[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 183 (Saturday, October 24, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6437-S6439]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                    Nomination of Amy Coney Barrett

  Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I want to start with a personal thank-
you to the Presiding Officer for indulging me for an additional few 
moments here so I may speak this afternoon on the nomination of Judge 
Amy Coney Barrett to be an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
  And while I intend to share with you my intention on how I will vote, 
I would like to start by expressing my disappointment with where we are 
in the Senate as a whole right now. There has been some good discussion 
here this morning as we are considering these unanimous consent 
agreements--statements being made but not action moving forward.

  I had hoped that if we were going to be at this moment in time, just 
over a week out from our national elections, that we would be here on 
the floor debating the merits of a COVID relief bill. In my home State 
of Alaska, as in so many States around the country, we are seeing 
unprecedented numbers now. The news, just yesterday, Friday, was that 
the United States reported the highest single-day recorded positive 
cases--83,757--really staggering.
  In Alaska, we have seen this virus spread to some of our small 
outlying villages, villages that are not accessible by road and 
villages that have limited medical facilities. We are really quite 
concerned about what this means for many of the Native people in these 
areas.
  We are not able to stay on top of the contact tracing like we were 
some months ago because of our increasing numbers. The pressure on 
hospital capacity is also a growing concern. And, economically, Alaska 
has been hit extraordinarily hard. As most know, we have a pretty 
substantial tourist season, but this year, we had little to no season 
for us. Many small businesses have closed permanently, but many, many 
more are going into the winter wondering how they are going to make it 
through the winter and scrambling to find ways to piece it together.
  Unemployment, loss of housing--in every conversation that I have with 
Alaskans, they are asking if and when we are going to see another round 
of COVID relief, and I regret that we have no deal to offer them today. 
Instead, we are here on a weekend, 10 days before the elections, to 
advance a U.S. Supreme Court nominee.
  Now, I was here on the floor yesterday. I had an opportunity to 
listen to the majority leader as he outlined the escalation of 
confirmation battles over the past 30-plus years, and I think it was an 
important lesson in our Senate history. I am not confused about how we 
wound up here, but I certainly am frustrated by it. It is with a heavy 
heart that I just regret that we are in this place.
  I think there was a worthy attempt during the 109th Congress, by the 
Gang of 14, to reduce tensions. There was, I think, a very genuine, 
good-faith effort there to try to dial things back. But, sadly, their 
bipartisan action was not rewarded by the voters, and perhaps that 
served as a warning to other Members of this body rather than an 
aspiration.
  We heard the history lesson, and I am one who has long recognized 
that pointing fingers doesn't ever actually solve a problem. I 
personally believe that every nominee for the Supreme Court should 
receive an up-or-down vote after they have passed out of committee. My 
record has been pretty clear, pretty consistent, and some might even 
suggest boring in its consistency, but I made a very strong commitment 
after I returned to the Senate at the end of 2010 and said: I do not 
believe that filibustering our judges was what we should be doing.
  So I might not have liked the judges that were before us, but I did 
not participate in a filibuster of a judge. I had an opportunity to 
vote up or down, and I thought that was the reasonable way to proceed. 
I believe that it is fair to the individual and it is fair to the 
institution.
  But I also recognize that the timing of this confirmation that we 
have before us will serve to reinforce the public perception about 
political influence on the Court, and I would hope that we all 
recognize that public confidence in our courts must be an imperative. 
We have to believe that justice is going to be equal for all of us.
  Now, I know that my colleagues are not surprised to hear me discuss 
my concern about the politicization of the Court. I made a similar 
point during the impeachment trial, when some

[[Page S6438]]

