Jeff Merkley

Mr. MERKLEY

Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, I thank my colleague from Connecticut for bringing his experience in the legal world to bear on this extraordinary development of secret police being deployed on the streets of America. As we heard from the President, he wants to expand this model. It was first in DC. Then it was Portland. Now he is talking about Philadelphia and Baltimore, Chicago and Detroit, Oakland. In other words, all across America, as the President says, where there happens to be Democratic mayors, he wants to go create that same mayhem. Thank you for bringing your expertise to bear on this. I had just read the story from Krista about the moms and the protesters all getting, as she put, it ``GASSED BAD.'' She said, ``It was brutal. . . . coughing and burning 4 hours later.'' Then she closes with, ``C'mon dads . . . we have [to have] meaningful change. Don't give up. . . . `' I was thinking about what I am describing, as I read these stories, or what these women are describing is the transition from this setting, where women are dancing; they are holding flowers; they are singing; they are chanting; they are eating ribs; and what unfolded a few moments later. And what unfolded? Two of these stories, so far, have described the sudden appearance of large men in camouflage, armed with sidearms, who shortly started to shoot them, gas them, spray them, throw flashbang grenades, tackle them--in one case, hogtie a woman who was a few feet away. And you can see how terrifying--these are men dressed for war against women dancing and holding flowers. This is beyond wrong. This is inconceivable. These unmarked, no agency, no unique identifier secret police--what my colleague just referred to like the little green men in Russia, coming to sweep people off the streets and throw them into unmarked vans. These pictures, I understand, are from 2 nights ago, and people were describing to me how batons were brought down--one on the neck of a woman--how they were thrown to the ground. This is showing maybe some of that right there. I can't imagine how terrified this woman was. Think about this: Within this week where we are recognizing John Lewis passing away--here is John Lewis on the Edmund Pettus Bridge being beaten by so-called public safety officers; I think they were Alabama police, but I am not sure who they were; they have badges; at least they weren't secret police--and this scene from 2 nights ago in Portland, these women being assaulted by these men ready for war with every armament you can think about, including impact projectiles; that is, rubber bullets and gas and flashbang grenades and batons, assaulting these women dressed in yellow T-shirts. I want to stress, as this last letter did, that for weeks and weeks and weeks before there was a ``wall of moms,'' protesters of every race were coming down to say we must reform systemic racism in America, and they, too, were peacefully protesting, and they, too, were standing, often with arms linked. The outrage over the Federal troops being deployed with these secret police tactics has swelled the numbers, including this most recent protest, but let's not think for a moment there haven't been people of great courage week after week, many of them organized and led by the Black population and Black leaders of Portland. How is it possible--Edmund Pettus Bridge, where a little over a year ago I was standing with my daughter and John Lewis, remembering what happened back when, when out-of-control leaders sent well-armed men to brutally assault peaceful protesters, and now, once again, we have out- of-control men, the President of the United States, sending well-armed men to brutally beat peaceful protesters. How is this conceivable? Protesters of all kinds have been working hard to basically say let's have public safety that works for all. But what is the President doing? While he is sending these forces to brutally beat peaceful protesters, he is running campaign ads, and here it is: ``You won't be safe in Joe Biden's America. Paid for by Donald J. Trump for President.'' He is deliberately assaulting peaceful protesters in order to run campaign commercials that say he is a strong man who can reduce violence in America. Let us all beware how twisted this is, how evil this is, how wrong this is, how much of an assault on the civil liberties of Americans this is, and how much we have a responsibility, having taken an oath to the Constitution, to put an end to it, which is why I am down here for the third day in a row saying: Let's insist that Federal officers be identified by whom they represent, the agency. Let's insist Federal officers have a unique identifier. Let's insist that if their mission is to protect a Federal building, they are on the perimeter of the Federal building, not sweeping through the streets of Portland, throwing people into unmarked vans That is my amendment. That is the amendment I am asking to be considered on this floor. Isn't it our responsibility to debate when egregious things happen in America, like a strongman, authoritarian President trampling on the Constitution by assaulting peaceful protestors with Federal forces? Isn't it our responsibility to debate it and vote on whether secret police are allowed in the United States of America? I have been reading these letters from the women who were down there. I will read one or two more, and then I am going to yield to my colleague from Oregon. As the two Senators from Oregon, we have heard from hundreds of people who have been protesting peacefully over these weeks and how hard local leaders have worked to deescalate, and how Trump, sending in these Federal forces to beat protestors--peaceful protestors--has completely escalated the situation, rather than deescalating it, all so Donald Trump can run a campaign commercial and try to persuade you he should be President. This story recounting is written by Joy, and she was down there with Krista, so she starts out: I don't know how my friend, Krista, managed to take a picture during the madness of this moment. I could not see anything and was struggling to breathe through the mass of foamy snot provoked by teargas that filled my mask. And she had posted a picture that Krista had taken of her right after she had been gassed. I don't think I have the--do I have the picture? I might have. Let me see if we can--no. If I find it, I will put it up. Getting gassed was painful and scary, yet still I felt secure and cared for by the several helpers that aided us with water and saline eye washes. Several people checked in to see if we were ok and help. That is the beautiful part of this otherwise unpleasant image. This is me on my knees, being helped by strangers. The ugly part of this moment is what happened before this . . . the moment when federal agents blasted us with teargas and rubber bullets despite ZERO provocation from our line of moms . . . we were simply standing side by side with linked arms. That's it. For no apparent reason they shot at a bunch of moms without giving a single warning. Nope, no warning. No request to move. They just blasted away at us like they were playing a video game. I yield to my colleague from Oregon and reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, across America, crowds have been assembling, saying: This is a moment in which we must not only have a national conversation about public safety and racism, but we need action. We need to change the scenario that exists in so many places where public safety departments have seen one group of citizens in a community as their clients and another group of citizens as the threat, which leads to systemic racism, differences in approach depending on the color of the skin of the person that you are dealing with. It may be as simple as saying: Let's stop that person. They have dark skin, and they are driving through this neighborhood, and maybe they don't belong here. Let's stop that person because they have dark skin, and maybe they are dealing drugs. That is systemic racism and profiling. This is a discussion about what value we should aim for here in America. That value is that every member of the community is a client; that there is the goal of providing equal public safety services to all and treating each and every person the same regardless of the color of their skin; and to have each public safety officer say ``How would I respond differently if I saw three young teenagers running toward a house and they were Black rather than White?'' and taking that into account and saying ``Would it change that? Would I respond the same?'' They are all our clients. We are here to serve everyone. That is the national discussion. People come into the streets and protest. This is a group of African-American, Black American protesters in Oregon. One of them is wearing a T-shirt saying ``We March, we sit down, we speak up, we die.'' When I read that, I was thinking about the experience I had a number of years ago when a Black American was working with me rebuilding a house, helping me out for a few weeks. We went out into suburban Maryland. This was back in the 1980s. We were trying to find a particular part or piece of equipment. We didn't know where that speciality store was. We pulled up next to a sheriff. The sheriff's car had two White sheriffs in it and a shotgun propped up between the seats. I said to my friend: Hey, roll down your window and ask those sheriffs where this place is. He started to roll down the window. He looked over and saw the two White sheriffs with the gun between them, and he never said a word. He just turned back. He looked straight ahead, and he looked terrified. I saw those sheriffs as people who work for me--who should work for everyone--and we could ask them for their help. He saw them as people who--if he started a dialogue with them, he might end up in deep trouble, in physical harm. That is what this conversation is about. That is what we are seeking to change in America. This idea of protesting for change is as American as apple pie. This is as American as the American Revolution, people standing up and saying: This is not right. Freedom of speech and freedom of assembly are core values of what it means to be a ``we the people'' republic. These protesters--often African American, often of many races--have been coming together. There have been some folks--often younger folks-- who have come to cause a bit of trouble that goes beyond simple protesting. We had a challenge in Portland of White extremists--often dressing in camouflage, antifa members who are looking for a fight--conflicting, often late at night. Portland has worked very hard to deescalate that situation--to deescalate it, to empower the message that the protesters are bringing about restructuring systemic racism, ending systemic racism. These acts, these conflicts, take away from that message. As they worked so hard to deescalate, along came President Trump. Trump had a different objective: He wanted to escalate violence on the streets of Portland. I can tell you, there is a huge difference between protesting and making your message known and respecting that and having a government that respects it. It is our government, our ``we the people'' government. And this a government--an Executive in the Oval Office who deploys Federal forces to create chaos and violence and to attack peaceful protesters. I have come to the floor twice in the last 2 days to go through and show the camouflaged, battle-ready troops deployed by Trump who are coming in a secret fashion, eliminating any indication of whom they work for. Are they Customs and Border Protection? Are they Federal Protective Service? Are they U.S. Marshals? They have no identity and have stripped all their unique identifiers, which means they can club a peaceful protester, they can shoot them in the head, and nobody knows who did it because there is no ID on their uniform. There is no accountability and no discipline and outrageous attacks on peaceful protesters. I was here speaking yesterday, and I asked for consideration be given on this floor for my amendment to end secret policing. It is a very simple amendment that