March 3, 2020 - Issue: Vol. 166, No. 42 — Daily Edition116th Congress (2019 - 2020) - 2nd Session

[Pages S1274-S1280]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE SESSION

                                 ______
                                 

   ADVANCED GEOTHERMAL INNOVATION LEADERSHIP ACT OF 2019--MOTION TO 
                            PROCEED--RESUMED

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of the motion to proceed to S. 2657, which the 
clerk will report.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       Motion to proceed to S. 2657, a bill to support innovation 
     in advanced geothermal research and development, and for 
     other purposes.

  Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                   Recognition of the Minority Leader

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic Leader is recognized.


                              Coronavirus

  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, the number of confirmed coronavirus 
cases in the United States has recently surpassed 100. As more 
Americans are tested in the days and weeks to come, that number is 
expected to increase. Just this morning, we learned that a second New 
Yorker, from New Rochelle in Westchester County, has contracted the 
virus and is in serious condition and currently in a New York hospital. 
Our prayers are with him and his family.
  This only underlines the urgent need to respond to the coronavirus on 
a national scale. The only appropriate response in Congress is to come 
together quickly and in a bipartisan fashion to deliver the resources 
and authorities our Federal agencies need to track and combat the 
virus, treat Americans with the disease, and develop a vaccine and 
additional treatments. We also must aid the States and localities in 
their efforts to deal with the disease because they are on the 
frontlines.
  I am glad that Congress is headed in that direction. I expect that, 
today, appropriators will announce an agreement on an emergency, 
bipartisan funding package to deal with the coronavirus. The agreement 
is expected to include between $7 billion and $8 billion of funding--
very close to the $8.5 billion that we Senate Democrats requested last 
week--and over four or five times the amount of new funding initially 
proposed by the administration.
  That is good news. When it comes to Americans' health and safety, 
there is no reason to be penny wise and pound foolish. If the bean 
counters at OMB unnecessarily cut the money we need, it will cost us 
more in the long run. It is far better to get our public health 
professionals, experts, and agencies the funding they need, up front 
and all together, rather than be forced to pass additional 
appropriations in the coming months. We may have to, but we ought not 
skimp now. If we did skimp, the scenario would make no sense. Yet, left 
to its own devices, that is what the administration would have done. So 
I am glad we pushed them earlier, despite the fact that President Trump 
didn't want to hear anything contrary to what he was proposing.
  I am pleased that both parties in Congress, in both Houses of 
Congress, are coming together to do the responsible thing. I hope and 
expect that we can pass the emergency appropriations through the Senate 
before the end of the week.
  As Congress does what is necessary to respond to the coronavirus, 
unfortunately, the Trump administration's efforts leave much to be 
desired. While the Trump administration's response is slow, halting, 
loose with the facts, and President Trump blames everyone but himself, 
Congress--Democrats and Republicans, House and Senate--are acting like 
the adults in the room. We are not letting President Trump's 
accusations and nastiness, his false statements and his inability to 
really grapple with the problem--and, instead, try to brush it away--
get in our way of doing what America needs to have done and done 
immediately.
  Congressional appropriators have had to include provisions in the 
emergency bill to prevent the administration from stealing funds from 
other public health and disease programs to fight the coronavirus. That 
is what the White House wanted to do. Test kits were not as widely 
available or accurate as they should have been in the early days of the 
coronavirus outbreak. POLITICO reported this morning that the 
administration was very slow to develop an accurate test for 
coronavirus and slow to allow hospitals and public health labs to 
develop that on their own.
  The emergency funding bill seeks to deal with these two issues. It 
explicitly funds laboratory testing. We may have to do even more in the 
weeks to come, but that is no reason not to immediately give a generous 
appropriation so that testing can be done. Every day we delay testing, 
every time a person who needs a test doesn't get one, is a day and a 
time when the virus gets worse and worse and worse and can spread.
  There are still major issues with the lack of testing infrastructure 
that is being provided by the administration. States and cities still 
don't have enough tests, and yesterday we heard from the National 
Indian Health Board that the Indian Health Service and Tribal health 
facilities are being left behind in the coronavirus response and have 
received few, if any, resources. That is unacceptable.
  Meanwhile, as Congress works--Democrats and Republicans, House and 
Senate--to come up with a strong, comprehensive bill with the necessary 
dollars, President Trump continues to spread rumor, loose speculation, 
and happy talk. If any member of the administration tells the President 
something optimistic, he repeats it and exaggerates it to the point of 
absurdity. The President said the disease might magically ``disappear'' 
once the weather gets warmer and promised that the