wanted to literally tear down Chief Justice Roberts and the Court 
because they needed a sound bite for a political ad in the primary 
campaign. I made the same case when I voted against the nomination of 
now-Justice Kavanaugh.
  Also, during that impeachment trial, I implored the Members of this 
Chamber to look inward and to really evaluate: Are we really willing to 
tear down not only the other party but the other institutions of our 
government as well?
  So I have looked inward, considering, in these difficult days, what I 
believe is best for the institutions of our government, and I recognize 
that confirming this nominee is not going to heal and it is not going 
to salve the wounds that these institutions have endured, but neither 
will threats that, should the balance of power in this Chamber change, 
everything is on the table, including the end of the legislative 
filibuster and packing the Court. To do that would only inflict even 
deeper, deeper wounds, fundamentally and dramatically altering how the 
levers of power operate in this country and compromising the one branch 
of government that must remain apolitical.
  We are the legislative branch, the executive branch. Both of these 
branches are inherently political. It is the third branch, our courts, 
that we count on to be apolitical. I think it would be a giant leap 
further down a path that we should not be following in the first place. 
So we have to figure out how we deescalate.
  So let me very simply explain this afternoon how I plan to vote over 
the next two days, starting with procedural motions, which I opposed 
yesterday, and I will oppose again tomorrow.
  In 2016, after the unfortunate death of Justice Scalia, I said that 
the Senate should not take up a nominee to fill that seat due to the 
impending Presidential election. I reiterated that statement in August 
of this year. And then, coincidentally enough, just hours before the 
news of Justice Ginsburg's passing that saddened the country--I didn't 
know that she had passed when I reaffirmed my comments from earlier, 
but that knowledge would not have changed my mind. I remain in the same 
place today. I do not believe that moving forward on a nominee just 
over a week removed from a pitched Presidential election, when partisan 
tensions are running about as high as they could--I don't think that 
this will help our country become a better version of itself.
  But, frankly, I have lost that procedural fight. We saw that with the 
vote yesterday. So what I can do now is be consistent with the 
precedent that I have set for myself and oppose a process that I said 
should not move forward, and I have done that.
  But at the end of the process is the substantive question of whether 
Judge Barrett should be categorically rejected as an Associate Justice 
in order to underscore my procedural objection. I believe that the only 
way to put us back on the path of appropriate consideration of judicial 
nominees is to evaluate Judge Barrett as we would want to be judged--on 
the merits of her qualifications. And we do that when that final 
question comes before us, and when it does, I will be a ``yes.'
  I have no doubt about her intellect. I have no doubt about Judge 
Barrett's judicial temperament. I have no doubt about her capability to 
do the job and to do it well.
  By now, most people are very familiar with her qualifications. They 
have seen her resume and bio. She has been all over the news, but her 
background is significant. She graduated with honors from Rhodes 
College and with honors from Notre Dame Law School, clerked on the DC 
Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court, and was an excellent professor 
for 15 years at Notre Dame Law School prior to being confirmed on the 
bench on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. I helped to confirm her 
to that seat on the Seventh Circuit.
  I have followed on from that time when I first came to know of Judge 
Amy Coney Barrett. I have done my due diligence in my role of advice 
and consent. I have worked through the articles that she has written 
and the cases that she has written. I have engaged in a lengthy one-on-
one with her. I watched both full days when she appeared before the 
Judiciary Committee. She presented herself admirably under a difficult 
situation. We all know around here that confirmation processes are not 
pretty.
  I have expressed my concerns previously that good people will decide 
that the confirmation process that we have now is sometimes an awful 
process, that I worry that they are going to think that it is just not 
worth it, not worth what it puts them and their families through, and 
they opt out. They opt to avoid government service.
  And, on this note, I will say that while some of the rhetoric from my 
colleagues has been overblown and unnecessary, this process with Judge 
Barrett is not nearly what it was in 2018 during the confirmation of 
Justice Kavanaugh. So, ultimately, I am glad and I am thankful that 
Judge Barrett did not opt out.
  I have concluded that she is the sort of person that we want on the 
Supreme Court. Her legal writing is excellent and will be an asset to 
her as well as future generations of lawyers as they read through her 
opinions. Her intellectual curiosity, which is demonstrated by the 
depth and breadth of her academic work as a professor, will also serve 
the country well. Her temperament and her very patient nature were on 
full display over the course of the hearing.
  I had a good and, I think, a very substantive discussion with Judge 
Barrett about some Alaska-related matters, focusing on Alaska-specific 
statutes, like ANILCA. I raised some of the public safety challenges 
that we face in my home State that served to undermine the principle of 
equal justice under the law.
  I raised the issue of voting rights and access to the ballot. It was 
important for me to hear and to better understand her views on 
precedent and her evaluation process, specifically the weight that she 
affords reliance on decisions that have been in place for decades, such 
as Roe v. Wade. We discussed the doctrine of severability in regards to 
the Affordable Care Act case. We spoke at length about my concern that 
the Supreme Court is increasingly viewed as political by the public and 
what that then does to erode public confidence in the impartiality of 
our courts. We talked about the criteria and the evaluation that that 
Justice would undergo for purposes of recusal from a matter.
  I do not believe Judge Barrett will take her seat on the Bench with a 
predetermined agenda or with the goal of putting a torch to every 
volume of the ``United States Reports.''
  Justices should come to the Court with an open mind, willing to be 
convinced by the arguments presented in each case, to exchange thoughts 
with their colleagues, to learn new things, and rule as the law 
requires. I am convinced that Judge Barrett will do just that.
  So while I oppose the process that has led us to this point, I do not 
hold it against her as an individual who has navigated the gauntlet 
with grace, skill, and humility. I will vote no on the procedural votes 
ahead of us but yes to confirm Judge Barrett when the question before 
us is her qualification to be an Associate Justice on the Supreme 
Court.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Mr. CASSIDY. Mr. President, I rise today to offer my support for 
confirming Louisiana native Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court of 
the United States.
  Deciding whether to confirm a Justice to the highest Court in the 
land is among the most important duties and privileges that a Senator 
has. We must consider the qualifications of the nominee the President 
puts forward and determine a nominee's fitness to serve.
  In this case, President Donald Trump made a terrific selection in Amy 
Coney Barrett. The Senate will vote on her confirmation in the coming 
days, and I will proudly cast my vote to confirm. Here is why:
  Judge Barrett is incredibly qualified to serve on the Court. She 
graduated summa cum laude from Notre Dame Law School, clerked for the 
late-Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, and spent 15 years in 
academia shaping a new generation of legal minds.
  According to her students, she was not an ideologue but, rather, she 
would listen and take their thoughts and process them and bring them to 
a better knowledge of the law. With that,

