Mike Lee

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Madam President, when the Grinch stole Christmas, it was a relatively simple operation, one that required a relatively simple solution. Unfortunately, cold, unfeeling regulations and entrenched bureaucracies do not have undersized hearts; hearts that can somehow grow three sizes. Protectionist laws and labor support shortages do not warm to holiday cheer. The COVID-19 pandemic has caused our already deeply troubled economy problems, and it has caused our already deeply troubled supply chain to become mired with challenges of all sorts, including truckdriver shortages, outdated port technology, lack of container storage capacity, port labor difficulties, and scarce freight equipment. In fact, as situations become more dire with the supply chain crisis, with inflation, and with shortages all over the country, our own regulations do a whole lot to delay and disrupt solutions that we need the most at the time we most need them. Americans are feeling the pain of skyrocketing prices, of shipping delays, and empty shelves as our laws and bureaucracies fail to respond to shipping backlogs and labor shortages. The system just is not working. And President Biden's press release policies have not fixed it. In fact, they have made it much, much worse. Like so many problems during his Presidency, President Biden is not touching them with a 39\1/2\-foot pole. As the holidays are here, we see the problems continuing to mount. And these problems needed solutions many, many months ago, but there is still hope. My STOP the GRINCH Act can help us fix the supply chain crisis and save Christmas. This is a bill that focuses on the problems that are actually slowing down our supply chain, and it is a bill that, if enacted, would get products off of ships, onto trucks, and into stores so that people in Utah and across the Nation could get the things they need for everyday life and especially for Christmas. By suspending a number of Federal restrictions on ports, on ships, and on trucks, we can help clear the backlog at our ports, get products onto shelves, and get the presents under the trees. The bill will help solve our truckdriver shortage by temporarily lowering the commercial driver license age to 18 for interstate travel, and it would waive for 1 year the hours-of-service requirements, specifically, for those involved in transporting containers into and out of ports. The bill would allow for more ships to move more freely and to move cargo between American ports by waiving the Jones Act, and it would also allow for Federal land that has been designated as appropriate for multiple use to be used to temporarily store cargo containers. That would do a lot in and of itself to help us break our port logjams. A combination of these things would do so masterfully. And, finally, my bill would help ease the lack of freight equipment by allowing excess Department of Defense equipment to be used to help move cargo. A lot of our problems can be traced to a lack of available truck chassis, and if we open up those that are deemed excess, we can do a lot to move freight. While this bill doesn't address every challenge with our supply chain, it does provide tangible solutions that, if enacted into law, would solve real problems right now. Look, we can end this nightmare before Christmas. We can stop the Grinch, save our holidays, and secure our economy. My STOP the GRINCH Act is the start to a merry Christmas and a happy new year.

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, it is important to remember every Agency within the Federal Government has an inspector general. Inspectors general play an important role in every Agency, and they are there for the purpose of independently reviewing the actions of those who operate that Agency. Everywhere you look, these inspectors general serve with independence, and what we see from them is work product that is publicly released and can be digested by the public. It is a helpful resource not only for the American people but also to us personally as Members of the U.S. Senate, who, in our capacity as Senators, have the ability and, in fact, the duty of exercising oversight over Federal Agencies. With respect to the U.S. Department of Justice, a body that really is all about law and has a lot of lawyers, to put it very mildly, you end up with a dichotomy--a dichotomy that can't be found anywhere else. In every other Federal Agency, the inspector general is able to do his or her job, to conduct research, to do evaluations, issue public reports. And those reports allow us to exercise our oversight responsibilities. They also allow the American people to know what is going on in the Agency in question. We have got a difference within the Department of Justice. If you are a lawyer within the Department of Justice, you are covered by the Office of Professional Responsibility. Now, I want to point out a couple of differences within the Office of Professional Responsibility--between OPR, as it is called, and the Office of Inspector General. These don't reflect any idea that one is bad and the other one isn't. They are just different. The Office of Professional Responsibility does operate on a confidential basis. It operates in secret. And I don't use that term denigratingly. It is there to perform a specific, highly specialized role. See, lawyers have a separate set of ethical rules and standards they are expected to abide by. The Department of Justice, employing a lot of lawyers, wants to make sure that there is some degree of consistency and discipline within the practice of law. They want to make sure that the relative interests, the privacy, and the professionalism of the attorney can be balanced with their other investigative demands. But the inspector general has a different function. The inspector general isn't there to evaluate whether or to what extent and in what way any of the highly specialized, sometimes complex, nuanced rules of professional responsibility affecting lawyers in the practice of law are concerned. No. The inspector general has a much different role. So that is one difference, is that one has a public-facing role; the other one has a private-facing role affecting the individual attorney or attorneys under investigation. Secondly--and this one is perhaps even more significant in its impact--the inspector general operates independently of the Attorney General. The head of the Office of Professional Responsibility, by contrast, reports directly to the Attorney General of the United States and can be fired by the Attorney General of the United States. This is a big difference, and it is a difference we don't see replicated in any other Federal Agency--not with lawyers, not with any other regulated professional class that I am aware of--nor should we, because, if we were to do that, we would end up creating problems. So this is not about a perceived inadequacy or a perceived culture of corruption within the Department of Justice created by the Office of Professional Responsibility. That is not at all what I am saying. In fact, I believe the people who operate the Department of Justice, the lawyers of the Department of Justice, including those who operate the Office of Professional Responsibility, by and large do their job and do their job well and faithfully. But insofar as we allow them to do their job in such a way that it precludes any ability by the inspector general of the Department of Justice to penetrate section 8E of the Inspector General Act insofar as it insulates the operations of the U.S. Department of Justice from investigation of the sort that we have come to expect and rely on from the Office of Inspector General, it is going to be a problem. Within the Department of Justice in particular, it is a big problem. I think it would be unwise in any Federal Agency for us to say: OK, the IG can do anything that the IG needs to do unless there is a lawyer involved. I think that would be dangerous anywhere because you do have lawyers involved, but it is especially dangerous at the Department of Justice because so much of what they do is law, is necessarily performed by people who are lawyers. What happens is that we see countless dead ends where, because the Office of Professional Responsibility has jurisdiction, the inspector general may not tread. They hit dead end after dead end. In the absence of evidence of actual criminal misconduct, they can't proceed, and nobody else can penetrate it. It ought not take evidence of criminal accountability--of criminal liability to enable the inspector general to do his or her job. There are myriad circumstances where someone might engage in unseemly, unethical, unwise behavior within the Department. Whether they are lawyers or whether they are not and separate and apart from whether those deviate from the professional standards imposed by the State bar of any State, by the rules of any court, or the professional standards for lawyers operating within the U.S. Department of Justice, there is an adequate, independent, freestanding interest that the American people have in being able to gain access to that information. But, alas, since 1988, section 8E of the Inspector General Act has precluded his visibility. This needs to stop. As my friend and colleague the Senator from Illinois stated so well moments ago, this bill is not either Republican or Democratic; it is not liberal or conservative. I have been a proud supporter of this bill and sponsored this bill during a Republican administration because I believe that regardless of who is in power, we need visibility into the Department of Justice--visibility that we have in every other Federal Agency, every one. We lack it here. We lack it here with respect to a whole lot of what the Department of Justice does because of this loophole in section 8E. What benefit does this bring to the American people? To the extent there are benefits there, I respectfully submit, they don't even come close to offsetting what we lose in terms of visibility. We need this. We need it now as much as ever. I implore my colleagues to support it.

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

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I agree with and echo the observations made by my friend and distinguished colleague, the Senator from Illinois. I would like to add a couple of things in response to the observations and remarks presented by the Senator from Arkansas. One of the points that he made that I feel compelled to respond to is he expressed concern about what he describes as potential weaponization of--I feel compelled to respond, in particular, to his argument that the Inspector General Access Act could result in the weaponization of allegations of attorney misconduct within the Department of Justice and that this could be used in circumstances to intimidate, threaten, and harass Department of Justice attorneys, including prosecutors, for either taking or not taking actions in retaliation to the same. This is always a concern. It is a concern that follows government, generally. It is, in particular, a concern that follows Federal prosecutors. It is also not a concern that is unique to the Inspector General Access Act. With or without passage of this, there is always a risk of that happening. Nothing about that risk that we immunize ourselves from by leaving intact the loophole--and it is a loophole. It is a deliberate carve-out in Section 8E of the Inspector General Act. It is a loophole. And my friend from Arkansas is right, it is not unintended. It is intentionally created. It was there for a reason. I don't mean to suggest any nefarious motive on the part of those who created it, but it might have been a shortsighted move at the time. It has, at least, in time, exposed a vulnerability in Democratic and Republican administrations alike. If the risk is weaponizing allegations of professional misconduct against Department of Justice lawyers, that is not something that we are immune from today. It is something that I am certain the Office of Professional Responsibility deals with all the time. It doesn't mean we make ourselves more vulnerable to it. It is simply by allowing the inspector general of the Department of Justice to do his or her job without regard to who is a lawyer and who is not, and without regard to this special carve-out for this one Federal Agency that makes it different from every other Federal Agency, including what makes Department of Justice lawyers different from attorneys in every Federal Agency. If the risk is that you might have people who, for bad reasons, might make up allegations of misconduct, there is no more risk of that with an inspector general than there is with the Office of Professional Responsibility. Here, again, they perform different functions. One of them is there specifically to deal with the rules of professional responsibility within the practice of law by Department of Justice lawyers. That is their focus. Their focus is not a broad one. Their focus does not include or extend to issuing a public report to inform the public about abuses of power. My friend from Arkansas is right. They can go in--if there are allegations of criminal misconduct and if they have evidence of the same that they have to pursue--yes, they can do that. That doesn't mean we don't need an inspector general capable of doing the job of the inspector general. He also made the argument that there is no expertise among and between inspectors general with regard to handling allegations of attorney misconduct. If that is true, the same can be said of all other attorneys and all other departments. My friend from Arkansas does correctly point out that attorneys within the Department of Justice--at least some of them do--perform different functions than what we see from attorneys in other Federal Agencies. That part is true. But that doesn't mean inspectors general assigned to the Department of Justice don't have the expertise necessary to investigate the types of allegations that they typically investigate. My friend from Arkansas also points out inspectors general tend to focus on allegations of waste, fraud, and abuse. Yes, this is absolutely true, and this is absolutely why we should not limit the access that inspectors general in the Department of Justice have to attorneys. Remember, this is a department that is all about law. It is focused on law. It is, therefore, not surprising that they have an unusual abundance of lawyers. You know what the Office of Professional Responsibility is not focused on--is not really their role; they are not involved in; they are not trained in--their focus is not on issuing public reports and informing the American people of allegations of things like waste, fraud, and abuse, generally. They have a much narrower function and perform that function especially well. They perform it laudably, and they do a great job of doing it. It is not the same thing as an IG. We need IGs with access to visibility into the Department of Justice. We don't have it now. We haven't since 1988. Thirty-three years is long enough. Let's close the 8E loophole and give the Department of Justice inspector general the access needed.