[[Page S1275]]

vaccine would arrive ``soon''--his words. Only yesterday were a group 
of governmental health experts and pharmaceutical executives able to 
convince the President that a vaccine will not be ready in a matter of 
months--as the President believed and said--and, in fact, could take a 
year to develop.
  We need leadership in this country. We need serious leadership at a 
time of crisis like this. We don't need the facts being brushed under 
the rug. We don't need executives being told: Just do happy talk. Don't 
tell the American people the truth.
  We don't need a President who doesn't know the facts and blithely 
states whatever pops into his head that he thinks will benefit him for 
the moment.
  This is a crisis. There is no substitute for credibility and honesty 
from our political leaders. We need the President and his team to level 
with the American people and tell the truth, more during a health 
crisis than ever before. Our public health professionals must tell the 
President the facts, and the President and his team must tell the 
American public the facts--just the facts.
  Now, the Vice President and Ambassador Debbie Birx will speak to both 
Senate caucuses at lunch today. I am disappointed that Dr. Anthony 
Fauci, the Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious 
Diseases, who was originally slated to join us, is no longer coming, 
but Senate Democrats have many questions for the Vice President about 
his administration's response to the outbreak and, even more 
importantly, what they are doing now to help deal with the problem as 
it gets worse and worse.
  We look forward to pressing him on the need for transparency and 
decisiveness and hopefully getting useful answers because the health 
and safety of the American people are at stake.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, Samuel Johnson was a great thinker in 
the 19th century and was quoted many times for things that he observed 
even then. He did have one statement about nothing focusing the mind 
like the prospect of a hanging, and I would like to use that as an 
analogy to my comments this morning.
  I do notice that the Senator from South Dakota has taken the floor. 
Let me yield to him because I think, in the order of speaking, he is 
next, and I will follow him.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Dakota.


                                S. 2657

  Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I thank the Democratic whip for yielding 
time. I will be short here.
  We are in a pretty good place in this country right now when it comes 
to energy. Our energy supply is abundant, and energy prices are 
generally affordable. We can't afford to become complacent. We are in a 
good place right now because of American innovation, because President 
Trump, working with our Republican majority in the Congress, took steps 
to expand our domestic energy supply and to lessen our dependence upon 
foreign oil.
  If we want to keep American energy affordable and abundant, we need 
to make sure we stay on the cutting edge of energy innovation and 
continue to invest in our domestic energy supply, from oil and natural 
gas to renewable energy sources like hydropower and wind. We also need 
to make sure we stay on top of threats to our energy grid and our 
energy security.
  Our colleagues at the Energy and Natural Resources Committee have 
spent a lot of time over the past months working on these issues, and 
yesterday we voted to move forward on bipartisan energy legislation put 
forward by Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Lisa 
Murkowski and Ranking Member Joe Manchin. The bill they put together, 
the American Energy Innovation Act, contains measures from more than 60 
Senators focused on energy innovation--particularly, clean energy 
innovation--workplace development, and the security of our energy grid.
  The American Energy Innovation Act invests in a wide range of clean 
energy technologies, from wind and solar to hydropower and geothermal. 
It also focuses on improving energy storage. Many modern clean energy 
technologies are intermittent or lack the reliability of traditional 
electric sources. The amount of energy produced from wind, for example, 
is dependent on the amount of wind on any given day. So it must be 
backed up by a traditional plant, often powered by natural gas.
  Creating new ways to store clean energy will allow us to increase our 
reliance on renewable energy sources. The American Energy Innovation 
Act also focuses on improving research into carbon capture, and it 
directs the establishment of a research and development program to 
identify ways to use captured carbon.
  The bill also invests in advanced nuclear energy research so that we 
can regain our edge in the use of this clean energy technology.
  I plan to introduce amendments to the legislation to review where we 
can boost hydropower in the Upper Missouri River Basin and to develop 
ways to recycle the windmill blades used in wind energy generation.
  Nearly half of the electricity generated in South Dakota is from 
hydroelectric, and we should explore building off of these investments 
through repowering existing dams and adding power generation to those 
without.
  In addition to clean energy and innovation, the Energy and Natural 
Resources Committee's legislation focuses on boosting the security of 
our electric grid. Our electric grid is the subject of a steady stream 
of cyber attacks, some of which could have devastating consequences. It 
is not hard to imagine the deadly results of prolonged traffic signal 
outages or long-term power outages at hospitals or fire stations. That 
is why the American Energy Innovation Act invests in cyber security and 
grid modernization.
  The act also focuses on improving our domestic supply of some of the 
key elements and minerals that we rely on for manufacturing everything 
from computer chips to batteries, to defense applications. Right now we 
have to import too much--too much--of these critical minerals from 
countries like China. For the sake of our national security, it is 
important that we find ways to identify supplies of these minerals here 
at home.
  Finally, the American Energy Innovation Act invests in workforce 
development. All the innovative technologies in the world will not help 
us if we don't have the skilled workers to operate and maintain these 
technologies. We need to ensure that, while we are investing in 
innovation, we are also investing in the energy workforce of the 
future.
  This legislation would help ensure that we maintain our energy 
independence for the long term. It will boost the security of our 
electric grid, strengthen our national security, and invest in American 
workers. It will help pave the way for a clean energy future.
  This is a good bill, and I hope that my colleagues will support it 
and not derail this legislation with partisan amendments. I know many 
of my colleagues across the aisle have a keen interest in adding 
certain energy tax provisions to this bill. I will remind them, 
however, that last summer the Senate Finance Committee created a number 
of task forces to examine expiring and expired tax policies. I co-led 
the Energy Task Force along with the senior Senator from Michigan, and 
many of the energy tax items that we reviewed were included in the 
year-end bill in December. Others were not yet ready for prime time.
  I am eager to continue to work with my colleagues on advancing 
American energy innovation, as this bill will do, but we have to be 
realistic about the fact that a number of the energy tax proposals in 
question are not yet ready for implementation and need to be considered 
in the context of other reforms and corrections to the Tax Code.
  As I said, I hope debate over tax provisions or other amendments will 
not delay passage of this important bipartisan legislation, and I look 
forward to working with colleagues of both parties to advance this bill 
and to help secure America's energy future.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.


