Regarding a democratic motion to begin work on a bill dropping the Justice Department from supporting lawsuits to strike the Affordable Care act. Live now to the floor of the u. S. Senate on cspan 2. Eternal god, our heavenly father, we cry to you, but sometimes you seem so far away. In our despair you sometimes seem distant, and we are tempted to surmise that we are all alone. When we shout, we seem to hear the echoes of our anguish. Nonetheless, we know that you are holy, mighty, and good. We have trusted you too long to let go. Empower our senators for these challenging times. Remove from their minds all bitterness and contempt for one another. Keep their hearts clean, their spirits courageous, and their minds clear, as they face these daunting times. We pray in your omnipotent name. Amen. The president pro tempore please join me in the pledge of allegiance. The pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. The presiding officer under the previous order, the leadership time is reserved. Mr. Grassley madam president . The presiding officer the senator pro tempore. Mr. Grassley i ask one minute for morning business. The presiding officer without objection. Mr. Grassley President Trump was rightly criticized for dodging a question about the peaceful transfer of power. Instead, trump criticized mailin ballots and rejected the premise that he will lose. No, that doesnt mean that hes planning some sort of coup. But it is important for any president to choose their words very carefully. The same is true for partisans on the other side whipping up fear that our democracy is in jeopardy or that the ballots wont be counted. Even worse is the rhetoric setting the stage to delegitimize any future trump victory. We now hear fullblown conspiracy theories. Let me mention a few. A group of biden supporters conducts a war game, speculating that the president Wont Leave Office without a biden landslide, questioning what the military would do. The chairman of the joint chiefs of staff stepped in with a simple civics lesson the u. S. Military has no role in the elections, he said. Democrats have doubled down on this debunked theory that the Postal Service is plotting with trump to disrupt election mail. The Postal Service does not answer to the president of the United States. It has plenty of capacity to deliver election mail. Plus, the federal government doesnt run elections. The 50 states run those elections. A key goal of russian active measures dating back to the cold war has been to get americans to double to doubt their government, its leaders and democratic institutions. Lets not do russian dirty work for them. No american should be questioning our free and fair elections. Now to my state of iowa, our people, who have requested absentee ballots, will have ballots mailed to them starting on october 5. Remember to fill out completely, including your drivers license or voter p. I. N. Number, and mail them to your county auditor well before election dates, but not later than the day before. Your ballot can be tracked on the secretary of states website. Check out where your ballot is. I have great faith in iowas Election Officials and our postal workers. Iowans who vote in person or absentee can be assured that your vote will count the same as any election. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. The presiding officer the clerk will call the roll. Quorum call mr. Mcconnell madam president . The presiding officer the majority leader. Mr. Mcconnell i ask unanimous consent that further proceedings under the quorum call be dispensed with. The presiding officer without objection. Mr. Mcconnell at this time last week, the nation did not know whom President Trump would be nominating to the Supreme Court. But amazingly, we did know what kinds of false attacks the far left would deploy against whoever it was. Democrats and special interests have been telling the country for 45 years 45 years that every Supreme Court vacancy under a republican president was going to bring about the apocalypse. John paul stevens they said was antiwoman. David souter they said wanted to hurt vulnerable people. John roberts was out to get Health Insurance. And, wouldnt you know, the president had barely finished saying judge Amy Coney Barretts name before the same old attacks began rolling in. Our 77yearold male former Vice President and our 69yearold male Senate Democratic leader have tried to inform american women that this 48yearold working mom wants to roll back her own rights as a woman roll back her own rights as a woman. Democrats have tried the to fear morning around a 4yearold academic paper that reinforced one unfair penalty in obamacare, which congress, by the way, has already eliminated three years ago. As an aside, madam president , if the American People are interested in which senators are serious about protecting americans with preexisting conditions, they can simply look up the vote senators took last night just last night. Every single democrat voted against legislation from senator tillis that would have submitted protections for these vulnerable americans. Democrats voted to block protections for preexisting conditions, just like they voted to block hundreds of billions of dollars for coronavirus relief, and just like they voted to block police reform. And a thousand other things they tell americans they support but vote against to block bipartisan progress. So heres another one of the madeup attacks. Democrats are demanding that judge barrett commit in advance in advance to recuse herself from entire categories