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, Pfizer released a study this week showing how antibodies from its vaccines respond to the Omicron variant in a lab. The company claims that three doses should provide some protection against the variant. It also showed that those who had previously had COVID and recovered demonstrated stronger immunity to the Omicron variant. While natural immunity comes at a cost, studies have shown throughout the pandemic that it works. Those who have recovered from COVID have significant protection from both catching the virus again and from the most severe symptomatic infections. While this is not always the case, and vaccination may improve immunity further, natural immunity is real. There are data to prove that. A study conducted in Italy showed that natural immunity is more effective than vaccines at reducing risk of future infection. Another study of half a million people in Denmark showed that natural immunity provides significant, lasting protection against infection. Finally, a study from three separate hospitals in Israel found that natural immunity from a previous COVID infection was ``twenty-seven times more effective than vaccinated immunity in preventing symptomatic infections.'' This, of course, is good news, especially considering that natural immunity is combining with vaccinated immunity in the general population. Recent data from the Nationwide Blood Donor Seroprevalence Survey shows that almost 92 percent of Americans over the age of 16 have COVID antibodies from vaccination or infection. The vast majority of Americans have at least some protection against COVID-19--92 percent. I believe the vaccines are generally safe and effective. I have been vaccinated, as has my family. I see these vaccines as a miracle, one that is helping protect many millions of Americans from the dangers associated with COVID-19. But I also recognize that millions of Americans are separately protected, separate and apart from anything else that might be there, as a result of immunity built up through their natural defenses because they have previously contracted and then recovered from COVID. Now, the science shows that this immunity is strong, that it is effective, and that it is really widespread in America. Astoundingly, that information is not frequently shared in the media and never mentioned by the Biden administration. In fact, the administration makes no effort to recognize natural immunity in its mandates or in its formal guidelines. I have asked the Biden administration to provide clarity on its research on natural immunity as well as meaningfully address the research being conducted by other countries that show natural immunity is strong and effective and valid. However, the Biden administration has yet to respond to my inquiries, inquiries that I asked, reasonably, to be answered no later than the beginning of this week. Tragically, tens of millions of Americans have superior protection against the virus, even from new variants, and yet this administration would still fire them if they don't comply with the administration's mandates regarding vaccination. It is as irrational as it is cruel. I have heard from hundreds of Utahns who are worried about losing their jobs due to the mandate. They are just a few of the half a million workers who are at risk of losing their jobs in my State. There are 45 million Americans altogether who could lose their jobs due to this unconstitutional, illegal, and immoral overstep. The Senate, thankfully, recognized that these jobs were worth saving last night. Fifty-two Senators, including Democrats and Republicans, stood with American workers. Now, that resolution could, of course, fail in the House, but it could, of course, be vetoed by the President. Nevertheless, regardless of that outcome, the Senate's statement last night rings loud and clear. Moreover, I hold out hope that the American people are being heard-- they are being heard in the Senate, as evidenced by last night's vote; they are being heard in the House of Representatives, which will take up this measure in the coming days. I hold out hope that the House, too, will pass this measure, and I implore the President to consider allowing it to become law. But regardless of what else happens, these workers need immediate, real, lasting protection from the threat of the mandates. One way to have a significant portion of these jobs protected is to recognize the benefits of natural immunity. So today I am offering a bill that would require that Federal Agencies recognize, accept, truthfully present, and include natural immunity in any regulation. This bill does not say that vaccines are bad or unhelpful; it merely asks the Federal Government to respect widely available science. I am glad to be joined in this effort by Senators Braun, Tuberville, and Sullivan, who are with me as cosponsors. This bill would keep Americans employed and help us beat the pandemic in a smart way. I urge my colleagues to support it. To that end, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions be discharged from further consideration of S. 2846 and that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration. I further ask that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. LEE. I object.

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, the Senate, today, will pass a bill that, quite literally, gives a blank check to President Biden and the Democrats. They will use it to pass the ``destroy America bill,'' which they call Build Back Better. There is literally a blank check in the bill. It is literally a blank check. The Senators who gave that blank check don't want you to know that they did it. They used procedural jiujitsu to hide their votes. Republicans are hiding behind Democrats, and Democrats are hiding behind Republicans, but the American people see through it. They closed the doors, held their noses, and created a new way to pass bad bills and claimed that it was just this one time. Mark my words: This bill will be one more tool repeatedly used to abuse the American people. This debt ceiling increase is a blank check for the Democrats' reckless tax-and-spending bill. It should have never happened.

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, it is important to remember that the fact that someone holds a government post and is an expert in a field does not make that person capable of making laws. Yes, there are lots of experts in our government; some of them hold high bureaucratic or other executive posts. It doesn't mean that they may make laws. By operation of the Constitution, we are the experts for purposes relevant to making law. We are the only organ of the Federal Government that may make law. And so anytime someone starts to say they are the experts, therefore, they get to make the law, that is a problem. To call this a ``nonsense idea,'' to refer to this as an idea that wastes the time of the American people, ignores the plight of almost 45 million Americans whose jobs are being threatened right now. My friend and distinguished colleague, the Senator from Washington, has made an argument against this that doesn't match her conclusion. What she is stating is not that natural immunity makes no difference-- although her conclusion would seem to suggest that--what she is saying instead is that someone who has had COVID and recovered and therefore developed natural immunity could develop additional resistance to future infections by also being vaccinated. I understand this argument. In fact, it is an argument that I myself have used. I had COVID, I recovered from COVID, and I have been fully vaccinated. But the question is not whether you can gain additional protection from that; it is whether or not you can look at an original COVID infection from which someone has recovered and accept the fact that it offers at least a comparable degree of protection as one can obtain from a vaccine. So let's be honest about what we are and are not talking about here. We are talking about 45 million Americans whose jobs are being threatened as they head into the holidays at a time when economic conditions make that unusually intolerable--intolerable as a result of many conditions that the Federal Government itself put in place. In all events, this is really a bare minimum of what we can do for the American people. The burden should not be on them to prove why they should not be fired--fired by a company being threatened by the President of the United States with crippling fines. This is cruel. It is barbaric. It is not authorized by statute or the Constitution. And in this circumstance, they are ignoring science.

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, On December 2, 2021, the Senate confirmed C.B. Sullenberger III to be Representative of the United States to the International Civil Aviation Union--ICAO--with the rank of Ambassador. After receiving responses to a series of written questions to the nominee, I remain concerned about this nominee's approach to the Ambassador position. In response to questions on balancing regulation with the need for an open environment for innovation, Mr. Sullenberger emphasized a position that favored more regulation at the expense of innovation, as well as deference to standards established internationally rather than those generated in the U.S. I do not disagree with the need for essential safety standards to protect the flying public; however, I believe Mr. Sullenberger's views cross a threshold in which the automatic preference for government regulation, particularly international government regulation, risks stunting the growth of aviation startups in emerging technology, entrench the largest players, and result in the exclusion of State and local jurisdictions from conversations in emerging areas of unmanned flight below the airspace of manned aviation. Finally, based on Mr. Sullenberger's responses, I am not convinced that he would properly advocate that the United States lead at ICAO in setting standards that would swiftly bring civil supersonic air travel to fruition. For these reasons, I did not offer my consent to confirm Mr. Sullenberger unanimously and instead requested a voice vote.

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, Congress, not the Executive, makes the laws in this country. National laws have to be passed by the legislative branch. Our Constitution makes that very clear. In fact, it is the very clause of the first section of the first article of the Constitution. It states unambiguously: All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives. You cannot make up Federal law without going through that formula-- passage in the House, passage in the Senate, followed by presentment to the President. In the case of COVID-19 vaccine requirements, the President of the United States has decreed mandates--mandates that threaten the jobs and the livelihoods of 45 million Americans, including over half a million Utahns whose jobs are on the line. Now, courts across the country have started--quite correctly--to recognize that these mandates are offensive to the Constitution. They are not authorized by the law. But that doesn't diminish in any way, shape, or form our duty here as Members of the U.S. Senate, as part of the legislative branch, to assert clearly, unambiguously, and swiftly that these mandates are unconstitutional, illegal, and morally indefensible. I have heard from hundreds of Utahns who are themselves at risk of losing their jobs and therefore their ability to provide food for their children, specifically due to these mandates. Their stories are nothing short of heartbreaking. I have heard from countless businesses in my State, businesses that are afraid of losing key workers and having to shut their doors and no longer operate specifically due to these mandates. I have heard from people who happen to have medical or religious concerns over the vaccines, and their pleas are falling on deaf ears. These Americans aren't asking for anything extravagant or unusual or unreasonable--far from it. These are Americans who are simply worried about their ability to put food on the table and gifts under the tree during challenging economic times--economic times that are difficult enough as it now stands, economic times that have been worsened by excessive government spending, economic times that are about to get a whole lot more difficult for a whole lot more people specifically because of these mandates. President Biden seeks to make them not only unemployed but also unemployable, second-class pariahs. Well, it is true the courts have offered temporary relief to some, but these Americans and these businesses look to Congress for immediate, lasting, and permanent relief. We do, after all, make the law. We are the only branch of the Federal Government authorized to do so. So this will be one of the easiest votes that I have ever cast in my 11 years in the Senate. The American people agree. Only 14 percent of those polled support firing those who are unvaccinated. Fourteen percent of all Americans say that, yeah, somebody who doesn't get the vaccine ought to be fired as a result of not getting the vaccine. Even some Democratic politicians are starting to change their tune. They are souring on the mandates. Americans understand that conditioning employment on personal medical decisions is callous, it is cruel, and it is immoral. It is certainly not something that these people want to face. It is not something that Democrats or Republicans want. It is not something they agree with. It is not something they are going to tolerate. The economic impact of firing half a million Utahns would be disastrous, and when you replicate the effects of doing that on State after State, where we see--according to many datasets, anywhere from a quarter to a third of the workforce in most States is being threatened by this. In some States, it is higher. It is more like 40 percent in places like West Virginia, 37 percent in Alabama, and 31 percent in Utah. Now, in the healthcare sector alone, where keeping doctors and nurses and technicians at work has been particularly difficult, the Nation risks losing countless thousands of key professionals while the need for their very services remains most dire. This isn't acceptable. It is not something we want to see. It is not something we should have to face. When you add all of this up, the cumulative effect across different industries and in different States across the Nation would be catastrophic as we face supply chain troubles, inflation, rising gas prices, a labor shortage, and so, so much more. The very last thing our economy needs is to have tens of millions of Americans unemployed. I am very, very much against these mandates. I am for the vaccines. I have been vaccinated. My family has been vaccinated; and I have encouraged people everywhere to get vaccinated, but when someone chooses not to be vaccinated for whatever reason--whether it is a medical reason or a religious reason or a reason related to a personal belief or due to a specific concern about a specific reaction they have had to something else--it is still their decision. It still doesn't warrant the overpowering hand of the Federal Government's coming in and threatening to force their employers to fire them under the threat of crippling penalties--penalties that any employer, no matter how big or wealthy or otherwise lucrative, would find incapacitating. I have come to the Senate floor now 20 times to speak specifically against President Biden's vaccine mandates. I have offered more than a dozen bills to reduce their harms on millions of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Utahns. Today, with my colleagues, I encourage the Senate to use the Congressional Review Act as it was intended. There is no clearer example in the history of the Congressional Review Act of such an egregious overstep by the Executive. There is no more blatant abuse of delegated authority or usurpation of authority that was never granted. The Congressional Review Act provides us with the opportunity to strike down this offensive mandate and make sure that neither President Biden nor any subsequent President can institute a similar rule. I encourage my colleagues to think of the half a million Utahns, of the almost 5 million Californians, of the 300,000 West Virginians, and of the tens of millions elsewhere across the Nation. Forty-five million livelihoods are at stake of the workers and families in each of our States. These Americans demand that we take action. Today, we have that choice. I implore each and every one of my colleagues to stand with the American people, the American worker, the American family by supporting this resolution.