says: You wear identification of your agency. You wear a unique identifier. You don't go outside your mission of protecting a Federal building unless you are in partnership with a Governor or a mayor. It is that simple. So simple. But my Republican colleague came down and objected to consideration of this amendment. I think, in essence, he didn't believe the story I am presenting. He didn't believe the story I am telling you about peaceful protesters being attacked. Maybe because it is so outside the conception of what a President would do, the thought is just hard to acknowledge, that we have a President who embraces this secret police strategy of assaulting peaceful protesters and grabbing people out of the crowd and throwing them into unmarked vans. It is hard to imagine. It is hard to imagine a President of the United States admiring authoritarian dictators across the planet, but we have a President who admires the authoritarian dictator-style tactics of Duterte in the Philippines and who admires the Crown Prince, who assassinated and dismembered an American-based reporter for the Washington Post. We have a President who admires Putin, who crushes the civil rights of his people. We have a President who admires the strong-arm tactics Erdogan is employing in Turkey. That is what we have. Until now, he didn't bring the secret police to the streets of America; now he has. I am going to try a different way of conveying what is going on and do it in the voices of women who were there at the protests 2 nights ago to try to convey what is happening on the streets of Portland and how terribly, terribly wrong it is. The message ``All Mothers Were Summoned When He Called Out to His Mama'' is a reference to George Floyd dying with a policeman's knee on his neck, cutting off either his air or his carotid artery, blood supply to his brain or both, killing him. So mamas have responded. They said: Let's go join the protesters as well. Surely this is not the case, that they are attacking peaceful protesters. They formed a group who went down, and they did things like dancing and chanting and handing out flowers, like this woman here. Isn't she beautiful? She is coming down, holding a sunflower. Others were holding mums. It is unimaginable that a President of the United States would send Federal troops to attack women like this, holding peaceful flowers and dancing and singing in the streets. But they were scared because they knew that peaceful protesters had been attacked previously, so some of them wore goggles, and some of them wore bike helmets. But let's hear from the women in their own words. Two of these women work on my team. I didn't know they were going to go down. I didn't know until last night that they had gone down the previous night, that they had been there. They had experiences, and they chose to share their experiences. I have maybe another five or six things that women wrote up about their experiences and posted them. I will try to share those, reading it in their voice. The first one is from Stacey Jochimsen: I joined the Wall of Moms in Portland on Tuesday night to support black and brown Americans and voice my concerns about police violence in our city. I showed up in cut off shorts and a yellow shirt--the identifier for the Portland Wall of Moms--I was wearing sneakers and carrying yellow mums and sunflowers that other moms had gifted me on my way in. We participated in hours of dancing, chanting, and singing. It was a beautiful protest on a warm Oregon night. I saw no violence, I felt safe. We were demanding change. We were standing up for our black and brown brothers and sisters; we were there to amplify their voices. Was there graffiti? Sure there was. Graffiti is not violence. At around 11 p.m., the Wall of Moms was called to the front of the federal courthouse. We went. We stood--arms linked-- facing the building, creating a wall of protection between protesters and the building. We were moms called to use our privilege to keep others safe, and we tried. While we stood, arms linked, officers in fatigues and gas masks (we assume were federal, they were unidentified) rushed from the building and from behind us. There was no warning. They took a woman to the ground and hog-tied her on the steps of the Courthouse. They swiped at cell phones and yelled at us from behind gas masks. They pointed weapons at us. Us. We were non-violent, peaceful demonstrators. We were moms in Converse sneakers holding flowers. I am still trembling at the sight of their weapons pointed at us. I have never felt so threatened and unsafe as I did at that moment. I had the realization that these officers really are not here to protect, they are here to harm. Were we going to be shot? Would I be struck in the head by a canister? Am I going to make it home to my children? We held our line as they threw flashbangs and shot tear gas canisters at us. I was peaceful, I was standing still and holding hands with women around me--surely they would not shoot at me. I could feel the women on both sides of me trembling. The officers pointed their weapons at us. I put my hands in the air and begged them not to hurt us. They shot more tear gas. The tear gas overwhelmed us--the pain was unimaginable. It burned my eyes, my throat, my skin. I did not bring goggles or a helmet to this protest. I wore a tank top and shorts. Why would I need a helmet and goggles at a peaceful protest? I coughed to the point of vomiting. We ran. Fellow protesters came to us with water bottles and helped clean our eyes. Another brought wipes to clean our skin. We coughed, we vomited, and we cried. Today, I am still shaking. I cannot focus. I am scared. I am jumping at loud noises. My heart is racing simply recalling the events of last night. I am worried about what the federal officers are going to do to my fellow Oregonians tonight. Let me be clear: there was violence on Tuesday night, but none of it was from protesters. The only violence I encountered that night was from federal police officers. I am grateful that I made it home to my kids last night. Others were not so fortunate. Thank you, Stacey, for sharing your firsthand account of the night before last--Tuesday night--on the streets of Portland, when Federal officers attacked peaceful demonstrators, where there was no violence except the violence of the officers on the protesters. This next recounting is from Amy Bacher. She writes: Pre-protest normalcy. There are people hanging out in a downtown park by the Justice Center. They are wearing masks, playing music, and, thanks to Riot Ribs, eating free food. The Wall of Moms gathers a short distance from there, where they hand out sunflowers and yellow carnations. Protective gear is also distributed, like helmets, due to issues with the Federal police firing ammunition. Medics hand out water and other safety gear to everyone to try to keep protesters safe. Usually, about a few hours into the protests, the secret police come out. It is unclear who they are now because there are no markings for what unit--who they are with--and they fire at the protesters. When it was the Portland Police Bureau, they were allowed to have their badges covered. My experience yesterday included the following: About 2,000 people gathered, chanted, gave speeches, and danced in the blocks in front of the Justice Center and Federal Building in the name of Black Lives Matter. People were serious about wearing masks. A small, white plane circled the protest area repeatedly. It appeared to be the same or similar aircraft of the plane that circled earlier protests around Revolution Hall. There were a few protesters trying to block a door of the Federal Building and post graffiti. One of the chants we shouted in front of the Federal Building was, ``Tell me what democracy looks like.'' Then ``this is what democracy looks like.'' We were all using our voices. The next moment, though, about 15 to 20 large men in camouflage and military gear appeared like they were ready for war. They had no name tags or identifiers. We had no idea if they were soldiers, what branch they were from, or why they were there. Almost all of them were holding pepper spray guns and looked like they had customized sidearms. They stood under the eaves of the Federal Building. The Wall of Moms were there in yellow T-shirts, stretch pants, and sneakers, basically. There was a long line--more than a block long-- facing the Federal Building. We were trying to stand in front of all the other protesters who had already been gassed for some 50-plus days, thinking that Trump's military would not fire on moms. We were wrong. There was no ask by officers in front of us to step back, move, or do anything at all. The officers started kicking tear gas directly at us, shoving a nearby mom in the neck, and pepper-spraying another mom in the face at close range. I had not been tear-gassed before and can't believe that it's allowed, especially with such frequency. It produces violent and immediate bodily reactions and should not be used on peaceful protesters. There is a near-immediate reaction. You can't see without pain of blinking. It feels like you are inhaling fire into your lungs and like your skin is being burned. My lungs are still burning 24 hours later. These are weapons of war that should not be used on Portlanders exercising their constitutional right to freedom or assembly. If, after 54 days, officers are still using these weapons of war and it is not working, we should be asking why--why they are still deemed effective or legal. Just before the first tear gas was thrown, three to four of the other officers tackled a woman to the ground and hog-tied her. We didn't see where she was taken. At least four women were arrested from that group. Then she gives a reference to the story on the web and how to find it. She also notes that Federal agents pepper-sprayed the first aid tent, which could be a crime when done in war. Federal agents went by the Riot Ribs free food cart in the park and pepper-sprayed the food and the grilles. That is where she ends her commentary. Thank you very much, Amy, for sharing your story of what happened the night before last. I hope that all of America is recognizing that what we would never conceive of happening in America is happening--Federal agents, Federal officers, being deployed to attack peaceful protests. As these two women point out, there was graffiti, but it was not violent. From one of the other letters I am about to read, I note: There were young folks pounding on the plywood that covers the doors of the Federal Building, but that, too, wasn't violent. The only violence came from the Federal officers. This next story was posted by Krista. She writes: So the nonviolent Wall of Moms just got gassed for absolutely no reason. Then she puts in the tags ``PDX protest'' and ``Black Lives Matter.'' I don't need cookies for being there. Please. I have the privilege of taking the night off to let my lungs rest. Black and Brown people don't get to change their skin color to take a break from systemic and personal racism. Also, Black women have been on the frontlines for decades. The Wall of Moms is getting a lot of attention, but we are not the story. Abolishing racist systems and ending police brutality against people of color is the real story. If you want to get involved but aren't able to go downtown, please consider making a donation to ``Don't Shoot Portland.'' Honestly, the leaf blowers helped so much on Monday. I was wishing that the dads would come out in force again Tuesday because the moms got gassed bad. It was brutal. I am still coughing and burning 4 hours later. Come on, dads. Until we have meaningful change, the protests will continue. Don't give up yet. Krista makes a point that I want to accentuate time and again: Black Americans have been protesting, putting their lives at risk night after night after night--all kinds of protesters coming together and all kinds of skin color coming together in order to say Black lives matter and that we have to end systemic racism My colleague is here to speak. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I ask for the opportunity to address the issue before us.

Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, I thank my colleague from Oregon for his intense representation of these legal issues and the role of the Intelligence Committee, noting that this has all the trappings of a President bent on the equivalent of martial law, operating in this rogue fashion, shredding the constitutional rights of people, sending Federal officers to attack peaceful protesters. I was reading the stories of women who were down at the protests the night before last. The next one is from Stephanie. She says: I went downtown again last night to peacefully protest. To use my voice and my 1st Amendment rights. To feel safe-- repeat: TO FEEL SAFE--against these anonymous federal agents. I wore: --A bike helmet --Goggles --A double mask --Ear plugs And I was still terrified. The #WallofMoms stood locked, arm in arm, right up against the fence line at the federal courthouse. We stood between these federal agents dressed in war gear and unarmed protesters shouting behind us. Sweat poured down my back. The Moms stood for hours. On my bike ride home I texted [an individual] Geoff [not me] each time I stopped and called Amy . . . to have a ``buddy'' on the phone with me. Every time I heard a car, my heart skipped a beat. Is it a crew of federal kidnappers, ready to throw me into a van? This administration has been chipping away at our rights since day 1, but this past week in Portland has been an acceleration. Wake up, especially those supporting them. We are in a crisis of great magnitude and we are about to lose control. Candace Jimenez, member of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, said she came out to protest after the deployment of Federal agents, and said: We have been dealing with that for 500 years. We understand the trauma, the terrorism, and the harm it causes. Bev writes: In less than eight hours, a group of moms helped me put together this #WallofMoms. We tried in earnest to give the kids a break by shifting the pervasive narrative that protesters are rioters. Case and point, we wore our whitest whites to show we weren't there to make trouble, we showed up to prove that the feds are the violent ones. . . . And we were right. Kids took down fences and did some skateboarding, two or three kids [banged] on walls, but the other people were peaceful. I want to tell you that I didn't vomit or pee my pants after being gassed, but I did. I guess I lost control . . . and soon after I couldn't open my eyes. To be clear, we moms weren't armed, [we weren't] throwing rocks, [we weren't] throwing water. That didn't happen. We were gassed for chanting ``Leave the kids alone.'' I want you to think about what's happening in this country and ask yourself how you're going to help change it. Heather was down at the protests, and I don't have her picture, her larger picture, but I can tell you that she posted a picture. She is very pregnant. How gutsy I think that is that she was there, even as she is about to give birth. She writes: I am . . . 9mo pregnant . . . and I stood between the police and the rest of the protesters last night with about 40 other moms. My unborn baby is the topic of many Twitter debates right now and symbolizes a thousand year old debate among those who want to stifle women's freedom. Right now I have even more power than usual and I am here to use it. I am SAFE. Thanks everybody for your concern. But we are

