[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 83 (Monday, May 4, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2196-S2200]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                              Coronavirus

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, the Senate convenes a session this 
evening during a trying time for our Nation. As we speak, millions of 
our citizens are respecting stay-at-home orders and doing their part to 
stop the spread of this pernicious disease. Millions upon millions are 
now newly unemployed, dependent on the actions we take in Congress to 
stave off financial disaster. More than 1 million Americans have tested 
positive for COVID-19. More than 67,000 lives have been lost.
  My home State of New York has been hit the hardest. The loss of so 
many precious lives, the suffering of so many families unable to 
comfort or even say goodbye to a loved one have been extremely painful, 
enough to break your heart.
  At the same time, while we are grieving, we are also inspired by the 
bravery of our doctors and nurses, healthcare workers, first 
responders, and other daily heroes--many of them immigrants--on the 
frontlines of this crisis. To them we owe an extraordinary debt of 
gratitude, an enormous thank-you that I hear out the windows of my 
apartment and many in New York at 7 p.m. when we applaud them as they 
change shifts every night--an act that brings isolated New Yorkers 
together.
  More than that, this Congress, this Senate, must deliver the people 
of our country relief. We have come together on several occasions to 
pass historic legislation in this time of crisis. They passed 96 to 0, 
which shows that this body can come together in a time of crisis, which 
should give Americans some hope and some solace. Let me be very clear. 
Our work is far from over.
  The Republican leader has called the Senate back into session despite 
the fact that the District of Columbia appears to be reaching the peak 
phase of this public health emergency, despite the risks we face by 
gathering here in the Capitol, despite the risks faced by security 
guards, cafeteria workers, janitors, and the staff who operate the 
floor of the Senate. I want to take a moment to thank each and every 
one of them--and all of those Capitol Hill workers--for being here 
today, for doing their jobs so that we may do ours.
  If we are going to be here, if we are going to make these fine people 
come into work in these conditions, let the Senate at least conduct the 
Nation's business and focus like a laser on COVID-19. At the moment, 
the Republican leader has scheduled no significant COVID-related 
business for the floor of the Senate. Tonight, we will vote on a 
nomination to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Later this week, the 
Republican majority on the Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing for 
a manifestly unqualified, totally divisive, rightwing judicial nominee.
  When the topic of COVID-related legislation has come up, Leader 
McConnell has simply drawn partisan lines in the sand. First, he has 
suggested that States and localities should go bankrupt--let them go 
bankrupt. He has since realized his mistake and walked that back. But 
then, only a few days later, the leader vowed to block any bill that 
does not include legal immunity for big corporations that operate 
unsafely and put workers in harm's way.
  The Republican leader said that his redline in a future relief 
package is not a national testing program; it is not more help for 
small businesses or housing assistance for families; it is not rescuing 
our healthcare system. Leader McConnell will not support new 
legislation to fight this evil disease unless

[[Page S2197]]