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, 45 million Americans, 45 million hard-working moms and dads, neighbors, and friends are being threatened right now with losing their jobs. They are being threatened not due to cyclical economic conditions, not because jobs aren't available, not because of some war or other calamity; their jobs are being threatened by their own government--a government that has chosen to tell them if they don't comply with a Presidential medical orthodoxy, they will be fired. This is unfortunate. This is most unfortunate. It is most unfortunate that this power has been exercised this way. The President doesn't have that power. Congress hasn't given the President that power. Congress doesn't have that power to begin with. This is not a power that belongs in the Federal Government to begin with. As a result of that, 45 million Americans are being threatened with their jobs. They are being forced to choose between an unwanted medical procedure and losing their job. Look, I want to be very clear. I have been vaccinated. My family has been vaccinated. I believe the development of the vaccine is something of a modern medical miracle. I am grateful for the vaccine. I think the vaccine is helping Americans be safe from the effects of COVID. It is not the government's job. It is not within government's authority to tell people that they must be vaccinated, and if they don't get vaccinated, they will get fired. It is wrong. It is immoral. You don't tell someone that if they don't do exactly what you want them to do, that they are going to lose their job. The American people overwhelmingly agree. In fact, according to a recent Axios poll, only 14 percent of all Americans agree with the President of the United States that if someone declines to get the jab, they should lose their job. Now, this is a huge percentage of the workforce in many States--most States, in fact. Somewhere between a quarter and a third of all workers are now being faced with the possibility of losing their job because of these vaccine mandates. This, at a time when Americans are struggling just to put food on the table, in part, because we have a government that is spending too much money it doesn't have. It is churning up money, printing it, in effect, in a way that results in rampant inflation; in a way that makes limited paychecks go less far, less capable of buying bread to put on the table. And amidst all of this government-manufactured crisis, government is making it worse; threatening to not just make that paycheck go even less far than it already does because of government but to take it away altogether. That is not kind; that is not the neighborly way in which we like to do things; it is not moral; and it is not constitutional. Look, it is tragic that this many Americans have to have their jobs threatened as a result of a Presidential temper tantrum. There is nothing about it that is OK. Deep down, we all know that it is not OK. I will tell you, there is another thing that is not OK. It is not OK that those who want to take away those jobs, those who are just fine with the President exercising this authority fought tooth and nail to prevent the U.S. Senate from taking the vote that we are preparing to take tonight, a simple vote--a simple vote that simply allows us to weigh in and decide whether or not we are going to fund that part of government, that feature of our government that is going to enforce the vaccine mandate. Those in this Chamber who shamefully were refusing over and over again to let us even cast a vote on that simple measure threatened to shut down all of government because they didn't want to have us have a chance, as the people's elected lawmakers, to decide whether or not we should proceed with vaccine mandate enforcement. They would rather shut down the government and make everything worse than they would stand accountable for what they are doing. Fortunately, this part of the story at least has a happy ending. We are going to be able to vote on that tonight. We are going to be able to vote on whether or not we fund vaccine mandate enforcement at the Federal level. This is wonderful. This is fantastic. It should not have resulted in days and days of shutdown threats and days and days of deflection, accusing other people of wanting to shut down the government when all we wanted to do was have a vote, to give a chance to the hard-working mom or dad, soldier, sailor, airman, or marine struggling to put food on the table. That is all we wanted. And all they wanted to do is use it as an excuse to deflect onto others that which they are doing. We can do better than this. We must do better than this. The American people deserve better than this. That is why I am so glad and grateful that we will be casting this vote tonight. But know this: This issue is not going away. I hope with everything in me that when we cast this vote tonight, that a majority of us will do the right thing and that we will vote the way that we know we should vote; that we will stand with those people who may lose their jobs. Thirty-one percent of the workers in my State--and in other States, it is higher. Thirty-nine percent of the workers in West Virginia stand to lose their jobs, 37 percent of the workers in Alabama, 33 percent of the workers in Georgia. In State after State, you see hard-working moms and dads being threatened. This isn't right. It is not even an authority that the President has. It is not authority that the Congress has. We shouldn't be doing this. Deep down, we all know that is right. We also know that some of these problems result from the fact that when we fund the government, we have made significant mistakes as a result of the fact we have allowed so many spending decisions to be concentrated in one vote on one bill, such that all of government tends to be funded or none of it gets funded. Sometimes the only opportunity we have to weigh in on a particular matter of public policy, one affecting 45 million American workers in this instance--the only chance we have to do that is on a spending bill, and we don't even get that chance unless we agree we can vote on an amendment on that. That should never result in a shutdown threat. When those threats are made, we should acknowledge who is making them. Never once has any one of us wanted to shut down the government. We wanted to give the American worker a chance for us to vote for them, a chance for us to stand with them. I urge--I implore--my colleagues: Please join me in voting to protect the American worker. Don't take away the job of hard-working Americans. Don't fire people because they are not inclined to adhere to Presidential medical orthodoxy. Please support me in this amendment.

Mr. LEE. If you don't want to get the virus, get the vaccine. The answer to someone not agreeing to your medical advice is not to fire them. It sure as heck isn't to have the President of the United States fine every employer in America that doesn't want to do this, whether they have religious objections or otherwise. This is wrong. We know it is wrong. We can stop this right now. Please join me in opposing and taking down and refusing to fund for the duration of this continuing resolution that part of government charged with enforcing this immoral, indefensible, unconstitutional, and illegal mandate. Vote on Amendment No. 4868

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, this always happens near the kick-the-can funding deadlines that we are now approaching. There is controversy surrounding what will and what will not make it into the continuing resolution; that is, the legislation funding the government for a finite period of time upon the expiration of a spending period. In the House of Representatives, the debate and controversy continued late into last night, and may well still continue later today. Here in the Senate, there are a number of Senators, including me, who are not inclined to give consent to expedite a funding measure that supports and funds President Biden's unconstitutional and sweeping vaccine mandate without holding a vote on that mandate and whether we should fund that part of government charged with enforcing it. Now, to be very clear about all of this, Senator Schumer, as the majority leader, could have done this without our help if he had started this process weeks ago or even days ago. He could have held votes and passed this resolution without needing to ask for the help of those of us who feel this way, who are not inclined to help him do it. Senator Schumer is in a bind, due to his own delay and his own denial. He is asking all of us to help him. Now, I have offered a very simple solution, a very reasonable solution. I am not asking that a poison pill or a pet project be included, no. I am not asking for dramatic reforms or draconian cuts. Far from it. I just want to vote on one amendment. I want the Members of this body to go on record on whether they support funding--in this bill--President Biden's vaccine mandate. The American people have a right to know, through our votes, where we stand and where we stand in connection with this bill, on a germane amendment--one that pertains to that, a simple up or down, yes or no-- simple majority vote. That is all I am asking. Let me first explain a little bit about the recent history of this situation. While those involved in this effort have been accused by many in elected office and in the press of brinksmanship, we have been nothing but consistent and clear and open about our position for weeks now--in fact, for a month. On November 3, a group of Senators--15 of us, in fact--declared our intentions, sending this letter to Senator Schumer. And in this letter, we made very clear that we will ``not support--and will use all means at our disposal to oppose--legislation that funds or in any way allows the enforcement of President Biden's employer vaccine mandate.'' Now, 15 Senators have signed this letter. And there it is right there in black and white--the words that I just read in that letter from a month ago. The letter--again, written back at the beginning of November--specifically mentions this funding deadline--the one we are now approaching; the one that is hitting us tomorrow night--as one for Senator Schumer and our colleagues to be aware of that we made our intentions clear. We did so out of courtesy to the majority leader and to those we represent: to the American people, those who will be affected by these matters. And now, as a matter of political convenience, he and others are saying ``their unwillingness to come to the table,'' which is the reason we are now approaching the deadline without an agreement, somehow amounts to an act of brinksmanship on our part. That portrayal is disingenuous, and it is wrong. After running out the clock, knowingly, deliberately not coming to the table to negotiate, and ignoring our clear, public position, Senator Schumer is now accusing us of wanting to shut down the government because we refuse to help him cram through a bill that we have already explicitly stated we are against. We are providing every opportunity to avoid a shutdown, and all we ask for is a simple up-or-down vote. Now, I stand by the commitment I made not to support or grant consent to pass or expedite a measure that funds, supports, or allows for the enforcement of the President's vaccine mandates. Now, it is true that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has issued an order halting enforcement of the OSHA mandate, and that OSHA has temporarily halted the enforcement of that particular mandate. That does not in any way remove our obligation here in Congress to protect our Constitutional role and to prevent unconstitutional measures, laws, and regulations from afflicting the American people. We still don't know the final outcome of that litigation. In any event, we have an independent responsibility--constitutionally and morally--to make sure that what we do here has our oversight and that we don't spend money on things that most Americans find abhorrent. Each of us did, in fact, swear an oath to the Constitution, and the Constitution does not grant the Federal Government the authority to implement a mandate of this sort. It just doesn't. You can search it; you will not find that authority. The Constitution certainly does not grant the President of the United States the authority to implement such a mandate without the explicit authorization of the people's elected lawmakers in Congress. Make no mistake, this mandate is not only immoral; it is also unconstitutional. For that reason alone, I must oppose it. But the harms certainly don't stop with the damage that is being done to our constitutional order. Millions of Americans are at risk of losing their jobs due to this mandate. While court orders are offering at least a temporary protection, these Americans are still anxiously awaiting lasting protection from Congress, and currently could receive at a moment's notice the final ultimatum to be vaccinated or lose their jobs. In fact, in fear of the huge fines that the Biden administration is threatening against businesses that don't comply once the mandate is enforced, many companies are already imposing these requirements on their workers. Countless businesses and hundreds of Utahns who are at risk of closure or dismissal have reached out to me. Their stories are heart- wrenching. These are good people. They are our friends and our neighbors. They are neighborhood businesses and American manufacturers, mothers and fathers trying to get by in increasingly difficult economic times. There are millions of them across the country. Over half a million workers in Utah alone are at risk of unemployment due to this mandate. As I have said each time I have spoken on this, I am not against the vaccine. In fact, I have gotten the vaccine. My family has gotten the vaccine. I have encouraged people to get the vaccine. I am against the mandate. I recognize that these vaccines are protecting Americans from the harms of COVID-19, and that the government has no business, no authority, and no justification to make millions of Americans second- class, unemployable pariahs. Even if the Federal Government did have that authority, which it doesn't, the President of the United States could not exercise it unilaterally, not without an act of Congress. Our economic condition is increasingly dire. Inflation is becoming long-lasting. The supply chain crisis has shown the prime value of American workers. You know, I can't think of a worse time to kick them to the curb. I want to be very clear: I don't want to shut down the government. The only thing I want to shut down is Congress's funding enforcement of an immoral, unconstitutional vaccine mandate. However, if the choice is between temporarily suspending nonessential functions on the one hand and on the other hand standing idle, as up to 45 million Americans lose their jobs, their livelihoods, and their ability to work, I will stand with American workers every time. That is not a closed question. I stand with American workers throughout Utah and across America. I stand with moms and dads needing gifts and paychecks before the holidays. I stand by what I and others committed to as our word, that word given a month ago without response. I won't support a continuing resolution that funds President Biden's grievous, immoral, unconstitutional vaccine mandate, and I just want to vote on it in connection with this spending bill. All I am asking for is a vote. It would take 15 minutes. We could do it right now, in fact. If Senator Schumer wants to avoid this vote so badly that he will shut down the government rather than hold it, he should explain why. We can fix this situation right now. Let's hold a vote. Let's hold it right now.

