratitude. Since yesterday's fiasco with Putin, only one Republican has spoken specifically on the Senate floor about this crisis. He was joined by the most eloquent statement by John McCain, who, because of illness, could not be physically present. That is it. It is not enough. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New York (Ms. Gillibrand), the Senator from Alabama (Mr. Jones), the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Leahy), the Senator from Michigan (Mr. Peters), the Senator from New Hampshire (Mrs. Shaheen), and the Senator from Michigan (Ms. Stabenow) are necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

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

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, the world breathed a sigh of relief. For almost 2 weeks now, we have had our attention focused on 12 children, Thai soccer team players who were lured into a cave with their coach and were thought to be lost for days. They couldn't be found in that flooded cave. Then came the good news that they were discovered. They were still alive. It was a miracle. Then came an extraordinary challenge: how to safely bring these 12 children out of this trap they were in and bring them to safety. I cannot imagine the effort that was undertaken. It included countries from around the world and the United States coming together to provide extraordinary levels of assistance at great cost to save the lives of these 12 children, to bring them out of this trap they were in and reunite them with their families. All the prayers and all the hard work, all the bravery and all the investment paid off. These children are safe, as is their coach. They are currently being tended to for medical care, but the day will soon come when they will be back in the warm embrace of their families. It was a great illustration of the caring heart of people around the world for children they had never seen; children who, through no fault of their own, found themselves in a deadly circumstance; children separated from their families with no hope when it came to their future. People responded. It was a great moment for the world to reflect on those children.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Connecticut. Certainly I am happy he is bringing to the attention of the Senate this critical issue of the future of the Supreme Court and the impact it will have on families across America. Certainly, when it comes to something as basic as our health insurance, we understand this. There are forces at work in Washington in the Trump administration that are trying to put an end to the Affordable Care Act, and in Congress, many Members of Congress--the House and the Senate--have voted 60 times to repeal the Affordable Care Act. We barely saw it survive just a few months ago when Senator John McCain, in the middle of the night, came and stood in that well and voted no, along with two other Republican Senators. They saved the Affordable Care Act. Most Americans had their own questions about the Affordable Care Act and how important it was, but they couldn't understand how the Republicans would come to us and say ``Get rid of it'' and have no replacement. We realize, as the Senator from Connecticut just explained, that under the old rules with insurance companies, under the old rules, many of us were victims. If you had someone with a preexisting condition in your family--perhaps you had diabetes, perhaps your child was a cancer survivor, had asthma, or so many different things--health insurance was very expensive, if you could get it. We changed the law. We said: You can't discriminate against an American because someone in their family has had a preexisting condition. Everybody is in the same pool in America. We are going to join together. Well, now the Trump administration has said they are going to fight that in court. They are going to try to declare it unconstitutional to protect people with preexisting conditions, so they filed a brief in a lawsuit--a lawsuit that is wending its way to the Supreme Court. When the Senator from Connecticut, Mr. Murphy, came before us and talked about the new nominee to fill the vacancy on the Supreme Court, it is important that he focused on the impact it could have on ordinary people. Most Americans, put to the test, couldn't name the Justices on the U.S. Supreme Court. Well, they know it is a big Court, an important Court, the highest Court in the land, but they don't know who is there until we get into this kind of debate. As we do, people tend to learn a lot more about the Justices and what their core beliefs are. When it comes to Judge Brett Kavanaugh, who now sits on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, he has a lengthy record--12 years of opinions as a judge, not to mention all the years before that when he was active politically in Washington, DC. Senator Murphy of Connecticut is correct to note that his approach to the law and his approach to the Constitution do not give us great hope in preserving the protections on health insurance that are part of the Affordable Care Act. One decision by that Supreme Court could undo years of legislative work and literally remove protections from families. We are talking about that today. We should be talking about that today. But it isn't what we are voting on today, and that is why I have come to the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Rhode Island, as well as those who were on the floor earlier. The remarks we are delivering today address the