Mr. MERKLEY

Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I rise tonight to ask: What does democracy look like in America? I have here a picture of what democracy looks like--people showing up presenting their opinions with their feet and their voices and their signs saying: We want change. And the change they want is to pursue the important value that public safety in America be a value that is applied equally to all citizens; that every single person in the community is viewed as a client for the public safety team; that the distribution of protection is equal and the treatment of citizens is equal, so that when public safety officers respond, they respond equally no matter what section of the city the call comes from; that they respond the same no matter the color of a person's skin; that profiling is a thing of the past; that viewing two young Black men on the street is not viewed differently than viewing two young White men on the street. It is that goal of having everyone treated fairly that has led so many to come out and say: We need major reform in our country. We need to set behind us the time period when departments of public safety tend to look at the White community and say, ``Those are our clients,'' and look at the Black community or the dark-skinned community and say, ``Those are the threats.'' That is what people are trying to change by turning out in America in this fashion. It is an important moment in which we need substantive change, real change--real change like the bill Cory Booker put together and led the battle on, and Kamala Harris put together with him in partnership and led the battle on. That is the type of change we need in America. That is why people have been turning out in the streets. But there is an unexpected twist on something we didn't anticipate, in which the President of the United States hasn't listened to this message about coming together so that everyone is treated equally. Instead, he is doubling down on a strategy of racism, a strategy of bigotry, a strategy of creating conflict in America with a determined new effort. This is a picture of protesting in Oregon. I was at a demonstration much like this, where people chanted: ``This is what democracy looks like. This is what democracy looks like.'' This is what democracy looks like, colleagues--people coming together with their signs and their feet and their time, saying: We need change. It is as fundamental as free expression under the First Amendment. It is as fundamental to our Constitution as the right to assemble. This is as fundamental to the vision of ``We the People'' as anyone can imagine--that vision that Lincoln summarized as ``government of the people, by the people, for the people,'' not of, by, and for some dictatorial force, not someone who wants to consolidate power in an imperial Presidency. In fact, our Founders were really worried about authoritarianism. They were really worried about an imperial Presidency. Once they launched that Constitution, what would happen with that first President? Would that first President say: I am now going to consolidate power in this young Republic, hold on to the Executive, ignore the balance of powers between the branches of government, and consolidate power in the Executive. I am going to take the forces that were the Revolutionary War forces, and I am going to turn them into a force to keep in power regardless of the constitutional requirement for elections. They were very worried about this. One of the reasons they particularly liked the idea of George Washington being the first President is that George Washington was very worried about that, and the example he set would mean a whole lot. It is one thing to have a Constitution on paper. It is a whole other thing to hold onto it, to keep it. Coming out of the Constitutional Convention, the story goes that someone asked one of the convention policymakers: What do we have? And he replied: A republic, if we can keep it--if we can keep it. This is what democracy looks like right here. There is another picture of what democracy looks like. This is the ``wall of moms'' in Portland, OR, coming out, standing side by side, creating a barrier between the police and the Federal forces that had been allocated to the city by President Trump and the people, creating that barrier, that ``wall of moms,'' to say: Do not use flashbang on us or all the people behind us; do not use tear gas on us or all the people behind us; do not use impact munitions, a polite name for, essentially, rubber bullets--they say ``nonlethal bullets''--we hope, right, because sometimes they do enormous damage--do not use your batons to knock us down and break our bones; do not pepper spray us in the face. We are the ``wall of moms.'' This is what democracy looks like, but this is a message lost on President Trump. We have something entirely different from the President. The President said: I am going to send some forces out to Portland to basically pour gasoline on the fire and turn it into, basically, a much more intense conflict. So you already have the basics of a challenge in which you have had folks from the White extremists coming in camouflage to Portland to create trouble and looking for a fight, and you have antifa coming to Portland to look for a fight with the White extremists, the White nationalists. Well, that had calmed down enormously to where there was only a small group left, coming in late at night and causing trouble. But Trump said: If I can recreate conflict in Portland, well, I can run a campaign on fear. Because what we have seen, in Presidential campaign after Presidential campaign, is a Republican candidate saying: If we run on fear, we will win because people think of us as stronger on national security. Well, we have seen the different strategies. There was the Ebola run- on-fear strategy. There was the ``immigrants, rapists, and murderers are going to run across the border and swarm America'' run-on-fear strategy. There was the ``ISIS is going to row across the Atlantic and invade America'' run-on-fear strategy. There was the Willie Horton ``you are going to be attacked by a dark-skinned person in an alley'' run-on-fear strategy. And all too often it has worked, this effort to gear up division in America, to play on racism in America. But to that strategy of division and racism I say: No way. That is too low, too wrong for America. We should be coming together as a country. We should have a message of coming together as a people. We should be taking on the challenges of healthcare and housing and education. Those are the bills we should have here on the floor of the Senate. We should be taking on the issue of fair labor, good-paying jobs. We should be working on rebuilding America's infrastructure. We should be addressing the fact that, even today in States all across this country, you can be discriminated against for being a member of the LGBTQ community. You can get married in the morning, and you can proceed to be thrown out of your apartment. You can be told you cannot eat in this restaurant, you cannot sit in this movie theater, you cannot receive this government benefit. The Supreme Court just took one step forward on the employment question, strengthening the ability to not be discriminated against in employment. We passed a bill here in the Senate back in 2013 to do exactly that, to strengthen protections in employment, but the Republican-controlled House wouldn't take it up and treat LGBTQ Americans fairly. If we were doing our job, we would have a debate on the Equality Act that would end discrimination in all of these areas because it is the right thing to do that no door should be slammed in the face of an American because of who they are or whom they love. Isn't that something we should be doing here? Shouldn't we be taking on this challenge of carbon pollution and climate chaos? All the fossil fuel companies have worked hard to turn this into a partisan issue. It didn't used to be a partisan issue. Back when President Bush--not yet President but candidate Bush ran against candidate Dukakis, it was the Republican candidate who ran on climate change. It was the Democrat who ran on fossil fuels. It is not so long ago, before Citizens United, that we had so many climate champions on both sides, but then dark money was introduced, and the fossil fuel community said: This is our chance to control the U.S. Senate. They put hundreds of millions--not thousands, millions--of dollars into the Senate campaigns 6 years ago, 2014. I remember it well because I was one of the folks they were targeting, and I saw their strategy of taking that money and putting it into third-party campaigns and running tremendous numbers of assault ads, negative ads, attack ads--doing it on social media all across the board Since then, what happened? Well, all the voices that were on the Republican side of the aisle saying ``We need to take on climate'' disappeared. That is the corrupting power of Citizens United and dark money. Then we had a bill here on the floor. We needed 60 votes, under our policy rules, to be able to pass it to close debate. It was disclosure--to say at least we should disclose where money comes from. But what happened? The fossil fuel lobby said no Republican can dare to vote for this bill if you want us to keep you in power, and every single Member across the aisle followed their lead and voted against disclosure. They voted for darkness. They voted for hiding these massive contributions coming in from who knows where because they are hidden. My point is that this is democracy here, people expressing their views, and here in this Chamber we should have democracy as well. We had it almost over our entire history, of people being able to put virtually any issue on the floor and have it debated on and then to have it voted on and then to have voters know how their Senator voted so there was accountability. But no more. We are in this incredible period in which there are a record number--low--of amendments, and the amendments we do have are basically not very significant to begin with or they are preprogrammed by leadership, not by each Senator having power. The idea of 100 Senators having that power--that sounds like something out of just another world, yet that was the Senate throughout its history until recently. Why do I keep emphasizing this? Because this concentration of power where bills and amendments only go through the majority leader is an absolute fit with government by and for the powerful--the opposite of government by and for the people. So if someone has a bill that says you can't gouge Americans on drug prices, they can't get that bill to the floor because it is blocked by the majority leader, and the drug companies don't want that bill on the floor, so they give a lot of money to that team. If someone says we should have reasonable gun safety laws--not violating the Second Amendment--and we will make the world a little safer for our children, well, that bill can't get on the floor because it is blocked by the majority leader, and it is backed by massive spending of dark money and the NRA. Or if we have a bill that says we should do a lot more about housing, I can't put that bill on the floor. How about we have a banking system that serves the cannabis industry so that we don't have huge bags of money opened up to the possibility of organized crime moving it around the country and doing bad things? We should extend that coverage, but we can't get that vote on this floor--which brings me to something more important than just basically anything I have just talked about, which is what President Trump is doing right now: deploying secret police across America, secret police here in America. Now, we know that President Trump admires authoritarian leaders. He has spoken with admiration about Duterte in the Philippines. He seems to be in love with Erdogan in Turkey. He loves the Crown Prince in Saudi Arabia, who assassinated an American-based journalist. He can't find anything wrong with how Putin runs Russia, as basically an authoritarian-style dictator. But now he is doing something beyond just this affection: He is bringing the tactics of authoritarian governments to the streets of the United States of America. This is what democracy looks like, but I am going to show you some pictures of what democracy doesn't look like--instead, what authoritarianism looks like, what paramilitary forces look like. So let's take an exploration of the President's strategy. Well, first, authoritarians don't want identity about the organization on their police uniforms, and they want the police, in functioning, to look more like warriors in some other fight across the sea. So you dress them in camouflage. Here are folks deployed by President Trump in the streets of Portland. What agency do these belong to? No shoulder patch, no identity on this front, no identity on the other shoulder, no identity on the helmet--no identity. Who are these people? How about these people? Are these the same group here? These are White extremists, nationalists, who come to Portland to get in fights. So President Trump dresses up his Federal forces to look like White extremists on the streets of Portland. How is there accountability if you don't know where they are from? Who can tell me if these folks are from Customs and Border