                              Coronavirus

  Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, as I noted earlier, Samuel Johnson once 
noted that there is nothing that focuses the mind like the prospect of 
a

[[Page S1276]]

hanging. I would say there is nothing that focuses the mind on the 
issue of healthcare like the prospect of a pandemic, and that is what 
we are facing now with the coronavirus. Americans should not panic and 
shouldn't be pessimistic, but we need to be realistic as the numbers 
total up around the world and we start to take an assessment of our own 
vulnerabilities--personal, family, community, and State 
vulnerabilities--here in the United States of America.
  We are also, I hope, reflecting on what we are counting on to get us 
through this pandemic in a positive fashion in America. The first thing 
is we look to two major healthcare organizations of the Federal 
Government: the National Institutes of Health, which is the premier 
health research agency in the world, and the Centers for Disease 
Control, which, again, leads the world when it comes to preventing the 
spread of disease and threats to the public health of America.
  The question we should ask ourselves is, How have we treated these 
agencies to date? The answers are mixed. The answer, when it comes to 
National Institutes of Health, is a positive one.
  Over the last 4 years, something dramatic has occurred. I was happy 
to be part of a bipartisan effort that was led by Senator Patty Murray 
of Washington, Senator Roy Blunt of Missouri, and Senator Lamar 
Alexander of Tennessee. What we have accomplished in the last 4 years 
is to increase the spending at the National Institutes of Health for 
medical research grants from $30 billion to $39 billion. It is a 
dramatic increase.
  We started off with a premise we wanted to increase the NIH budget by 
real growth of 5 percent--that is 5 percent over inflation--each year. 
We held to that standard; in fact, some years were even better. We have 
a lot to show for it. There have been real breakthroughs when it comes 
to medical research. We want to continue down this line.
  When it came to the Centers for Disease Control, I had the same goal 
in mind. We didn't quite reach it. Over the last 4 years, we have seen 
a 14-percent increase at the CDC. I believe this coronavirus pandemic 
threat is going to open the eyes of America to the need to make sure 
the CDC is adequately, properly funded for years to come.
  At the outset, the focus of the mind is on those agencies of 
government which do the absolute essential work of research and the 
prevention of the spread of disease. The NIH and CDC need to occupy a 
special place when it comes to budgeting by the Federal Government.
  The second thing we note is there are practical questions to be asked 
and answered. We are now talking about the development of a test to 
determine whether individuals have been affected by the coronavirus. 
That test is now starting to come forward. It will be released in 
States across the United States in the next several weeks.
  Some obvious, practical questions face us: How much does this test 
cost? Is it covered by health insurance? If it is not covered by health 
insurance, can the average family afford it? These are the practical 
questions which those of us who have good health insurance and are not 
worried about the next paycheck can take care of, but for millions of 
Americans, it is a significant challenge. We notice that in some cases 
it takes more than one test to determine that a person is truly free of 
the coronavirus.
  The obvious question is, Does our health insurance cover this kind of 
testing? As I stand here, I don't know the answer to it. If it turns 
out to be an expensive test, and it is not covered by insurance, 
Americans are going to be faced with that challenge right off the bat.
  It brings to mind the real fundamental issue of the debate in 
Congress over the last 10 years about health insurance. Our friends on 
the other side of the aisle argue that people ought to be able to pay 
less for health insurance that covers even less. We on this side call 
that junk insurance. The Affordable Care Act said that health insurance 
plans had to have certain basic coverage before they could be offered 
in this country. We got rid of the lifetime limits that some health 
insurance plans had. We eliminated the discrimination against people 
with preexisting conditions. We said that kids could stay on their 
parents' health insurance plan until they reached the age of 26. We 
said every health insurance plan had to include those provisions. We 
included coverage in basic health insurance of mental illness and 
addiction services--basic fundamental care that every American should 
expect when they buy health insurance.
  The Republicans on the other side of the aisle say: Well, we ought to 
be able to buy insurance that doesn't cover those things. It will be 
cheaper. Let the consumers decide.
  It is OK for a consumer to decide for less coverage, I suppose, if 
they can be guaranteed good health for the rest of their lives. No one 
knows about the next accident or the next diagnosis that might really 
call into question the adequacy of our health insurance coverage.
  I stand with the Affordable Care Act. We should have a basic standard 
when it comes to health insurance in America so that when you buy a 
plan, it covers what most Americans will need, the basics that they 
will need. Junk insurance has no place in America, and it is no bargain 
for people who truly need health insurance for reimbursement.
  When it comes to the cost of dealing with the coronavirus, whether it 
is the initial test or followup hospitalizations, we all want the peace 
of mind that our health insurance plan will cover those needs.
  The third issue that is clear is that there are people who are going 
to miss work because of this coronavirus. Some of them are asked to 
stay home and work from home and things continue as usual, and they 
receive their regular paycheck, but for others, they have to leave the 
workplace because of fears they may have a flu or may be contagious or 
someone else at work might be. What happens when they go home when it 
comes to their paycheck? Are they going to be given medical leave and 
paid for their absences?
  It is an issue which comes to the forefront in this coronavirus 
debate. Frankly, it is with us all of the time. Those of us on the 
Democratic side believe that medical leave should be extended. We have 
just expanded it when it comes to Federal employees. We should do it as 
well for people across the United States. Medical leave gives you peace 
of mind to make the right medical decision. Don't go to work with a 
fever. Don't go to school with a fever. Stay home. Protect yourself, 
your family, the people you work with, the people you are around during 
the course of a day. Medical leave gives you that option, and it is one 
that is a practical solution to something that we face all the time.
  The fourth issue that I will raise has been brought up by this 
coronavirus debate is the role of pharma in the future. It is 
interesting that across America when you ask Americans their concern 
when it comes to the cost of healthcare, the cost of prescription drugs 
is high on the list.
  It is also interesting that health insurance companies--the major 
companies--tell us that one of the biggest drivers in the increase in 
health insurance premiums is the cost of prescription drugs. Pharma is 
obviously a challenge to all of us. We want them to have the money to 
be profitable, to invest in research, but we don't want them to 
dramatically overcharge for the products they make. ``Your money'' or 
``your life'' is not a good answer when it comes to pharma and the 
public health of America.
  Now we are going to face it again, the prospect of a vaccine. We hope 
to have a vaccine quickly, but even ``quickly'' by medical terms is a 
long time.
  Dr. Fauci, of NIH, has said it could be a year, a year and a half, 
even 2 years before a real, reliable vaccine is discovered to deal with 
coronavirus. It is an indication of the kind of research that has to 
take place--research that starts, I might add, at the Federal level, 
with your government doing research.
  I know pharmaceutical companies will ultimately produce the product, 
the vaccine, but it starts with an investment by the Federal Government 
in the basic research to lead up to that vaccine whenever it is 
discovered. Then we have the question about once the vaccine is 
discovered, who will sell it to America and at what price? That is a 
debate that we went through several years ago.
  We faced the swine flu. During that period of time, some 40 million 
Americans were actually vaccinated in 1976