it gives big corporations legal immunity.
  Judicial nominees, legal immunity for big corporations--in all due 
respect, Republican leader, these are not the Nation's most urgent 
priorities right now. There are much more pressing issues that deserve 
not only the Senate's focus and attention but should be the subject of 
bipartisan negotiations for the next emergency relief package, known as 
COVID 4.
  Here are just a few. Our health system is under enormous strain. We 
need more money to flow to hospitals, community health centers, and 
nursing homes. Essential workers--many on low wages--work longer shifts 
at great personal risk. They deserve hazard pay. Each first of the 
month brings new rent payments to families suffering financial 
hardship. Relief for renters and homeowners must be on the agenda. 
State and local governments are stretched to the breaking point, 
imperiling the jobs of teachers, firefighters, police officers, food 
inspectors, and other public employees. State, local, and Tribal 
governments deserve Federal support.
  As we begin to contemplate a return to normal economic activity down 
the road, one thing is certain: We are not testing nearly enough 
Americans--not nearly enough--to know when the moment to safely reopen 
our country has arrived. Despite the length of this crisis--now 
measured in months--the administration has yet to develop an adequate 
national strategy on testing.
  These are urgent issues we should focus on. These are problems the 
American people want us to come together--Democrat and Republican--to 
solve. These are the topics--not redlines in the sand on ideological 
wish lists--that we should be debating and negotiating for a future 
bill. The Republican leader himself acknowledged that there isn't 
enough testing on the frontlines, but he has reconvened the Senate to 
do nothing to address the problem.
  As we return to work under the cloud of crisis, Senate Republicans 
should concentrate on helping us recover from COVID-19, not confirming 
rightwing judges or protecting big businesses that threaten to put 
workers at serious risk.
  The administration has done a very poor job of implementing parts of 
the CARES Act and the most recent supplemental emergency legislation. 
So Democrats have urged our Republican colleagues to, at a minimum, 
hold hearings on the implementation of COVID-related legislation passed 
by Congress. It is a positive step that Senate Republicans are now 
beginning to follow our request and considering scheduling some 
oversight hearings in the coming weeks with key White House Coronavirus 
Task Force officials.
  These hearings are very important. Congress can make laws but only 
the executive can implement them. But a time-honored responsibility of 
Congress, given to us by the Founding Fathers, is oversight, to make 
sure that the executive is executing the laws. So we need to hear from 
Dr. Fauci, Dr. Birx, Secretary Mnuchin, Chairman Powell. We need to 
know why so many small businesses are having trouble getting loans, 
while larger and more well-connected businesses are not. We need to 
know why unemployment insurance checks are failing to get to workers.
  Maybe, above all, we need to know why we still don't have enough 
tests. Months ago, in early March, here is what President Trump said: 
``Anybody who needs a test gets a test.''
  It was a lie then; it remains a lie now. Administration officials 
promised 27 million test kits would be available by the end of March. 
It is now May, and it still hasn't happened.
  The President continues to pressure States and businesses to reopen, 
but he refuses to take responsibility for the one thing that would 
allow them to do it safely--testing. Do you know how the White House 
knows it is safe to hold a press conference? They test all the 
reporters before allowing them into the briefing room. What does the 
White House do before the President holds a meeting with business 
leaders? They take everyone's temperature and then administer a 
coronavirus test.
  Why on Earth is there not a plan for the rest of the country, the 
whole country, not just the President and the White House? Many 
experts--most experts--say that we need far more tests than we have.
  If we had been on the same track as countries that use nationwide 
testing to stop their outbreaks, like South Korea and Canada, we would 
be testing 2 million people a day right now, and already tens of 
millions would have been tested. Some experts say we should increase 
capacity to 30 million tests per week later this year. Others are 
calling on it to be even higher. Right now, we are testing only 230,000 
people a day--a drop in the ocean compared to what is needed.
  We need testing capacity now, but we will also need it later. Some 
believe that COVID-19 will resurge later in the year--perhaps with a 
vengeance. There were reports today that the CDC has projected a 
growing number of deaths from coronavirus into the summer, and yet we 
still don't have adequate testing or even an indication that the 
administration is focused on the problem. If, God forbid, this virus 
comes back in the summer or the fall, the best way to deal with it is 
testing, short of a vaccine, which we will not have by then. Testing, 
we don't have it.
  The lack of a national testing strategy, the painfully slow buildup 
of testing capacity, the gross exaggerations of success by the 
administration has gone on for too long. This administration needs to 
take on responsibility for a national testing regime and deliver on it 
immediately. It is, in the eyes of most experts, the best way to deal 
with the current crisis and certainly the best way to prevent a future 
crisis from growing out of control.
  So there can be no doubt that this will be one of the strangest 
sessions of the U.S. Senate in modern history. Our offices will be 
emptied, our staffs working from home. Senate Democrats will not hold 
regular caucus meetings in person. We will do them by teleconference. 
Anyone who comes to the well of the Senate to speak will wipe down 
their microphone and desks with a disinfectant and refrain from the 
usual practice of handing our speeches over to the Senate reporters. We 
will wear masks in the hallways of this Capitol and on our way home. We 
will vote in small groups, and we will not do what comes so naturally 
to every public official--shake hands.
  The American people are watching us right now. They expect us to do 
our jobs. They expect us to come together to address the issues that 
really matter. We cannot--cannot--and must not merely go back to 
business as usual in the Senate. It is not business as usual out in our 
country. Leader McConnell must hear this.
  Right now, Leader McConnell and the Republican majority should shelve 
the divisive judicial fights and the partisan, divisive redlines. Let's 
focus on working together to heal the sick, employ the unemployed, 
stabilize the economy, and making sure the administration properly 
executes the laws we pass so that we can prepare our country for the 
day when we will finally, God willing, return to normal.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I am learning the etiquette of the mask as 
we try to make certain we set a good example for our country that is 
very attentive to the public healthcare crisis we face.
  I listened carefully to the remarks of the Republican majority 
leader. He spoke about the reconvening of the Senate this day, and he 
talked about the work that we achieved a few weeks ago in passing the 
CARES Act--$2.2 trillion in rescue funds for America--by 96 to nothing. 
Then, by a voice vote, we passed $484 billion more--almost $2.7 
trillion. That is an amount that is far in excess of the annual Federal 
budget of the United States of America for domestic discretionary 
spending, and we did it in a matter of days and weeks. We knew that we 
were facing, as the President characterized it, a national emergency, 
and we still do.
  The Senate is here today because, against medical advice, the 
majority leader has brought us back to Washington. We know what the 
standard is