future of our relationship with the NATO alliance, particularly in light of the visit that President Trump is now making to meet with Vladimir Putin of Russia. I am glad many of my colleagues came here today to speak on the threats posed by President Trump to America's core national security alliance--something that would have once been unimaginable. In fact, there was a time when a Republican President named Ronald Reagan really inspired the United States and the world by noting how important the NATO alliance is to the world and to the United States. In a speech that he gave to the Parliament of Great Britain in 1982, Ronald Reagan said: We're approaching the end of a bloody century plagued by a terrible political invention: totalitarianism. Optimism comes less easily today, not because democracy is less vigorous, but because democracy's enemies have refined their instruments of repression. Yet optimism is in order, because day by day democracy is proving itself to be a not-at-all fragile flower. Reagan went on to say: Our military strength is a prerequisite to peace, but let it be clear we maintain this strength in the hope it will never be used, for the ultimate determinant in the struggle that's now going on in the world will not be bombs and rockets, but a test of wills and ideas, a trial of spiritual resolve, the values we hold, the beliefs we cherish, the ideals to which we are dedicated. President Reagan then went on to say to the British Parliament: I've often wondered about the shyness of some of us in the West about standing for these ideals that have done so much to ease the plight of man and the hardships of our imperfect world. Contrast what President Reagan said about the partnership of the Atlantic alliance nations in NATO with what has happened with this current White House and President regarding some of these same key Western allies at the G7 summit last month. First, President Trump stunned the Western world by saying even before arriving at the summit that Russia should be welcomed back into the group of G7 nations, even though Russia was expelled after invading and seizing sovereign Ukrainian territory, which it still holds. President Trump made this plea to try to win over this effort of support for Putin to a Western world that is skeptical of Putin and his tactics. Putin launched an aggressive cyber act of war right here in the United States in an attempt to void and change a national election and to favor his candidate over another. That, in many respects, is a cyber act of war, which President Trump refuses to acknowledge. At the summit itself, President Trump arrived late and left early after letting it be known that he didn't even want to attend the G7 summit with our traditional allies. The President, sad to say, was utterly disrespectful to our Nation's oldest and most reliable allies. In fact, a White House trade adviser, Peter Navarro, said that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau ``stabbed us in the back,'' and then Mr. Navarro went on to say, ``There's a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad-faith diplomacy with President Donald J. Trump and then tries to stab him in the back on the way out the door.'' Navarro's comments echoed a series of tweets from the President withdrawing from a joint G7 statement after initially agreeing to it. Then the President went on in this tweet, personally attacking Prime Minister Trudeau in the coarsest terms and criticizing and disparaging America's oldest Western allies simply for imploring him not to end decades of shared Western-led international order and cooperation. One senses that President Trump's sense of history extends to the day before yesterday. Has he forgotten that since the attack on the United States of 9/11, the Canadians have stood by us, as so many other countries have as well? One hundred fifty-nine Canadians have given their lives standing by our troops in Afghanistan in a NATO effort since operations began there in 2002. Could we ask anything more of a trusted ally than to sacrifice the lives of its young soldiers? Canada has, and continues to, despite this language from President Trump. Then, to add insult to injury, President Trump showered one of the world's most brutal nuclear-armed dictators with glowing warmth, pats on the back, flattery, and even a White House-made propaganda video showing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as a great statesman. Can anyone here imagine what would have happened if President Obama had constructed a propaganda video before beginning his negotiations with Iran or if the President had saluted an Iranian general? FOX TV, the Republicans, and many other leaders would have had a field day with that image. I am all for talking to one's adversaries in the pursuit of diplomacy. I have met with my share of autocrats around the world, trying, in my small way, to advance America's interests and values, but I don't check America's values or reality at the door at those meetings. I do not know of any modern President who let normal disagreements between key allies turn into a personal spat that alienates our friends and undermines our security. In fact, I am increasingly convinced that President Trump is so enamored by validation-seeking autocrats and offended by our traditional allies expressing disagreements that he is incapable of distinguishing friends from enemies. This is truly problematic and dangerous. Now, our allies have just cause to worry that President Trump will give away concessions to