Rand Paul

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, today I wish to pay tribute to Dr. Alan Crandall, of Salt Lake City, Utah, who passed away on October 2, 2020. A leader in the ophthalmologic community, Dr. Crandall was senior vice chair and director of glaucoma and cataract at the University of Utah John A. Moran Eye Center. Alan was born on June 13, 1947. In 1969, he received his undergraduate degree from the University of Utah, where he stayed to earn his medical degree in 1973. He later returned to the University of Utah as a professor and chairman of the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences. In his career, Crandall pioneered several surgical techniques and participated in clinical studies used to impact the future of ophthalmology and used his skills to further the next generation of ophthalmologists through training and mentoring surgeons. As founder of the Global Outreach Division of the Moran Eye Center and past president of the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, Dr. Crandall spent nearly four decades helping those in need access high- quality eye care. Dr. Crandall's service to the field of ophthalmology continued as a member of the National Board of Medical Examiners and the American Board of Ophthalmology. His philanthropy was widespread, performing free surgeries in his local community and in dozens of developing countries around the globe. I traveled with Dr. Crandall to Guatemala and Haiti to help perform vision restoring cataract surgeries and saw firsthand his compassion and commitment to curing preventable diseases. Dr. Crandall's humanitarianism was so renowned that he received numerous international awards for his work. He is the only physician to have received four of the most prestigious humanitarian awards in ophthalmology from the American Glaucoma Society, the American Academy of Ophthalmology, the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, and the Chang Family Foundation. Additionally, Rotary International awarded him with both the Health Care Heroes Award for Excellence in Health Care and Community Outreach and the Vocational Excellence Award for Humanitarian Service. On behalf of all ophthalmologists, together we mourn the loss of an outstanding surgeon and even greater man. Alan was a steadfast ambassador to the field of ophthalmology, and his true selflessness will certainly never be forgotten.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I rise today to honor one of Louisville's finest, Louisville Metro Police Major Aubrey Gregory. Police work is an unquestionably difficult and dangerous job, but it is among the noblest callings. Each and every day, officers risk their lives to keep our communities safe. Officers such as Louisville Metro Police Major Aubrey Gregory meet the challenges they encounter every day with professionalism, class, and courage. Major Gregory joined the LMPD in 1999 and leads Louisville Metro Police Special Operations Unit. Serving to keep the peace in Louisville during a time of uncertainty, Major Gregory has led his fellow officers with class and courage during this difficult time. Dedicated service from officers like Major Gregory during times of protest is important to keep protests peaceful instead of a riot. Major Gregory and his fellow officers deserve and have our respect and admiration. Major Gregory was shot on Wednesday night during the protest in Louisville. Fortunately, Major Gregory is expected to make a full recovery. I join my fellow Kentuckians in wishing Major Gregory a speedy recovery.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I rise today to honor one of Louisville's finest, Louisville Metro Police Officer Robinson Desroches. Police work is an unquestionably difficult and dangerous job, but it is among the noblest callings. Each and every day, officers risk their lives to keep our communities safe. Officers such as Louisville Metro Police Officer Robinson Desroches meet the challenges they encounter every day with professionalism, class, and courage. Officer Desroches joined the LMPD in 2019. Serving to keep the peace in Louisville during a time of uncertainty, Officer Desroches has served his community with class and courage during this difficult time. Dedicated service from officers like Officer Desroches during times of protest is important to keep protests peaceful instead of a riot. Officer Desroches and his fellow officers deserve and have our respect and admiration. Officer Desroches was shot on Wednesday night during the protest in Louisville. Fortunately, he is expected to make a full recovery. I join my fellow Kentuckians in wishing Officer Desroches a speedy recovery.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I have no problem with asking unanimous consent at this point to pass the legislation with a few amendments. Since this will not be going through committee, we ought to, like you say, examine the legislation and think about what it involves. I think having a few commonsense amendments would make sense. It is about 200,000 or 270,000 Venezuelans. I think we can accommodate them. We are a big, great country, and America has room for them. We should make sure, though, that they don't overburden the welfare system, and there should be rules that people, as part of this program, do not come to the country to receive welfare. That is my first amendment. My second amendment would say that at the end of the 18-month period, Congress should vote on whether or not to extend the period. In the past, we have granted this temporary status, and it has been renewed decade after decade and become just sort of this lost zone for people for whom we can't figure out a permanent solution. My third amendment would actually create an ability to absorb more people in our country and would be more of a permanent solution. My third amendment is called the BELIEVE Act, and it is a bill that I have had out there for several years. What it would do is to take the merit- based employment in our country, employment-based visas, and double these visas. So, if you want to accommodate the 200-some-odd thousand Venezuelans, we need more green cards, ultimately, for permanent status. This would be increased employment-based visas. So, my unanimous consent request would be to pass your bill with these three amendments: One, to prohibit welfare; two, to make it Congress's prerogative to decide that this term needs to be extended and it would have to be a vote by this body; and then the third thing would be that we expand our employment-based visas in order to accommodate folks like this in our country. I would ask unanimous consent that your bill be passed, and, also, including my three amendments to the bill, and at this point, I ask unanimous consent for that.

