[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 85 (Wednesday, May 17, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2994-S2995]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                          National Police Week

  Mr. PORTMAN. Mr. President, I rise during Police Week to pay tribute 
to our police officers around the country--the men and women in blue 
who serve us every day in Ohio and in every State represented in this 
Chamber.
  In Ohio, this is a particularly difficult week. Here we are during 
Police Week, and we are, once again, mourning the loss of a police 
officer. This happened just last Friday. Last Friday, a gunman took two 
people hostage in the woods behind a nursing home in Kirkersville, OH, 
which is a small town about 25 miles east of Columbus.
  The first one to arrive on the scene was the police chief of this 
small town. His name was Steven DiSario. Chief Steven DiSario 
confronted the assailant, and he was ambushed by this assailant. He was 
shot. He was killed. This gunman then went inside the nursing facility, 
and he murdered two staff members--a registered nurse, Marlina Medrano, 
and a nurse's aide named Cindy Krantz. Then he took his own life.
  By the way, Police Chief Steven DiSario was 36 years old and had just 
become the police chief in Kirkersville a month ago. The women who were 
slain were Marlina Medrano, who had a son, and Cindy Krantz, who had 
five kids, including a 10-year-old son. Those kids had to spend 
Mother's Day preparing for their moms' burials.
  On Monday, I went to Kirkersville and saw the memorial there for the 
officer. I also had an opportunity to meet with some of the officers 
who were from neighboring communities. There was just one police 
officer in Kirkersville--just the chief. I was able to express to them 
the sympathy and the gratitude of the people throughout Ohio. I had 
brought a flag that had been flown over the U.S. Capitol in honor of 
Chief DiSario, and that flag will go to his family as a very small 
token of the appreciation and gratitude of all of us for their father's 
and husband's service.
  Chief DiSario had six kids, and his widow, Aryn, is currently 
pregnant with their seventh child--a child who is never going to know 
his or her dad. What he or she will know is that he died a hero, that 
he died a hero in risking his life to protect innocent people.
  That is what police officers do every single day. They keep us safe. 
They take dangerous criminals and weapons and drugs off our streets. 
They enforce the law. Even their very presence helps to deter crime and 
keep our communities safer, but they do it all at great risk--at great 
risk to themselves and at great sacrifice to their families.
  A little more than a year ago, I did a ride-along in Columbus with 
Officer Greg Meyer. He is one of those brave Columbus police officers 
who goes out every day to help keep our communities safe, and we were 
focused on a couple of issues that night in Columbus.
  One was the drug trade, particularly the opioid crisis we face in 
Ohio. He was able to show me where much of this activity occurs, and we 
were able to see with our eyes some of the people who were trafficking 
drugs, dispersing, and what goes on in our communities.
  We were also talking about human trafficking and his work in that 
area. We were able to go to some particular places at which there had 
been trafficking in the past and where the police had broken up 
trafficking rings in which girls and women had been made to become 
dependent on heroin. Then the traffickers had them, often in a hotel 
for a week until they had moved on to another one and trafficked--
sold--human beings, usually online, usually through the iPhone. Again, 
this police officer was able to tell me about what he has done and what 
his force has done to help protect these girls and women and to help 
get them out of that situation.
  This was just a few hours for me, and I always enjoy doing these 
ride-alongs, but this is his life and their lives every day. They are 
out there doing their best to try to protect us and to make our 
communities safer.
  The day before this tragedy occurred in Kirkersville, we had had a 
lot of police officers here in town because, on Thursday and Friday and 
over the weekend, police officers had been coming in for Police Week 
and Police Memorial Day, which was on Monday, so I had a chance to meet 
with a bunch of these officers and thank them for their service.
  We talked about the fact that the job is dangerous and increasingly 
dangerous. Unfortunately, the numbers show that. Little did we know 
that, the day after we had been talking, there would have again been 
this tragedy in Ohio. We talked about the fact that some of their 
families have had sleepless nights because they do not know whether 
their husbands or their wives or their sons or daughters are going to 
be coming home.
  In our Nation's history, more than 21,000 police officers have died 
in the line of duty. Think about that--21,000. We have already had 42 
this year, 2017. In 2016, we lost 143, which is about one officer every 
3 days. Again, last year, five of those fallen officers were from Ohio: 
Aaron Christian, a patrolman with the Chesapeake Police Department; 
Thomas Cottrell, a patrolman