[[Page S2198]]

in the District of Columbia for the people who live here--to stay home; 
not to meet in groups; to work away from your normal working place to 
protect yourself, your family, and everyone else. Yet we are back in 
town. The majority leader tells us we don't take days off. He says we 
are here to do the Nation's business, which can only be done--that it 
is only possible--when we are here. He talks about taking careful steps 
back. I have been waiting for the majority leader to announce what the 
business of this week will be. Boy, there are a lot of things we should 
be doing.
  I know, back home, from the endless telephone conference calls that I 
am involved in and from the comments by my friends and neighbors in 
Illinois, that there are many unanswered questions which they would 
like this Congress to address. We have been waiting carefully, 
expectantly, for the majority leader to announce what we are doing this 
week that merits this return. It is not just because Members of the 
Senate are being asked to come back. Listen, that is what we ran to do. 
We promised the people of our States that we would be there to do the 
business of the Senate and the Nation when called upon. Certainly, I 
want to keep that promise. All of us do. Yet it is appropriate to ask 
exactly what it is this week that we will be doing.
  There is a noncontroversial nomination that will be before us in a 
matter of 2 hours, which is likely to pass by an overwhelming vote. 
That can't be the reason. There must be more, but what is it? There are 
lots of things which the majority leader could bring us back to do. It 
appears one of the things he is most intent on is to make certain that 
we consider the nomination of a young district court judge from the 
Commonwealth of Kentucky. This individual was nominated last year to 
serve on the district court in the Commonwealth of Kentucky. His name 
is Justin Walker.
  Justin Walker has a distinction. He is one of nine Presidential 
nominees who has been sent to the Senate Judiciary Committee by the 
White House who has been judged ``not qualified'' by the American Bar 
Association. It was the American Bar Association that said his absence 
of any significant trial experience disqualified him to serve at the 
lowest Federal court--a lifetime appointment, make no mistake. Yet it 
seems Justin Walker is well connected with the majority leader by his 
having served on his staff, at least as an intern, but it may be more--
I am not sure--and other connections that I am not aware of. It is 
enough that his nomination has become a priority for the U.S. Senate, 
which is interesting. Despite any ``career'' on the Federal district 
court of less than 6 or 8 months and despite the fact that he has had 
no trial experience by which to take that job, the majority leader, 
Senator McConnell, wants this man to be elevated to the second highest 
court in the land--the DC Circuit Court of Appeals.
  I don't understand it. It is certainly hard to argue that this is 
part of a response to a national health emergency in America. It has 
nothing to do with it. It is a political decision, clearly, to elevate 
this man--of all of the members of the Federal district court bench 
across the Nation--to be next in line to be considered for the Supreme 
Court. I hope he has seen a Federal trial in the time he has served on 
the district court in Kentucky. I guess we will find out in the hearing 
that has been called for on Wednesday of this week.