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I voice my objection to the original motion of Senator Menendez.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, a special little girl named Zoey is celebrating her first birthday on September 28, 2020. In recognition of this day, Spencer County Judge Executive John Riley is declaring it as Zoey's Congenital Cataract Awareness Day. It is the hope of her parents that every primary care clinician in Spencer County, the Commonwealth of Kentucky, and beyond, is aware of this rare cause of blindness that can be surgically treated when diagnosed early enough. As an ophthalmologist, I have had the privilege of participating in these surgeries and know how life-changing early intervention can be. Fortunately for Zoey, after three surgeries, she has a very promising prognosis. I am honored to help make Zoey's birthday wish come true by sharing her story and thereby raising awareness for the early detection and treatment of congenital cataracts.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, Col. Ronald Dudley Ray, USMC, served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense (Guard/Reserve) during the Reagan administration and was a highly decorated Vietnam veteran who was an adviser to the South Vietnamese Marine Corps during the Tet Offensive and other campaigns. He was awarded two Silver Stars, a Bronze Star with combat V, and a Purple Heart. His gallantry under fire was exceeded only by his tenacious advocacy for his fellow veterans. He entered law school at the University of Louisville, where he graduated at the top of his class. Throughout his civilian career, he used his talent and professional skills to encourage, organize, and recognize veterans from the Vietnam era. He personally championed the Kentucky Vietnam Veterans' Memorial in Frankfort, and led the way in raising $1 million for its design and construction. A great student of American history, he amassed a collection of over 10,000 books on the subject, and he shared his vast knowledge by writing and speaking about the history of the country he loved and served with such distinction. Colonel Ray, who passed away July 6, 2020, leaves a unique legacy of personal service to our Nation and dedication to its veterans that is worthy of this special distinction.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following interns in my office be granted floor privileges until August 8, 2020: Rachel Carpenter, Brett Abbott, Rachel Altman, Daniel Rankin, Maddie Martin, Jacob Lambert, Noah Vehafric, Jackson Berryman, and Duke Garschina.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, there is a Cold War-era quote, attributed to Winston Churchill, that ``in a democracy, a knock on the door in the early morning is the milkman.'' In the United States, we are not supposed to fear a knock on our front door. If the police do knock on our door, we expect them to come at a reasonable hour and to respond to criminal activity with the professionalism befitting the peace officers they are. Those are the expectations of a free people, proud of its history and tradition of separating the roles between civilian law enforcement agencies and the Armed Forces--one is to keep the peace within its community, the other is to destroy foreign adversaries. By keeping those roles separate, Americans have historically built and sustained a strong bond of trust with their police officers. But, for years, the war on crime and the misguided war on drugs has looked a lot like the war on terror. Throughout our country, due to the Department of Defense's 1033 Program, law enforcement is equipped with the tools of the U.S. military, which has predictably resulted in the continued decline of the relationship between the police and those they serve. Perhaps we should discuss the kinds of machinery provided to local police departments. The 1033 Program provided to the sleepy New England town of Keene, NH, a Ballistic Engineered Armored Response Counter Attack Truck, otherwise known as a Bearcat. That might sound menacing, but it is nothing compared to what the Department of Defense provided to Columbia, SC: a mine-resistant war truck, equipped with a machine gun. These examples are by no means unique. Between 2006 and 2014, the Department of Defense transferred over $1.5 billion worth of equipment, including over 600 mine-resistant ambush protected vehicles, 79,288 assault rifles, 205 grenade launchers, and 11,959 bayonets to civilian police departments. These are not the tools of peace officers. These are weapons uniquely designed to crush an enemy army. Mr. President, there has emerged a consensus that we have turned our back on our own principles and blurred the lines between civilian law enforcement and soldiers of war. And we know that because the Inhofe amendment concedes as much. By limiting the types of weapons that can be transferred, such as bayonets and grenades, the Inhofe amendment acknowledges that there are at least some military-grade weapons that should not be turned on the streets of America's communities. But, despite that major and very welcome concession, the Inhofe amendment contains a very telling blind spot. It focuses almost exclusively on weaponry and not the true issue here, the importance of trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve. The Inhofe amendment takes as a given that the transfers of military surplus equipment are between the law enforcement agencies, the DOD, and no one else. The Schatz-Paul amendment takes a different approach by ensuring that communities are notified of requests and transfers, by posting notices throughout the community and on a public website, as well as community participation by ensuring that a jurisdiction's governing body approves of the transfers. And the Schatz-Paul amendment provides enforcement mechanisms to combat police militarization. Mr. President, the police have a very difficult job and serve a critical function. Without the rule of law, a civilized society cannot exist. We cannot take the police for granted. They are brave citizens, and they deserve our gratitude. That is the core of the Schatz-Paul amendment. Our amendment takes seriously the idea that the cops on the beat can only do their job well when they are well known to their neighbors and trusted by their communities. By providing the Federal Government and local citizens a role in evaluating what tools should be available to civilian police forces, the Schatz-Paul amendment will help build the relationship between law enforcement, their communities, and, in turn, make our citizens, our police, and our neighborhoods safer. I urge my colleagues to vote yes on the Schatz-Paul amendment.