[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 121 (Wednesday, July 18, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5031-S5033]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                     Nomination of Brett Kavanaugh

  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to join my 
colleagues in making it clear just how

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high the stakes are when it comes to our Nation's highest courts--for 
our families, for our communities, for our country, and for our future.
  Since the day he took office, President Trump has made one move after 
another to turn the White House and the entire executive branch into a 
tool for those who have the most power, the most money, and the most 
influence to get even more power, more money, and more influence. From 
our public schools to our public lands and more, it is hard to find any 
Trump administration decision where the bottom line didn't come first.
  But it is not just his administration. President Trump has 
systematically worked to roll back decades of progress through our 
courtrooms, from the Supreme Court on down, which will have long-
lasting impacts stretching far beyond his time in the White House.
  I know some of my colleagues were here last night to talk about the 
absolutely egregious circuit court nominees who would do everything 
they can to whittle away at our rights and freedoms as Americans. I 
want to talk about that for a bit as well, but I want to take some time 
first to talk about a nominee who would sit above those circuit court 
nominees in our Nation's Supreme Court and who, if confirmed, would 
overturn Roe v. Wade, eliminate protections for patients with 
preexisting conditions, reverse settled law and precedent, and give 
these extreme circuit court nominees even more room to do damage to our 
Constitution, our laws, our freedoms, and our way of life.
  It is telling that President Trump and his Republican and special-
interest allies are desperately trying to make the case that Judge 
Kavanaugh isn't well outside the mainstream, far outside the bounds of 
reasonable, and deeply opposed to what people across the country want 
when it comes to their rights and freedoms being protected. They may 
try, but they will not succeed because the record is clear and the 
facts are clear. Judge Kavanaugh is an extreme pick who would be 
devastating for our country if he is confirmed, and we need to do 
everything we can to stop it.
  So I am standing here right now, on behalf of the families in my home 
State of Washington and across this country, to be very clear about 
what is at stake if President Trump and his enablers continue to try to 
turn our judicial system into one that works for massive corporations 
and special interests and against regular families.
  Earlier today, a number of my colleagues stood in this spot to sound 
the alarm on what is at stake for our environment and our public health 
if the balance of this Court swings toward President Trump and his 
extreme special interests. I want to expand on those concerns, and I 
want to talk about just a few of the many issues that Judge Kavanaugh 
would impact should he be confirmed and how awful this would be for our 
families, communities, students, and workers and for our environment, 
our elections, our country, and more.
  But before I get into some other issues--and, again, just a few of 
many--I want to start with two that I believe are most important and 
that every woman, every man, and every family should be thinking very 
hard about: protections for patients with preexisting conditions and 
Roe v. Wade.
  First, President Trump has broken promise after promise he made to 
workers and families on the campaign trail, but he has never once 
wavered in keeping promises he made to extreme, ideological, rightwing 
special interests.
  President Trump said he would make taking away patient protections--
like those for preexisting conditions--and gutting policies that have 
made healthcare more affordable for millions a top priority. He failed 
to jam a bill through Congress here to make those things happen. So he 
has done everything he can to attack patients' healthcare from the Oval 
Office.
  His biggest attack yet is Judge Kavanaugh--an extremely conservative 
nominee vetted by those same rightwing special interests who President 
Trump is so determined to keep happy, a judge who those special 
interests picked because they know he will help them undermine 
affordable healthcare from the Supreme Court Bench.
  I believed President Trump when he said he was determined to 
undermine patients' healthcare in order to satisfy rightwing special 
interests. Healthcare coverage, especially for people with preexisting 
conditions, is on the line with this nomination, and we cannot afford 
not to take this threat seriously.
  That is not the only healthcare issue under threat. President Trump 
said he would appoint Supreme Court Justices vetted by these groups for 
their willingness to overturn Roe v. Wade. He said women should be 
punished for having an abortion. In office, he and Vice President Mike 
Pence have done virtually everything they can to restrict women's 
access to healthcare and to chip away at women's constitutionally 
protected reproductive rights. Unless women and men across the country 
stand up to stop them, they will succeed in putting another Supreme 
Court Justice who has the ideological rightwing's stamp of approval 
when it comes to striking down Roe.

