John Thune

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, today I recognize Samuel Silvernagel, an intern in my Washington, DC, office, for all of the hard work he has done for me, my staff, and the State of South Dakota over the past several weeks. Samuel is a recent graduate of the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, MN, having earned degrees in Russian and business law. This fall, Samuel plans to continue serving the American people by working on Capitol Hill. He is a hard worker who has been dedicated to getting the most out of his internship experience. I extend my sincere thanks and appreciation to Samuel for all of the fine work he has done and wish him continued success in the years to come.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, today I recognize Rachel Schoon, an intern in my Washington, DC, office, for all of the hard work she has done for me, my staff, and the State of South Dakota over the past several weeks. Rachel is from Brandon, SD, where she graduated a semester early from homeschool to participate in a 6-month-long mission trip overseas. Currently, she is attending South Dakota State University in Brookings, SD, where she is pursing degrees in communications and political science. She is a hard worker who has been dedicated to getting the most out of her internship experience. I extend my sincere thanks and appreciation to Rachel for all of the fine work she has done and wish her continued success in the years to come.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, today I recognize Steven Meyer, an intern in my Washington, DC, office, for all of the hard work he has done for me, my staff, and the State of South Dakota over the past several weeks. Steven is a recent graduate of Northern State University in Aberdeen, SD, having earned a degree in government and criminal justice. This fall, Steven plans to attend the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University in Washington, DC. He is a hard worker who has been dedicated to getting the most out of his internship experience. I extend my sincere thanks and appreciation to Steven for all of the fine work he has done and wish him continued success in the years to come.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, inflation is on the rise. Inflation in June was at its highest level in 13 years. Consumers are facing the effects: higher prices. Americans are facing increases in rent, in their restaurant bills, in their grocery bills, gas prices, and the list goes on. Want to buy a used car? Expect to pay a lot more money than you would a year ago. Inflation happens when the amount of money out there exceeds the supply of products. When that happens, when demand outstrips supply, prices increase. And that is what we are seeing now. It is being aggravated by Democrats' decision this spring to flood the country with unnecessary money. During times of crisis, there is a place for increased government spending. The money the government invested in COVID vaccines, for example; the forgivable loans provided to small businesses to help them weather the pandemic; and the increased assistance to hospitals and healthcare providers as the crisis escalated. But crisis spending is for just that, a crisis, or at least it should be. Unfortunately, Democrats have never met a temporary government dollar that they didn't want to keep spending. ``Temporary'' government programs aren't really a thing for my friends across the aisle. And so as the crisis was waning and our economy was rebounding, Democrats doubled down on the crisis spending and passed a massive COVID relief bill filled with unnecessary handouts; hundreds of billions of dollars for State governments, the majority of whom were doing just fine without it. In fact, many running surpluses. Tens of billions more for schools who had barely made a dent in the billions of dollars they had already been given. Republicans and at least one liberal economist warned that Democrats' massive spending plan could overstimulate the economy, but Democrats didn't listen. So it is no surprise that the flood of unnecessary government dollars is currently helping to boost inflation. Here is the kicker, Mr. President. After flooding the economy with unnecessary money, Democrats are now preparing to double down on that strategy. That is right. Despite passing a largely unnecessary $1.9 trillion bill just 4 months ago, Democrats now want to spend an additional $3.5 trillion--$3.5 trillion. The truth is that number is likely to be even higher, a lot higher. One estimate suggests that the $3.5 trillion is likely to be more like $5 trillion or $5.5 trillion. That is from an independent analysis by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, where President Biden's own Treasury Secretary used to serve on the board. That is an inconceivably large amount of money. To put that number in perspective, the entire Federal budget for 2019 was less than $4.5 trillion--the entire Federal budget. So Democrats are just casually tossing out a new spending bill that might very well exceed the entire Federal budget in 2019. I can assure Americans that that much money would fuel increased inflation. Consumers would continue to be squeezed by rising prices and watch the value of their salaries decrease. But the damage would not be just limited to the effects of inflation. Americans would also suffer as a result of the massive tax hikes Democrats are envisioning. Democrats plan to pay for all or some of their spending by raising taxes left and right on small businesses, large businesses, investment, well-off Americans. All of them and more will see tax increases under Democrats' plans. The