  So, when the majority leader comes to us and says we have important 
nominations that deal with national security, I am sorry, but Judge 
Walker is not one of them. What we have in his confirmation hearing is 
a political decision for political advancement at the risk of this 
Senate and the hundreds of people who are working here today because we 
have been called back.
  What else could the Senate Judiciary Committee do other than to 
entertain Senator McConnell's former intern to be raised to the second 
highest court in the land? There are a number of things we might 
consider.
  I think one is contact tracing. Contact tracing is going to be the 
key to opening our economy in America. Contact tracing says, if you 
have been exposed to a person who has tested positive for COVID-19, 
that we have ways--technological ways and other ways--to trace you and 
notify you. That also raises questions about information and privacy, 
which is one of the issues the Senate Judiciary Committee considers.
  There is the Bureau of Prisons. Currently, at the Bureau of Prisons, 
there is a raging conflict because there is raging infection. This is 
not the only correctional institution that faces that, but it does. 
Guards, correction officers, as well as the inmates themselves, are at 
risk because COVID-19 is in the ranks of those serving time in our 
prisons. Many States--even the Federal Government to some extent--are 
considering the appropriate policy to keep America safe but also to 
treat these individuals with fairness, especially those who are working 
for the Federal Government and are doing what we ask them to do. That 
is under the jurisdiction of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
  Instead of this Kentucky nominee of Senator McConnell's, whom he 
wants to move up quickly to the second highest court of the land, 
shouldn't we be asking basic questions about the policies of the Bureau 
of Prisons?
  There are immigration issues too. It is interesting when you take a 
look at the spokespersons when it comes to medicine. So many of them--
not all of them by any means--are new immigrants to America. I salute 
all of our healthcare heroes. We have signs in our yard at home, and 
others around the neighborhood do as well. We can't thank these men and 
women enough for going to work every day and risking their lives every 
day to keep us safe--doctors, nurses, lab technicians, those working in 
nursing homes--and to treat those who are infected and save the lives 
of the people we love.
  As you listen on television to their comments about the risks they 
are taking and the costs they are paying with their families and 
others, I note how many of them are new immigrants to this country. It 
is no surprise. Many of these people--well-trained and educated--come 
to the United States for opportunities they can't get in their home 
countries, and in terms of our healthcare, we prosper because of that 
decision. Yet, when it comes to decisions by the U.S. Senate in dealing 
with immigration and healthcare, you would think that we would have no 
use for these people.
  Take the DACA protectees--those who, under President Obama's 
Executive order, have the protection of DACA so they will not be 
deported from the United States and can legally work in the United 
States. These are important people. I tried, with Senator Graham, in a 
bipartisan amendment back 6 weeks ago, to say that their legal status 
in America would be respected at least until the end of this calendar 
year so they could continue to be here without the fear of deportation, 
and it was stopped.
  According to Senator Graham, the comment from one of his colleagues 
was: There go Durbin and Graham again, working on the Dream Act.
  Yes, I am. I am still working on the Dream Act. Do you know why I am 
doing this? It is that, out of the 780,000 DACA protectees, at least 
41,000 of them are in the healthcare field today.
  When it come to those here in the United States who have temporary 
protected status--at least 11,000 of them--are we ready to say publicly 
what some Members of the Senate say privately: ``Let them leave. We 
don't need them''? I am not going to say that. I know better, and so do 
families across America. Thank goodness for these healthcare heroes--
those born in the United States and those not born in the United 
States--who have come here to help us through this public healthcare 
crisis. Immigration is an issue for the Senate Judiciary Committee. 
Will there be a hearing this week? None have been posted that relate to 
this COVID-19 challenge. We haven't even addressed it.
  What about profiteering? Wouldn't that be an interesting issue for us 
to have a hearing on in the Senate Judiciary Committee--violations of 
current law? As I mentioned, I spent my time in telephone conference 
with a lot of people who are buying protective equipment--
administrators of hospitals, clinics, and medical professionals 
themselves. They report what is happening. It came from Fairfield, IL, 
which is a smaller community in downstate Illinois, where the hospital 
administrator said: Senator, we used to

[[Page S2199]]

pay 22 cents for a surgical gown at this hospital. The price is now 
between $11 and $20 apiece. Somebody is ripping them off. They know it, 
I know it, and the Senate Judiciary Committee should know it too.