Mr. LEE

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

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Madam President, I was going to give a speech first. I am now going to invert the order and do my unanimous consent request first in deference to my friend and colleague, the Senator from Rhode Island. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Armed Services be discharged from further consideration of S. 2842 and that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration. I further ask that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. LEE. Madam President, our Armed Forces have been asked to work miracles over the last 18 months. During a global pandemic, in the face of natural disasters, and facing dangerous missions, our men and women in uniform have risen to the challenge just as they have so many times throughout our history. Many of our servicemembers have contracted and then recovered from COVID. Now these heroes--the same heroes--are being placed in a corner by this administration. President Biden's COVID vaccine requirement for the Armed Forces does not grant our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines the respect that they deserve. As the Senate debates our annual National Defense Authorization Act, it would be a huge mistake not to consider this mandate's impact on our retention and recruitment of servicemembers and, thus, on our military's readiness to secure our national security. This mandate, tied with President Biden's more sweeping general vaccine mandate, is something that, in combination, has put millions of Americans in so many difficult, untenable, unfair positions. In most cases, these are hard-working, everyday Americans. They are mothers and fathers, husbands and wives who are just trying to put food on the table during difficult economic times. These mandates are forcing millions of our fellow citizens into second-class, unemployable status, placing countless of our neighbors on the economic and social fringes of our society, even more than what they were already experiencing with rampant inflation caused by excessive government spending to the tune of trillions of dollars. Now, I have heard from hundreds of Utahns, in recent days, who are concerned about losing their jobs--losing their jobs not just in general, not just in the abstract, but specifically due to these mandates. Some of these individuals are heroic members of our military. These servicemembers were rightly praised for serving during a pandemic and serving in dangerous conditions, on dangerous missions, but now they are being forced out, often with limited or no retirement benefits because of the President's mandate. Let me share with you just a few of their stories. One soldier told me his story. He has been in the Army now for 18 years-- nearly two decades. He never received a single reprimand, whether written or otherwise. He honorably and proudly served his Nation. All along, he was planning on retiring upon reaching two decades of service. He is almost there at 18 years--just 18 months shy, in fact, of reaching that really important milestone in his career. Now, because of the vaccine mandate, he is at risk of losing his benefits and of not even receiving an honorable discharge. Regarding his situation, he said: ``This will cause a substantial loss in pay and quality of life for myself and a large number of others I know.'' Another soldier who reached out to my office has served for 10 years in the military. He has been informed, despite his many years of successful, faithful Active-Duty service, that he will not receive an honorable discharge if he declines to comply with the vaccine requirement. Accordingly, he asked to resign from the military. Now, his commanders made clear that he would be barred from resignation. He sought a personal religious exemption. He was summarily told his exemption request would be denied. Of his situation, he said: ``To be backed into a corner with two very bad options is both disheartening and sad, especially with what I have sacrificed and what my family has sacrificed on behalf of the military.'' Another soldier reached out to my office in a similar situation. This soldier has children who experienced complications with receiving the vaccine. This soldier also has a child with significant learning disabilities, whom he is worried about providing for. He said: This really could be a life-changing event for my family, and I feel strongly enough about it that I will risk all my benefits not to take it. I just wish I had a choice. These stories are just barely scratching the surface of the countless thousands of servicemembers in similar positions. The Department of Defense has begun prohibiting unvaccinated members of the National Guard from receiving Federal pay or benefits. These guardsmen risk being marked absent from training drills if they are not vaccinated. This move has the effect of pushing the unvaccinated out of the National Guard. Approximately 10,000 marines remain unvaccinated. That is around 6 percent of the Corps. Losing these capable servicemembers and showing unvaccinated Americans that they should not join our Armed Forces makes our military less capable. It threatens its ability to do what only the military can do. In total, there are reports of approximately 60,000 unvaccinated servicemembers who risk discharge under less than honorable conditions due to this mandate-- 60,000. The Department of Defense, for its part, refuses to provide the number of servicemembers who have applied for vaccine exemptions, but there are reports that even some of the few Americans in military uniform who have received exemptions are seeing those exemptions revoked. That is chilling to say the least. Relatively few of them are getting them granted, and some of those who have had them granted are seeing them revoked. Now, these servicemembers, like millions of other Americans whose employments have also been put at risk, all deserve a better option. That is why, today, I am asking that the Senate pass my Respecting Our Servicemembers Act. That is why I came to the Senate floor and why, a few moments ago, I asked unanimous consent that we pass it. I know not everyone is going to agree on every issue here and that we are not going to agree, perhaps, on every issue pertaining to the mandate, but I think we at least ought to be able to agree on this one. We ought not to be mistreating those upon whom our safety depends. This bill that I brought forward to try to pass today would prohibit the Secretary of Defense from requiring COVID vaccination for our military. I am grateful to my colleagues Senators Braun and Tuberville for joining me. This is now the 18th time I have come to the Senate floor, asking that the Federal Government take a tempered, reasoned approach--an approach that is noticeably absent from that which the President has chosen to pursue. As I have said every time I have done this, I am not anti-vaccine. I believe the development of the COVID vaccines is something of a medical miracle. I am vaccinated, my family is vaccinated, and I have encouraged everyone around me to get the vaccine. I have also acknowledged that it is not my decision, and it is certainly not a decision that should be forced on them by the Federal Government and certainly not by a single person acting within the Federal Government who shouldn't be exercising that authority unilaterally. Whether or not vaccines should be mandated by the Federal Government is, of course, an entirely different, free-standing question. Our military servicemembers deserve the right to make this medical decision for themselves without the threat of losing the ability to care for themselves and provide for their families. They currently face being forced out of the military--out of military service and also out of the benefits that they have earned. To add insult to injury, they are also threatened with the risk of a less than honorable discharge, all for the supposed grave sin of deviating--of daring to deviate--from Presidential, medical orthodoxy. We are better than this. This is not something we should be doing. Everyone knows it. Deep down, we know it is wrong. You know, according to a recent Axios poll, only 14 percent of the American people agree with President Biden's apparent assumption that someone should be fired as a consequence of declining to get the vaccine. That is wrong. That is why I came here today. That is why I will be back as many times and as long as it takes to end these mandates. It is unfortunate that this legislation, which should be easy to pass, wasn't able to pass today. It is unfortunate that it drew an objection. The American people don't want this, and our national security is undermined by it. I find that most unfortunate, and I will continue to fight it. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Madam President, our Nation exists today in a time of relative peace, with limited and manageable active hostilities threatening U.S. national security. On the horizon, the United States faces a militarily ambitious and formidable but not yet insurmountable opponent in China and in its quest for regional dominance in the Pacific. Yet in the face of this new age of great power competition, U.S. grand strategy continues to operate with outdated goals and across all regions of the globe, lacking prioritization and desperately needing scale. After the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan and the corresponding diplomatic, military, and humanitarian disaster, one would think the instinct would be to jettison decades of military-industrial groupthink. One would think the American people, and certainly our men and women in uniform, deserve a thorough, exhaustive review of what is working and the huge swaths of what is failing in our military and defense strategy, infrastructure, and planning. One would think that Congress would reclaim powers assigned to it by the Constitution to make serious reforms to protect the security and prosperity of the United States. One would think we would reform our procurement process and trim the bloated, perversely incentivized military-industrial complex. One would think we would prioritize resources toward the largest and most imminently looming threats to U.S. national security. One would think we would burden share with our allies where our security interests align. One would think we, here in the U.S. Senate, would take specific steps to make sure that failures like the withdrawal from Afghanistan don't happen again, whether in the Middle East or in any other emerging theater of conflict. Unfortunately, this year's National Defense Authorization Act fails to put the interests of U.S. citizens first. This is not the introspective or retrospective bill that the American people should be able to expect and largely continues the failed--the failed--policies of many decades past. The American people and the brave men and women of our military deserve better. We are, thank heavens, in a time of peace, with limited active hostilities. Despite that, we remain intimately entangled in the affairs of too many nations abroad. Our troops and equipment scatter every region of the globe. We spend billions of dollars supporting, supplying, and training allies who, in many cases, contribute little to their own self-defense, let alone ours. We face an ambitious opponent in China, as it seeks military dominance in the Indo-Pacific region. There is no question that while Xi Jinping remains in power, the PLA and the PRC will not shy away from bold moves and the quest for regional hegemony. But the U.S. strategy should not presume unrestrained, offensive intervention; rather, targeted and scaled deterrence should frame the mission set across all U.S. forces postured in the region. Further, the United States should accordingly rescale resources in the war zones of yesteryear to appropriately prioritize protecting the U.S. homeland and military personnel from tomorrow's threats. Congress is responsible for raising and supporting armies, of making war, and of ratifying treaties. This bill neglects those responsibilities. Regarding Afghanistan, the NDAA includes funding and new authorities for the nonexistent Afghan security forces, along with reimbursements to coalition partners for supporting U.S. operations and a sense of the Senate on future U.S. counterterrorism posture postwithdrawal, with little eye toward reforming or removing outdated and overbroad authorizations for the use of military force. Perpetuating funding and authority to support a nonexisting defense force is as much bad foreign policy as it is bad fiscal responsibility. We must do better. The American people expect and deserve for us to do better. Additionally, this NDAA fundamentally changes the purpose and the scope of the military draft. The new purpose is greatly expanded to ``ensure a requisite number of personnel with the necessary capabilities to meet the diverse mobilization needs of the Department of Defense during a national emergency.'' Instead of being a seldom-used tool only for the most extreme cases of compelling national defense, the draft could be morphed into compulsory national service in the face of any emergency. Even more troubling is the mandatory registration of women for the draft. Look, all are immensely grateful for the incredible contribution women make to our Armed Forces, but that participation should never be forced. This bill paves that dangerous road without due consideration given to its impact on young families and single parents. Further, the policy provides no guarantee that women would not be sent directly to the frontlines of combat, alongside and simultaneously with able-bodied men. While I am opposed to all of the NDAA's changes to the draft, at the very least, this body should consider a reasonable amendment, a few reasonable amendments on this front, including one of mine that would prohibit the disturbing scenario of mothers and fathers being conscripted simultaneously out of the same family, leaving their children stranded without either parent. It also provides a similar exemption for single parents. I hope this body will consider and pass this amendment in the near future. I also hope that the body will make that unnecessary by, first, passing an amendment striking that provision altogether. We don't need to be expanding the draft, and we shouldn't be making the draft applicable to women. This bill further reduces our military end strength by over 7,000 servicemembers. Troublingly, the biggest cuts come from the Marine Corps and the Air Force. And in the face of an aggressive China, the Navy also faces reduction in Active Forces when it arguably should be the first contender for an increase in end strength, not a cut. As we pivot toward the Indo-Pacific, our naval and our air superiority are both vital. We need them. Our withdrawal from the Middle East should reduce the level of Active-Duty Army personnel deployed overseas, and yet the Army faced a less than 1-percent reduction in that specific category. This bill places us on a dangerous footing regarding future mutual defense commitments. This bill would provide a vague, near- authorization for the use of military force to defend Taiwan against an invasion from China. The question of war deserves here, as always, its own debate by Congress, rather than a haphazard statement of policy that may be abused by the executive branch in order to bring us into a new conflict, into a new conflict without the people's duly elected representatives whose job it is to decide whether we go to war to make that decision under the light of day and with full debate that the American people can witness. Like NDAAs of old, this bill appropriates more funds to procurement than anywhere else, with no reforms to the bureaucratic barriers that make procurement so costly and so inefficient. Finally, this NDAA does not sufficiently bolster our defensive position in this hemisphere. The goals outlined by this bill are vague and equate to an abdication of Congress's responsibility to give the Defense Department instructions for a strategic approach to the Western Hemisphere. It provides blank check authority for the Department of Defense to support programs and activities for purposes including institution- building to countercorruption and to serve humanitarian infrastructure needs. This attempt at nation-building is misguided, and it will not be helpful to us in our efforts to deter China. Thankfully, there are a few positives in this bill for U.S. national defense and for the security of the people of Utah. This bill continues to support the development of fifth-generation air power capabilities in the F-35 Program, continuing a critical investment in our air defense--something that is also becoming even more important. This bill also fully funds the modernization of our ground-based nuclear deterrent, protecting the U.S. homeland for generations to come. This important work will largely be done by the people of Utah and our dedicated servicemembers at Hill Air Force Base. The House version of the NDAA also includes my Military Spouse Licensing Relief Act. It is important to note here that one in four military spouses currently face unemployment or are actively seeking work largely because of frequent moves due to their spouse's military orders, which keep them moving from place to place on a pretty routine basis. This provision in the House version of the bill would also allow spouses of our military servicemembers to work in their chosen profession, wherever military orders may take them in the United States, without having to navigate the complicated requirements of State occupational licensing. My State, the State of Utah, led the way with this commonsense type of reform that makes life and achieving prosperity easier for those families who serve our Nation. It should become law. We need it. Our military families need it. Our military and the American people generally would be much better off with it. We could have done more. This National Defense Authorization Act could be a pivot point where we reexamine our defensive stance in the world and reclaim our constitutional arrangement here at home. This NDAA could have been a turning point in which we in Congress reasserted our authority over war-making powers. My National Security Powers Act that I have introduced with Senator Murphy and Senator Sanders would clarify and update and modernize the War Powers Resolution. The bill would also restore congressional authority over arms exports. It would additionally require congressional approval of emergency declarations and prevent the President from misusing emergency powers. The National Security Powers Act would rein in Presidential abuses of the war power and make our Nation safer and more aligned with the Constitution. It is bipartisan. It is exactly the type of reform that belongs in the NDAA. We must also make reforms to our emergency war spending. Though President Biden thankfully didn't request, and Congress didn't provide, the OCO slush fund in this bill, there is much that needs to be done to restore Congress's power of the purse in the defense environment specifically. The Cost of War Project estimates that post-9/11 war spending totals $8 trillion from 2001 to 2022. Of the $8 trillion, OCO and interest on OCO funds accounts for $3.3 trillion. That is real money, and a lot of it. My Restraining Emergency War Spending Act would define emergency war funding and require the Department of Defense and Congress to limit spending set aside for emergencies to the purpose for which it was authorized. We also need to return accountability to our defense alliances by requiring wealthy and capable Nations to contribute their fair share of their defense. In the NATO alliance alone, only 11 of the 13 NATO member countries meet the 2 percent defense spending requirement. This means that 63 percent of the alliance shown here in red consists of countries that don't foot their share of the bill. They are not holding up their end of the agreement. So my Allied Burden Sharing Report Act would help us know just how much or just how little our allies are contributing. Now, this report used to be published annually. It should be still. This NDAA would have been an ideal venue in which to legislate the return of that report. We also must use these legislative opportunities to prepare the Department of Defense for future defense focused on the technology, the reforms, and the regions of the future. Our defensive position regarding China and in the Indo-Pacific should focus on deterrence. Spreading our forces and our expensive equipment to the ports and the shores of allies in the region is ineffective and could prove more of a vulnerability than an advantage against Chinese strike capabilities. A deterrent posture would combine defensive strategy and operations to fend off possible attacks from a position of strength and limit risk to U.S. personnel and assets. Further, we must prioritize recruitment and retention for the future fight. We need to provide a suitable and welcoming environment for those in uniform and for their families. We need to end the President's sweeping vaccine mandate and give our servicemembers the respect they deserve. After a disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan and the end of our Nation's longest war, this NDAA could have been--should have been--an opportunity to debate, rethink, and reform our Nation's defenses. The National Defense Authorization Act--U.S. defense and security broadly--is one of the few items this body regularly considers that is explicitly, unambiguously within the enumerated powers of Congress. Consequently, it is something that deserves due consideration and significant debate on the floor in order for Members to be able to raise issues like those that I have described today. Yesterday, this body attempted to close debate on this bill without consideration of a single amendment--not a single one. While this bill does make key progress in limited areas, it does not get to the heart of many of our national defense problems. It does not restore Congress's role in our national defense. It does not provide a holistic strategy to defend the United States and the people of Utah-- or the people of any other State. This bill and the floor process yet remain missed opportunities, and I am going to continue to fight for both necessary policy reforms and for an open process generally on the floor. Anything less, particularly in this critical area, amounts to an abdication of the duties of this body to the detriment of the citizens we serve. We can and we must do better.