President, of course, likes to repeat his mantra that he won't raise taxes on those making under $400,000. In fact, that isn't really true, as the President's plans for a second death tax will undoubtedly hit middle-class Americans. While it is true that the President won't be raising income taxes on Americans making less than $400,000 a year, middle-class Americans will unquestionably bear a substantial part of the burden of his tax hikes because raising taxes, any taxes, has consequences for everyone. Democrats like to pretend that raising taxes is a consequence-free enterprise, but that isn't even close to being the truth. It doesn't take an economics degree to recognize that. It is common sense. Raise taxes enough on anyone or any business and that individual's behavior or that business's behavior is going to change. A business facing a substantial tax hike may raise prices; it may freeze salaries; or it may not hire as many new workers, and all of those decisions will be felt by ordinary Americans. Think about it. If a business raises prices to deal with the impact of a tax hike, who is going to feel it the most? Ordinary Americans on a budget. What is more, most Americans, if they are not self-employed or working for government, are employed by businesses, and if the business they work for isn't doing well, their prospects are going to be significantly affected. If businesses hold down wages to deal with the impact of tax hikes, for example, ordinary Americans' long-term earning potential will be diminished. These effects may not sound as concrete as being handed a tax bill, but they have just as real of an impact on Americans' incomes and Americans' lives. Studies suggest that 50 to 70 percent or more of the burden of corporate tax hikes is borne by workers in the form of things like lower wages. Combine Democrats' proposed business tax hikes with their massive proposed increase in the capital gains tax, which would chill the investment that helps drive job creation, and you have a recipe for permanently diminished economic growth and a permanent reduction in opportunity for American workers. If Democrats received any mandate in the last election, it was a mandate for moderation, for compromise, for bipartisan cooperation. Yet Democrats are behaving as if they had received a mandate for a partisan revolution. They are busy driving the country down the road to socialism with a massive and permanent expansion in the size of government, and their reckless tax-and-spending spree will hurt the very Americans they claim to want to help. I hope some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle will put the brakes on their party before the Democrats' massive spending spree ends in economic disaster for the American people. I yield the floor.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Burr), the Senator from Montana (Mr. Daines), the Senator from Wisconsin (Mr. Johnson), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran), and the Senator from Florida (Mr. Rubio).

Mr. THUNE

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

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, last week, I came down to the floor to discuss how the ``defund the police'' movement has contributed to the surging crime we see around the country. And as I noted, the Democratic Party bears a substantial degree of responsibility to the situation we find ourselves in because this is a party that either actively contributed to defund the police rhetoric or implicitly endorsed it largely by staying silent. Now, however, Democrats have come to realize that attacking the police and the sharp spike in crime could hurt their electoral chances next year. And so the President and other Democrat leaders have, all of a sudden, announced their concern about rising crime rates. But as I said last week, they are still trying to have their cake and eat it, too, because missing from their messaging is any real condemnation of defund the police rhetoric and the toll it has taken on our cities and police departments. And their plans for confronting the surge in crime are long on punishing gun dealers and gun manufacturers and short on going after those actually committing crimes. It is typical of Democrats, for whom fighting crimes seems to involve controlling guns--specifically, guns owned by law-abiding gun owners-- more than it involves controlling criminals. What Democrats should be doing is training their attention on violent offenders, traffickers, and gangs, and illegal straw purchases; not finding ways to saddle law- abiding gun owners with burdensome regulations because it is not law- abiding gun owners who are responsible for most of the gun crimes in this country. The majority of gun crimes are committed by individuals who have obtained their guns illegally--illegally--which is why fighting these crimes should involve improving enforcement of our laws and increasing prosecution of those who violate them, not creating new laws that will only serve to further burden the constitutionally guaranteed Second Amendment right of law-abiding individuals. Unfortunately, as I said, Democrats are following their usual playbook during this recent crime surge, which they seem to see as a convenient excuse for pushing some of their gun control priorities. The President recently delivered remarks on crime, and the first priority he discussed at length was going after federally licensed firearms dealers. That is right, firearm dealers. While we can all agree that firearms dealers who violate the law should be punished, the rogue gun dealers that the President refers to are only responsible for a tiny fraction of guns being used in