Protection? Are they from the Federal Protective Service? Are they U.S. Marshals? How do we know? We don't because they are deliberately not marked. We are told that these are actually Customs and Border Protection. I called up the head of Customs and Border Protection, and I said: What is the story with this tactic of secret police on the streets? He said: Oh, no, no, no; we insist they have ``CBP'' on them. We insist they have a unique identifier. In fact, he put this in a tweet. He told all of America: We don't do that. But America has pictures, and those pictures tell us there is no ID. They are being deployed as secret operators on the streets of Portland. That is going to be terrifying because you don't know who they are. Is it just someone who wants to create trouble who puts ``police'' on their shirt? Is it one of these folks? These folks have badges on them that look a little more official. We see an American flag here. We see an American flag here. Are these White extremists coming to the streets to beat people up, or are they Federal agents? And if so, who are they, and what is their mission? We found out their mission in short order. Here we have a picture of a Navy vet. That Navy vet said he came down to say: What does it mean to honor your oath--your oath of office, your oath to the Constitution? He wants to know. He was a veteran who served in our forces to defend the Constitution. How did President Trump's secret police respond? Here is a CBP agent with a baton right here, striking him. Here is another one with a baton coming around to strike him again. Here is another one spraying pepper spray into his face. This man, just standing here--his hands are basically hooked in his pocket, like this--he is just standing here saying: I came down here to see what people thought about honoring their oath to the Constitution. And he is attacked. He is attacked by multiple members of this secret force Trump puts on the streets of our Nation. They had not just pepper spray and not just batons; they had other weapons, impact munitions--in this case, U.S. marshals. Here is a young man who is holding a boom box over his head--that is what it looked like--and he is on one side of the street. On the other side of the street are the marshals. As he stands there in the video, you see him crumble and fall to the ground because from across the street, he was shot right between the eyes. Critical condition. Fractured skull. Who in the world would expect a Federal officer to shoot a protester, who is either holding up a sign or a radio, between the eyes from across the street? Do you think that is accidental? They accidentally shot him in the head? It wasn't accidental; it was deliberate. They are sending a message. A lot of other people got shot with these munitions. I am told that he is no longer in critical condition. Thank goodness for that, but it could have been very, very different. We still don't know the ultimate outcome of this assault on a peaceful protester. Pepper spray, using batons on veterans, shooting a peaceful protester in the head from a few yards away--that is not all that Trump's secret police were up to. They decided to go through the streets and grab people and throw them into unmarked vans. Here is one of those vans on the streets of Portland. Here are President Trump's secret police, unmarked, throwing another protester into a van. One of the individuals who was treated in this fashion said he was terrified because he thought these camouflaged folks were the White extremists who come to make trouble, and was he being kidnapped? They would not answer the question when they were asked ``Who are you?'' They didn't answer the question. Secret police, unmarked, using pepper spray, batons, impact munitions, and tear gas on peaceful protesters, and then throwing people--grabbing them and throwing them into unmarked vans. What does that make you think of? What country are we talking about here? Are we talking about Syria? Are we talking about Duterte in the Philippines? Are we talking about Erdogan in Turkey? Are we talking about the Crown Prince in Saudi Arabia? Are we talking about Putin running Russia? We could be talking about any of those folks, as they use these tactics, but this is unacceptable and outrageous and unconstitutional in a democratic republic. President Trump coordinated this deployment of secret police and attacks on peaceful protesters to create a big conflagration, a big explosion of protests in Portland. The protests had died down to just less than 100 actors and some bystanders in the late evening, and then I am told that on the days that followed these outrageous attacks, the protests multiplied--not one- or twofold but fivefold or more. That is exactly what Trump wanted because he wanted to say: There is this dissent and trouble in the streets of Portland. I am your law-and-order President; I will take care of that trouble. You create the trouble. You escalate the conflict so you can say ``I am the one who can deescalate it'' later. This is a horrific strategy that no Member of this Senate should have the slightest sympathy for--a strongman in the Oval Office adopting the secret police tactics of the worst dictators from around the globe. Some of the headlines that followed were things like this: ``Federal Law Enforcement Use Unmarked Vehicles To Grab Protesters Off Portland Streets.'' ``A Navy vet asked federal officers in Portland to remember their [constitutional] oaths. Then they broke his hand.'' You saw the pictures of them striking him with the batons. ``Federal Officers Deployed in Portland Didn't Have Proper Training, D.H.S. memo said.'' It says: Untrained, undisciplined folks, but they knew what the President wanted and that was to create an escalation of violence on the streets of our city. You are probably wondering, didn't the President call and talk to the Governor before he decided to deploy these secret police on the streets of Portland? No, he didn't. Didn't the DHS Secretary? No. How about the Department of Justice? The Attorney General? No. Surely they called the mayor and said: Before we deploy folks to patrol the streets with tear gas and batons and impact bullets, rubber bullets, pepper spray; before we beat up peaceful protesters and shoot them in the head, we want to talk to you, Mayor, about what is going on. Did the President call? Did the Secretary call, the Secretary of Homeland Security? Did the Secretary or the Attorney General call? Did the head of Customs and Border Protection, CBP, call before they sent in their special operating group? Did the Marshals' lead director, commissioner call? The answer is no, no, no, no, and no. None of them called because they weren't coming to coordinate, to help; they were coming to disrupt. They knew that if they asked to come, asked whether they were wanted, the answer would be no, you are not wanted because you are coming to inflame the violence and disruption The President was giving speeches, saying ``Look at what a wonderful President I am because I am sending help to quell violence in Portland'' while he was sending secret police to create violence. This has to be one of the bigger lies he has told in his time as President. By various accounts, he tells a number of them every single day. But this lie to the American people is not just a little white lie; this is not just a little misrepresentation; this is something of constitutional input about who we are as a country. We don't do secret police in our country. We don't grab people off the streets and terrify them and throw them in unmarked vans in our country--at least not until now. You see, the President has looked at the polls that say we are not very happy. Americans are not very happy with the way you have executed the Presidency. We are certainly not very happy with the way you have managed this really big crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic. When there is a crisis, you start to see someone--can they rise to the occasion? Can they bring forth the best in people? Can they facilitate cooperation? Can they mobilize resources? Can they make the case in an effective and persuasive fashion? The American people have seen that President Trump could not rise to the occasion. He could not bring himself to bring people together. He could not make the case for a national strategy on how to tackle the coronavirus. He could not mobilize resources to address it in a timely fashion. Millions more are going to get sick as a result of his incompetence, and tens of thousands more will die because of the incompetence of President Trump. What is a President running for reelection to do when his incompetence is revealed in its complete and total clarity to the Nation? You create a war. That is what you do. You create a war because a war might rally people to your side when we are being attacked. But in this case, the President couldn't come up with an overseas war. ISIS? Too weak. The scary Ebola? Too long ago. North Korea? A completely failed strategy by the President of expressing his love for yet another dictator and that love not being returned in any effective policy changes. So what is left? Immigration. Oh, wait--he already played the rapist and murderers at the border card. He already offended people throughout our Nation by snuffing out the lamp of Lady Liberty. What is left? You have to create a war inside the United States. First came Washington, DC. He tried out the secret police strategy by deploying forces onto the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, unmarked, and nobody knew who the hell they were. Who are these people who are on the Lincoln Memorial? Are they far-right extremists carrying guns? Are they Customs and Border Protection? Are they U.S. Marshals? Who are these people? Nobody knew. They were secret police at the Lincoln Monument. And then he decided to test the strategy of using weapons against peaceful protesters across from the White House. There they are gathered together. There is this great tradition in America. If you want to protest where the President can see you, you go to L'Enfant Plaza and you look up at the second story and you hold up your protest sign and you scream your position on something that you consider very important for America--the change you want to see or the man you object to. The President and his family look out those windows and say: I sure hate seeing those protesters. But that is symbolic of the right to assemble and the freedom of speech in our beautiful Nation under our extraordinary Constitution. What did President Trump do? Well, he walled off L'Enfant Plaza across from the White House so people couldn't protest there. That is what this President thinks of protesters. He sees them as a threat to him. He doesn't like freedom of assembly, and he doesn't like freedom of speech, but what he does like is a good photo opportunity. So the President decides to get the team together and we will go over and I will stand on the steps of the church and hold up a Bible. I still am a little confounded about what his message was to do that. The thing is, to get to the steps of the church, he would have to come near these protesters he hates because he hates protesters. He doesn't like Americans calling for change or criticizing his policies. I am thinking back about this ``wall of moms'' that I showed you earlier--these moms coming down, forming a line, and saying: Don't tear gas us. Don't do shock grenades. Don't shoot us with rubber bullets. Don't pepper spray us. And yet his forces did all those things. Where did he try this out first? He tried it in that area behind L'Enfant Plaza where the church steps were. His forces went out and attacked those protesters. Nobody saw violence of any kind. This had nothing to do with quelling a riot. This had to do with one simple thing: The President hates protests and wanted to show what a strong man he is, like those dictators he admires all across the planet--like the Crown Prince in Saudi Arabia, like Duterte with his extrajudicial executions in the Philippines, like Putin, whom he just can't say enough good things about who suppresses the civil rights of the Russian people. He wanted to show how strong he was so he sent his team out to tear gas, use impact munitions, rubber bullets on the protesters so he could stand at the church with a Bible. I am still wondering what passage in the Bible he was there to talk about. You can think for yourselves. You can imagine. You can ask yourselves: What did the President want to say with the Good Book in his hand? Did he want to say this book talks about turning the other cheek, and I will show how much I admire that principle of turning the other cheek by coming out and telling my team to tear gas and shoot peaceful protesters? Is that what the President wanted to do, kind of somehow demonstrate support for turning the other cheek by having his team gas and shoot people in that area close to L'Enfant Plaza, close to the steps of the church, or did the President want to come out and say: This Good Book talks about beating swords into plowshares, and I want to come out and show just how I believe in the principle of beating swords into plowshares by having my team gas people and baton people and do these explosive flashbang grenades. Is that what the President was trying to do? What