[[Page S1277]]

for swine flu--45 million, to be exact. For several months, four 
pharmaceutical firms refused to sell the vaccine they had manufactured 
to the government until they received full liability indemnity and a 
guaranteed profit. The vaccine was there, but they wouldn't sell it 
until they received those promises. In fact, the Federal Government 
assumed the liability for this vaccine. According to this article that 
was published this morning in the New York Times, they eventually paid 
out over $100 million in claims.
  Are we going to face that again with pharma when it comes to a 
vaccine for coronavirus? Certainly, they are entitled to a profit for 
their own investment, whatever it may be in that vaccine, but the 
initial work on the research is being done by the Federal Government. 
That Federal Government research will lead to a product which will lead 
to a profit for these companies.
  I am not opposed to a reasonable profit, but I do think, if they are 
going to hold us hostage for months over a guaranteed profit that is 
unreasonable, that America is going to rebel against these 
pharmaceutical companies. Our debate about pharma and its relationship 
with America in the future has really sharpened its focus by this 
debate on the coronavirus that we are facing today.
  Madam President, there is one other aspect that I would like to 
raise. I was surprised at the briefing we received 2 weeks ago in 
Washington on the coronavirus to learn how many pharmaceuticals are 
actually produced in China and how many pharmaceutical ingredients are 
produced in China and India. It turns out we have a real dependence, 
when it comes to developing medicines and drugs, on these two countries 
and many others. When it comes to medical devices, the same is true; 
medical equipment, the same.
  It raised a question in my mind as to whether we should do something 
thoughtful and perspective in terms of dealing with global dependence 
on medicine, medical devices, and medical supplies.
  I am introducing legislation this week calling for the creation of a 
commission to look at this dependence, to measure it today. Today we 
are facing the coronavirus, the possible--I underline ``possible''--
interruption in the supply of pharmaceuticals and the supply of 
pharmaceutical ingredients from China because of the coronavirus. Did 
we anticipate this? Have we stockpiled enough of these drugs so we will 
not be caught short on something that is absolutely vital? If we 
haven't, we should.
  We should also think about the prospect that in the future, for 
certain critical drugs, there should be a domestic source in the United 
States that we can count on if there is some interruption in global 
trade because of a medical crisis such as this or because of terrorism, 
for example. I hope we can get some guidance on this from the agencies 
involved and from those we respect who can give us third-party judgment 
on this.
  Let us, at this moment in time as we face this crisis, look ahead to 
what the next challenge might be and be prepared for it. As we debate 
this coronavirus, I urge my colleagues to do our best to try to find 
bipartisan ground to work on. I have found, across my State, regardless 
of political allegiance, the people of Illinois and in many other 
States are looking for us in Washington to address this problem 
responsibly, in a mature way, in a totally nonpolitical way.
  When statements are made by political observers, even by the 
President himself, that are far afield from the truth, let's not be 
derailed by that. Let's focus on medical expertise that we can trust, 
public health experts who can guide us through this in the appropriate 
way.
  In the meantime, realize we are blessed to live in a country with the 
best, most talented medical professionals in the world and the best 
medical resources on Earth. We want to make certain we give them all 
the room they need to lead us through this crisis and challenge in a 
very positive way.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BOOKER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Loeffler). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                      Bipartisan Background Checks