crimes. Going after gun dealers as one of your top law enforcement priorities is not going to do much to stem the illegal flow of weapons or their use in crimes. Enforcement dollars and enforcement personnel are not endless. You can waste a lot of money and a lot of man-hours conducting checks of law-abiding gun dealers while criminals continue to use their illegally obtained weapons unchecked. Nowhere are President Biden's priorities more clear than in his choice of nominee to lead the ATF, which is the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. David Chipman would come to the ATF directly from an organization where he has spent the past 5 years as a gun control advocate. He is well known for his at times extreme views on gun control and restricting the Second Amendment, including his support for banning probably the most popular rifle in the United States. He supports a so- called assault weapons ban, which usually refers to banning certain guns for their accessories and their appearance of lethality. But, alarmingly, he could not give a clear representation of how he would define such a policy in his confirmation hearing. Equally as troubling is Mr. Chipman's clear disdain for gun owners. He claimed that most individuals with concealed carry permits are either untrained or irresponsible. During the pandemic, he mocked law- abiding gun owners and condescendingly said that first-time gun owners should put their guns away in their cabinets behind the beef jerky-- behind the beef jerky--that they have presumably been saving for the apocalypse and only take out the weapons if ``the zombies start to appear.'' I appreciate Mr. Chipman's long service as an ATF special agent, but I have serious concerns that, as the head of the ATF, he would spend more time going after law-abiding gun owners than actual criminals. The fact that he spent years as a gun control advocate gives us a pretty strong indication of what his priorities are likely to be if he ends up heading this Bureau. While Mr. Chipman couldn't make new gun laws as head of the ATF, he would certainly--I should say he could certainly have a hand in writing a whole lot of new regulations, regulations that could end up substantially burdening Americans' Second Amendment rights. ATF has already gotten away with the Biden gun control agenda with proposed rules against firearms parts kits often used by hobbyists and widely used stabilizing braces, often referred to as pistol braces, first designed to help a disabled veteran safely fire a weapon. These regulations would turn millions of legal gun owners into potential criminals, and David Chipman would be in charge of seeing them through. Moreover, his demeaning attitude toward gun owners should also disqualify him from the ATF position. An individual who regards law- abiding, gun-owning Americans as a bunch of untrained and irresponsible doomsday preppers waiting for the zombie apocalypse has no business--no business--leading a gun enforcement Agency. The President, the Vice President, and Mr. Chipman may not like it, but the plain language of the Bill of Rights clearly guarantees the right of law-abiding Americans to own firearms. That right, like every other right guaranteed by our Constitution, must be respected and protected, and those who exercise their Second Amendment rights deserve to be respected as well. I do not believe we can rely on Mr. Chipman to respect our Second Amendment rights or the Americans who exercise them, which is why I cannot vote to confirm him as Director of the ATF. I encourage supporters of the Second Amendment on both sides of the aisle to oppose his nomination. Law-abiding, gun-owning Americans deserve better than Mr. Chipman to handle the ATF. I yield the floor.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senators Cornyn, Grassley, and I be allowed to complete our remarks before the scheduled rollcall votes.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, it has been all political theater all the time lately as the Democrats attempt to manufacture a crisis that will allow them to pass their partisan Federal takeover of State election law. There was President Biden's overwrought speech in Philadelphia last week warning that election laws being passed in various States are ``the most dangerous threat to voting and the integrity of free and fair elections in our history.'' That is right, in our Nation's history. Apparently, post-Civil War voter suppression laws and poll taxes and other atrocities don't hold a candle to what is happening today in places like Georgia, where--the horror--only election officials will be able to hand out water to those in line at the polls. Then, of course, there were the Texas Democrats' antics as they flew to Washington via a private jet to shut down the Texas Legislature and prevent election legislation from being passed there, and the Senate Democrats' field hearing in Georgia yesterday to highlight the supposed horrors of Georgia's mainstream election law. In his speech last week, President Biden mentioned stopping the spread of disinformation, which is an ironic statement when the Democrats are engaging in one of the most massive campaigns of disinformation we have ever seen, because--and let's be very clear--the narrative the Democrats are peddling, which is that States are engaging in a massive campaign of voter suppression, is simply false. In other years, I doubt whether any of the State voting laws that have been passed would have been more than a blip in the national news because they are nothing more than ordinary, mainstream updates to State voting guidelines. The Georgia law that has provoked so much Democratic hysteria is not only