Vladimir Putin, just as he did with the North Korean dictator. Against all reason and international norms, Trump is considering recognizing Russia's illegal occupation of Crimea because, sadly, President Trump has no sense of history and little knowledge of Vladimir Putin's true agenda. He is making threats and belittling NATO, the strongest alliance on the face of the Earth, while at the same time craving time with Vladimir Putin, whom he describes as a fine man. That is something which I am sure the people in our NATO alliance find incredible. Quite simply, the first and long overdue statement from Trump to Putin ought to be: Do not interfere in America's elections ever again. I don't want your help, which was an attack on our democracy, and I do not believe your denials. That ought to be the opening remark with Vladimir Putin. My guess is that it will not even be close. I can think of few times in history that the party of Ronald Reagan has sat so quietly on its hands while an American President's actions threatened our Western security alliance and our place in the world. I don't understand why the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has not held a full committee hearing on Russia in more than 1 year, not to mention ever conducted an investigation into Russia's attack on our last election--something clearly within the jurisdiction of this committee and which it did in the past amid allegations of foreign election interference. What of the Republicans' stunning silence about President Trump's undermining of NATO? There are some national needs and congressional responsibilities that ought to call on all of us in both political parties to rise to the occasion. Think about what Russia's President Putin would most like to see happen in the West and compare it to what is happening under President Trump. President Trump has called NATO obsolete and questioned the centrality of the collective security guarantee of article 5. He has questioned whether NATO should come to the aid of NATO's Baltic States--NATO members. In fact, President Trump reportedly asked NATO at the recent G7: Why do we need it? Is that now the official position, not just of President Trump but of his Republican Party? I would implore those Members of the Senate of both parties who have visited the Baltic nations and understand the vulnerability of those states and their bloody history over the last century and a half to speak up on behalf of the need for NATO to stand in concert and in alliance with those Baltic States. This week the Canadians sent their forces and representatives to Latvia, where they are providing special help on the ground. Similar NATO forces are in Lithuania and Estonia. They are doing their best to convince Putin not to engage in acts of aggression against these small nations, while at the same time the President of the United States questions the purpose of this effort. President Trump has withdrawn the United States from key international agreements on trade, climate, and even the expansion of nuclear weapons in Iran. In doing so, the President has estranged the United States from its allies. While I hope we do reach a diplomatic agreement with North Korea, I want to note that what little was agreed to in Singapore doesn't even come close to the terms and inspections that were in the Iran nuclear agreement from which President Trump simply walked away. President Trump has insulted and strained relations with America's closest European and Western allies, so much so that European Council President Donald Tusk recently dismissed the United States by saying: ``With friends like that, who needs enemies.'' It has reached the point that just ahead of the NATO summit, we lost another senior career diplomat when James Melville, our Ambassador to Estonia, resigned over frustration with the controversial comments being made by President Trump. Ambassador Melville served under 6 different Presidents and 11 Secretaries of State, and he never thought the day would come when he couldn't support a President's policies-- until now. President Trump has tried to discredit key democratic institutions and processes in the United States, sowing mistrust in our political system and government. He has insulted poor nations, made immigrants a manufactured enemy, separated children from parents forcibly, and declared that America must come first in this world, isolating the United States day by day and more and more from the nations and countries that have been our traditional allies. Why in the world is this President pursuing the agenda of one of our adversaries, who attacked our election process, militarily seized sovereign territory of our allies, murdered and attempted to murder dissidents on our allies' soil, provided weapons to Ukrainian separatists that shot down a Malaysian commercial airliner, killing hundreds of innocent people, repeatedly buzzes and tests NATO defenses, and jails and represses its own people when they advocate for basic democratic rights? Before departing this morning for Brussels, instead of setting a positive tone for the NATO meeting to follow, President Trump, incredibly, decided to take to Twitter to criticize our allies again. My friend and American patriot, Senator John McCain, was one of the few Republicans--one of the few--to recently speak up on behalf of our alliance. Here is what he said: To our allies: bipartisan majorities of Americans remain pro-free trade, pro-globalization & supportive of alliances based on 70 years of shared values. Americans stand with you, even if our president doesn't. I couldn't agree more. I wish John McCain were on the floor of the Senate today to deliver those remarks in person, but his spirit is here among those on both sides of the aisle who value our NATO alliance and cannot understand the relationship between President Trump and Vladimir Putin. The cause of democracy and freedom in this world requires a strong alliance that stands together for values the Americans believe in, share, fight for, and die for in war after war. We need that spirit to return again to the United States. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Illinois (Ms. Duckworth), the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Leahy), and the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Markey) are necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Leahy) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, last night, in the San Diego Federal District Court, U.S. district court judge Dana Sabraw made a critical ruling that will affect the lives of thousands of people who have been the focal point of America's attention over the last several weeks. Judge Sabraw was appointed to the Federal bench by President George W. Bush. In reading about him online, he is a Japanese American whose background was in private practice law before he assumed the Federal bench. He was given the responsibility of ruling on the Trump administration's zero tolerance policy. You will remember that policy. It started in April. It was a decision by the Trump administration and Attorney General Sessions to separate children from their mothers and parents if they attempted to enter the United States without having legal authorization. The net result of that policy was the separation of thousands of children from their parents. It has been on the news almost every day for weeks now. A firestorm of opposition has come about on both political sides of the aisle. Democrats and Republicans have said this is unfair; that it is not right. Even the First Ladies--Democrats and Republicans--have come together in an unusual show of unanimity in their opposition to President Trump and Attorney General Sessions' zero tolerance policy. Attorney General Sessions defended the policy and said he had a Biblical defense for what they were doing. President Trump made it clear he was behind the policy as well. Yet the opposition grew and grew in its intensity to the point at which there were statements made by the Pope, as well as by an evangelical supporter of the President, Franklin Graham, when they called the administration's decision immoral. Late last week, President Trump issued an Executive order that said he was ending this family separation, but that order didn't contain one word about what was going to happen to these children. There was no resolution of the whole question of reuniting these children with their parents. I learned about this matter months ago--well, several weeks ago, at least--when we learned that a mother from the Congo had made it through South America and Central America to our border in California. She presented herself with her 6-year-old daughter and asked for asylum because she feared persecution and death back in her home country. That happened over 6 months ago. They removed her 6-year-old daughter from her custody and flew the girl 2,000 miles to Chicago. So the mother remained in San Diego, and the daughter was in Chicago. That was when we learned about it in my office. We started pursuing it. After we brought it to the attention of those at the Department of Homeland Security, they said that was not the policy, and they were going to work on it. They did reunite the mother and child, but the separation of this family led to this lawsuit, the lawsuit Judge Sabraw ruled on last night. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the opinion of the court be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, let me read some of the words Judge Sabraw wrote last night in his order, in his conclusion, about the zero tolerance policy of separating children from their parents. The unfolding events--the zero tolerance policy [the judge writes] serve to corroborate Plaintiffs' allegations. The facts set forth before the Court portray reactive governance--responses to address a chaotic circumstance of the Government's own making. They belie measured and ordered governance, which is central to the concept of due process enshrined in our Constitution. This is particularly so in the treatment of migrants, many of whom are asylum seekers and small children. The extraordinary remedy of classwide preliminary injunction is warranted based on the evidence before the Court. For the reasons set out above, the Court hereby GRANTS Plaintiffs' motion for classwide preliminary injunction, and finds and orders as follows. It goes into detail, and I will not read it in its entirety since it is now going to be printed in the Record, but it reads, clearly, that the court is enjoining the government--the Trump administration--from separating minor children from their parents. It goes on to read that it also orders the Trump administration to reunify all class members with their minor children who are under the age of 5 within 14 days of the entry of this order, and defendants must reunify all class members with their minor children who are aged 5 and older within 30 days of the entry of the order. Defendants must immediately--and this is the government--take all steps necessary to facilitate the regular