Mr. LEE

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

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, this is now the 17th time I have come to the Senate Chamber specifically to speak against President Biden's vaccine mandate. I have pledged before, and I pledge again today, to continue this fight until we beat the mandate. Now, thankfully, progress has been made on this front. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit last week halted enforcement of President Biden's general mandate. It did so directing their rulings specifically to the OSHA portion of the mandate. This is the one that applies to all workers everywhere and any place of employment with more than 100 workers. I, along with millions of Americans, am grateful that the U.S. court system performed its role in protecting the separation of powers and otherwise protecting the limits on government written into our laws and our Constitution. It is also encouraging to see the government Agency charged with enforcing the general mandate; that is, OSHA, has now halted the enforcement of the mandate and is complying with the order issued by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. This, however, does not end President Biden's vaccine mandates. That mandate in particular remains the subject of ongoing litigation, and there are other requirements placed on other specific groups of workers outside of the OSHA mandate and, therefore, outside the scope of the order issued by the Fifth Circuit. Now, I have spoken previously on the situation that members of our Armed Forces face and on things that people who work in the healthcare profession face--difficult things, challenging things, things that threaten their livelihoods and cause a lot of problems for workers. I have offered various bills to help those groups of Americans keep their jobs and make sure that they have the right to make their own medical decisions. I am fighting against the mandate. I am not fighting against the vaccines. I support the vaccines. I am vaccinated. I have encouraged others to be vaccinated. I see the development of these vaccines as something of a modern medical miracle, one that is protecting so many millions of Americans from the harms of COVID. But this one-size-fits-all dictate from Washington certainly isn't the answer and, under our system of government, can't be. I have heard from hundreds of Utahns who are personally at risk of losing their jobs and their livelihoods due to this mandate. Many of these Utahns have religious or health concerns about the vaccine. President Biden promised these mandates would include exemptions for those people in those categories specifically, but in reality they are being dismissed or placed on unpaid leave or pushed into retirement with reduced benefits. These are good people, everyday people. Many are dedicated frontline workers. Far too many are just trying to make ends meet and feed their families. It shouldn't be too much to ask to allow them to continue doing that unencumbered by their own government in their efforts to do that. These mandates will just push people out of work and make many of them not only unemployed but unemployable outcasts in their chosen professions, professions for which they have spent years studying and learning and receiving certifications just in order to work. What a tragedy. This wouldn't just harm those affected directly by the mandates. It absolutely would harm those directly affected by them, but the harm extends much further than those directly affected. It would affect all of us, in fact. The American economy is currently facing a labor shortage the likes of which we haven't seen in decades. Businesses across the country are struggling to find enough workers just to keep their doors open, let alone produce and serve at full efficiency. President Biden's mandate will add to our high unemployment and our low labor force participation rates, and it will put even more pressure on inflation--inflation that is making it harder for Americans everywhere, especially the poor and middle-class Americans, people living paycheck to paycheck who find that every dollar they earn is buying less of everything, from gas to groceries, from housing to healthcare. Federal Reserve Chairman Jay Powell recently warned that ``hiring difficulties and other constraints could continue to limit how quickly supply can adjust, raising the possibility that inflation could turn out to be higher and more persistent than we expected.'' The mandate is only worsening the problem. Now, I believe the Biden administration recognizes the harms this mandate will cause for our workforce. It is evident in the administration's date of compliance extension to January 4 that this is the case. Now, I have to ask an obvious question here--or one that I think should be obvious, should be intuitive. If the forced vaccination of our entire Federal workforce, including employees and contractors and subcontractors--if forcing the vaccination of every one of these workers--were truly an emergency so drastic that all workers, contractors, and subcontractors, even those working remotely in their own homes, must be vaccinated immediately, then why would they risk delaying compliance? They can't have it both ways. If they want to say that this is an emergency; this is dire, so dire that we have to force every contractor, subcontractor, and Federal employee to get vaccinated immediately and we have to fire them if they don't--if that is truly so emergent--then why delay it to January 4? Why delay it at all? Now, to be sure, it would be bad. And, to be sure, I am glad they have extended it. Perhaps, maybe, this means they are reconsidering this awful, horrible step, this horrible thing that they are inflicting on those who can least afford to absorb something like this. But it really does undercut the emergent nature of the situation, and it undercuts their underlying reasoning that this has to happen immediately, so immediately that we have to fire all of them if they won't submit to Presidential medical orthodoxy. This mandate is even so drastic that it includes all workers and all contractors, including all those who work remotely, who don't even go into a workplace. And it also includes even those who have natural immunity from a previous case of COVID-19, something that some studies have indicated will provide 27 times the immunity of a vaccine. Again, vaccines are great. I have been vaccinated. I have encouraged others to do the same. Vaccines are protecting hundreds of millions of Americans right now. But why not take into account their natural immunity, and why on earth would you fire someone who already has natural immunity or who works from home? That makes absolutely no sense. This mandate simply goes far beyond what is reasonable. It begs all sorts of questions. Why are you doing this? So, today, I am offering a bill to help another group--yet another group of people--a group consisting of people not protected by the Fifth Circuit's halting of the general vaccine mandate. Federal workers are still facing a vaccine requirement from the Biden administration. Almost 3 million workers in this country are employed by the Federal Government. Many of them have reached out to me and my office and are concerned about losing their jobs due to this mandate. I know I am not the only one. I know that every single Member of this body has received phone calls, letters, emails, and other pleas for help from people who don't want to lose their jobs. This is a response to them. This is an effort to try to help them and part of my ongoing effort to reemphasize the fact that it doesn't have to be this way. My bill, the Protecting Our Federal Workforce from Forced COVID-19 Vaccination Act, would prohibit an executive Agency from requiring its employees to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. It is a simple solution to prevent more unemployment and to protect countless Americans from being forced out of the workforce. This bill will help protect Americans' right to make their own medical decisions and will help protect our economy as it strains under multiple crises and as the holiday season comes around. I encourage and sincerely implore all of my colleagues to support it. To that end, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 3243, which is at the desk. I further ask that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I appreciate the thoughtful remarks and the insights of my friend and distinguished colleague the Senator from Michigan. He is someone with whom I enjoy working, and one of the many things I appreciate about him is that he puts a lot of thought into everything he does. And I have always known him to be considerate, and I appreciate that about him. I also am in agreement with the fact that in an ideal world people would be getting vaccinated more than they are. And in that world, if more people got vaccinated, I do think there would be fewer hospitalizations, fewer deaths, and fewer COVID infections. And there are a lot of data sources supporting that. I also agree that we are all tired as a country, as individuals, as families, regardless of what State we live in. We are tired of the pandemic, of the ERs being overcrowded, and things like that. These are all things we want to do away with. And I also agree with my colleague from Michigan that those things really would be alleviated if more people got vaccinated. In my mind, the question that we are discussing here isn't about a disagreement over the objectives that we have got; it is more about how to get there, who has authority to take what action and what consequences might attach to government actions. Notwithstanding the fact that my friend from Michigan and I both agree that the American people, to the extent they have been vaccinated, are benefiting as a whole from being vaccinated, it doesn't mean that everyone is going to agree. It doesn't get rid of disagreements that exist, in some cases, because of our religious belief or other moral conviction--one that I don't happen to share and probably most of us in this body don't happen to share, but that some people have. There are some people who, for religious or moral reasons, believe that they shouldn't be vaccinated. There are others who have a specific medical condition that has involved receiving medical advice from board-certified medical doctors that someone shouldn't get this particular vaccine. I am not a doctor. I am not a scientist. I don't purport to understand these things. But I do know what I hear from Utahns, which is that a number of them have cited medical conditions of one sort or another; previous personal or family medical history that has signaled particular sensitivity to vaccines in general; or, in some cases, when people have autoimmune conditions of one sort or another or a combination of them. In some cases, doctors are concerned about inflaming that condition, inflaming the immune system of particular patients, and on that basis advise their patients with particular, somewhat unusual medical histories not to be vaccinated. There are others, still, who might not fit into either of these categories, but might consist of people who have already had the coronavirus and have recovered from it at some point over the last 18 months. There are studies indicating that natural immunity is real, and that have suggested that natural immunity can convey comparable immunity to that available under the vaccine. Some of the studies have indicated that that immunity could not only be as strong as, but, in some cases, 27 times stronger than that conferred by the vaccine. I had both. I had the coronavirus over a year ago and I still chose to be vaccinated in addition to that. My own experience with the coronavirus wasn't all that pleasant. It wasn't an experience that I care to relive. In consultation with my doctor, I concluded that it was a good thing for me to get it. I was willing to get it, especially upon learning that it might help protect me even further if I also had the vaccine in addition to having natural immunity. But, you know, not everyone is going to reach the same conclusions. And one of the struggles that we have had as a country involves difficult questions that people face when they disagree--when they have a genuine disagreement. We have to be careful about how we use government power because the government power necessarily involves the use of force. Most of the time, mercifully, it doesn't have to involve the direct actual use of force. It can involve the implicit or implied or future or prospective use of force. In other words, you comply with this or that law or regulation or government dictate of one sort of another, then you are fine. If you don't, you know that at some point there will be consequences. A lot of people comply voluntarily after they received--I don't know--a notice from a law enforcement officer or agent. Or maybe they wait until someone has sued them, and then they get a court order. But they know that at some point, if they refuse to comply, the government can enforce what it is requiring. So whenever we involve government in these kinds of decisions, we have to be able to defend the actual or threatened or potential use of force in order to justify what we are doing. And we have to ask: Is this moral? Is this an appropriate case to use violence? Because if it is not an appropriate case to use violence for something, there is kind of a problem with putting government into the equation, because ultimately you have to rely on government to be willing to threaten violence and carry out violence; meaning to show up at somebody's house with a summons, an arrest