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the intern Sean Piwowar be allowed access to the floor for today.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, Senator Udall and I are pleased to present a bipartisan amendment that will finally end America's longest war. Our amendment will finally and completely end the war in Afghanistan. Over 4,000 Americans have died in Afghanistan, and over 20,000 have been wounded. It is time to bring our soldiers home. I supported going into Afghanistan originally. Had I been in Congress at that time, I would have voted in favor of it. But the people who attacked us on 9/11 have all been killed or captured. Most of the people fighting us today are their successors or children or the children of their children. In fact, we now have soldiers who were born after 9/11 serving in Afghanistan. The cycle shows no sign of ending. The war shows no sign of ending. It is not sustainable to keep fighting in Afghanistan generation after generation. We have been fighting in Afghanistan for so long that our youngest soldiers fighting there weren't even born at the time. We have spent about $1 trillion to establish an Afghan Government--a government that is rife with corruption and dysfunction. We spent more to rebuild Afghanistan than the Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe after World War II. We have built infrastructure in Afghanistan and then watched it deteriorate and watched the Afghans be unable to even maintain the infrastructure we built for them, and then they ask us for more money to maintain the structure. Meanwhile, our roads and our bridges crumble here at home as we rebuild the infrastructure in Afghanistan. One example is, several years ago, we reportedly hired a local security consultant to help secure the roads at a cost of $1 million per year. But according to the report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, American officials came to suspect that the money was being funneled to insurgents to stage attacks on our infrastructure to justify the security contract. So our money was going to a guy who was paying insurgents to pretend to attack him so he could provide security for their infrastructure. It is crazy. We spent $43 million on a natural gas gas station. Guess how many vehicles in Afghanistan run on natural gas. Zero. You can't even find the gas station. My staff went there to see if the money had been spent, and they couldn't go there because it was too unsafe. Now the report is that the gas station has been abandoned--$43 million. We spent nearly $80 million on a luxury hotel. Why is the American taxpayer building luxury hotels in Kabul? Guess what. A contractor ran off with the money. It is a skeleton. The Taliban are now said to climb up into the structure and shoot down at our Embassy. What kind of foolhardy nature of government are we that we continue to stay there? These are just a few of the many examples that have had us spend more than we spent in Europe on the Marshall Plan. We continue to pour good money after bad into Afghanistan, hoping that the outcome will somehow change, hoping that maybe the first 20 years will produce better results than the last 20 years did. This NDAA, this defense authorization that we are debating here in the Senate, even has the sense of the Senate in it opposing a precipitous withdrawal from Afghanistan. We have been there for 20 years. How can we characterize withdrawal after 20 years, after we defeated the enemy, as precipitous? It is crazy. The American people say ``Come home,'' and this is your chance. Many people have said that we should end the war. Today, you get to vote. Are you for staying in Afghanistan for another generation? Are you for continuing a war that has lost its purpose? Today, we get to vote up or down: Are you for the war or against the war? Does the war still have a mission? The American people know better. They are ready to declare victory and come home. It is why President Trump's message resonated with so many. He said ``It is time to come home,'' and the people agreed. Not only is it time to end the war and focus on our needs at home, but it is time to reward those who fought the battle. We are spending $50 billion a year over there. From the savings in the first year, in our amendment, Senator Udall and I will provide a $2,500 bonus for anyone who has been deployed in the long War on Terror. That is a pretty good bonus. Our soldiers deserve it, and they also deserve to come home because there is no military mission left. Instead of spending another $50 billion in Afghanistan next year, let's give some of that money to our soldiers who fought the war, and let's begin saving some money from the massive deficit we face here at home. This is the Senate's chance to show that it is time to declare victory. It is time to come home. I urge support for my amendment, and I also remind Senators this is your chance to vote to end a war.

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to complete my remarks.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Thank you.