  Mr. BOOKER. Madam President, I have prepared remarks, but before I do 
that, I want to thank the pages who are in this class right now. They 
are hard at work, and they do so much for this institution. I just want 
it written in the Record of the U.S. Senate that on this day in March, 
the junior Senator from New Jersey recognized them for everything they 
do around here, even though they do not tell jokes that are very good.
  Now, if I may start my prepared remarks, I rise today with other 
colleagues who are speaking, particularly my colleague from 
Connecticut, Senator Murphy, to speak on a bill that actually passed 
out of the House, which was something that was extraordinary. It passed 
out of the House of Representatives just over a full year ago, and we 
are waiting here in the Senate for it to come to the floor.
  I am one of these folks who really believe that we have too much 
unnecessary partisanship around issues when there is so much common 
cause in our country and when there is so much common ground in our 
country. Yes, indeed, debate is important. Disagreement is important. 
It undergirds the ideals of democracy that we should form a national 
conversation and work through our differences--the idea that that 
actually produces a better whole and a better result.
  But when we have a nation that has such extensive agreement on an 
issue, where 97 percent of Americans agree, where Republicans and 
Democrats in the House of Representatives agree, and we can't get 
action here, to me, that is not adding to the strength of democracy. It 
is weakening our Republic.
  It was almost exactly a year ago that the House of Representatives 
passed H.R. 8, the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2019. This 
legislation would require a background check before any sale or 
transfer of a firearm. Under existing law, you can go to a gun show and 
purchase a gun from an unlicensed seller without having gone through a 
background check. Think about this. You could be on a terrorist no-fly 
list; you could be a convicted felon; and you could be a spousal 
abuser. You can be a lot of things--anything--and be able to go to an 
unlicensed seller at a gun show and fill up a trunk full of weapons. 
This is a glaring loophole that allows dangerous individuals--who we 
all agree are dangerous--to purchase a gun in violation of Federal law.
  Again, 97 percent of Americans wanted that loophole closed. The 
evidence is clear. A study found last year that States that have this 
commonsense, widely supported, bipartisanly backed background check 
law--when States have it in place, they get 10 percent lower homicide 
rates. This isn't speculation. Folks who have that law in place on a 
State level have 10 percent fewer homicides.
  But today, over a year out of its passage out of the House, the 
Senate has failed to take up this commonsense bill, which we know--
which we know factually--would save lives.
  What is one of the fundamental reasons our government was founded in 
the first place? For the common defense. We are here to defend our 
Nation from violence, from terror, from injury, from harm. Everyone in 
this body takes that commitment very seriously. So here we have 
something 97 percent of Americans want. We know it would save lives, 
protect our country and, yet, no action. The bill has not come to the 
floor.
  I know this personally. I was the mayor of my State's largest city, 
and in the overwhelming majority of homicides and shootings where we 
captured the person and found out how they got their gun, they were not 
qualified to buy a gun. It was illegal for them to buy a gun in any 
State because many of them had criminal convictions. Yet they found 
easy ways to obtain a gun because we have so many loopholes in the 
commonsense law--loopholes that allow violence to happen that is 
terrorizing communities. Of course, we know that is not just anecdotal 
evidence. According to the Gun Violence Archive,

[[Page S1278]]

an estimated 15,208 people were killed with a gun in the United States 
in 2019.