squarely in the mainstream when it comes to State election laws, but it is actually, in some ways, more permissive than voting laws in some Democratic-led States. A piece in the New York Times, hardly a newspaper that carries water for Republicans, concluded that the voting provisions of the Georgia law are ``unlikely to significantly affect turnout or Democratic chances.'' In fact, the piece notes that Georgia's law could ``plausibly even increase turnout.'' Meanwhile, the Washington Post Fact Checker column noted again: ``The law does not put up roadblocks to Black Americans registering to vote.'' That from the Washington Post Fact Checker. And yet Democrats have repeatedly asked us to believe that this law is ``Jim Crow on steroids'' and part of ``the most significant test of our democracy since the Civil War.'' Those are quotes, actual quotes, from Democrats. That is right, since the Civil War. Apparently, segregation and the horrors of Jim Crow are nothing compared to Georgia's adjustment of its regulations on no-excuse absentee voting, which isn't even allowed in some Democrat-led States like New York. It is almost comical, except that it is not, because there is nothing funny about Democrats irresponsibly evoking the horrors of Jim Crow to convince Americans that reasonable reforms to election laws are really a dastardly plot to suppress votes. There is nothing amusing about Democrats attempting to deceive the American people in order to pass their election legislation because that is exactly--exactly--what Democrats are doing. Democrats have been determined to pass H.R. 1, their Federal takeover of State election law, since 2019. Back in 2019, of course, they told us we needed it because our democracy was broken, but then the 2020 elections happened and, lo and behold, Democrats won, and all of a sudden our democracy was working fine--a record turnout, I might add, in the 2020 election, the largest since the year 1900. But Democrats still want to pass H.R. 1, now because, as both the Speaker of the House and the House Democratic whip have openly admitted, they think it will improve their electoral chances, and so they have manufactured a crisis in the hope of convincing the American people of the need to pass Democratic legislation. There is a reason that Senate Democrats haven't managed to pass H.R. 1 so far, and that is because it is a terrible bill. The bill would seize power from States when it comes to regulating and administering elections, an authority that States have held, literally, since the founding. It would implement public funding of political campaigns, which would mean that billions of government dollars, money that belongs to the American taxpayer, would go to funding yard signs and attack ads--I am sure something the American taxpayers would be really happy to see. It would impose onerous new requirements and restrictions on political speech. It would open up private Americans to retaliation and intimidation simply for making a donation to support a cause that they believe in. It would effectively eliminate States' voter ID requirements. It would politicize the IRS by allowing the IRS to consider organizations' beliefs when deciding whether or not to grant them tax-exempt status, and the list goes on. No less an organization than the American Civil Liberties Union opposed--opposed--H.R. 1 in the last Congress because the bill would ``unconstitutionally burden speech and associational rights.'' Let me just repeat that for emphasis. The American Civil Liberties Union opposed this legislation because it would ``unconstitutionally burden speech and associational rights.'' In his speech last week, President Biden expressed concern about States like Georgia ``moving from independent election administrators who work for the people to polarized state legislatures and partisan actors who work for political parties.'' It made me wonder if the President even knows what is in H.R. 1 because H.R. 1 would make the Federal Election Commission, the primary enforcer of election law in this country, into a partisan body. Instead of an independent Commission, evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans, the FEC would become, to borrow the President's words, a partisan actor that works for political parties. If the President is concerned about independent election administrators becoming partisan actors, perhaps he should take a look at revising his party's legislation. Since they have so far been unable to get their partisan election takeover through the Senate, Democrats are now threatening to include election measures in the partisan tax-and-spending bill that they are planning to force through Congress using rules which allow them to evade objections from the Senate minority. Their idea is to provide financial incentives for States to adopt Democrats' preferred election standards. I suspect it is an abuse of Senate budget rules that will hopefully not make it through the legislative process. But it is another disturbing sign of how committed Democrats are to shoving through their partisan election measure. For the sake of our democracy, let's hope that they will continue to be unsuccessful. While I am mentioning free speech and troubling narratives coming from the White House, I want to mention the White House Press Secretary's comments last week. The Press Secretary noted that the Biden administration is ``flagging problematic posts for Facebook that spread disinformation'' and later stated that if individuals are banned on one social media platform, they should be banned on all platforms. Wow. Now, there is no question that private companies have the right to moderate activity and content on their