message in the Bible was he trying to convey? Was he trying to convey the message that Jesus Christ talked about time and time and time again of helping the poor and the destitute, and he thought it was such an important message to carry to the United States that he would use force, tear gas, rubber bullets to clear the path so he could talk about how important it was to help the destitute and the poor in America and how his policies might help them? No. We don't know. I don't think the President knew. He has never indicated that he is actually familiar with the contents of that book he was holding up, which makes it a particularly bizarre photo op. But this was his first trial run of this strategy of using weapons against peaceful protesters, of using unmarked uniforms on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. He loved it so much. He loved that sense that he was so strong because he could clear the path with his Presidential team so he could get to those steps. He was such an awesome man, such an incredible President showing strength by attacking peaceful protesters so he could have his photo on. It filled him with such energy, he thought: Let's try this out elsewhere in the country--so he comes to Portland. He comes to Portland, and he proceeds to say: Let's use that secret police strategy again, unmarked. Let's use those batons and pepper spray again against a peaceful protester. Let's use those impact munitions again against someone holding up a sign, shooting them from across the street, giving them a fractured skull and putting them in critical condition and into the hospital. Let's take it and even amplify it a little bit and put them into unmarked vans and sweep them away. This is what we have with the Trump secret police strategy. As he did these things, he went out on the campaign stump and said: Look what a mighty leader I am attacking these peaceful people with these weapons. I did it to the protesters in Washington, DC, and I did it to the protesters in Portland, OR, and now I am going to take my strategy of attacking protesters and spread it all across America. What does he talk about? He says: I want to take this strategy to Baltimore. He says: I want to take this strategy to Philadelphia. He says: I want to take this strategy to New York. And then he said: I want to take it to Chicago and I want to take it to Detroit and I want to take it to Oakland, CA. What do those things have in common? And then he says: They are led by Democrats. I will take my strategy of inciting violence with secret police, unmarked van abductions, use of pepper spray, batons, and flashbangs--the whole arsenal--and I will take it to all these cities where there are Democratic mayors. Then I will say: Look at me. I am a law-and-order President, and I can quell all that trouble I created across this country. You are probably thinking I made up this list of cities that the President talked about. Surely, the President wouldn't take this incredibly horrendous secret police strategy and express that he wanted to take it on a trial run all across America so he could create violence in Democratic cities, but in his own words: Who's next? New York and Chicago and Philadelphia and Detroit and Baltimore and all of these--Oakland is a mess. And he framed it as going to quell violence, but, instead, the strategy produces violence. It enflames. It accentuates. It outrages. It creates conflict. I have here an article, and it is from FOX 32 News in Chicago: ``Lightfoot confirms federal agents will help manage Chicago violence.'' Chicago has a Democratic mayor. Let's go create trouble there. Mayor Lori Lightfoot had a different tone Tuesday regarding President Donald Trump's decision to send agents to Chicago. ``I'm hopeful that they will not be foolish enough to bring that kind of nonsense to Chicago,'' the mayor said. Well, what did she mean by ``nonsense''? It is the polite word for attacking peaceful protesters with batons and flashbangs and tear gas. I am certainly not saying that Portland didn't have some tensions. The extremist groups on the right have made a favorite trip out of coming to Portland to cause trouble and the anti-fascists have responded in kind, and that is what the local team has to manage and deescalate. They have succeeded in deescalating it to where it was a small group late at night. And then Trump came in and blew it all into a big crisis once again. When I said that this is coordinated with his campaign, campaign ads went up. His strategy of creating chaos in America, then campaigning on it couldn't be more transparent. As President Trump deploys Federal agents to Portland, Ore., and threatens to dispatch to other cities, his re-election campaign is spending millions of dollars on ominous television ads that promote fear. . . . The influx of agents in Portland has led to scenes of confrontations and chaos that Mr. Trump and his aides have pointed to as they try to burnish a false narrative about Democratic elected officials allowing dangerous protesters to create widespread bedlam. The Trump campaign is driving home that message with a new ad that tries to tie its dark portrayal of Democratic-led cities. There it is--campaign ads to fit his dark portrayal of Democratic-led cities. The idea that not only would the President bring those secret police tactics to America--to our streets--he would deploy them in his effort to create conflict so he can win reelection, so he can have something that scares the American people. Don't we have enough to be worried about already? Don't we have a pandemic to manage? A number of us worked to say: Mr. President, you need to have a national strategy on producing protective equipment to help stop the spread of this contagion. Mr. President, that should probably include taking available factories and putting them to work making protective equipment and distributing it quickly. The President said, no, he's not doing it. He is not activating the Defense Production Act to have a national strategy to stop the spread of this disease. I have two healthcare workers in my family. My son works in a doctor's office recording the computer code on the symptoms and so forth. He is a medical scribe. My wife goes house to house visiting folks who are in hospice. They are in the final chapter of their life, and she coaches them and their family on care and support during this final chapter of our journey here on this planet. A number of the people she sees are very high risk because they are fragile and sick in that final chapter, so they would be very affected if this disease were introduced. Some of them have the disease. She has to be very careful that she doesn't pick it up and bring it home to my elderly mother who lives in our house. My elderly mother is in her nineties. She probably wouldn't want me to call her elderly in her nineties, but she is fragile, and she would be affected. My son doesn't want to bring it home or spread it. Both of them had trouble getting the protective equipment they needed early in this pandemic because we didn't have a national strategy. Trump failed the leadership test. How about another critical piece of this, which is testing? We needed to crank up all of the biological manufacturing capacity of America to produce the reagents so that people could be tested and get the results within hours or a day so that, if they were infected, even if they were asymptomatic--they didn't have the disease symptoms, but they had the disease, and they could spread it--that they would be quarantined, but the President said no. So we put into the bill a requirement for the President to produce a national test strategy and produce a report with his test strategy. What did it read? It read our test strategy--our national strategy--was to leave it to the States. What kind of leadership is that to have no strategy on producing the reagents or the tests and getting them around the country? One thing we have done here is we have funded a lot of money to help communities buy tests because they are expensive. We said they should be free to the victims--to the people who are getting tested, that is. Every health expert has said you have to crank up this testing so that there is no wait time. It doesn't help to get the results 7 or 10 days later. I have been holding townhalls. I hold one in every county every year in Oregon, 36 counties. This year, I only got 21 in before the coronavirus made it impossible to hold them in person, but I have been holding them digitally, electronically. I keep hearing the report from the county health agents that now testing has increased to its taking 7 days to get a response, 9 days to get a response, 11 days to get a response. Why is that? It is because we didn't have any national strategy for producing tests. As the disease flares up and grows in magnitude in the Southern States, more and more resources are getting diverted to those Southern States. So there are not the testing supplies because there is no national strategy. Then the experts said: Well, you should have a contact tracing strategy, so, when people test positive, you can immediately find out who they have been in touch with so those people get immediately quarantined before they can pass it on to other people. Yet that doesn't work if you can't get test results quickly, and it doesn't work if you don't have contact tracers. A number of us have worked to provide funding for contact tracers. Elizabeth Warren and I have introduced a bill that calls for 100,000 contact tracers across this country. There is $75 billion in the House's bill for testing and tracing across the country. How did President Trump respond this last week? President Trump said: I don't want any money for testing in this bill--no money for testing. He wants this stripped out; yet it is an essential element for controlling the coronavirus. I don't think he will win on that one. I think the Members of this Chamber, on both sides of the aisle, care enough about their constituents that they want to help with testing and contact tracing, but the President wants the testing stripped out. Why does he want it stripped out? It is because, if you test more people, then you get more positives, and if you get more positives, it doesn't look good. So he is choosing to have things look good rather than to contain the coronavirus. If you proceed to offend people across the country by failing in leadership on protective equipment and failing in leadership on testing and failing in leadership on contact tracing, you need another plan, and we have the plan. The President has made it clear he will test out his secret police and attacks on peaceful protesters in DC, magnify that experiment in Portland, and see if it creates more chaos. If it does, he will deploy that effort across the Nation. That is President Trump's plan, and it is as wrong as anything could be. Secret policing has no place in the United States of America. I introduced a simple amendment to the Defense Authorization Act, which deals with security powers and things like Customs and Border Protection and deals with things like U.S. Marshals, and I said we are on that right now on the floor of the Senate. Let's have this debate about secret policing, and let's just ask a few simple things. First, when the President sends agents anywhere in the country, they have to carry identification about who they work for. It is not that big of a request, and it is not expensive. Instead of putting a generic ``police'' or no marking at all, you put ``CBP,'' or you put ``U.S. Marshals,'' or you put ``Federal Protective Service'' or one of a dozen other Federal police units that play different roles. That way, the American people will know who they are. Then you put unique identifiers on them so that, if they do something terrible, like walk up and shoot a protester in the head, you would know who had done it. You could find out. Now, some of my friends have said: Well, we are not sure we want to require names to be on the uniforms because there have been some cases in which people have been so outraged that they have harassed the families of the police officers or of these Federal agents. We don't want that. OK. A number would work that could be used to identify someone after an egregious act but would protect the families of our Federal agents who are doing a good job. That is pretty simple. Have an ID as to what agency you belong to and a unique identifier. You are no longer secret. Then you can't be deployed on some expanded mission of sweeping the streets. Your legitimate mission should be to protect a Federal monument or a Federal building, and you have to be at that Federal building or in the near vicinity of it or of the monument. That is pretty simple. If you want a broader mission, you have to coordinate with the mayor and the Governor and get their permission It is pretty straightforward. Have a patch with the agency, a unique identifier, and pursue your mission in the near vicinity of the Federal property. What else? The President would have to tell the people of America how many people he is sending, from what agencies, and to what city for a little bit of transparency. That is it. This amendment that I am proposing to stop secret policing is simple; yet my colleagues are blocking it from being considered in this bill. I yield the floor.