communication between class members and their children. The court went on to say that within 10 days, the government--the defendants--must provide parents telephonic contact with their children if the parent is not already in contact with his or her child. Last Saturday, the Department of Health and Human Services issued what I consider to be a rosy and misleading press release about how much information they had about the parents and their children and how much telephone communication was taking place. I will tell you, in having contacted various people who are well aware of the situation, they have really overstated the contact information as well as the context between parents and children. Now they are being tested. The court has told them to return these children to their parents. Last Friday, I was in Chicago at one of the agencies that was the custodian for 66 of these children who have been the victims of President Trump's zero tolerance policy. It was an experience I still remember and will not ever forget--of seeing six little children walk into a conference room, where I was sitting--little kids--and learning that two of them, who I thought might be twins because they had similar hairdos, were, in fact, as one of them said to me, ``just amigas,'' friends. One was 5 years old, and one was 6 years old. As a father, it is hard for me to remember my kids at that age, but I can sure visualize my grandkids for a moment, who are now 6, 7, and 8, if they were to be separated from their parents by thousands of miles for weeks at a time. That was the policy of zero tolerance--to put pressure on those who consider seeking protection or asylum in this country. I just left a meeting downstairs with a person whom I admire greatly. His name is King Abdullah of Jordan. I admire him for so many things-- his efforts to find peace in the Middle East--but especially because that tiny Kingdom of Jordan, in the Middle East, has done something which should be a lesson to the world. That nation of 7 million Jordanians has accepted 3 million refugees. It is at their political peril for them to have that large of a population within their borders. Yet, time and time again, refugees have presented themselves to Jordan and have been given not only humane treatment but good treatment under the circumstances. The United States and many other nations have helped, and I am glad we have, for it is the right thing to do. Compare what we have done in the United States when it comes to refugees. Historically, we have accepted 75,000 to 100,000 refugees a year after careful screening, inspection, and vetting. In some cases, we have gone way beyond that. When the Cubans came over and said they wanted to escape Castro's communism, we opened our doors. Thank goodness, we did, as they have made a great addition to America. Three Members of the U.S. Senate are Cuban Americans, and I am sure they are very proud of their family heritage. We opened our doors to Cuban refugees. We opened our doors to refugees as well from the Soviet Union and to people who wanted to practice their Jewish religion and felt they were being discriminated against. We opened our doors for them. We opened our doors for the Vietnamese to come here after the war and to become part of America because they had been on our side and had fought for freedom in their country and had run the risk of being killed. Time and again, the United States has opened its doors. What has happened under this administration? First, the President announced last year that he was reducing the number of refugees to 45,000 a year who would be allowed in America--a dramatic cutback. How many have been accepted so far this year as we are well over the halfway point of this fiscal year? There have been less than 16,000 refugees. After careful screening, there have been less than 16,000. I believe we can do better. I believe there are those who are in need of help. I believe this is the definition of who we are as Americans-- the way we treat the people at our borders. If we are humane, if we are civilized, if we are caring, it is a message to the world. If we are the opposite, it is also a message to the world. Right now, we have to look at the scoreboard. The kids have won, and zero tolerance has lost. I hope now we can sit down and come up with a rational, reasonable approach. America cannot accept every person who wants to live here. I wish we could, but we can't. We have to have an orderly process, and we must have border security, but we need to do it with clarity and with humanity. We need to follow our Constitution, which the President, I hope, is reminded of after this decision last night. This decision reads that due process is a part of the Constitution and that the chaotic governance of this administration is not consistent with the Constitution and its principles. It is time now for the President to understand that and to reunite these children under the age of 5 within 14 days. Within 30 days, those under the age of 18 need to be reunited as well. Then we can move forward and put this sad chapter in American history behind us. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN. Will the Senator from Texas yield for a question?

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I would like to make one point and then ask a question. When President Obama, who was my friend and colleague in the Senate, came up with family detention policies under his administration, I objected, as well, and I can show the Senator from Texas the objection.