  This is another issue we could take up and that I hope we would 
consider. Instead, we have McConnell's nominee for the DC Circuit Court 
of Appeals, which he considers to be vital national business. I don't 
see it that way. What I see is a lot of people here who are gathered in 
the Capitol, doing their jobs as they were hired to do and as they are 
dedicated to perform--at risk. I am prepared to be here because that is 
what I ran for office to do, but I would hope it would be for something 
substantive in order to deal with real issues of national security and, 
certainly, issues related to this national health emergency.
  The District of Columbia and the States on either side of the 
District--Maryland and Virginia--all continue to record new cases of 
COVID infection and death. They have not seen a 2-week decline in new 
COVID cases, which the White House announced as a guideline a few weeks 
ago, that is necessary to begin the first phase of reopening. The 
opposite is true. In this Washington Metropolitan Area, where we have 
been called in to work today, we find a COVID hotspot. In the week 
ending last Thursday, the District, Maryland, and Virginia recorded 
20,000 new COVID cases--a staggering amount of sickness and suffering. 
All three jurisdictions remain under stay-at-home orders to try to curb 
the spread of this deadly virus in order to save lives and ease the 
burden on our exhausted medical workers.
  My State of Illinois also remains under a stay-at-home order as do 
more than half of the States. Not one State in America has yet to meet 
the first requirement of safety to reopen our schools and businesses 
and communities in this pandemic. That first requirement is a 2-week 
decline in new infections. Like millions of Americans, Members of the 
Senate and our staffs have been working from home for the last 6 weeks 
to try to save lives and keep our health system from collapsing.
  I do have to take exception to the statement made by Senator 
McConnell when he said: Across America, you don't get to take days off. 
I have been on the phone every single day--my colleagues, the same--
talking to people in their own home States, dealing with challenges and 
issues that face businesses and labor unions and charities and 
hospitals. The list is so long that I don't know where to start or 
where to end. Yet he would suggest I was home, taking a day off.
  Out of my home, Senator McConnell, my kitchen became my surrogate 
office, and I am sure many Senators will say the same. I worked as hard 
there as I do in this building--maybe harder on some days. So we didn't 
take days off. We have negotiated a nearly half-trillion-dollar COVID 
emergency aid package for our home States--a life support package to 
provide much needed resources for testing and for our heroic healthcare 
workers.
  When you take a look at the issue of lost revenue, I spoke to the 
mayor of the District of Columbia a few minutes ago. She talked about 
revenue that is, obviously, lost to her--hundreds of millions of 
dollars that she has to face in the next budget--all related to the 
COVID and all related to the downturn in our economy. The same thing is 
true in my State and virtually every other State.
  This COVID crisis has taken its toll on business activity, on the 
attendance at events, on purchases. It means less revenue going into 
the coffers of States and local governments. We provided $150 billion 
for this purpose in the original CARES bill. Many of us believe we need 
to stand up for them again. You can't give speeches on the floor about 
your respect for the police and first responders and firefighters and 
then say it is a darned shame that the people who employ them will not 
be able to pay them in the months ahead.
  As for this notion of declaring bankruptcy, what an economic disaster 
that would be if States and local governments were declaring bankruptcy 
right and left, not to mention the real hardship it would cause among 
first responders and those healthcare workers, including nurses, whom 
we value so much. So many of them who are employed by State and local 
governments would suffer if the suggestion of bankruptcy went forward.
  We can legislate without violating public health guidelines and 
risking making this pandemic worse. So the urgent business of the 
Senate should be the COVID challenge that we face everywhere. In our 
coming back to Washington, why isn't that a priority that has been 
announced? At this moment, we don't know what will happen with the 
Senate's agenda tomorrow or in the 2 or 3 days after. If it relates to 
COVID-19, count me in. If it relates to true national security, count 
me in. Yet, if we are just coming here because of a promise made to a 
38-year-old Federal judge in Kentucky, it doesn't meet the test. As I 
mentioned before, this nominee was judged ``not qualified,'' and he has 
made statements that are openly hostile to the Affordable Care Act, 
which I would like to address for a moment.