[[Page S6439]]

she has been universally praised by her former students and ultimately 
served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
  Her record and experience show that she is ready for the Supreme 
Court.
  There is some home-State pride. Judge Barrett was raised in Metairie, 
LA, and is a graduate of St. Mary's Dominican High School. When I go 
back there, I will see folks with the pen she would have received when 
she graduated, and they are very proud to have attended the same school 
and perhaps to have been in the same class.
  As a fellow Louisianan, I am proud that one of our own will become a 
Supreme Court Justice. She will be only the second person from 
Louisiana to serve on the Court, which, for my State, makes the 
confirmation historic. But it is more than Louisiana rooting for Amy 
Coney Barrett; she will serve our country well.
  I will also say that I think it fitting that a woman fill the seat 
that opened after Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's passing. Although she 
and I had our differences in political and judicial philosophy, she 
should be recognized for her service and lifelong pursuit of ensuring 
that women have a seat at the table. We thank the legacy of Justice 
Ginsburg and her service to the United States.
  One of the many things that are notable for Justice Ginsburg that I 
will emphasize is that she broadened the perspective of SCOTUS--the 
Supreme Court of the United States--as they treated the law. I think 
Judge Barrett does the same. She will be the first mother of school-age 
children to serve on the Court. She and her husband Jesse are raising 
seven children, two of whom were adopted from Haiti and the youngest of 
whom has Down syndrome. If there is a mom--whether a working mom or 
not--who wonders if her perspective is ever spoken to when cases are 
considered before the Supreme Court, Justice Barrett will bring that 
perspective to the Court.
  Finally, I want to thank Judge Barrett for her willingness to serve. 
To accept a nomination to the Supreme Court is, sadly, to accept 
ruthless attacks from partisans seeking to score political points. Her 
nomination was no different.
  She has been repeatedly attacked for being a practicing Catholic. She 
has every right to live her faith. No one in public service should be 
expected to cast aside deeply held religious convictions to satisfy an 
angry mob fabricating reasons to say no.
  Thank you, Judge Barrett, for defending your--and by extension all of 
our--religious liberty.
  I think the balance and the grace she exhibited during a very 
difficult 2 days of being before the committee but in her life in 
general is testimony to the depth by which she considers the best of 
her faith.
  That said, her political enemies and some in the press intentionally 
mischaracterized many of her statements, twisting them into new ways to 
attack her, again fabricating reasons to say no. Yet Judge Barrett 
handled each attack with grace and dignity.
  During her hearing, she displayed time and again that she has the 
skills, the demeanor, and the experience to serve on the Supreme Court.
  On Monday, I will proudly cast my vote to confirm Amy Coney Barrett 
to the Supreme Court. She will serve our country well, and she will 
serve the future generations that will be influenced by her decisions 
on the Supreme Court well. I encourage my colleagues to put politics 
aside and to do the same.
  Thank you
  I yield back. The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Murkowski). The Senator from 
Connecticut.