  There is no sugarcoating this. We are on the precipice of five men 
voting to overturn a historic ruling that has made women healthier and 
made them more equal and more free in the United States. We cannot let 
that happen.
  Those are two issues that so many of us are focused on, and they are 
so important, but they are far from the only ones. Another key issue I 
want to briefly mention today is the rights and freedoms of our LGBTQ 
friends, coworkers, neighbors, and fellow Americans. We have made 
progress, but there are many questions and cases in this area that will 
come before the Supreme Court in the coming years--whether it is 
questions regarding equality under the adoption laws for all couples or 
the rights of a couple to buy a wedding cake, whether transgender 
troops can serve their country, whether someone can continue being 
fired simply for being LGBTQ, and more. So there is a whole lot at 
stake. Anyone who cares about this issue or anyone who simply believes 
that everyone in this country should have fundamental rights and 
freedoms--no matter who they are or who they love--should join us in 
rejecting Judge Kavanaugh.
  That is not all. We have known from day one that President Trump 
would be hostile toward our bedrock environmental laws, that he was 
eager to do the bidding of the coal, oil, and gas industries, that his 
slogan of putting America first actually meant that the United States 
would be dead last in the fight against climate change, and that 
Trump's economic agenda has more to do with rolling back rules that 
help to keep our kids safe from toxic pollutants, protecting our 
drinking water, or preventing health problems in senior citizens--the 
ones those special interest groups try to call pesky regulations and 
what the rest of us moms, grandmothers, and ordinary people call 
commonsense protections.
  But it is apparently not enough just to attack our environment for 
the administration. If you really want to shape our Nation's 
environmental laws for generations to come, you put someone on the 
Supreme Court for life who will consistently side with the massive 
corporations and special interests that put profits ahead of the health 
and well-being of families, and, boy, did those CEOs and special 
interests hit the jackpot with President Trump's nominee.
  You don't have to spend long looking at Judge Kavanaugh's record to 
see that, should he be seated, nearly five decades of environmental 
protection are at risk, including the protections enshrined in the 
Clean Air Act, which has significantly cut the smog, soot, and 
chemicals that choked communities prior to 1970 and prevented hundreds 
of thousands of premature deaths and cases of heart disease in the 
years sense.
  Also at risk is the Clean Water Act, which, if erased, would take us 
back to the bad old days before commonsense protections--like when the 
Cuyahoga River was so polluted that it caught fire; when shellfish beds 
were closed in Puget Sound, nearly decimated by pollutants; or when an 
estimated 20 million gallons of sewage effluent flowed into Lake 
Washington every single day.
  I could go on and on about the strides our country has made to keep 
our families safe, but the bottom line is that because of our landmark 
environmental laws--like the Clean Water Act and the Clean Air Act--our 
rivers are cleaner, our air is easier to breathe,

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and families are better protected than ever before.
  Though we have a lot of work yet to do, it would be a grave mistake 
to go backward, and that is just what so many people fear would happen 
with Judge Kavanaugh on the Bench, given his past rulings and given the 
test that President Trump applied and his commitment to only nominate 
someone screened and approved by the extreme right, especially his 
stance that could take decisions away from our Nation's scientists and 
nonpartisan professionals and put those decisions into the hands of 
special interests.
  That takes me to another issue I want to run through briefly: making 
sure our elections in this country are free and accessible and that 
corporations don't have a louder voice in our process than ordinary 
voters. These are issues where our courts have failed to serve us well 
in recent years, but by confirming Judge Kavanaugh, we would be 
cementing this awful pattern for a generation and making necessary 
reform so much more difficult.
  Judge Kavanaugh will continue his habit of ruling to make it harder 
and harder for citizens to vote and have a voice in this democracy. We 
know this. We saw how he ruled in favor of stricter voter ID laws--ones 
where the intention to make it harder for Americans to vote was clear 
and absolutely the wrong way to go. We cannot have a Supreme Court that 
continues to allow voter suppression.
  So I ask my colleagues: If you believe that voting in our country 
should be open to all and that people shouldn't have less access to the 
voting booth because of where they live or the color of their skin, 
join me in rejecting this nominee and demanding someone who will 
protect our elections and our democracy. If you believe that Citizens 
United was an awful decision that perverted the First Amendment and put 
shameful amounts of power into the hands of the mega rich and the 
biggest corporations, join me in rejecting this nominee and demanding 
someone who would put our ordinary voters first.
  If we can't stem the flow of dark, unaccountable money in politics, 
and reverse the tide of the wealthiest Americans and biggest 
corporations being allowed to have the loudest voices in our elections, 
we are going to keep running into massive challenges as a 
nation. Without a Supreme Court willing to do that, without rejecting 
Judge Kavanaugh and demanding someone else, we can't do that. Giving 
the most powerful among us an advantage in our elections is not the 
only way Judge Kavanaugh is working for those at the top, and I want to 
briefly discuss another.