  When we passed the Affordable Care Act about 10 years ago, the goal 
was to reduce the number of Americans who had no health insurance. It 
was successful. In the State of Illinois, it cut in half the number of 
uninsured--people without health insurance. Its critics didn't vote for 
it; have not come up with an alternative to it; and like this Justin 
Walker, the Federal judge in Kentucky, have been openly contemptuous of 
the notion of moving our Nation toward full healthcare coverage. I 
don't think that argument is as compelling today, under the current 
circumstances, if it ever were. All of us appreciate the need for a 
real safety net. All of us understand, without real health insurance 
protection at this moment in history, the people we love--our children, 
our spouses, our parents--would be at risk because they wouldn't have 
access to good, quality healthcare.
  This is a situation in which this judicial nominee--Mr. Walker, who 
was found ``not qualified'' for the Federal district court position--is 
now openly contemptuous of the Affordable Care Act and argues that it 
should be eliminated at this moment in history--the assurance of 
healthcare and health insurance protection. Is he the person we want on 
the second highest court in the land? In the midst of the most deadly 
health crisis and the most devastating economic catastrophe of our 
times, the majority leader's agenda remains unchanged--to fill the 
Federal bench at any cost.
  The Trump administration's response to the COVID-19 crisis has 
shocked many people. America has 5 percent of the world's population. 
Yet we have one-third of the world's COVID infections and more than 25 
percent of the COVID deaths. Let me say that again. America has 5 
percent of the world's population and more than 25 percent of the COVID 
deaths. As of this morning, 67,682 Americans have died of this 
ferocious virus. They include my friends, people I know, and members of 
my family. In my State of Illinois, we have lost 2,618 men, women, and 
children to this pandemic. When the Senate left Washington, DC, 6 weeks 
ago to work from home, there were 5,000 COVID infections in my State. 
There are more than 50,000 today. We are No. 2 in testing, so our 
numbers, I think, are more accurate than in many other States.
  Americans feel great anxiety and sadness, but these healthcare 
professionals keep our heads up and our focus very clear. These 
essential heroes are doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists, 
pharmacists, and the men and women who make sure there is food in these 
hospitals and that the floors are clean. They include postal workers, 
grocery store clerks, truckdrivers, law enforcement officers, teachers 
who continue to teach our kids and help to keep them safe. They are all 
part of this national effort. I would say that the notion of 
homeschooling, or e-schooling, which is now very common across America, 
has renewed the appreciation of many parents for what the teachers are 
doing every single day to help their kids.
  In my State and every State, people of color have suffered more than 
their share of COVID sickness and death, partly because of longstanding 
health inequities that leave people of color with more preexisting 
health conditions, partly because of barriers to healthcare, and partly 
because Black and Brown people fill so many jobs

[[Page S2200]]

that are deemed essential. One major hospital in Chicago told me that 
half the people who died from COVID-19 in their hospital were 
uninsured, many of them Hispanic. They are people who may or may not 
have health insurance. They are desperate to work and earn a living. 
Some of them are afraid that they or some member of their family may be 
deported if they show up to a hospital to report themselves sick, so 
they wait until it is literally too late, and they die.
  We have seen our economy shut down and a lot of hardship as a result. 
Many owners of businesses, restaurants, and others have talked to me 
and others in the Senate about how soon we can reopen. But most of 
them, not all of them, most of them understand that going through this 
kind of shutdown of our economy and our personal lives is bad--bad if 
we do it one time; it is horrible to think about doing it a second time 
if we reopen too soon in the wrong way.
  In my State, 830,000 people filed for unemployment insurance between 
March 1 and April 25. They are among the 30 million Americans who filed 
for unemployment since COVID came to America--40 million. That is the 
fastest, deepest loss of jobs we have ever seen. To reopen our States 
and Nation before we have done the hard and careful work required to 
open safely only risks more infection, more death, more lost jobs, and 
more economic hardship. Reopening before we can reopen safely risks 
overwhelming our hospitals and ICUs. We need to listen to public health 
experts, the doctors and the nurses, many of whom have worked past 
exhaustion. We need to be responsible and not give in to chance on the 
street.
  What is the essential work that the Senate should be doing? 
Investigating why we do not have enough testing in this country that is 
essential to reopening the economy and working with State, local, and 
Tribal governments to help them hire and train the estimated 300,000 
contact tracers needed to reopen America safely. Rather than forcing 
States to bid against each other, we have to plead with the President 
to use his authority under the Defense Production Act to produce here 
in America the respirators and other PPE that is essential for workers 
and their families. We have to provide oversight for the Paycheck 
Protection Program and make sure those loans are going to small 
business as we originally intended and not to wealthy hedge fund 
operators. We ought to be working to shore up the U.S. Postal Service, 
an essential public service created under the Constitution. What a 
reminder it has been to all of us staying at home, watching that letter 
carrier come by every single day. It is a bright spot, with his big 
smile, greeted by everybody on my street with gratitude for his 
continuing work day in and day out. That is what our Postal Service is. 
For them to be degraded and insulted by the critics is totally unfair--
totally unfair.
  We ought to be making plans to ensure that every American voter can 
vote by mail in the November election, given the likelihood that this 
lethal virus will still be threatening us. If this Senate is going to 
gather as a body in this pandemic against the medical advice of some 
and the sound judgment of others, let's make sure our work is 
essential. We are still waiting for a report from our Republican 
majority leader about the agenda that brought us to Washington and that 
brings us here this week, ready to work, ready to address the COVID-19 
crisis that faces our country.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Ernst). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.