John Thune

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Texas (Mr. Cornyn), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Cramer), the Senator from Montana (Mr. Daines), and the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Texas (Mr. Cornyn), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Cramer), the Senator from Montana (Mr. Daines), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Rubio), and the Senator from Alabama (Mr. Tuberville). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Marshall), and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay'' and the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Marshall) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Marshall), and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay,'' and the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Marshall) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney). Further, if present and voting: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Texas (Mr. Cornyn), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Cramer), the Senator from Montana (Mr. Danes), and the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay''.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Texas (Mr. Cornyn), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Cramer), the Senator from Montana (Mr. Daines), and the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Texas (Mr. Cornyn), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Cramer), the Senator from Montana (Mr. Daines), and the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Cramer), the Senator from Montana (Mr. Daines), and the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

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

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) and the Senator from Utah, (Mr. Romney). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have noted ``nay''.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, we recently passed the 1-year anniversary of President Biden's inauguration. It is a natural time for taking stock of the first year of his Presidency. In President Biden, we were supposed to get a leader--a leader at home and on the world stage. The grownups, we were told, were back in the room. But the truth of the matter is that President Biden's first year in office has been marked by a lack of leadership more than anything else. Again and again, President Biden has simply abdicated his responsibilities. Take perhaps the two defining domestic crises of the Biden Presidency: our inflation crisis and our border crisis. In both cases, the response of the President and his administration has by and large been to stick their fingers in their ears and pretend the crises don't exist. Sure, the President or his people make a gesture toward the problem every now and then, but mostly, you would be forgiven for thinking that neither the border crisis nor the inflation crisis was even on the President's radar. Migrants continue to pour across our southern border in massive numbers, creating a humanitarian, enforcement, and security nightmare. And the President? Well, he appears to believe that if he ignores the problem long enough, it will go away. When he does talk about immigration, it amounts to a green light to the cartels and traffickers to keep leading migrants to our borders. That is why I recently joined more than 100 lawmakers in requesting that the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general investigate the Biden administration's border failures. Between the President's rhetoric and his failure to take any meaningful action to address the influx of illegal immigration, it is no surprise that we saw more than half a million attempts to cross our southern border illegally in the current fiscal year's first 3 months alone--half a million. Meanwhile, American families are struggling with the worst inflation in 40 years--40 years. The last time inflation was this bad, ``E.T.'' was just premiering, and ``Return of the Jedi'' hadn't even come out yet. American families are struggling with huge increases in the price of the most basic necessities, from food to fuel. And the administration's response? Mostly crickets. Of course, President Biden hasn't just been largely ignoring this crisis; he actually helped create it. The so-called American Rescue Plan Act the Democrats passed and the President signed into law in March of last year helped produce the sky-high inflation we are experiencing. But instead of addressing the resulting crisis, the President has been focused on passing another massive government spending bill that would almost undoubtedly worsen our inflation problem. Yes, his solution to our inflation crisis is to double down on the strategy that helped produce so much inflation in the first place. Meanwhile, Americans are wondering if their paychecks will stretch to afford the sharp increases at the grocery store and in gas prices, utility bills, household commodities, and the list goes on. On the world stage, of course, the defining moment of President Biden's first year was his disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan. The President's arbitrary, chaotic withdrawal was a real low point for our country. Thirteen of our military men and women died in a terrorist attack during the evacuation from Kabul. We abandoned thousands of individuals who had worked with us in Afghanistan and whom we had promised to protect and left behind hundreds of American citizens. The President, who was supposed to restore our standing on the world stage, left our allies wondering if our word could be relied on, not to mention the fact that the disastrous withdrawal left our country in a more precarious national security position. Meanwhile, the President's