warrant, or something like that and take them away. All that involves force. And again, mercifully, most of the time it doesn't have to come to that. Most of the time, Americans, you know, comply with the law just because it is a good thing to comply with the law. But we really should ask the question whether a government action is morally justified in any circumstance to such a degree that the use of violence would be warranted if it came to that. I struggle to accept the proposition that it is OK to use violence to force someone to get a COVID-19 vaccine. As much as I love the fact that the vaccines are available and are a real blessing--something of a modern medical miracle--I can't get comfortable with the idea of using violence to force people, who have another opinion, to comply. It seems morally problematic and morally unjustified--for that matter, indefensible--for the government to tell someone, ``If you don't get this shot, you will get fired;'' and, in fact, to tell their employer, ``You must fire this person if this person doesn't get the vaccine, even if this person has a good-faith religious belief against it, even if this person has natural immunity or has some particular medical condition causing his or her board-certified medical doctor to advise against receiving the jab.'' That isn't moral to say to that person, ``You didn't comply with a Presidential medical edict, so you are fired;'' and to tell the employer, ``If you don't fire that person, you are going to be the subject of punitive fines that will cripple any business.'' And I literally mean any business. I don't think there is a business in America subject to these mandates that could survive the crippling, deliberately cruel fines that are levied under them--not a one. This isn't right. It is not moral. Deep down we know it. In fact, according to a recent poll conducted and reported by Axios-- hardly a rightwing publication--it involved a question, and the poll question was something along the lines of: Should a person who declines to be vaccinated be fired for not being vaccinated? And 14 percent agreed that that is OK--14 percent. Only 14 out of 100 Americans said: Yeah, that makes sense, that is OK; fire this person, fire him, fire her. They don't matter. It is compounded when you look at the tragedies imposed by the individual circumstances. The soldier; the sailor; the airman; the marine; the TSA worker; the Federal contractor; the employee of a subcontractor of a company with one Federal contract who does mostly non-Federal work; the mom, the dad working in a factory, in a school, in a floral shop--if any of those either have a Federal contract or have more than 99 employees, all of those people are having their livelihoods threatened. It is not just a job. It is, in many cases--as is the case in the healthcare industry, for example--people who have spent a lifetime acquiring the skills and professional certifications, the degrees, the training, the education necessary in order to participate in that profession. Many of these people, by the way, throughout the darkest hours of the pandemic, were the people working hardest to protect Americans, to make sure they had access to the healthcare they needed. Those same people are now being told: You are not good enough. You don't deserve a job. You are going to be fired, even if you have a medical condition that precludes it. Even if this could be morally justified, which it can't, one must ask the question asked by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit: Does Congress, does the Federal Government, have the power to order such a widespread vaccine mandate? It doesn't. The OSHA mandate, for example, constitutionally, it would have to be predicated on Congress's authority under the Commerce Clause, which gives us the power to regulate trade or commerce between the States, with foreign nations, and with the Indian Tribes. Even as that provision of the Constitution has been interpreted really broadly since 1937--even under that broad interpretation, one that has seen only three acts of Congress over the last 84 years being deemed outside of Congress's authority under the Commerce Clause--when you have to almost try hard to pass legislation predicated on Commerce Clause authority that doesn't fall within it, but even under that, this doesn't pass the test. It is not, by its nature, economic activity. In fact, it is not activity. You are punishing nonactivity. Even under these high watermark precedents from the New Deal era establishing a very deferential standard of review for exercises of Commerce Clause authority by Congress, this doesn't even pass that. And even if it did, which it doesn't, you would still have to identify the case of the OSHA mandate a definable delegation of authority from Commerce using some intelligible principle authorizing this kind of action. You will not find that. It is not there. I have reviewed upside down, sideways, backwards, forwards the statutory text at issue with regard to OSHA. It does not provide this authority. The moral authority is lacking. The constitutional authority is lacking. There is no power delegated by the Congress to OSHA to do this. It is not defensible. I am glad that delays on some of these mandates have been imposed. I am glad that OSHA is at least agreeing to comply with the order of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit; and, at least for the duration of that litigation, enforcement will be halted. I hope and I fully expect that the ultimate resolution of that case will be consistent with what the Fifth Circuit ruled last week. In fact, I have little doubt that it will be. This is, in some ways, the most brazen act of Presidential overreach that we have seen in a single directive, since President Harry Truman, on April 8, 1952, issued an order seizing every steel mill in the United States for steel production related to the Korean war effort. Mercifully, the U.S. Supreme Court was able to intervene and, within a couple of months, invalidated that action. This one is even clearer than that; but, more importantly, this one is more emotionally compelling than that. That unconstitutional act of Presidential overreach affected a handful of steel companies. It certainly affected thousands upon thousands of workers. It didn't have the ability to affect directly or indirectly every single man, woman, and child in America. This one does. That is one of the reasons why these moral and statutory and constitutional questions matter so much. That is why I have been coming to the floor every day, and why I will continue to do so indefinitely as long as it takes. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I appreciate the thoughtful remarks from my friend and colleague, the distinguished Senator from the State of Oregon. The Senator from Oregon and I have spent a lot of time working on a number of issues together. He and I agree on a number of issues and have worked together to ensure the privacy of the American people and make sure that they are protected from an overreaching government, one that sometimes has intruded on them in violation of the spirit, if not also the letter, of the Fourth Amendment. I remember when I first came to the Senate, the Senator from Oregon took me to lunch and we had a good chat. He introduced me to a lot of concepts in the Senate and has always been a good friend to me. I feel the need to respond to some of these issues. Yes, I, too, like my friend and colleague, the distinguished Senator from Oregon, wish that we didn't have to come to the floor to discuss these things. I wish that it weren't necessary because I wish that we weren't even talking about firing people, about people losing their jobs, becoming unemployed and possibly unemployable as a result of Federal policy that refuses to allow people to make decisions on their own. Insofar as my friend, the Senator from Oregon, describes the policy of firing people who refuse to get the vaccine as necessary to protect the elderly, I would respectfully submit that quite the opposite is true. We are actually imperiling those who might need medical treatment the most, including the sick and the elderly. Insofar as we destabilize our healthcare workforce--which, make no mistake, this maximum mandate does; it does that unquestionably-- remember that the CMS mandate that we are talking about, unlike the OSHA mandate, doesn't give any option to allow for testing, for example, if someone has a religious or a moral or a medical objection to the mandate. So what this really is going to do is it is going to take a lot of people out of the healthcare workforce and sideline them. Yes, this is going to be devastating to those individuals. You are suddenly taking away their means of providing for their needs and those of their family. It would be absolutely devastating to them, as I mentioned a minute ago. This is also a field in which they invested a lot of time and money-- sweat, blood, and tears--to getting the education and professional certifications necessary to work in a field that has a lot of requirements attached to it, and with good reason. It is not good for anyone, least of all the elderly, to destabilize that same workforce. Insofar as we are going to talk about what is better for the healthcare system, I just would respectfully reach the exact opposite conclusion of that proposed by my friend from Oregon. This isn't going to make things better. It is going to make things worse. My friend from Oregon also described the approach that I am taking of protecting the individual healthcare worker's right to make an appropriate decision without government interference; described that and, as I understood it, my other efforts to try to curb the more egregious impacts of the vaccine mandates imposed by the Biden administration as somehow unnecessarily suppressing access to the vaccine. I want to make very clear that just is not accurate. I would state that as not at all consistent with what I am doing. Not a single one of my proposals would suppress access to the vaccine. Each time I have come to the floor and talked about these things, I have made very clear that I have been vaccinated. Every member of my family has been vaccinated. I have encouraged everyone I know to get the vaccine. The vaccine, really, is a medical miracle of sorts, and it is one that is protecting a lot of people. Not everyone agrees with me. But the fact that they don't agree with me, the fact that they don't agree with President Biden or anyone else in government doesn't mean they should lose their job for it. But it sure as heck doesn't mean that firing them because they won't get the vaccine and then opposing the effort to force their firing would somehow amount to an act of suppressing access to the vaccine. That is a logical syllogism that just doesn't work. In no way, shape, or form would we be suppressing access to the vaccine if we liberated the American people from an overreaching executive who is insisting that people be fired if they don't agree with the President's officially sanctioned view on vaccines. My friend also noted that people are safer when they get vaccinated. I believe this is generally true. I don't think it is going to encourage more people to get vaccinated by telling them that they are going to get fired if they don't. Particularly with the subject matter we are covering today, where we are talking about the CMS end of the vaccine, these are people who work in healthcare. These are people who are highly educated in it, who have professional certifications, in many cases, graduate degrees in healthcare. They can make their own informed decision as to what to do. I tend to believe that people are generally safer when they get vaccinated, but that doesn't mean that firing them is the right thing to do. Look, finally, my friend from Oregon--and I don't use that term loosely. He and I talk regularly. He was in my office earlier today, and we were talking about an upcoming game between the University of Utah and Oregon. When he refers to frightening remarks regarding the vaccine, I am not sure what he is referring to. I hope he is not referring to remarks debating the merits, or lack thereof, of vaccine mandates. Nothing about these remarks should strike anyone as frightening. What I think would be frightening would be if tens, if not hundreds, of millions of Americans are threatened with getting fired based on their refusal to get the vaccine. I don't think we will ever reach a point where there are that many people who decide not to get vaccinated. It is certainly not going to be hundreds of millions of people declining to be vaccinated. But whatever the number is, it still doesn't make it right for the President of the United States to just decide arbitrarily that they either have to follow his medical advice and that of his administration or get fired; to choose between getting an undesired medical procedure, or, on the other hand, losing their opportunity to put bread on the table for their children. It is not constitutional. It is not within Congress's power. Congress hasn't exercised that power. It certainly hasn't given that power to the President of the United States. Regardless of all those statutory and constitutional arguments, this is a fundamentally, morally flawed proposition that says everyone has to get this; and if you disagree, you will get fired; we will render you unemployed and unemployable. This is wrong, and it is especially wrong to do to our healthcare workers. Let's not do this. I urge my friend and colleague from Oregon to reconsider. We can do better than that. The American people expect more. They demand better, and we need to listen to them.