platforms--although, for the sake of the free exchange of ideas and a culture of freedom of speech, they should be very transparent, principled, and accountable about doing so. We all remember the backpedaling that recently occurred when media and social media realized that they might have too hastily censored the theory that the coronavirus originated in a Wuhan lab. But while private companies have a right to police information on their sites, the government cannot be in the middle of colluding with social media platforms to censor Americans' speech. And the Biden administration has no business telling Facebook or Twitter whom they should ban from their platforms. We condemn governments in other countries, like the Chinese Communist Party, that do exactly this. We condemned the Cuban Government just last week for shutting down their population's access to the internet in the face of widespread protests. If the government gets into censoring disinformation on social media, as compared to, say, terrorist propaganda, where does it end As we are rapidly finding out, ``disinformation'' tends to mean whatever those with censorship power want it to mean. Is the Biden administration going to start pushing social media companies to censor anything that contradicts its narrative on the supposed voting rights crisis? Is it going to suggest that anyone defending States' election laws is spreading misinformation? The best way to counter misinformation about lifesaving vaccines is not censorship; it is broadly sharing more persuasive and more accurate information. The White House Press Secretary's casual admission of a Presidential administration actively monitoring Americans and colluding with social media companies to censor information is deeply troubling, and I am concerned that the Biden administration is moving us down the road toward government control of Americans' speech. I would like to see the White House worrying about its own campaign of disinformation on State voting laws. That would be a better use of its time than trampling on freedom of speech by censoring Americans' activities on social media. I yield the floor.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Idaho (Mr. Crapo) and the Senator from Nebraska (Mr. Sasse).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Madam President, it didn't take long. Just a year since ``defund the police'' became a rallying cry and cities started cutting money from police budgets, crime is surging. At the beginning of June, the New York Times reported: Homicide rates in large cities were up more than 30 percent on average last year, and up another 24 percent for the beginning of this year. Homicides are up in New York City, Philadelphia, Chicago, Los Angeles, Columbus; and the list goes on. And it isn't only homicide rates that have risen. During the first 4 months of the year, Los Angeles saw a 73-percent increase in shootings. As of the end of May, Portland, OR, which has been ravaged by violent riots over the past year, was on track to exceed 1,000 shootings for this year, as compared to 389 in 2019. A Washington Examiner piece from June reported: Through the first 14 weeks of this year, New York City saw an 81 percent increase in shootings, the highest number of shootings during the same time period since 2002. Robberies, grand larcenies, felony assaults, and shootings have all increased in April and May compared to last year. San Francisco has seen a surge in car break-ins, among other crimes, with the San Francisco Chronicle reporting in June that ``last month, the Police Department's Central Station saw a 753 percent increase in auto burglaries compared to the previous May.'' In Oakland, CA, carjackings are up almost 88 percent, shootings are up 70 percent, and homicides are up 90 percent. Unfortunately, I could go on all day. The crime surge is real, and it is frightening. I quoted a lot of statistics and percentages, but there are real people behind every one of those crimes--people whose lives have been cut short or ravaged by violence, people whose sense of safety has been destroyed. It turns out that--surprise--defunding the police is a terrible idea. It is no coincidence at all that cities that have slashed their police budgets have seen huge increases in violence. Some of them are even recognizing the mistake they made and seeking to restore the funding that they cut. A Fox Business piece reports: Cities like New York City, Oakland, Baltimore, Minneapolis, and Los Angeles are planning to reinstate tens of millions for the construction of new police precincts, increase police department budgets, among other plans to bankroll more efforts to confront the uptick in crime. Unfortunately, the problem won't necessarily be fixed that easily because ``defund the police'' rhetoric has not just resulted in smaller police budgets; it has also resulted in police demoralization and left departments worried about deploying officers to do their jobs. It has resulted in a wave of police retirements and resignations. The New York Times reports: Thousands of police officers nationwide have headed for the exits in the past year. A survey of almost 200 police departments indicated that retirements were up 45 percent and resignations rose by 18 percent in the year from April 2020 to April 2021 when compared with the previous 12 months. That is from the New York Times. The city of Asheville, NC, has lost one-third of its police force-- one-third, Mr. President. It is not surprising. It turns out that when you spend months vilifying police officers and demonizing them for doing their jobs, some of them no longer want to stay. This is perhaps the worst consequence of the ``defund the