  We know that gun violence is the single leading cause of death for 
children and teenagers. Our greatest natural resource in this country 
is our children. Black children and teenagers are 14 times more likely 
to die of gun homicide than their White peers. There is tragic carnage 
going on for African-American kids. In just one city, for example, in 
St. Louis, MO, between April and September of last year, 13 children 
ranging in age from 2 to 16 were killed by a gun.
  There is another kind of gun violence we don't talk about. We don't 
talk enough about the death of our children, but we definitely don't 
talk about domestic violence in our country. It is factual that when an 
abuser can get a gun--if that abuser has a gun, a victim of domestic 
violence is five times more likely to be killed. Again, with the racial 
disparities in communities of color like the one I live in, we know a 
Black woman is twice as likely to be shot and killed by an intimate 
partner as well.
  Our duty is to protect this Nation and to protect one another. This 
is not controversial when you have 97 percent--97 percent. Every year 
in the United States of America, on average, 100,000 people are shot, 
and they survive. Many of them will carry with them, for their lives, 
mental and physical wounds. The economic cost of being a gun violence 
survivor is measured in the tens and tens of thousands of dollars. The 
community costs of folks being killed--I have seen this in my community 
when a shooting happened in front of the IHOP in Newark on Bergen 
Street. The IHOP had to close one of its shifts, and people lost jobs. 
It reverberates out into the community.
  You see scars happening every day in America. These wounds are 
physical, are economic, and involve mental health. I can't tell you how 
many communities in America--when we celebrate the very ideas of our 
country on July 4, when those firecrackers go off and children hear 
them, they duck for cover. They hide under beds. They show signs of 
post-traumatic stress. That is what we are living in right now. This is 
an everyday reality.
  I just came to the floor today to point out that a year--12 months, 
365 days--from the House's passing of the bipartisan bill supported by 
97 percent of Americans, which is fundamental to the reason for 
government, the common defense in the wake of one of the greatest 
killers of children in our country--all of these things, and we here 
are doing nothing.
  What did Martin Luther King say? What we have to repent for is not 
just the vitriolic words and violent actions of the bad people; it is 
also the appalling silence and inaction of the good people.
  I have stood for comprehensive gun safety reform, and a lot of things 
I support aren't supported by 97 percent of Americans like background 
checks. Heck, I support gun licensing. The percentage of Americans who 
support that falls into the seventies. I support an assault weapons 
ban. Support for that falls as well. So maybe that is an area where we 
debate. I will stand for those commonsense changes because, again, I 
believe in the data. States that do that have seen dramatic drops in 
violence. We can debate that.
  But when we have a bill from the House that 97 percent of Americans 
support, that has bipartisan support, that we know will save lives, and 
we don't act, what does that say about us? Every day in this country, 
people are being shot, and people are killed, and we do nothing when we 
all agree.
  This week, March 7, will mark the 55th anniversary of the day that 
600 civil rights activists, led by a young man named   John Lewis, set 
out to walk from Selma to Montgomery to protest systematic racialized 
disenfranchisement, discrimination, and violence. Those nonviolent 
protesters were met with vicious beatings with billy clubs by Alabama 
State troopers. They had tear gas and dogs set on them. Congressman 
Lewis had his skull cracked open.
  By the next day, Americans all over this country--that horrific 
scene, we know this as Bloody Sunday--Americans all over this country 
saw that violence, saw that viciousness, and saw what was being done to 
people who were nonviolent marchers fighting for justice and equality. 
It motivated Americans of all backgrounds--Black, White, Christian, 
Jewish, Republican, and Democrat--to join in the call for change.
  I love this Nation, and I love my country. I love folks who agree 
with me and who disagree with me. I think patriotism is love of 
country, and you can't love your country unless you love your fellow 
country men and women.
  I say to the Presiding Officer, I love you, man.
  My friends across the aisle, we don't agree. Heck, in our own caucus, 
we don't agree, but we love one another.
  My faith and the other faiths represented in this body--I am excited 
that we have more religious diversity in this body than ever before--
all of our faiths are founded on this fundamental principle: Love thy 
neighbor.
  This is the challenge. It is, how do we manifest love into our 
policy? Well, as I have read, one of the great authors said: What does 
love look like in public? It looks like justice.
  This is the great thing about our country. We don't always act right 
away, but throughout our history, when we were confronted with the 
wretchedness of our society, with the incongruences between reality and 
our morals and beliefs, we have seen this country rise up and make 
change. When four girls died in the bombing in Birmingham, it shocked 
the conscience of this country, and we made change. When women in a 
factory called the Triangle shirtwaist factory were trapped in 
sweatshop-like conditions--a fire broke out--this country watched in 
horror, read about in horror back then, and saw in horror through the 
pictures of women throwing themselves out windows, dying on the 
pavement below, it shocked the conscience of this country, and we in 
this body passed laws to protect workers. I could go on throughout our 
entire history.
  We are not always fast to get there, but we are a caring, 
compassionate, loving country. We are. That is the root of who we are. 
They are the values we profess. I know that as much as we disagree and 
try to vilify each other, the truth is, we are a nation founded on the 
ideals of love.
  Again, I look at my colleague up there in that seat. I have watched 
him. I saw him on HBO reading our founding documents. It was moving to 
me to see Republicans and Democrats--I am sure you saw it--reading our 
founding documents. Our Declaration of Independence--I hate to say 
this, you might say I am a little too mushy--it ends with one of the 
greatest declarations of love in human history. It says, if we are 
going to make this Nation work, all the stuff we just talked about, if 
we are going to be the country that is, as the prophet Isaiah said, 
ultimately a light unto other nations, inspiring free peoples across 
the globe--we are the oldest constitutional democracy. We stepped out 
into the course of human events and said we are going to found a 
country based on virtue, not a theocracy, not a monarchy, on virtue--
that we would be a nation based on ideas. And those ideas, as imperfect 
as the geniuses who founded this country--and, God, they didn't believe 
that women were equal or Blacks were equal, but they believed in those 
ideals and those virtues and that this Nation should always strive to 
make a more perfect Union, making more real those virtues and those 
values in people's lives. The history of our country is a glorious 
testimony of us getting better and better with each generation.
  Susan B. Anthony stood up and said that it was we the people, not we 
the male citizens that made this country, not the White male citizens. 
It was we the people. She used the words of our founding documents to 
inform her moment of history to call to the conscience of our country.
  Martin Luther King, right here in DC on the Mall, did he turn to some 
new radical treatise? No. He went back to our founding documents and 
quoted them in his speech at the March on Washington. That is the 
beauty of our Nation.
  So what does it say, that testimony to love, that the founding of our 
Nation in the Declaration of Independence--and, yes, to all those 
people, I will give you deference that that declaration called Native 
Americans savages. I will give you deference that the men who wrote 
them were imperfect representatives of the values to which