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, yesterday, I came to the Senate floor and spoke on President Biden's vaccine mandate. I explained that I have now come to this Chamber a total of 16 times and offered 12 different bills that would counteract, limit, or, in one way or another, restrain the vaccine mandate. I also explained that, unfortunately, each of these bills has been rejected by Democrats in the Senate. I have spoken to Utahns and folks from across country who have expressed to me their frustration at moving goalposts and changing expectations in the middle of the pandemic. President Biden's vaccine mandate, which has been halted now by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, happens to be among the latest attempts to force Americans to make health decisions under the threat not just of unemployment but also under the threat of becoming unemployable. That is a taxing burden for anyone to bear. Anyone who has kids at home or if they don't have kids at home, if they are just supporting themselves, these days all Americans are helping someone or something that they love, that they care about, and they ought to have the opportunity do that. They ought not have their ability to make a living threatened by virtue of a distinct religious belief or a particular medical concern or a particular desire not to receive a particular treatment. I will reiterate here what I have said before. I have been vaccinated. My family has been vaccinated. I believe that the vaccines are helping countless Americans be protected against the dangers of the COVID-19 virus. Just the same, there is a big difference between believing the vaccine does good and receiving the vaccine, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, saying that anyone who disagrees or who thinks that it is not right for them, for one reason or another, ought to be fired from their job and rendered unemployable as a result. That is very, very different. That is something that very few Americans would agree is right. In fact, according to a recent Axios poll, only 14 percent of Americans believe that someone who decides not to get the vaccine should be fired as a result of that decision. Now, in some lines of work, this sort of thing is already coming into play. For example, our military servicemembers and frontline workers who sacrificed so much to care for and protect the American people during the pandemic are already being forced out of work. I have heard from many members of our Armed Services from Utah who are being discharged under less-than-honorable conditions and under conditions that are in no way, shape, or form appropriate in light of their many, many years of faithful, honorable service to this country. They are losing their jobs--and not just their jobs but also their benefits, their dignity, their ability to serve further. You know, I have introduced and offered up a bill that would help them, but Democrats objected to that. On November 4 of this year, a couple of weeks ago, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services--known as CMS--imposed a requirement that all healthcare workers at facilities participating in Medicare and Medicaid be vaccinated by January 4. This requirement, if it takes effect, will affect millions of Americans in tens of thousands of care centers across the Nation. And unlike the mandate imposed by OSHA, which has now mercifully been stayed, at least for the pendency of the litigation pending in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, this mandate--this particular mandate--gives no option for testing if someone has religious, moral, or medical objections to the vaccine. Now, let's just think about this on an individual level. There are nurses in this country who worked faithfully and tirelessly throughout the pandemic, without regard to their own circumstances, in some cases without regard to their own health, their own sanity, putting their lives at risk at times. They have gone to work caring for others, and they have saved lives in the process. They accepted the risk, and they were rightfully heralded as heroes for doing that. They still are heroes, and they still should be heralded as heroes. But many of these same nurses caught COVID at work and have recovered. They are, in fact, heroes. But now the Biden administration is giving them an extraordinary--and I would add extraordinarily cruel--ultimatum; one that I don't think I have ever seen in government; one that I didn't ever expect I would see in government. Those very same doctors and nurses and other healthcare workers--the same people we appropriately described as heroes--can either get a medical procedure they don't want or lose their current employment and any future realistic prospect of employment. Let that sink in for a moment. What if this were you? What if this were your spouse or your child, someone you loved? What if this were your friend or your neighbor? The truth is, these people fit into all those categories. They are not our enemies. They are our friends, our neighbors, our family members, our loved ones. At a minimum, they are people who served valiantly throughout a pandemic, and they should not be punished; they should be thanked. These heroes will be thanked for their service with a pink slip and a boot out the door as they become outcasts in the very profession that they have selflessly chosen and the very profession for which they have spent a lot of money and a lot of time receiving training and the very profession to which they dedicated their lives. What a tragedy. What a needless, senseless tragedy. These are not abstract anecdotes. This isn't just hypotheticals, speculation. No, not at all. I have heard from hundreds of Utahns who risk losing their employment if these vaccine mandates take effect. They are everyday Americans. They are good Americans. They are valiant Americans. Oftentimes, they are struggling to make ends meet and to feed their families. They are our neighbors, our friends, our caretakers, our heroes. They deserve the respect that is necessarily implicit in the ability to make decisions for themselves, including these decisions for themselves. Additionally, as a practical matter, it is extremely foolish to be pushing healthcare professionals out of their jobs at the precise moment when our healthcare system is under such incredible strain. Hospitals are understaffed as it is. I mean, a lot of places are understaffed. Hospitals are particularly understaffed even without this mandate. So requiring medical facilities to fire perfectly good doctors and nurses and technicians is only going to further strain our system and place more Americans at risk of serious harm. So today I am offering my 13th bill in the effort to curb the vaccine mandates. My Respecting Our Frontline Workers Act would simply prohibit any Federal Agency from requiring that staff and healthcare facilities be vaccinated against COVID-19 as a condition of that facility being able to participate in Medicare, Medicaid, and CHIP. But this bill would provide certainty to our Nation's healthcare heroes and honor the sacrifices that they have made to help Americans in need at a time when we were, as a country, facing great need. It will keep our healthcare system strong during what is still a really difficult time. This bill is the reasonable, compassionate answer to the current situation. I encourage my colleagues to support it. To that end, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 3225, which is at the desk; I further ask that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, last week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued an emergency stay on President Biden's sweeping vaccine mandate. The court granted the stay, citing ``grave statutory and constitutional issues'' with the mandate. The 22-page order is persuasive and compelling in explaining the grave effects the mandate will have on businesses and individuals alike throughout the United States. The order also explains that the limited nature of the Federal Government under the Constitution simply doesn't allow for sweeping mandates of this nature, generally, but it certainly doesn't allow for sweeping mandates like this one without an act of Congress. You see, our powers within the Federal Government are carefully circumscribed; they are carefully constrained. The Constitution brings about a balancing, a limitation on powers that operate along two axes. The vertical constraint is called federalism, and the horizontal constraint is something we refer to as the separation of powers. The Federal Government's powers are, as James Madison described them in Federalist No. 45, ``few and defined,'' while those reserved to the States are ``numerous and indefinite.'' Likewise, within the three branches, we have these protections in place to make sure that no one person can exercise what power the Federal Government does have exclusively; you can't accumulate too much power. So the President of the United States, under our constitutional system, isn't a King and may not rule by decree. He is not free to just do things because he thinks they are a good idea. The judges also, refreshingly, asserted the commerce clause of the Constitution and brought up the commerce clause as the source of the claimed authority for Federal action under this circumstance, noting that, even under broad interpretations of the commerce clause that we have seen from the Federal court system since 1937, the commerce clause is not unlimited in the scope of the authority that it provides to the Federal Government, and in this case, it certainly doesn't authorize the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to issue a sweeping vaccine mandate on all companies with more than 99 employees nor does the commerce clause even authorize Congress to undertake such an action, which, of course, Congress has not undertaken. We have erred dangerously, over many decades, from the true application of the Constitution's limits. In many respects, we have lost sight even of the fact that this is a government of limited powers, and now that lack of those limits--the lack of respect for those limits within those who operate the Federal Government--is placing millions of Americans at risk of not only becoming unemployed but, in many cases, unemployable. Some in Congress are, today, taking it even further in asking the President of the United States to impose a vaccine or a test mandate as a condition precedent for interstate travel. Now, I have heard from hundreds of Utahns who are at risk of losing their jobs because of this now, thankfully, halted mandate. These are not bad people. To the contrary, they are good people. They are our neighbors and our friends. They are everyday Americans who are all too often just trying to get by to provide for their families. They are not our enemies, and it is troubling to think that the President of the United States said--on national television no less--that he is ``losing [his] patience'' with them. What does that even mean? In fact, recent polling numbers show that, if anything, it appears to be the other way around. We are losing patience with him and with his broad assertions of authority that he doesn't even have. I have come to the Senate floor about 15 times now to oppose this vaccine mandate. I have offered a dozen bills to limit, clarify, or otherwise counteract the vaccine mandate. Each time, one or another of my colleagues from the other side of the aisle has objected to what should be uncontroversial bills. Let's review each of these that we have gone through so far. Now, this started back on September 28 with S. 2850. This bill, S. 2850, would have provided exemptions for those with religious or moral objections to the vaccine mandate. President Biden, significantly, had promised these exemptions would be in the mandate, but for some reason--for some reason that I struggle to understand--Senate Democrats, nonetheless, objected to the passage of that bill. So then I came back, and I offered up S. 2840, the Don't Jab Me Act, a bill that would require that the Federal Government make those who suffer from the vaccine mandate financially whole. The Democrats rejected that bill too. Next, I offered S. 2843, the No Taxation Without Congressional Consent Act, a bill that would require congressional authorization before the fines associated with the mandate could be charged to businesses. Notwithstanding the fact that the Constitution is very clear about where taxes need to originate within our system of government, the Democrats objected to that bill as well. So then I came back with another bill. This time it was S. 2848, the Your Health Comes First Act. This is a bill that would offer exemptions from the mandate to those who have preexisting medical or other health concerns about the vaccine. This is also another exemption that President Biden himself promised in his speech when first announcing the vaccine mandate, but it is an exemption that the Senate Democrats, apparently, didn't feel worthy of codifying with legislation, and so they objected to that one too. This one was particularly surprising because if, in fact, President Biden himself felt comfortable with those exemptions, one would think that there wouldn't be discomfort with codifying what he himself said should be the law. So then, in response to that, I returned to this Chamber on another day, and I offered up S. 2846, the Natural Immunity is Real Act. This bill would require that the Federal vaccine mandate recognize natural immunity. Countries across the world recognize this immunity for the powerful protection that it, in fact, provides, a protection that, according to some studies, may be as much as 27 times stronger than that offered by the vaccine alone. Unfortunately, President Biden's mandate wasn't so generous on that point. This bill, too, was rejected by the Democrats, disregarding science's showing the very real impact of natural immunity. So I came back, and I offered up S. 2847, the Let Me Travel America Act. Now, this bill would prohibit the requirement of vaccination before citizens could travel between the States. Apparently, the Democrats want to leave that option open because they objected to that one too. Well, that one is not in the vaccine mandate. It is feared, as I mentioned a few minutes ago, that that might be on the table. Apparently, it still is because people were unwilling to codify what should be a natural conclusion for most Americans to reach, which is that our right to travel from one State to another without permission from the Federal Government ought not be interfered with and that it is fundamental that we shouldn't mess with it. That is why it was unfortunate that this one, too, drew an objection. So I returned. I hoped that this body could give some assurance and some respect to the brave men and women of our military who are at risk of losing benefits and losing the right to serve over this vaccine mandate. So my bill that I offered that day, S. 2842, the Respecting Our Servicemembers Act, would protect servicemembers from losing their livelihoods and their benefits--that they have accrued and earned through their valiant service--as a result of the mandate. The Democrats objected to this one too. That is particularly sad. These are heroes. These are people on whom we rely to keep us safe. We ought to give them more trust than that. We ought to not put them in a position in which many of them are facing a difficult decision. So I offered another bill. I returned to this body, and I offered a bill that should be one of the least controversial measures that we have ever considered, not just about the vaccine mandate but about anything. That bill, the Parental Consent for Vaccination Act, would have simply required that parental consent be provided before COVID-19 vaccines were given to children. The Democrats objected to that as well. So I came back, and I offered the Transparency in COVID-19 Vaccination Act. This bill would have provided information regarding vaccine side effects to the public. It would have just made sure that the American people had access to that information. I thought information would build confidence in the vaccines. The Democrats disagreed, and they objected. Apparently, that was too much. I don't know why people wouldn't want more information. I actually think that would have built confidence in the vaccine, but, apparently, they didn't see it that way or maybe they just didn't want people to have access to the information. I don't know. I can't speak for them. I just know they objected. So I came back for the 10th time. I offered up the Transparency in COVID-19 Research Act. This bill would have provided research and information drawn from that research--that the American taxpayers are paying for--to the public, that should be available to the public. We pay for that research. We ought to know what the findings are. The government shouldn't have anything to hide and wouldn't have anything to hide here, but the Democrats disagreed, and they objected to that one as well. So I tried again. I came back, and I offered up S. 2851, the Transparency in COVID-19 Expenditures Act. This bill is just a good housekeeping measure. It is a commonsense measure. It is not something that should have been either liberal or conservative or thought of as Republican or Democratic. It is just a good housekeeping matter. You know, I think it is strange that it would be controversial, given the simplicity of what it would do. It would simply call for an audit regarding how our COVID-19 funds have been spent. I thought the information would be helpful to us as we make policy moving forward, and yet the Democrats objected to that one. So I tried again. I offered a 12th bill that would simply end the mandate. The No Forced Vaccination for COVID-19 Act would clarify that Federal law does not authorize OSHA or any other Federal Agency to implement a general vaccine mandate, but the Democrats objected to that one too. Twelve times--twelve bills. Some were simpler than others. Some should have involved no controversy whatsoever. Some just inserted good principles of lawmaking or constitutionalism generally or federalism in particular. Each one was rejected, one right after the other after the other, repeated 12 times. Thankfully, while some in this body have floundered, judges on the Fifth Circuit fulfilled their duty to the American people and their oaths to the Constitution. That does not mean, however, that this fight is anywhere near over. It will continue in the courts, where the States and the Biden administration will each be able to make their case. But I am also going to continue this fight here. I will stand for those Utahns and those Americans who are at risk specifically because of this mandate. It is also important for us to remember that separate and apart from what the courts might do, we have an independent obligation, having each taken an oath to uphold and protect and defend the Constitution of the United States in the fulfillment of our duties. We need to make sure that before authority is exercised--especially authority operating in such a personal manner on such a personal issue as this--that power isn't being taken from those to whom it belongs. The power in our system of government belongs to the people, and in the absence of a delegation of power to the Federal Government, that power is retained by the States respectively or by the people. So we ought to be looking at this carefully and closely, analyzing it on our own. We can't assume that the Federal courts will save us from our own unconstitutional actions. I have been critical of Presidents of both political parties when they have taken actions that exceed the scope of their authority as President of the United States or of actions enacted by the legislative branch under the direction of either political party that exceed the power of the Federal Government. This is an issue that is not Republican or Democratic. It is not liberal. It is not conservative. It is simply an American issue. It is a constitutional issue. We ought to be debating it, discussing these things here, and not waiting for the courts to act. One of the profound frustrations that I have encountered over the years is that sometimes people will conflate the issue of constitutionality with litigation. They will assume that constitutional issues are those that have to be addressed in the courts and only in the courts. Fortunately, we have the courts to adjudicate disputes and the meaning of statutes and provisions of the Constitution, but that doesn't excuse us of our responsibility to provide an independent check and balance to make sure that authority isn't being exercised where it should not. It is especially important where, as here, we are dealing with a fundamentally misguided and, I believe, immoral proposition; that is, that individual Americans, hard-working moms and dads throughout this country, ought ever to be put into a position by their government to choose between, on the one hand, receiving a medical procedure that they may not want or to which they may have religious or other moral objections or which they might have a specific health concern, for example--they ought not ever be put in a position where they have to choose between that unwanted medical procedure on the one hand and on the other hand, the ability to put bread on the table for their children. That is not right. The American people know it, and deep down, they know something is terribly wrong whenever one person can, with the stroke of the Executive pen, issue so broad, so deep, and so immoral a mandate. I am not going to stand for this. I will be back. I will be back tomorrow. I will be back the next day. I will be back as often as it takes, as long as it takes. I am not going to stop until we win this fight. Thank you. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. LEE