police'' movement. Cutting police budgets is not a good idea, but resources and equipment can be built back up again, sometimes fairly quickly. It is a lot harder to replace good seasoned officers with years of experience protecting public safety. While it would be hard to replace them at any time, it is particularly hard today because it is difficult to imagine why anyone would want to become a police officer right now. Why would good men and women sign up for a job where they are regularly characterized as the worst kind of criminals? Why would they sign up knowing they may be prevented from or punished for doing the job we ask them to do? Violence against police officers--always a danger--is up. The sickening scene of protesters shouting ``death to police'' outside a hospital where two ambushed law enforcement officers were fighting for their lives has to be emblazoned on the minds of police officers nationwide. Again I ask, why would anyone want to join the police under these conditions? The ``defund the police'' movement is not only costing us many good officers today, it has depleted the pool of good officers for the future, and that is a travesty. The unfortunate truth is, the Democrats bear a substantial amount of responsibility for the situation we find ourselves in because this is a party that either actively contributed to the ``defund the police'' rhetoric or implicitly endorsed it by largely staying silent, not to mention the less-than-censorious attitude the Democrats frequently displayed when it came to the violence and property destruction of last summer and the past year. California Representative Maxine Waters said protesters in Minneapolis this April should ``get more confrontational'' should the verdict in the Chauvin trial not go their way. Far-left Members of the House of Representatives spent the past year making statements like these: Policing in our country is inherently and intentionally racist. No more policing, incarceration, and militarization. Now, more mainstream Democrats have become wise to the fact that their party's association with the ``defund the police'' movement may threaten their electoral chances next year. As polling demonstrated, Americans are squarely against the idea of defunding the police. So the President and other Democratic leaders all of a sudden announced their concern about surging crime, but they are still trying to have their cake and eat it, too, because missing from their messaging is any real condemnation of ``defund the police'' rhetoric and the terrible toll it has taken on our cities and police departments. In fact, President Biden, who is currently trying to reinvent himself as tough on crime, filled key roles in the Department of Justice with individuals who have gone on record with their support for defunding the police. President Biden's Secretary of Labor actually cut police funding while serving as Boston's mayor, and his Secretary of Housing and Urban Development has suggested that we should consider decreasing police budgets. Democrats' actual crime-fighting plans are long on punishing gun dealers and gun manufacturers and short on actually going after criminals. The President's nominee to head the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives seems more interested in targeting law-abiding gun owners than in dealing with the surge in gun crime. I have one last point to make about the ``defund the police'' movement, and that is its fundamental injustice. Are there bad police officers out there? Of course there are. There are bad teachers out there, too, and bad social workers and bad small businessmen. But just as it would be outrageous to demonize all teachers because of a few bad apples in their profession, it is outrageous to demonize the hundreds of thousands of dedicated men and women defending public safety in this country because of a handful of bad offers. We owe our men and women in law enforcement a great debt--a debt we can't even fully comprehend. These men and women go out and risk their lives every day of the week, every month of the year, to keep us safe. But they don't just risk their lives; they also bear a heavy physical and emotional burden. Most of us go about our daily lives without having to confront much evil because our law enforcement officers go out every day to confront it for us. They confront violence so that we don't have to, and they pay a price. It is tough to have to see evil on a daily basis, to spend years rescuing children who are in trouble or supporting victims of violence or bringing rapists to justice, but it is a price most of them are glad to pay. They signed up to protect the innocent, to keep the public safe and evil at bay, and they are proud to do it. We owe them and their families our profound gratitude. It is abhorrent that anti-police rhetoric has become such an accepted part of our national conversation and has been winked at or endorsed by so many Democratic leaders. We owe our police officers much better. I hope the belated realization among some that police officers are essential to keeping our communities safe will spell the end of the ``defund the police'' movement. It is time to focus on protecting public safety and honoring men and women who spend every day working to promote it. I yield the floor.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Graham).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators ares necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Graham), the Senator from Wisconsin (Mr. Johnson), and the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Graham).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I be able to complete my remarks before the vote.