Mr. PAUL. Madam President, I think it is a terrible thing that the government pays checks to dead people. The problem is that Social Security is not sharing that information with Treasury. I have a bill to do that and will ask unanimous consent for it to be joined with Senator Carper's bill and Senator Kennedy's bill. At this point, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 4104, introduced earlier today. I ask further 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. PAUL. Madam President, at this point we have a pending motion.

Mr. PAUL. Madam President, I am asking, are there any objections? If there are no objections, I guess it passes.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. I think it is important to know and let the record show that I have been working with Senator Booker's office for 3 months on the amendment of this bill; that I am willing to have unanimous passage of the bill today, but I think it is incredibly important that we get this right. A Black woman in New Jersey assaulted three Jewish women and slapped them. It was terrible. She uttered racial epithets about these Jewish women. She was charged with third-degree misdemeanor assault with up to 1 year in prison, which to me sounds pretty significant for slapping, but she was then charged with a hate crime in addition to that, which was 4 years in addition. If slapping someone and hurling racial epithets gets you 10 years in prison, this is exactly what we have been fighting about in criminal justice reform. We set up a system and didn't pay attention to the penalties, and all of a sudden things we didn't intend happened. So we have to be smart about this. I am willing to pass the bill today, as amended, which would simply say not that you even have to harm someone--you have to attempt to harm them, but it has to be an attempt to harm them. So all the discussion about bruising while trying to lynch someone-- yes, that is attempted murder. It would be covered by this bill. Nothing in the bill would stop or prevent the prosecution of heinous behavior. That is what it is intended for What I am trying to do is to make sure we don't get unintended consequences. We fought the battle against mandatory minimums for a decade now because we tie up people in sentencing that makes no sense. Ten years for slapping someone would be an abomination, and it could happen to anyone. Do we want a Black woman who slapped three Jewish women in New Jersey to get 10 years in prison? If there is a group of them, it is now a conspiracy to lynch. We have to use some common sense here. We should not have a 10-year prison sentence for anything less than, at the very least, an attempt to do bodily harm. The statute lists what bodily harm is, but it could still be an attempt. It doesn't mean you actually have to have it, but what it would preclude is when somebody shoves somebody in a bar and they fall down and have an abrasion and they say: ``He did it because of a racial animus toward me,'' and then you have a 10-year penalty. That is not right. All of us are advocates on the same side of criminal justice reform. We have all argued on the same side that the law is screwed up and has incarcerated too many people unfairly. That is what I am trying to prevent here. So the point is, I understand the emotions about this. Do you think I take great joy in being here? No. I am the sponsor of 22 criminal justice bills. Do you think I am getting any good publicity on this? No. I will be excoriated by simpleminded people on the internet who think I don't like Emmett Till or appreciate the history and the memory of Emmett Till. I will be lectured to by everybody that I have got no right to have an opinion on any of these things, and I should be quiet. But we cannot just not read our bills. I have worked in an honest way with Senator Booker's office for 3 months on this bill. We have gone back and forth. We gave them some language. They came back to us and said it wouldn't work, and I said: What about this, and we haven't gotten any more responses. We haven't gotten responses back in a month or more. The situation now is they are litigating in the press and trying to accuse me of being in favor of something so heinous that it makes my skin crawl and makes me sick to my stomach to even read the accounts about what happened. But we also ought to be fair and honest about this. Lynching is illegal. People who say there is no Federal law against lynching are not telling the truth. The law says that if you kill somebody and you have racial animus, under the hate crimes statute, it is illegal. You can't do that. It is also illegal in all the States. This bill does not make lynching illegal. So for all the discussion of that, this bill creates a new crime called conspiracy to lynch. Oh, yes, I am for it. If there is a crowd, let's arrest the whole mob. All four policemen should be responsible for what happened to Mr. Floyd. The thing is, when we do that, we have to be careful that we don't then put a crowd of people in where someone pushed into someone or someone slapped someone. There has to be justice. People are chanting ``justice.'' Justice has to have a brain and has to have vision and can't be hamstrung into something that could give someone 10 years in prison for a minor crime. This is a very minor attempt. Everything we left in here we have worked with Senator Booker's office to make sure it is inclusive. They came back and said: What about attempted? We said: Let's change the language. So we have in there ``attempt to cause serious bodily harm.'' So there could be no injury, but someone will have to have a discussion of whether there was an attempt and it was an attempt that looked like it would be serious. So I think slapping someone isn't, but under the current statute as is--people say: Ah, nobody will ever do it. Maybe, but we are putting it on the books. The mandatory minimums have kept people in jail for decades. There are people who have life for nonviolent crimes. All of us have worked on the same side of that issue. I am asking for a very minor change. I will pass it right now. I am completely out of the way. I am for the bill. I am asking unanimous consent to pass the bill today with one amendment that just says let's be careful not to arrest people for slapping someone or not arrest somebody for pushing into someone and get them 10 years in prison. This isn't about someone trying to kill another person or someone attempting bodily harm. Those people would be included in this language even if they did not have a mark on the person. But if they were rounding him up, tying him up, and they had thrown a rope over a tree, that is attempted murder. They would still be included under this bill, even without a mark on them. What we have to preclude and what we are trying to preclude is that the bill doesn't get used for the wrong purposes. We are all on the same side about whom we want to punish and whom we should prevent. We are also on the same side on the symbolism of this, but we can't pass laws that do exactly what all of us have said is wrong with our penal system, all of the unintended consequences. There is one here, and I ask, in a very polite way--I have been asking for 3 months--for one small change, and I will let the bill go today, on this day, if we can have it. The changes have been out there. They are not brand-new. They have been in Senator Booker's office for 3 months. We have tried to, as he has had objections, work with him on his objections. So I would ask unanimous consent, once again, to pass the bill, as amended.