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

Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, my colleague has said that the facts I have presented tonight are a fabrication, to use his exact word. He has called it a breach of protocol. He has called it a violation of common decency. I think we are here as a Chamber to address difficult, important issues in America. This is a difficult and important mission. This is a new use of force in a manner that doesn't belong in the streets of America. It is important that we debate it. I would be happy to have it be a standalone bill, come up right after this National Defense Authorization Act, and have it debated for 2 hours and voted on, because then we actually have a conversation and we have to take a position, and our constituents can see where we stand, and folks could propose an amendment to it if they didn't like the way I have written it. It is so simple. It says: Do what we have always done. Put ID about where you come from. Have a unique identifier. And don't go sweeping through the streets if your mission is to protect a Federal property. Stay at that Federal property or work with the Governor or the mayor if you have a broader effort. Those are reasonable things. I don't think that it was a breach of protocol to ask this Chamber to consider that on this bill because there is a connection. We are talking about a bill that involves the use of force and how we govern in America. I don't think it is a violation of common decency. My colleague does, and I would prefer that we actually have that conversation about the facts and about the arguments, about the simple solution I proposed when we can actually take a vote or other people can offer amendments to it and modify it. That is this Chamber doing what it should be doing. So I am disappointed that my colleague is blocking this from being considered before this body. I do love this body, and I first came here when amendments were freely--

Mr. MERKLEY. And I would invite my colleague to stay if he would like to and yield to him if he wants to jump into the conversation.

Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 2 minutes.

Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, in a moment, I will again ask for this important issue of deployment of secret police to be debated and voted on, on this floor. That is what the U.S. Senate is for, to address the issues facing Americans, but I didn't want to ask until my colleague was here to respond from the Republican Caucus. When he is ready, I will make that motion. I make this motion to send a couple of different messages. One, most importantly, is that secret policing has no place in America, and all Americans must stand arm in arm and say no. The second is, when there is an important issue like this, this is the Chamber in which it should be debated and voted on so we can hear the conflicting views. There may be clauses in the amendment that I will propose that people won't like, insight that they can provide, or modifications that they would like to propose to my amendment, but it can't happen unless this amendment is considered on the floor. That is why, notwithstanding rule XXII, I ask unanimous consent to call up my amendment to stop secret policing in America, amendment No. 2457, an amendment to limit Federal law enforcement officers for crowd control; that there be 2 hours for debate, equally divided between opponents and proponents; and that upon the use or yielding back of time, the Senate vote in relation to the amendment with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. MERKLEY. Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 5 minutes.

Mr. MERKLEY

Mr. MERKLEY. I say to my colleague from Oklahoma, that if these secret police were released on the streets of Tulsa, you would be down here defending your constituents, but you have a responsibility to defend all constituents across the country, the rights of all citizens in the United States of America. I am not asking you to support my bill. I am not asking you to make the argument for it. I am asking for the simple courtesy that this Chamber do the job it is vested with under the Constitution, which is to take up serious issues that arise in America, hold a dialogue about them on this floor, and take a vote to show the American people where we stand in the hopes to solve the problem. I have no doubt that I wouldn't get 100 votes. You raise some interesting points. You note that my request to debate a very serious issue in America circumvents process. I can state that for 200 years this Chamber believed it was here to address serious issues, and they didn't raise process issues to keep serious issues from being debated. You didn't need unanimous consent. Just a few decades ago, I was here watching this Chamber working the Tax Reform Act and watching each amendment completed, and as soon as it was done, the next Senator asked for the recognition of the Chair. In fact, normally there would be about 10 Senators saying--and it was always ``Mr. President.'' Now it is often ``Madam President.'' But they were getting attention because the next person who spoke got the next amendment. This system has taken away the fundamental responsibility of Senators to be able to introduce important issues in America, have them debated, and voted on. My colleague says: Well, we have a new process where the majority leader and the ranking member of the committee consult and decide what should be considered. That concentration of power is totally at odds with the vision of this Chamber developed by our Founders.

Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, when, in the course of time, America should find a President in the Oval Office who chooses to bring the police tactics of dictators around the world to the streets of America, then that is the moment it is incumbent on every Member of this Chamber, who has sworn an oath to our Constitution, who is determined to practice civil rights of America, to stand up and say: Not now, not here, not ever, and we put an end to it. That is why I brought forth this amendment--the Stop Secret Policing in America amendment--and ask for it to be debated on this bill, because it involves police powers, military powers of the United States of America, and it is happening right now. What am I talking about? Well, let me give you some sense of what we have seen on the streets of America in the past few days--as I note here, authoritarian governments, not democratic republics, and unmarked authorities at the protests. Well, this is what we saw: Customs and Border Protection in military uniform, in combat camouflage, in the streets, no marking what the organization is and no unique identifier. The head of the CBP said: No, no. They had markings and unique identifiers. But here they are. And to make it even worse, they look a whole lot like protesters from the far right who come to make trouble, dressed in camouflage, and they actually have things that look more like badges than the actual representatives of Customs and Border Protection. What else did we see? Here is a Navy veteran standing in the street, who said he came down to the protest to simply say: Are you honoring your oath to the Constitution? Here we have CBP officers beating him. Here is one baton. Here is another. They broke one of his bones, while this man here is pepper- sprayed in the face--a peaceful protester standing, being attacked by unmarked, war-prepared, dressed-in-camouflage forces deployed by the President of the United States. What else happened? Well, they decided to not consult with the city and not consult with the State and not think carefully about what weapons they were carrying and how they use them, so impact munitions. This protestor right here in the silhouette is standing, and he is holding what appears to be a sign above his head, or maybe it is a radio. Moments later in the video that shows this, he is shot down. You see him collapse on the street. A peaceful protestor, standing, making his case as guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States of America, and he is shot square between the eyes by President Trump's forces deployed without permission and no coordination with the local representatives or the Governor of the State of Oregon. This young man, struck down, shot in the head, in the hospital in critical condition. He is doing better now, thankfully. Then these forces deploy away from the Federal buildings and go into the streets and start snatching protestors and throwing them into unmarked vans--vans like this one right here. One young man said: I was terrified. He said: I didn't know who these people were. They wouldn't identify themselves. There is a video of people saying: Who are you all? And they won't answer. They grab him. He thinks they might be those folks from the rightwing protesters who come in camouflage. He may be being kidnapped. He doesn't know. Even after he is thrown into a jail cell, it is not explained why they grabbed him off the street. Secret police--unmarked--patrolling streets, throwing people into unmarked vehicles, and sweeping them away--that is what you get from authoritarian dictators, not a country, a republic where we have a constitution and we have rights. That is what is going on here. That is what has to stop here in America. Some of the headlines: Federal law enforcement use unmarked vehicles to grab protesters off the streets. A Navy vet asked Federal officers in Portland to remember their oaths; they broke his hand. That is the Navy vet in the white sweatshirt who is being attacked, with two officers batoning him while another sprays him with pepper spray for standing in a peaceful protest. Federal officers deployed in Portland didn't have proper training, DHS says. Well, they shouldn't have been there. We need a bill to stop secret police in America. We need a bill done as an amendment on this bill right now, on this bill we are considering about military force, a bill that says that your organization has to be identified on a uniform; that says there has to be a unique identifier so you don't think you can just get away with anything and abuse people and never be held accountable; a bill that says that if you are there on a mission to defend monuments or buildings, you defend monuments or buildings; you don't go out through the streets--if you want to become crowd control in the streets and take over a city, you have to have the permission of the mayor or the permission of the Governor; and that the Federal Government, in transparency, in our democracy, has to tell us all, as participants, as this we-the-people government, that they are disclosing how many people, from where, are being sent to what city. This isn't just some small issue. This is the President saying yesterday--after bragging about what he has done in Portland to violate the rights of people--saying he is looking at New York and Chicago and Philadelphia and Detroit and Baltimore and Oakland--deploying these secret police tactics all over this country. All I do right now is stand here and say: I want a vote on ending these secret police practices in America. I say to every Republican colleague and every Democratic colleague: I want a vote, and I am here in full partnership with my colleague from Oregon who shares this indignation, this outrage over the violation of the Constitution, who will share those thoughts, and then we will, together, ask to have a vote. What is this Chamber if it cannot take on and hold a debate and a discussion over authoritarian, secret policing strategies brought to the streets of America? My colleague.

Mr. MERKLEY. The support is felt strongly throughout Oregon to stop the secret police in America, but it is a coast-to-coast feeling, and I yield to my colleague from Connecticut to speak for the other side of the country.

Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that Senators Rosen and Hassan be added as cosponsors to Senate amendment No. 2457, to reform Department of Defense to limit the use of Federal law enforcement officers for crowd control, and to S. 4049, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021.

Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that Senators Stabenow, Casey, Udall, Shaheen, Kaine, Smith, Schumer, Feinstein, Cardin, Whitehouse, Leahy, Tester, Schatz, Cortez Masto, Warner, and Menendez be added as cosponsors to Senate amendment 2457 to reform the Department of Defense to limit the use of Federal law enforcement officers for crowd control to S. 4049, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021.

Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President.

Mr. MERKLEY. On behalf of two Oregon Senators and my colleague from Connecticut and the 34 other Senators who are standing up for democracy, rights, and against secret police, I ask unanimous consent to call up amendment No. 2457, an amendment to limit Federal law enforcement officers for crowd control; that there be 2 hours for debate, equally divided between opponents and proponents; that upon disposition of the Tester amendment, the Senate vote in relation to the amendment, with no amendments in order prior to the vote and with all other provisions under the previous order remaining in effect.

Mr. MERKLEY. My apologies to my colleague from Wyoming. I think we are not in quorum call.

Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that Senators Casey, Udall, Shaheen, Kaine, Smith, Schumer, Feinstein, Cardin, Whitehouse, Leahy, Tester, Schatz, Cortez Masto, Warner, and Menendez be added as cosponsors to S. 4220, the Preventing Authoritarian Policing Tactics on America's Streets Act.

Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that Senators Rosen and Hassan be added as cosponsors to S. 4220, the Preventing Authoritarian Policing Tactics on America's Streets Act.

Mr. MERKLEY. I will not yield until I am done. That was one of his arguments; that it circumvents process. The second is, he said it takes equipment away and training away, and yet my bill doesn't deal with equipment or training. So, clearly, that argument doesn't stand. Then he noted title 32 status under the control of the Governor, but this bill says an expanded role of crowd control occurs under the permission of the Governor, not without it. So this is why these issues should be debated on this floor. I call on all my colleagues to return the Senate to a place where serious and important issues regarding the rights of Americans can be considered and not shoved aside because one Member doesn't want them addressed. That is a challenge for this Chamber, but we have a bigger challenge, which is how do we defend the rights of our citizens if we can't put an amendment on the floor and have it debated and voted on? So, to all my colleagues who believe the secret police have no role in America; that unidentified officers, delegated without proper training, without consultation, without coordination, who are beating up peaceful protesters have no place in America; that they are being thrown into a van, and you don't even know what that van is or who those people are has no place in America; that the tactics of Duterte in the Philippines and Putin in Russia and Erdogan in Turkey have no place in America; who believe in a ``we the people'' government; those colleagues I thank, and let's bring this issue to the floor and have the debate and have the vote. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. MERKLEY

Mr. MERKLEY. We are talking about millions of American children who are suffering not just discomfort but damage to their minds because they don't have enough to eat. The majority leader is sending us on vacation rather than addressing it. Thank you to my colleague for coming to the floor, organizing, carrying this forward, the work you do, and authorizing the work the Appropriations Committee does and the funding. We have got to address this. We have to recognize how bad the situation is, how bad things are nationally. More than 40 million people have lost their jobs; 120,000 people have died. The rate of infections are exploding across the country--and how bad things are in my home State--243,000 people are out of work. We have an unemployment rate of over 14 percent, higher than it was any point in the great recession. Food insecurity and hunger have doubled since March. Food is at the top of the hierarchy of needs for human life. All we have done is come to the floor and say: Let's help in a pretty modest way with a 15-percent increase--the $4 and change that the Senator talked about--60 cents? We probably should be doubling it. But that 15-percent increase in the maximum benefits does make a difference. It makes a difference. Hunger doesn't take a vacation and neither should we. As Senator Stabenow proposed, we should debate a bill now--pass now a bill. We should effect these changes at this moment and not leave this Chamber until we have gotten the work of the American people done for the most important need any human being has, and that is basic nutrition. When Martin Luther King was accepting his Nobel Peace Prize, he said that he had ``the audacity to believe that people everywhere could have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits.'' Let this Chamber have the audacity not just to believe that people can have three meals a day but to make it happen. I am fully in support of your efforts, a full partner on behalf of all those who suffer hunger in the United States, on behalf of every child who wants a basic foundation to thrive here in the United States of America. We are failing in our job. Hunger doesn't take a vacation and neither should the Senate. Let's get the act passed now.