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, the Republican leader was here a few moments ago discussing an issue which I think has gotten a lot of play here lately, and that is this attempt by Democrat members of the Texas Legislature to come to Washington, DC, to protest legislation that is being moved through the legislature in the State of Texas. In fact, this is the cover of one of yesterday's newspapers--or I should say today's newspapers. It has a photo there of all the Democrat legislators from Texas meeting with the Democrat leadership here in the U.S. Senate. Allegedly, they are here, playing hooky from their jobs in Texas, having flown in, I am told, on private jets--so much for doing something about the climate--to protest the fact that in Texas their voices are not being heard and not being given input into the legislative process there. I point that out simply because it is really incredibly ironic. I mean, it is rich with irony. Sometimes, around here, you just say you can't make this stuff up. They are here in Washington, DC, away from Texas, which is where their jobs are, to protest the fact that their views and voice are not being heard in Texas and that the majority in Texas is running roughshod over the minority and their rights. The same Democrats, I would add, here in Washington, DC, are trying to get rid of the legislative filibuster in the U.S. Senate, the very mechanism that historically has protected the rights of the minority and given them a voice in the legislative process, the very thing that has been used historically in a way that ensures that the Senate has to come together behind big solutions, collaborate, find that common ground, find that compromise. The Democrats here in Washington and these Democrats from Texas are all in favor of getting rid of the legislative filibuster. Think about that. It is really pretty remarkable that they would come up here to protest what is happening in Texas at a time when they support getting rid of the very protections that give the minority here in the U.S. Senate a voice in that legislative process. And the other really remarkable irony about this is the issue that they are here to speak in support of S. 1, the bill that would federalize, that would nationalize elections in this country and take power away from States when it comes to regulating and administering elections, a power that has been held by States going back to the Founders. And so they came here basically to say you need to pass H.R. 1. Well, again, what is H.R. 1? H.R. 1 is this massive Federal takeover of elections in this country, and it is also the test case for why we have got to get rid of the legislative filibuster. I would be willing to bet that the Democrat leader at some point in the next couple of weeks is going to call up S. 1 again. We voted on it once already, but he is going to call it up again because he thinks it is good politics, and, plus, he wants to pressure his Members to do away with the legislative filibuster in order to pass S. 1 with 51 votes. So, again, the irony of all of this, honestly, is some stuff you just flat can't make up. But I would reiterate what I have said before about S. 1: It is a solution in search of a problem. We have States around this country who are, in some cases moving to put in place election integrity measures, measures that will ensure that every vote counts and that everybody has an opportunity to vote but that people don't have an opportunity to cheat. That is all it is about. It is about election integrity. And most of the measures that are being adopted in States around this country are simply that--nothing more, nothing less--and, again, historically consistent with the way that our election process has been governed in this country, and that is to allow States to make those to do things in a decentralized way, to not consolidate power in Washington, DC, but rather to distribute that power and make it that much harder to hack into it. I mean, you think about it, you have 50 election systems in this country. It was what the Founders intended. They wanted to distribute power. They wanted to have a decentralized system, not one that was driven and controlled by a bureaucracy here in Washington, DC. I think that is consistent with what the American people believe ought to happen and the cases it should be when it comes to elections in this country. So it really is interesting to see these Democrat legislators from Texas coming to Washington, coming all the way up here--again, playing hooky from their jobs in Texas--to protest a piece of legislation that is being used by the Democrat leadership to try and get rid of the legislative filibuster, the very mechanism that protects the rights and the voice of the minority in the U.S. Senate. It has, literally, since our country's founding

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Graham).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators is necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Graham).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Graham) and the Senator from Wisconsin (Mr. Johnson).

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 Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Graham).

Mr. THUNE

Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, last month, Speaker Pelosi was asked if she thought a 15-week-old unborn baby was a human being. She declined to answer. A few days later, the President's Press Secretary was asked if the President thinks a 15-week-old unborn baby is a human being. She also declined to answer. In case the President and the Speaker are in any doubt, let me just clear things up for them. A 15-week-old unborn baby is a human being. That baby has a human mom and a human dad, and human beings have other human beings. That is not a complex moral or philosophical question. That is biology 101. Of course, I am pretty sure the reason the Speaker and the President's Press Secretary declined to answer these questions is not because they are confused about the answer. I don't think there is anybody out there who isn't aware on some level that unborn human beings are human beings. The moment of birth does not magically confer humanity. No, the Speaker and the President don't want to admit that unborn children are human beings because admitting it would make it hard to defend the fact that they support the right to kill these babies. If you support abortion, it is much easier to pretend an unborn baby is just a clump of cells rather than a separate human being with his or her own fingerprints and DNA. It is a lot easier to