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for the expedited passage of H.R. 35, the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, as amended. I seek to amend this legislation not because I take lynching lightly but because I take it seriously, and this legislation does not. Lynching is a tool of terror that claimed the lives of nearly 5,000 Americans between 1881 and 1968, but this bill would cheapen the meaning of lynching by defining it so broadly as to include a minor bruise or abrasion. Our Nation's history of racial terrorism demands more seriousness from us than that. W.E.B. Du Bois wrote in his autobiography about the 1899 lynching of Sam Hose in Georgia. Du Bois wrote that, after the lynching, Hose's knuckles were viewed on display at a store on Mitchell Street in Atlanta. His liver and heart were even presented to the Governor of Georgia as a souvenir. Sickening, grotesque--the images of lynching. In 1931, Raymond Gunn was lynched in Maryville, MO. The spectacle drew a crowd of almost 4,000 people, including, if you can believe it, women and their children. In the tragedy of lynching, the author writes that one woman even held her little girl up so high so she could better see the victim who was ``blazing on the roof.'' Sickening and grotesque, these images. In the summer of 1955, 14-year-old Emmett Till was visiting family in Money, MS, when he went to a country store and bought some candy. While in there, he was accused of flirting with a White woman, and for that offense, Emmett Till was kidnapped in the middle of the night and bludgeoned so badly that, afterward, his body was unrecognizable. He could only be identified by the ring he was wearing. After seeing her son's remains, his mother insisted on having an open casket funeral so the whole world could see what the killers had done to her son. We must remember the murders of Emmett Till, Raymond Gunn, Sam Hose, and the thousands of others whose lives were destroyed by the barbarity of the lynch mob, but this bill will not do that. This bill would expand the meaning of ``lynching'' to include any bodily injury, including a cut, an abrasion, or a bruise, physical pain, illness, or any other injury to the body, no matter how temporary. Words have meaning. It would be a disgrace for the Congress of the United States to declare that a bruise is lynching, that an abrasion is lynching, that any injury to the body, no matter how temporary, is on par with the atrocities done to people like Emmett Till, Raymond Gunn, and Sam Hose, who were killed for no reason but because they were Black. To do that would demean their memories and cheapen the historic and horrific legacy of lynching in our country. As Congressman Amash stated, ``To be clear, the bill does not make lynching a new Federal hate crime. Murdering someone on account of their race or conspiring to do so is now illegal under Federal law. It is already a Federal crime, and it is already a hate crime.'' He is right. We have had Federal hate crime statutes for over 50 years, and it has been a Federal hate crime to murder someone because of his race for over a decade. Additionally, murder is already a crime in 50 States. In fact, rather than considering a good-intentioned but symbolic bill, the Senate could immediately consider addressing qualified immunity and ending police militarization. We can and must do better. That is why no one in the Senate has been more involved in criminal justice reform than I have. No one has introduced more criminal justice reform bills. In my time in the Senate, I have authored or cosponsored at least 22 unique criminal justice reform bills. I am acutely aware of the injustices perpetrated year in and year out in our cities, but reform needs to be more than window dressing. That is why I am on the floor today to offer the expedited passage-- pass it today--of the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, as amended. Lynching is a particularly vicious kind of murder, and a Federal law should treat it as such. For these reasons, the Emmett Till Antilynching Act should be adopted with my amendment, which would apply the criminal penalties for lynching only and not for other crimes. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of H.R. 35, which was received by the House. I ask unanimous consent that my amendment at the desk be agreed to, that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed, and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. The PATRIOT Act was begotten of the most unpatriotic of ideas--that liberty can be exchanged for security. The history of the PATRIOT Act shows that the exchange is a poor one. As our liberty wanes and wastes away, we find that the promises of security were an illusion. The history of the PATRIOT Act is really a history of how power corrupts and how bias and malfeasance grow when power is unchecked. The PATRIOT Act allowed a secret court, FISA, to grant generalized warrants to collect personal data from millions of Americans. The spies who run these surveillance programs then lied--for years and years--to us. One of the most notorious of these liars was James Clapper. When cross-examined under oath by Senator Wyden, James Clapper denied that the government was collecting data on millions of Americans. A month later, the whistleblower, Edward Snowden, revealed that Clapper had lied. Snowden revealed that Clapper and others were using the PATRIOT Act to spy on virtually every American. Snowden revealed that the secret FISA Court was allowing a single court order to command the collection of millions of Americans' personal phone data. Most Members of Congress had no idea that this was going on. In fact, one of the authors of the PATRIOT Act publicly expressed his shock that such a massive surveillance of Americans was occurring with no notification of Congress. Clapper and others, though, said that is not true. They justified their actions by saying: We have been briefing