of cases for no reason. This is another totally invented standard nobody has ever suggested that Supreme Court justices should categorically sit on the sidelines until the president who nominated them has left office. What an absurd suggestion. Justice ginsburg and breyer were confidence during president clintons very first term. Justice sotomayor and kagan were confirmed during president obamas first term. All four of these justices went on to participate in electionrelated proceedings while the president whod nominated them was on the ballot. And Justice Breyer and ginsburg participated actively in clinton v. Jones and other matters connected to president clintons eventually impeachment. In fact, they urged and attempted to get the Supreme Court even more involved. This is a sideshow, a sideshow, madam president. If judge barrett is confirmed, she will swear an oath. She will have a lifetime appointment. Nobody seriously is suggesting she lacks any bit of the integrity which everyone trusted Justice Ginsburg, Justice Breyer, sotomayor, kagan and countless others to exercise. In fact, her integrity and independence are precisely what judge barretts peers across the political spectrum go out of their way to applaud. Judge barrett has no obligation to make any of the bizarre bizarre prejudgments that our democratic colleagues are demanding. Like i said, much of the script has been entirely predictable. Ill tell you one thing i didnt predict. I honestly did not expect the democratic leader to come to the senate floor and say that concerns about antireligious discrimination are, quote, manufactured his stairics. Didnt expect that. I did not expect we would hear the leader of the democratic conference stand on the senate floor and say that americas freedom of religion is, quote, an imaginary issue. The democratic leader claimed intignantly that his fellow democrats would never never make an issue out of a nominees personal religious beliefs. He took great offense such a thing would even be suggested. But the whole country knows that three years ago when the Judiciary Committee was considering this very nominee this one for her current position, Senate Democrats did precisely that, exactly that. The senior senator from california literally implied in front of the entire country that judge barrett was too catholic too catholic to be a judge. Here was the quote the dogma lives loudly within you, she said, and thats of concern. The senior senator from illinois asked judge barrett in the official record listen to this do you consider yourself an an orthodox catholic . The junior senator from hawaii felt spelled to tell the nominee, quote listen to this youd be a catholic judge. Youd be a catholic judge. No one imagined these exchanges, but they happened on video before the entire nation. Multiple sitting senators read it in an open hearing that judge barretts religious views created doubt about her fitness to serve. Outside the senate, it was not imaginary when one faith group in which judge barrett and her family participate reportedly came under cyberattack a few days ago. Their membership directory was reportedly hacked just as judge barrett emerged as a frontrunner. Nobody had to imagine the ominous articles from a. P. , reuters, the washington post, and politico, all implying there was something questionable, questionable or problematic about judge barretts faith practices. Nobody had to imagine politico sending a contributing editor to snoop around the Church Buildings and report what a jute group had written on their whiteboard. So no, americans dont have to imagine this elite disdain. All they have to do is read it. Its not just this one nominee. Nobody imagined it when the junior senator from vermont accused a different nominee of hatred and islam phobia islam phobia because he expressed a personal view that christianity gets things right which islam gets wrong. Its not imaginary when the junior senator from california casts aspersions on another nominee for listen to this belonging to the knights of columbus. And another democrat implied he should quit this mainstream Catholic Group if he wanted to hold Public Office. Quit the knights of columbus if you want to hold Public Office . In america . The democratic leader says these are manufactured hysterics. He said people who call this out are hysterical. Frankly, it would be better for our country if that were true. But thats not the case. Just yesterday, 24 hours after the democratic leader swore that democrats would not make this an issue, the junior senator from hawaii tried to say judge barretts faith is irrelevant, but immediately proceeded to question whether her closely held views can be separated from her ability to make objective, fair decisions. No one, no one should be deceived by these thinly veiled euphemisms. This is the exact form that religious discrimination has taken in america for decades. For decades. Especially when it comes to public service. We do not often hear people say they simply dislike a particular religion altogether. Thank goodness we are mostly past that kind of bigotry. No, going all the way back to jack kennedy, the more common accusation has been something a little more subtle. That people of deep faith or certain faiths are incapable of being fair or objective. That they are incapable of doing certain jobs well. That such americans are torn between divided loyalties and not to be trusted. Heres what the left is trying to say. Oh, we have no problems, no problems with judge barretts faith in an abstract sense. We just think