[[Page S2995]]

with the Danville Police Department; Sean Johnson, of the Hilliard, OH, 
Division of Police; Steven Smith, of the Columbus Division of Police; 
and Kenneth Velez, an Ohio State trooper.
  I had the opportunity to meet with some of the families of these 
fallen officers to express our appreciation, to express our respect for 
them and the sacrifices that they bear. It takes courage to wear the 
badge, and those officers wear the badge day in and day out. They knew 
what they were getting into. Yet they wore that badge; they died 
wearing that badge.
  Although these heroic men were taken from us, their examples can 
never be taken away and will not be. Ohioans are going to remember them 
as models of bravery and service, as examples of fellow citizens who, 
on behalf of all of us, were in the habit of walking into danger rather 
than running away from it.
  We have an opportunity to do something that will make a difference 
for our police officers by supporting the Police Week resolution that 
the House and the Senate are working on. I urge all of my colleagues to 
support it, and I am sure they will. I think we need to show our men 
and women in blue, who are on the frontlines, that we do appreciate 
them.
  There is also legislation that can be supported. Most recently, with 
the majority whip, I introduced legislation that is called the Back the 
Blue Act. It is very simple. It says, if you target law enforcement 
officers, you are going to have to pay a very high price. That is 
appropriate. We think the Back the Blue Act, which would increase 
penalties on those who would attempt to harm or kill a police officer, 
is going to make a difference because it will send a strong message and 
help deter some of these crimes. Ultimately, I think that it will make 
our heroes in blue safer and help save lives.
  Again, I urge my colleagues to join me in the wake of this terrible 
tragedy we had in central Ohio. I know the people of Ohio are looking 
for Congress to stand tall and to stand with our police officers and to 
thank them for what they do to protect us every day.
  Let's support this Police Week resolution. Let's support the Back the 
Blue Act. Let's do everything we can to ensure that our police officers 
know that we are with them--that we are at their side--as they do their 
job every day to protect us.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont is recognized.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, pending before the Senate is the nomination 
of Rachel Brand to be the Associate Attorney General of the United 
States--the United States, not of the President.
  We once had an Attorney General who told us on the Judiciary 
Committee that as a member of the President's staff, it is not the 
Secretary of Justice; it is the Attorney General of the United States.
  I say this because her nomination to the third most senior position 
at the Department of Justice comes at an unprecedented time of chaos 
and upheaval--not only at the Justice Department, but also at the White 
House, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and across much of this 
administration.
  We should all agree that it is more important than ever that the 
Justice Department be led by public servants with independence and 
integrity. Unfortunately, President Trump's Attorney General and Deputy 
Attorney General have failed this test. I did not expect Attorney 
General Sessions to show independence from the President, which is why 
I voted against his nomination.
  But I had higher hopes for Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. 
Mr. Rosenstein's role in the dismissal of FBI Director Comey and his 
willingness to provide pretext for President Trump's interference in 
the Bureau's ongoing Russia investigation has precipitated a crisis of 
confidence in the Department.
  The Senate must take steps to restore the independence of the 
Department of Justice. After reviewing her record and hearing her 
testimony at her confirmation hearing, I am not confident that Rachel 
Brand is up to that task. Like so many of the President's nominees, she 
carries a heavily skewed, pro-corporate agenda that would do further 
harm to the Justice Department and its independence.
  Ms. Brand has long championed deregulation and the rolling back of 
vital environmental, consumer, and labor regulations protecting the 
American people. Ms. Brand has justified indiscriminate surveillance of 
Americans and defended broad assertions of Executive power. She even 
refused to say whether she would recuse herself from matters involving 
the Chamber of Commerce and the Chamber Litigation Center, her current 
employer. I cannot support a nominee who lacks an independent voice. I 
will therefore vote against her nomination.