the Elite 8 Congressmen. Who were the Elite 8, and who made them elite? The Elite 8 are the majority and minority leaders of the House and the Senate and the majority and minority leader of the Intelligence Committees of the House and the Senate--eight people. When they were quizzed about this program, most of them said they couldn't remember ever being briefed on it. But the real constitutional question is, have we not changed and subverted the Constitution to make eight people more important than the rest of us? So this was a program where they were collecting the data on everybody's phone calls--everybody in America--and you would think there would have to be a debate and approval by Congress, but there were only eight people, and those eight people seemed to be confused that they had approved the program as well. The idea that a single court order can allow the collection of personal data from millions of people is antithetical to the intentions of the Fourth Amendment. The Fourth Amendment dictates that the government must identify an individual and the items and the location to be searched. The Fourth Amendment was intended to forbid general warrants or writs of assistance that, historically, Monarchs had used indiscriminately to collect vast amounts of either belongings or possessions of individuals. The Fourth Amendment was written to prevent that from happening. The PATRIOT Act essentially allows for generalized warrants and the bulk collection of personal data. The Fourth Amendment also dictates that a search can only occur when the government proves to a judge that there is probable cause that a crime has been committed. However, under the PATRIOT Act they have lowered the standard. So there is the constitutional standard--the Fourth Amendment. But, under the PATRIOT Act, the standard now becomes if it is relevant to an investigation. That is a much looser, broader standard, and it is not a constitutional standard. So the question is, Through these special, secret courts and through the PATRIOT Act, can we allow things that the Constitution actually prevents. What we have done is eroded protections for Americans. So some of us have said the Constitution should still apply to Americans. If you want to look at the data of foreigners or spy on foreign countries or potential terrorists, by all means, do it, but Americans should still be protected by the Constitution. The PATRIOT Act doesn't provide this protection and allows anybody to be investigated if the government can prove that it is relevant to an investigation. That standard is so broad that it could mean almost anything. It is hard to imagine something that could not be argued to be relevant to an investigation. To those of us who prize the rights guaranteed in the Bill of Rights, the PATRIOT Act is a violation of our most precious rights. The PATRIOT Act, in the end, is not patriotic. The PATRIOT Act makes an unholy and unconstitutional exchange of liberty for a false sense of security. I, for one, will oppose its reauthorization. Today we are also here, though, to discuss the FISA Court that interacts and uses some of these extra powers, these extraconstitutional powers. It has been revealed over the last few years that the FISA Court was manipulated, lied to, and ultimately condoned the investigation of a political campaign. I believe that the authors of the FISA Court, who intended to restrain unconstitutional searches, would be appalled at what the FISA Court has become. They would be appalled that this secret court intended to be used to investigate foreign spies and terrorists was turned into a powerful and invasive force to infiltrate and disrupt the political process. It should not matter whether you are a Democrat or a Republican or a Libertarian; we should all be appalled at this abuse of power. The question is, How do we fix it? To my mind, there are two approaches. No. 1, we could try to make the FISA Court less bad by adding procedural hurdles to make it more like a constitutional court or, No. 2, admit that the FISA Court cannot be made constitutional, admit that FISA uses a less-than-constitutional standard when it allows searches to be performed that do not meet the Fourth Amendment. The Fourth Amendment requires probable cause that you have either committed a crime or are committing a crime. The FISA Court only says the government must prove or assert that there is probable cause that you are connected to a foreign government. As we have seen, the standards were so lax that when they went to the Trump campaign and said that a certain person was related to a foreign government, it turns out it was untrue. They didn't present facts to the court that actually argued that he wasn't an agent of the foreign government, and that person had no one to argue for him. The deficiency of the FISA Court and why it is not constitutional is that you don't get a lawyer. You actually don't even get told you have been accused of a crime. The only reason we know that President Trump's campaign got caught up in this is that he won. Because he won and now has the power to open and put sunlight on this, we are now able to see in. If this had been an ordinary American caught up in this, you would never be told, you would never get a lawyer, and you would be brought before this investigative body and subjected to a search of vast amounts of your private information without probable cause. That is not constitutional, and I don't think we can make it constitutional. I think we should admit that we can't constitutionally allow Americans to be subjected to a search that doesn't follow the Fourth Amendment. I believe there is no fixing the FISA Court to make it constitutional for Americans. I believe the only solution is to exempt Americans from the FISA Court. If government wants to investigate a political campaign, which should be a very rare and a very unusual circumstance, to have the government involved in a political campaign, governments