it disqualifies her from this promotion. Madam president , that is the definition of discrimination. About a be century ago, openly anticatholic political cartoons pictured the pope or the Catholic Church as an octopus wrapping its tentacles around the institutions of american government. Thankfully, those displays are long gone. But the core attitude clearly is not. Americans of faith are not imagining the increasingly hostile climate that the political left and the media have spent literally years sowing. And no, there is no free press, as some commentators have suggested, because many prominent liberal voices or prominent democrats themselves identify as catholic. You dont get a free pass just by calling yourself a catholic. More than onefifth of our country belongs to the same church as judge barrett. Onefifth of our country. Tens and tens of millions of americans, all of them, like all americans, must be free to live their faiths in diverse and different ways without being barred, without being barred from public service. These kinds of aspersions do not become any more acceptable if the call is coming from inside the house. Sadly, none of these problems are imaginary. The American Peoples concerns are not manufactured. The Little Sisters of the poor did not wake up thinking it would be good fun if the Obamabiden Administration tried to force them to violate their own consciences. These nuns do not manufacture their lengthy legal battle for the fun of it. It was the secularization left that went on offense. Churches all across america did not go looking for one of these cycles, the cycles of the democratic president ial contenders to suggest places of worship should lose their taxexempt status if they preach or practice traditional teaching. It was the secularization left that went on offense. If parts of the elite american left have become this out of touch with mainstream religious beliefs held by millions and millions of their fellow citizens, it will take more than victim blaming to dig out of it. They can start this week. They could start today. They could commit to evaluating judge barrett on her credentials and qualifications, and they could stop gawking at deeply religious americans like they have encountered extraterrestrial life or bought a ticket for a safari. Madam president , i understand there are three bills at the desk due for a second reading en bloc. The presiding officer the leader is correct. The clerk will read the title of the bill for the second time en bloc. The clerk s. 4773, a bill to establish the paycheck protection program, second draw loan, and for other purposes. S. 4774, a bill to provide support for air carrier workers, and for other purposes. S. 4775, a bill to provide continued emergency assistance, educational support, and Health Care Response for individuals, families, and businesses affected by the 2020 coronavirus pandemic. Mr. Mcconnell in order to place the bills on the calendar under the provisions of rule 14, i would object to further proceeding en bloc. The presiding officer objection being heard, the measures will be placed en bloc. On the calendar en bloc. Mr. Mcconnell i move to proceed to calendar number 554, s. 4675. The presiding officer the clerk will report. The clerk motion to proceed to s. 4675, a bill to amend the Health Insurance portability and accountability act. The assistant democratic leader. Mr. Durbin i come to the floor today to speak to one of the most significant issues facing the security of our nation. It is a question of domestic terrorism, specifically the threat of violent White Supremacists. In tuesdays president ial debate, Moderator Chris Wallace asked President Donald Trump to condemn White Supremacists and rightwing militia. President trump refused. Instead, he replied, and i quote , proud boys stand back and stand by, end of quote. The proud boys, a farright group that promotes and engages in violence, viewed President Trumps words as call to action. The groups leader, joe biggs, said he took the president s words as a directive to, quote, f them up, close quote. I was aequaled but not surprised by the president s words. He has a long history of inflammatory racist remarks. Now, President Trump claims that violence is a leftwing problem, not a rightwing problem his words. Let me be clear. I joined Vice President biden in condemning all violence, but we know that White Supremacists pose a great threat. An unclassified may, 2017, fbidhs joint intelligence bulletin found that, quote, white supremacist extremism poses a persistent threat of lethal violence, end of quote. This was a finding by the lead Law Enforcement agencies of the Trump Administration. They went on to say that White Supremacists were responsible for more homicides from 2000 to 2016 than any other domestic extremist movement. The director of the f. B. I. , mr. Mr. Wray, in response to a question i posed in the senate Judiciary Committee last year, said that the majority of domestic terrorism arrests involved White Supremacists. Now, for years, i have urged the Trump Administration to respond to the ongoing thread of violent White Supremacists and other far rightwing extremists. Instead, they have repeatedly downplayed this very lethal and real threat. Attorney general barr has never responded to the multiple letters i have sent asking what the department of justice was doing to combat white supremacist violence. Unfortunately, as we have learned from former Trump Administration officials themselves, the Trump Administration has downplayed the threat of violent Whit