[[Page S1279]]

they were called to, but that declaration of love at the end is 
unmistakable. At the end of the Declaration of Independence, they say, 
if we are to make it all work, we must mutually pledge--I look at my 
colleague in the seat because he knows these words backward and 
forward. It says we must mutually pledge; that is, pledge to each other 
our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.
  God, I think about those words more than you might realize. What does 
it mean to give someone your sacred honor, to pledge to them your lives 
and your fortunes? God, I would die for this country, as I know my 
colleagues would. None of the people in this body--I know many of my 
friends in this body have come here with great wealth, but none of them 
are doing it for wealth.
  Our lives, our fortunes, but that last one, sacred honor, what does 
that mean? To me, a word that evokes that greatest of human values, 
love; that word that we honor each other. We believe we are people who 
must elevate each other and protect each other.
  There is a bill in the House that passed in a bipartisan way on that 
fundamental ideal of being there for one another. Whether you pray like 
me or look like me, we are there for one another. We protect each 
other. We stand for each other. I may have differences with the man in 
that seat who is on the other side of the aisle, but, God, I give you 
my sacred honor that I am not going to vilify or demonize your 
character because we are Americans.
  Now, the call of our country is people who are overlooked are dying 
every day in communities like mine around this country, people being 
felled by domestic abusers. We know from the data that this can make a 
difference, a bipartisan voice. Ninety percent of Americans ask: Can we 
pass comprehensive background checks?
  We can do better. Let's leave the things we want to debate that, God, 
I want to debate--gun licensing, assault weapons ban, leave those 
aside, but we agree that someone on the terrorist no-fly list should 
not be able to go to a gun show and go to a casual seller and buy 
weapons. Those are the weapons showing up on the streets in Newark. We 
have traced them.

     My country tis of thee
     Sweet [sweet] land of liberty
     Of thee I sing.

  May our country be free from fear and free from violence, and may we 
be empathetic toward those today who are fearful of their abuser, who 
are fearful to walk their kids to school. May we understand that that 
liberty to fight for freedom from fear is still an unachieved dream in 
this country. That liberty that comes from safety and security is still 
an unrealized dream for millions of Americans. May we join together and 
pledge our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor. May we pledge to 
one another to do the work America wants--to keep each other safe and 
secure and to ensure our children, disproportionately impacted by 
violence, grow up to carry on our culture, and our traditions, and the 
honor that is America.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Cruz). The Senator from Missouri.