recent press conference left serious questions as to how well he is likely to handle another pressing national security, and that is the issue in Ukraine. Casually dismissing a possible ``minor incursion'' into Ukraine's sovereign territory did not inspire confidence in the President's ability to stand up to Russia. We can't afford missteps and walk backs. Putin is looking to test America and NATO's resolve, looking for any hesitation or division. I hope the President and the majority party will take seriously the threat to Ukraine, utilize any remaining levers of American influence to deter a renewed attack, and, if Putin proceeds, make him immediately realize it was a miscalculation. Perhaps the biggest thing the President was going to do--the most important way he was going to be a leader--was to pull our country together. That was the defining theme of President Biden's inaugural address. I quote: Today, on this January day, my whole soul is in this: Bringing America together. Uniting our people. And uniting our nation. Contrast that speech with the speech that book-ended the other end of his first year, his speech in Georgia on election legislation. We went from a President who wanted to unite our Nation to a President who refers to his political opponents as enemies. ``We can see each other not as adversaries but as neighbors,'' the President said in his inaugural address. ``We can treat each other with dignity and respect.'' In his Georgia speech, by contrast, the President's political opponents became not only adversaries but enemies and racists, all for the crime of disagreeing with the President's vision of election reform. The President's complete condemnation of half the country was striking. I lost track of the number of people he implied were racist. The President assumed bad faith on the part of those who disagree with him. Missing from his speech was any shred of recognition that perhaps Americans of good will can disagree on election legislation. No, if you disagree with the President, you are a racist. Like Hillary Clinton before him, it is clear that President Biden conceives of a large portion of the American people as deplorables. The President repeatedly referred to justice in his Georgia speech. Perhaps he should consider the profound injustice of baselessly suggesting half the country is racist. In his inaugural address, the President said, ``We must reject a culture in which facts themselves are manipulated and even manufactured.'' I have been profoundly disappointed to see the President and many of my Democrat colleagues manipulate the facts about State election bills to support their desire for a Federal takeover of elections. Manipulated facts were a hallmark of the President's speech in Georgia, as he tried to twist a mainstream election law into Jim Crow 2.0. His attempts were particularly ironic given that the State he was complaining about offers greater opportunities to vote than are offered by the President's home State of Delaware. Days later, at a press conference marking his first year in office, the President laid the groundwork for future division and disunity by suggesting that the 2022 elections could be illegitimate if Democrats' election legislation doesn't get passed; that is, I assume, if Democrats don't win. It was yet another profoundly disappointing remark from a President who was supposed to take the lead in bringing this country together. One year into the Biden Presidency, it has become clear that the President of the inaugural address--the President whose whole soul was committed to uniting our Nation--has long ago disappeared. The President has not only failed to unite the country, but, as his ugly and divisive speech in Georgia made clear, he has come to regard anyone who opposes his policies with active hostility and contempt. Just 1 year--1 year--after dedicating himself to uniting our country, the President is dividing Americans into supporters and enemies. ``We must end this uncivil war that pits red against blue, rural versus urban, conservative versus liberal,'' the President said in his inaugural address. It is too bad the President's actions have not matched his words. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Wyoming (Mr. Barrasso), the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Wyoming (Mr. Barrasso), the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) and the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Missouri (Mr. Blunt), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven), the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney), and the Senator from Pennsylvania (Mr. Toomey). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Hoeven) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Wyoming (Mr. Barrasso), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Kennedy), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran), the Senator from Utah (Mr. Romney), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Rubio), the Senator from Alaska (Mr. Sullivan), and the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, tomorrow, the streets of our Nation's Capital will be filled with Americans from across the country who have come to Washington, DC, to march for life. They come to nudge the conscience of our Nation, to remind all of us that every day in this country, baby girls and boys are being killed by abortion. The March for Life, of course, is just one small facet of the pro- life movement, which works every day in this country to offer help and hope to moms in need. Pro-lifers collect supplies for pregnant moms. They pay for prenatal care. They assist moms with housing. They help moms continue with their schooling or find employment. They provide a listening ear to support a mom going through