should request a Fourth Amendment search from an article III constitutional court. Some will say: Oh, it is hard; we will never get it. Guess what--even constitutional warrants are mostly granted. The vast majority of them are granted. But guess what--a judge will be a little reticent to get involved in the political process because they know how heated it is and how important it is to our Republic. But that is the way you should investigate a campaign if you are going to. Opponents of doing the tried and trusted constitutional way will argue that it takes too long and it is too hard. But guess what--the Constitution was meant to be an onerous standard. The Constitution was meant to be rigorous. Our Founding Fathers understood that justice cannot be achieved in secret courts that neither notify the accused nor let the accused have legal representation. You can't find justice where there is no adversarial process, where you don't get a lawyer. I think it is high time we quit letting fear overrun our constitutional duty. Today, I offer an amendment that restores the Constitution for all Americans and forbids the secret FISA Court from ever again meddling in our political process. Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 1586 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. PAUL. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, no virus, not even a plague, should cause us to forget that our freedom is the result of resisting the concentration of power in the hands of a few. Recently, there has been dangerous talk of the President adjourning Congress. I am reminded of the long English battle to forbid the King from dissolving Parliament. In fact, Charles I lost his head partly because he insisted on dissolving Parliament. In those days, Parliament did not take Charles' royal power grab laying down. When Charles I dissolved Parliament in 1629, members took matters into their own hands and descended on the speaker, John Finch, and sat on him. Since he could not rise, the Parliament could not close. While he squirmed and was held down, Parliament passed several motions, condemning the King's power grab. Ultimately, the English Parliament would change the Constitution to forbid the King from dissolving Parliament. Now, I am not suggesting we hold the President of the Senate down and commandeer the Senate--though the idea has crossed my mind. Whatever path of resistance we take, talk of the administration adjourning or temporarily dissolving Congress should loudly be resisted as if the Republic depended on it. Perhaps more alarming than allowing a President threatening to dissolve Congress is that Congress currently has allowed itself to become more of an oligarchy than an assembly. A few Members of the leadership are set to pass legislation, spending nearly a half a trillion dollars, without any recorded vote or debate. Shouldn't someone shout stop? Shouldn't someone point out the terrible precedent of having a few Members speak for all the Members? I, for one, believe that if there exists too much danger to have Congress meet--and if there exists too much danger to have Congress meet in person, we should allow emergency voting remotely. In that vein, I offer the following resolution. I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of my resolution at the desk; I further ask that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble agreed to, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table without any intervening action or debate.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, no amount of money--not all the money in China--will save us from ourselves. Our only hope of rescuing this great country is to reopen the economy. If you print up billions of dollars and give it to people, they are unlikely to spend it until you end the quarantine. The good news, though, is that the scientific community finally has facts instead of conjecture. The models that used 3.4 percent mortality were, fortunately, very wrong. Random samples of thousands of people have now been tested for antibodies or immunity to coronavirus. Two large randomized studies in California show similar results. The number of people who already developed antibodies to the coronavirus is 25 to 50 times higher than the number that is being reported as infected. This is great news. This study means that the mortality rate may well be 25 to 50 times less deadly than previously thought. The virus is still dangerous, and we shouldn't ignore the risks, but we should put those risks in perspective. These randomized tests indicate that, instead of a 3.4 percent mortality, that the rate could be as much as only 0.1 percent or 0.2 percent. We now have scientific evidence from randomized studies that we can manage this disease without continuing the draconian lockdown of the economy. The question before us isn't to do nothing or to print endless amounts of bailout cash. The debate should now include the one choice that will get our economy growing again: reopening American commerce. Today, I rise in opposition to spending $500 billion more. The virus bailouts have already cost over $2 trillion. Our annual deficit this year will approach $4 trillion. We can't continue on this course. No amount of bailout dollars will stimulate an economy that is being strangled by quarantine. It is not a lack of money that plagues us but a lack of commerce. This economic calamity only resolves when we begin to reopen the economy. Opening the economy will require Americans to rise above partisanship, to understand that deaths from infectious disease will continue, but that we cannot indefinitely quarantine. Make no mistake about it, this has been a difficult month for our country. For many of us, we have not seen a greater challenge. I am encouraged to see how our communities are responding. In Kentucky, we have seen tremendous collaboration. People from all walks of life have come together to help each other. We