                              Coronavirus

  Mr. BLUNT. Mr. President, I want to talk for a few moments about 
where we are with the coronavirus response and the supplemental. I 
think all Senators will have an opportunity to be updated again today.
  This is not a new place for us to be. This time last year, the 
Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, 
Education, and Related Agencies held a hearing on emerging threats, and 
at that point we were experiencing the second largest outbreak of Ebola 
in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, antibiotic resistance was a 
global danger, and there was a flu outbreak bigger than we had seen in 
a long time. So 1 year later, we are still fighting the Ebola outbreak 
in the DRC, antibiotic resistance continues to be a global problem, 
and, according to Dr. Tony Fauci, the Director of the National 
Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the flu we are seeing 
this year is shaping up to be one of the worst in decades.
  Several thousand Americans die every year from the flu--usually, at 
least 35,000, sometimes as high as 75,000. I think about 350,000 
Americans have died from the flu in the last decade.
  We are now facing a new danger--the COVID-19 danger. That is the new 
coronavirus that we hadn't seen before. As we learned with Ebola, 
patient zero, who doesn't know they even have this yet, can board a 
plane or a cruise ship, and they can be in another country or even in 
another continent in a matter of hours. This lesson is, once again, 
reinforced.
  This is like all other diseases. It doesn't know any boundaries. We 
are no longer living in a world where our health can be separated from 
the health of other countries. Last week, the number of new coronavirus 
infections outside of China outpaced those inside China for the first 
time. Maybe the good news is that China is beginning to see something 
headed in a different direction, but the bad news is the infections in 
Iran, Italy, South Korea, Japan, and other places. This has moved into 
Europe now, and in South America a case was just announced in Brazil.
  This is kind of that moment where we have some opportunity to do 
everything we can to prepare for the worst, but we still have the 
option of hoping for the best. That is what happened with SARS. That is 
what happened with H1N1. To some extent, it is what happened with Zika. 
It turned out to be bad for the people who had it but not as bad as we 
anticipated at one point it might be.
  It is disturbing to see the first deaths in the State of Washington, 
but, certainly, the message to us is to be more vigilant and be better 
prepared.
  The Congress, in the last 5 years, has increased money--that doesn't 
count whatever we do this week and next week--for preparedness by 44 
percent. A year ago, we created for the first time an infectious 
disease fund--our colleague in the House,   Tom Cole, was one of the 
major proponents of this--to let the Health and Human Services people 
have access to money immediately. Because of that, they had $105 
million that they wouldn't have previously had to be able to spend 
immediately to help contain this problem, where it can be contained, to 
bring Americans back here, particularly from China, and to keep them in 
a known location for the 14-day incubation period to see if anything 
happened. All of that was possible because we had given them the 
flexibility that they hadn't had before.
  The first-line-of-defense funding has been there. We are now moving 
toward a conclusion of what we can do to make more money available for 
a vaccine. A vaccine takes a while. We are not going to have a vaccine 
for a while. We are going to be continuing to talk to Dr. Fauci and his 
team about this. We are working with experts at what is called BARDA, 
or the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, to move 
those vaccines quickly. But even if we had a vaccine in 18 months, that 
would be the U.S. world record to develop a vaccine here with the 
safety that we would think it would need to have so that anybody could 
take a vaccine and, with that vaccine, this particular virus would 
likely be dealt with.
  So there is no treatment right now. There is no cure right now. The 
treatment is to handle these issues in the way that we can in a public 
health system that has been built over decades. There are 50 States and 
the District of Columbia, and all have local public health providers. 
We are going to have new money available to work with them, but, again, 
the preparedness money that they have had for the last 5 years should 
have been used in a way--and I believe was used in a way--that gets 
them all more ready to deal with this than they otherwise would have 
been.
  We need to continue so that the Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention have what they need to improve the surveillance systems, the 
testing systems. I think we are going to find quickly that there will 
be a test that will be approved by the FDA that allows people to check, 
in a number of locations, and have that process in a number of 
locations that tests to see if, in fact, you have what you thought was 
a worse-than-usual cold--or maybe you thought it was a not-worse-than-
usual cold. Sometimes this particular disease doesn't evidence that 
much happened at all. Because of that, I think there is

[[Page S1280]]

probably, at this point, a bigger number of people who we think would 
be a percentage of people who would have really negative consequences--
even death--from this disease, rather than all the people who had it 
and didn't know they had it.
  We have learned in the past, through outbreaks of a flu strain that 
we didn't have a vaccine for, of Ebola, of Zika, that what we do to 
protect people in other countries winds up protecting people here. We 
have to be sure that we understand that a lot of our fate in this has 
been determined and will continue to be determined by what we do to 
first try to contain this virus and, secondly, to provide the money to 
be sure that, when we do have an outbreak, which has already begun in 
our country, it is an outbreak that is really held at the lowest 
possible level of people impacted and, if you are infected by this 
disease, that you have the ability to work from home, to do other 
things. The hospital is not always the place to go.
  We are working with State and local health officials right now to see 
that that happens. The money that has been used, I think, has been used 
effectively. Clearly, we are trying to agree--between the House and the 
Senate and the administration--to exactly the right number. I would say 
that, at this point, the administration has been the most agreeable to 
whatever money we want to provide but, obviously, would like to have 
that money provided quickly.
  I feel confident we are going to have the resources to deal with 
this. I feel confident that this will be a problem that will not impact 
more people than would usually be impacted by something like the flu. 
Again, we need to prepare for the very worst and hope for the very 
best, but our job right now is to prepare for the worst things that 
could happen and have the funding available so that we don't have to go 
through a couple of weeks again where an easy determination should have 
been reached.
  One thing we could have done is to have given the administration 
exactly the amount of money they asked for--we could have decided to 
spend it differently--2 weeks ago and then get into a discussion of 
what we need next. That is not the course we decided to go down.
  We are trying to come up with an amount of money, it appears, that 
would get us through this entire incident with this virus, but it is 
time to get that done. Hopefully, we will see a bill filed later today 
and the House able to vote on that bill before they leave this week. 
Once that number is done, I think it will be seen as almost certain 
that the Senate will be able to deal with that bill and approve that 
number.
  We are going to move forward. I think, again, we are going to move 
forward in a way that minimizes, as much as possible, the impact that 
this has on families and on individuals.
  Mr. President, I look forward to you and I both having a chance to 
learn more about this even today and to learn more as we move forward. 
The big thing we need to learn now is the amount of money we need to 
have to spend and how we allocate that money for a vaccine and other 
things.

                          ____________________