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

Mr. LEE

Mr. LEE. Mr. President, months ago, as Americans watched harrowing video footage of the Afghanistan evacuation efforts, service men and women from around the world rose to the challenge of a complex mission. As the chaos persisted, the 82nd Airborne Division of the U.S. Army was called on to support noncombatant evacuation operations--NEO--at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Afghanistan. They completed their mission honorably. One member of the 82nd Airborne Division, Sgt. Breanna J. Jessop, a chaplain assistant, assumed the role as the noncommissioned officer-- NCO--in charge of the airport chapel. Sergeant Jessop, despite tremendous obstacles of ongoing and imminent threats, conducted herself with courage, discipline, and attention to detail. Her work saved many. Always putting the well-being of her fellow soldiers first, Sergeant Jessop used her ingenuity to ensure 4,000 U.S. military personnel and coalition forces had access to basic hygiene items at a time when resources were, at best, limited. Further, she made time to assist soldiers with religious support, help care for those who had suffered casualties, and ensure the well-being of the soldiers with whom she served. At the height of the NEO mission, Sergeant Jessop showed outstanding leadership. She oversaw the operation of an entire orphanage that had been formed as a result of the increase in unaccompanied minors at the airport. She led the mission to assist in caring for children and offered assistance for children ranging from newborn babies to 17 years old. As a result of her untiring humanitarian efforts, over 400 displaced children were kept safe during the NEO mission. Outside of her assigned duties and responsibilities, Sergeant Jessop, has helped pioneer the Under the Canopy Program which serves as a touchpoint forum for lower enlisted paratroopers. There, she provides vital leadership to assist with planning, preparing, and overseeing the execution of each event. Her work helps hundreds of paratroopers each month to identify issues and discuss new and ongoing initiatives. Sgt. Breanna J. Jessop, a native of Myton, UT, truly represents the U.S. Army values and what it means to be a paratrooper and Sky Dragon soldier. About Sergeant Jessop, Maj. Gen. Chris Donahue once said, ``There are so many different words that you could use to describe her: strength, resilience, willingness to share what others would never be willing to . . . that's the type of remarkable person and paratrooper that she is.'' I could not agree more. Sergeant Jessop was recently recognized by the United Service Organizations as the 2021 Service Member of the Year. This award is fitting and well-deserved. Yet no award will ever fully honor the service of Sergeant Jessop. Her dedicated service to the children orphaned at Hamid Karzai International Airport and her fellow servicemembers is commendable and will be remembered and revered in the hearts of many for years to come.