a difficult time. The March for Life is just one small facet of that work, but it is an important one because abortion is an injustice that happens behind closed doors. It is not something that we see happening, and so it is all too easy to forget that every day in this country, hundreds of babies are being killed by abortion. The CDC reports that almost 630,000 babies were killed by abortion in 2019 alone--630,000. That number is so big, it is almost unfathomable. To put 630,000 in some kind of perspective, that is equivalent to roughly 70 percent of the population of my State of South Dakota killed in 1 year--630,000 unique, unrepeatable human beings; future doctors, nurses, farmers and teachers and plumbers and busdrivers and research scientists, beloved sisters and brothers and nieces and nephews, future moms and dads. That is a lot of lives lost. So events like the March for Life are fundamentally important because they provide a public witness to the truth about abortion. They remind all of us of what can be all too easy to minimize or ignore or forget, and that is that in this country, we are denying our most vulnerable citizens their most basic right. You would think by now that we would have learned our lesson about deciding that one group of human beings is expendable; about deciding that some human beings are excluded from the protection and dignity that every member of the human family should enjoy. Unfortunately, history makes clear that great sins are often repeated. But we don't have to stay silent in the face of them. Indeed, we must not stay silent in the face of them. ``Rescue those being led away to death,'' it says in the Book of Proverbs. ``[H]old back those staggering towards slaughter. If you say, `But we knew nothing about this,' does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? . . . Will he not repay everyone according to what they have done?'' The March for Life helps make sure that we can never offer the excuse ``But we knew nothing about this'' and reminds us of our responsibility to speak up to rescue the babies in this country who are being led away to death mere weeks or months after their life has begun. Those who would defend a supposed right to abortion would like Americans to believe that the decision that legalized abortion in this country is settled law, but the truth is, it is not. If it were settled law, the Supreme Court wouldn't regularly be asked to rule on abortion legislation. There is a reason why Roe v. Wade has never taken on the character of settled law, and that is because it was a fundamentally wrongheaded decision; a decision in tension with our most basic beliefs as Americans--that every person is endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights. Chief among them is the right to life. Americans are not a perfect people. We have made some very grave errors in our past. But Americans are fundamentally a good people. While we have not always fully realized the promise of our Declaration--the promise of protection for the unalienable rights of every person--it is something we keep fighting for and pursuing. We really believe in the right to life and liberty and to the pursuit of happiness, and we have the sentiments to go with that: a strong sense of justice, a passion for the right, an instinct to protect the vulnerable. So the idea of killing innocent, vulnerable human beings is not something we can easily make our peace with. So it is not surprising to me that, despite the best efforts of the pro-abortion movement, a strong majority of Americans support restrictions on abortion. An Associated Press poll from this June found that 65 percent of Americans believe that abortion should generally be illegal in the second trimester, or from about 13 weeks of pregnancy, while a whopping 80 percent--80 percent--of Americans believe that abortion should generally be illegal in the third trimester. Americans know that abortions kill babies. The pro-abortion movement can talk all it wants about blobs of tissue or products of conception; science and technology and common sense point inexorably to the humanity of the unborn child. And Americans know that human beings deserve to be protected even when they are small or weak or vulnerable--especially when they are small or weak or vulnerable. It is reprehensible that a country like ours, dedicated to the defense of human rights, has some of the most extreme abortion laws in the world. We are part of just a tiny handful of countries that allow elective abortion past 20 weeks of pregnancy. Among those other countries are China and North Korea--not exactly the kind of company we want to be keeping when it comes to protecting human rights. It is time for us to do better. We can do better. And I am so grateful for all of the marchers and for all those in the pro-life movement who are out there fighting to ensure that we do better. ``Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves,'' it says in the Book of Proverbs. Thank you to all those who are speaking up tomorrow. Keep speaking up, and I am confident that sooner or later, life will prevail. I yield the floor.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Burr), the Senator from West Virginia (Mrs. Capito), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Cassidy), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Cramer), the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. Inhofe), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Marshall), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran), the Senator from South Dakota (Mr. Rounds), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Scott), and the Senator from Pennsylvania (Mr. Toomey). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Marshall) would have voted ``nay.''