defend killing that baby if you pretend that baby is just a part of the mother instead of a unique, separate, unrepeatable individual. That is why the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and the Press Secretary for the President of the United States have declined to answer a question any 10-year-old could answer: whether the baby inside his or her mom is a human being. At the end of May, President Biden released his budget. It was a slap in the face to pro-life Americans. The President's budget abandons decades of bipartisan compromise and calls for the elimination of the Hyde amendment, which protects taxpayers from having their tax dollars go to fund abortions. And that is not all. The budget contains a whole host of pro-abortion measures that would, among other things, direct taxpayer dollars to fund abortion providers here at home and overseas. This isn't just some theatrical proposal. Democrats in the House of Representatives have already acted in committee to exclude the Hyde amendment and other pro-life measures from appropriations bills. If we can't agree that unborn human beings deserve to have their human rights protected, we should at least be able to agree that taxpayers should not be forced to fund the killing of unborn persons. The American people don't think taxpayers should fund abortions. In fact, nearly 60 percent of Americans oppose taxpayer funding of abortions. The President himself has, as recently as his Presidential campaign, supported the Hyde amendment, but there is one interest group that controls the Democratic Party. It is the abortion industry and its supporters, and I guess the President figured that he needed to sacrifice his support for the Hyde amendment if he wanted to win the election. And now Democrats and the President are following through by attempting to force taxpayers to pay for abortions. To hear Democrats talk, you would think abortion on demand, without limits, up until the moment of birth, was the standard position of this country and the world. But it is actually not. The United States is one of only a tiny handful of countries in the world--in the entire world--that allow elective abortions past 20 weeks of pregnancy. Americans are squarely to the right of the Democratic Party on abortion. A strong majority of Americans believe abortion should be illegal or there should at least be some restrictions on abortion, and that has been the position of the American people for a long time Despite the Democrats' best efforts, Americans still aren't convinced unlimited abortion on demand should be the law of the land. It is really not surprising. No one who has ever heard the thump, thump, thump of an unborn baby's heartbeat really thinks that we are just talking about a clump of cells. No one who has ever looked at an ultrasound screen and seen an unborn baby waving her hands or kicking her feet is in any doubt that that baby is a human being. And at some level, every person knows that human beings have human rights and that human beings deserve to be protected, even when they are small and weak and vulnerable--especially when they are small and weak and vulnerable. No matter how hard the abortion lobby pushes, they can't convince the majority of Americans that abortion is an unqualified good. Unfortunately, however, they succeeded in turning the Democratic Party into their legislative arm. And President Biden and Democrats in Congress are obediently pursuing a radical abortion agenda that puts them squarely to the left of the majority of the American people. It is not limited to taxpayer funding of abortion or abortion providers. President Biden nominated a radical pro-abortion crusader as the Secretary of Health and Human Services. In May, Secretary Becerra appeared before a House subcommittee where he chose to answer a question on Federal abortion law by indulging in a game of semantics. Not only did he fail to commit to enforcing the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, he refused to even acknowledge its existence, even though he voted against the law repeatedly during his time in the House of Representatives. Then there is the so-called Equality Act--Democrats' unprecedented assault on free speech and religious liberty that would also erode conscience protections on abortions as well as restrictions on Federal funding. Under the Equality Act, doctors and nurses who have a moral objection to participating in abortions could be forced to participate or lose their jobs. I haven't even mentioned the Women's Health Protection Act, sponsored by almost every Democrat in the Senate, which would threaten even the mildest State limits on abortion. It is deeply disheartening that making sure unborn children are deprived of their human rights has become a defining cause for one of the two major parties in this country. We can do better than this. We have to do better than this. Congressman Henry Hyde, for whom the Hyde amendment was named, once noted that abortion--which, as he said, denies ``an entire class of human beings the welcome and protection of our laws''--is a betrayal of ``the best in our tradition.'' And he was right. What kind of a message does it send to our children when we tell them that an entire class of human beings is not worthy of protection, when we deny human rights to the most innocent and vulnerable humans among us? We have to do better. To my Democratic colleagues, I would say, if we cannot act today to secure justice and human rights for unborn human beings, let's at least stand for the great American tradition of freedom of conscience and protect the rights of doctors and nurses who decline to participate in abortions. Let's at least spare Americans who oppose the taking of innocent human life from having their tax dollars go to fund abortions. At the very, very least, we should be able to agree upon that. As I said, I am saddened and disheartened that a major political party in this country made depriving unborn human rights as their defining cause, but their right to life will not be ignored. While Democratic leaders may deny the humanity of the unborn, there are a lot of Americans out there--a lot of Americans--who recognize it. I have faith that sooner or later this country will live up to its founding promise and the best of its tradition and extend the protection of its laws to every human being, born and unborn. I yield the floor.

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 Indiana (Mr. Braun) and the Senator from Indiana (Mr. Young). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Indiana (Mr. Young) would have voted ``nay.''