have worked to identify and supply additional protective gear, masks, and gloves to protect our doctors and nurses who risk their lives on a daily basis. UPS has set up an airlift operation out of Louisville that includes a healthcare facility for FEMA. This lets FEMA make overnight deliveries from anywhere in the country. Over 3 million pounds of masks, gloves, and other equipment have been shipped to the Louisville airport by UPS. We have worked with some of our bourbon distillers to assist them in transitioning to producing hand sanitizer. We helped repatriate Americans trapped overseas. We also have seen how our communities have banded together to support neighbors, businesses, and those in need. When protective equipment was in short supply, we discovered a way to use industrial masks, and we supported legislation to allow us to bring approximately 30 million masks into the medical community. When the FDA wouldn't approve COVID-19 tests other than the CDC's--a test that initially failed--we introduced legislation that circumvented the FDA and circumvented the redtape to get testing done quicker. Over the years, the U.S. has accumulated more than $23 trillion in debt, spending money that we do not have and borrowing from our kids' and our grandkids' future. The gargantuan Federal bailout that just passed over $2 trillion brings us closer and closer to a point of no return, a point in which the world loses confidence in the dollar and a point in which our debt becomes an existential threat to our security. The United States is already having to borrow simply to pay our promises to senior citizens. The U.S. is borrowing about $1 trillion a year just to pay for everyday obligations. This is before the pandemic bailout. The U.S. is already borrowing nearly $2 million every minute. With the recent $2 trillion bailout, we are borrowing faster than we have ever borrowed before. Had we practiced sound budgeting in the past, we would have been in a significantly better position to weather this storm. Congress' failures of the past, coupled with the pandemic prices of the present, could seriously jeopardize our economic future. In this moment, we need to think carefully about what we do next. To stop the spread of this virus, commerce has been disrupted, businesses have closed, and millions have lost their jobs. Right now, the number is 20 million unemployed. The job losses will continue no matter how much money you throw at it until you reopen the economy. Our government has intervened with unprecedented scale to prop up our economy. We have injected $2 trillion. I do believe it makes sense for the government to provide support to businesses and families who can't make it through this. I supported expanding unemployment benefits for workers displaced by government quarantine, including self-employed individuals that have lost their businesses. But make no mistake, the massive economic calamity we are experiencing right now was caused by government. Passing out $1,200 checks indiscriminately to people who haven't lost their jobs will do nothing to rescue the country. If we were going to make discrete direct payments, the criteria should have been sending checks to people who needed it, people who lost their jobs, people furloughed, people who had wage cuts. Instead of directing help to the unemployed, though, some of these bailout checks will go to couples who earn nearly $200,000 a year. But you could give everybody in the country $12,000, and it wouldn't end this recession. Our recovery only comes when the quarantine has ended. Experts will disagree on the exact date that we should reopen the economy, but sane, rational counsel should continue to push for the quickest end possible. Opining about never shaking hands again is a recipe for keeping the economy closed until no one dies from infectious disease. While the infectious disease experts should be queried, so, too, should economists. We should seek counsel about balancing the harm to health caused by disease with the harm to health caused by enforcing dysfunction on the economy--not easy decisions. Most importantly, leaders in each State must weigh in on the problem. New York City's opening date will be different from Fargo, ND. We need to get past a one-size-fits-all approach to infectious disease. Realize that most of this money that is being loaned to small business is not a loan. Most of this money will not be repaid. It will ultimately be considered grants that will be added to our national debt. Let's be honest about this. Applications for the program opened to overwhelming initial demand. The current data indicates that the money is gone, so now, here we are again, with leadership from both parties saying, Let's do another $300 billion, what is another couple hundred billion dollars? But realize the money desired is not money we have saved for a rainy day. This money doesn't exist anywhere. It will be created or borrowed. Even more alarming than the money is the idea that one Senator can stand on the floor and pass legislation spending a half-trillion dollars and have no recorded vote and no debate. Look, I understand the hardships of Senators returning from around the country, so I have not invoked the Senate rules to demand a recorded vote. I did return today, though, so that history will record that not everyone gave in to the massive debt Congress is creating. My hope is that, across the country, there will remain a vibrant voice for limited government for our constitutional Republic. I don't want to see this massive accumulation of debt destroy this great country. My advice to the Senate and to the American people is let's be aware of what we are doing by creating all this new debt, and let's think before we jump to a terrible, terrible conclusion.

Mr. PAUL

Mr. PAUL. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the votes scheduled at 12:10 p.m. be allowed to begin now.

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