  Last month's Janus decision made it clear that workers and their 
unions need a fair voice on the Supreme Court. Unfortunately, Judge 
Kavanaugh has a long record of weakening worker protections, 
undermining union rights, and making it easier for corporations and 
special interests to tilt the scales of justice in their favor.
  I would urge my colleagues who claim to care about the rights and 
economic security of working families to join me in rejecting this 
nomination and put the power back into the hands of working families 
and the middle class.
  This point is especially potent given the disgrace we witnessed in 
Helsinki. Every American should be deeply concerned about President 
Trump putting someone on the Supreme Court who is prepared to protect 
him from legal attack and do his bidding.
  As we all watch, many of us in horror and dismay, as President Trump 
continues to do everything in his power to try and discredit the 
Mueller investigation, we cannot forget, for a moment, that his Supreme 
Court nominee suggested in a 2009 law review article that a sitting 
President should not be subjected to criminal investigation or civil or 
criminal litigation.
  Does anyone think, for one second, this isn't something President 
Trump was looking for? Is there anyone who has seen how President Trump 
has acted, listened to what he said who thinks he is not thinking about 
what happens if something related to this investigation goes to the 
Supreme Court?
  President Trump controls the White House. His Republicans control 
both Houses of Congress. The last thing we need, the last thing any 
American who truly cares about our country should want is to place the 
last remaining branch--the final branch intended to be independent, to 
put our Constitution first--into the hands of a Trump lackey. That 
would be awful. It would eliminate even the pretense of checks and 
balances. If Judge Kavanaugh is confirmed, with his record and given 
what we know about President Trump, that is exactly what would happen.
  If you believe we should be taking the Russian election interference 
into U.S. elections seriously, join me in rejecting this nominee and 
demanding someone who would be truly independent and place an 
appropriate check on Executive power.
  If you believe a President is not above the law, join me in rejecting 
this nominee and demanding someone who will take our Constitution and 
our judicial independence seriously.
  If you believe Executive power is not unilateral and that real checks 
and balances are required, join me in rejecting this nominee and 
demanding someone who will clearly and unequivocally make sure that 
continues to be a reality.
  Finally, I want to highlight Judge Kavanaugh's troubling record on 
commonsense gun safety. This is an issue that certainly hit close to 
home for far too many people in recent years. Churches, schools, 
concerts, it seems like no place is immune to the rampant gun violence 
happening in the country, which is why millions of Americans have taken 
to the streets in recent months to demand action.
  Yet, at the same time, Judge Kavanaugh has taken a far more expansive 
interpretation of the Second Amendment and has vigorously argued that 
assault weapon bans are unconstitutional. His position is far more 
extreme than even the late Justice Scalia. It is no wonder the NRA 
immediately applauded Judge Kavanaugh's nomination and has pledged now 
to spend untold amounts to seal the deal on his confirmation.
  Those are just a few issues weighing on so many people's minds right 
now. I could go on about what is at stake if President Trump turns his 
White House, and potentially now the judicial system, into one that 
favors the powerful few.
  I would like to close by saying there are few things I take as 
seriously as a Senator than my duty to consider and vote on a Supreme 
Court nominee. In my time in the Senate, I have had the opportunity to 
consider nominees from Democrats and nominees from Republicans. I voted 
for some of them, I voted against some of them, each on their merits, 
and each based on how I think they would serve.
  This time is different. We know exactly where President Trump's 
Supreme Court nominee will fall on the specific issues, no matter what 
vague answers Judge Kavanaugh chooses to deliver through this process.
  Why do we know this? Because President Trump told us openly, 
publicly, and repeatedly. The President laid out specific tests and 
promised to only pick nominees from a prescreened list of people who 
would absolutely meet them.
  Nobody should be fooled. Judge Kavanaugh is a rubberstamp. He will 
stand with special interests over families, and he will take our 
country in the wrong direction.
  I urge my colleagues, stand with me in rejecting Judge Kavanaugh's 
nomination and join me in calling on President Trump to send us someone 
who would stand with women, with our workers, with our families, and 
who would truly commit to respecting settled law and the rights and 
freedoms we all hold dear and the longstanding protections that help 
keep our families safe and healthy.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.