[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 3 (Wednesday, January 5, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Pages S38-S40]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                   Unanimous Consent Request--S. 2895

  Mr. SCOTT of Florida. Madam President, last month I was proud to see 
the Senate come together in a bipartisan effort and pass a 
Congressional Review Act measure to overturn President Biden's 
unconstitutional Federal vaccine mandate on private businesses. In that 
bipartisan vote, a majority of U.S. Senators sent a clear message that 
these job-killing mandates are wrong and have no place in our country's 
fight against COVID-19.
  Then, just days after Christmas, President Biden said something very 
interesting. While he was talking with Governors about the COVID-19 
pandemic, he admitted:

       Look, there is no Federal solution. This gets solved at a 
     State level.

  This is President Biden's message: States should be leading the 
effort. Now, that doesn't mean there isn't a role for the Federal 
Government. But what we have seen from the Biden administration is no 
progress, just worsening cases, and the horrible job-killing 
consequences of his unconstitutional mandates on private businesses.
  I want to be clear: His unconstitutional mandates are job killers. 
Back in October, the Federal Reserve reported that vaccine mandates 
were widely cited by businesses as a reason for low labor supply and 
hiring and retention issues. It was a finding my Republican colleagues 
and I have been warning about for months before their report, and it is 
directly tied to inflation.
  When the labor supply is reduced, prices go up, and families, 
especially those on low and fixed incomes, suffer. Restaurants, grocery 
stores, gas stations, and small businesses all have to charge more.
  I heard about a restaurant owner in St. Petersburg, FL, who had to 
take certain items off the menu because they simply cost too much, and 
he can't pass the cost on to his customers. He has even seen the price 
of oil and to-go boxes more than double.
  I talked to an operator of a food bank in Osceola County, FL. She 
used to see 15 families each day, and now she is seeing upward of 70 
families. Food prices have gone through the roof. It is more expensive 
for her to get food to give to people hurting at the very time demand 
is up. This is the reality for families and small businesses all across 
America, and vaccine mandates do nothing but make these problems even 
worse.
  I can't imagine why, just when our country is working to get back on 
its feet, the President of the United States would be pushing policies 
that kill jobs, but that is exactly what he is doing. Now lockdown-
loving Dr. Fauci and President Biden want to double down on their 
insane mandates and are considering forcing every American who wants to 
fly to show proof of vaccine before boarding an airplane. This is just 
another Orwellian response from the Biden administration and radical 
Democrats that does nothing to protect the American people.
  Providing information about the virus, providing tests, supporting 
vaccine and therapy developments, and getting the economy back on track 
should be the only role of the Federal Government in this pandemic.
  Congress has to take a stand and protect the American people from 
these

[[Page S39]]

communist China-style policies that are meant to divide us. That is why 
a few months ago, I introduced the Prevent Unconstitutional Vaccine 
Mandates for Interstate Commerce Act. The bill would prevent Federal 
Agencies, like the Department of Transportation and Department of 
Commerce, from requiring proof of vaccination for companies trying to 
do business across State lines.
  Importantly, it would block the Federal Government from making 
airline passengers show proof of vaccine before catching a flight, 
which is exactly what Dr. Fauci wants to do.
  This bill also protects truckers and will ensure that the Biden 
administration can't ruin our supply chains even more. Our truckers are 
the key to fixing Biden's supply chain crisis, and we should do 
everything we can to protect them.
  President Biden has continually showed us his track record of failed 
policies and a mandate for domestic airline passengers would only add 
to his growing failures and blame shifting. We saw it in his failed and 
deadly withdrawal from Afghanistan. We have seen his administration's 
complete failure to handle the crisis across the southern border. We 
see it every day in President Biden's inability to fight inflation by 
stopping reckless spending. We continue to see his failure and complete 
void of leadership in how this administration is fighting COVID-19.
  Now, I am sure my Democrat colleagues will say that this legislation 
isn't needed because at this exact moment, there is not a vaccine 
mandate to fly on a plane, but they said the same thing last year when 
we tried to preemptively block vaccine mandates for private businesses. 
They claimed the President has committed not to do that. We know the 
President broke that promise.
  The American people deserve better than politicians who continue to 
mislead them on the Federal Government's failures to fight COVID 
properly. The back-and-forth has to end.
  We must end these ridiculous, unconstitutional vaccine mandates and 
focus on getting our economy back on track. That is why, as I mentioned 
earlier, the U.S. Senate passed a Congressional Review Act measure to 
invalidate President Biden's vaccine mandate on a bipartisan basis. The 
Senate, along with the majority of Americans, doesn't believe that the 
Federal Government should force people to choose between taking the 
vaccine and losing their job. That is why I am again demanding that the 
Federal Government stop trying to force the American people to follow 
draconian, job-killing mandates that hurt families.
  This is the second time I have come to the floor to try to pass this 
bill and protect the rights of American families and businesses. I 
would like to thank Senators Cynthia Lummis, Ron Johnson, Mike Lee, and 
Roger Marshall for joining me in introducing this important and 
urgently needed legislation. This is a commonsense bill, and I hope all 
my colleagues will support it.
  As if in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the 
Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation be discharged from 
further consideration of S. 2895 and the Senate proceed to its 
immediate consideration.
  I further ask that the bill be considered read a third time and 
passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid 
upon the table.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The junior Senator from Washington.
  Ms. CANTWELL. Reserving the right to object, my colleague is right--
he has been to the floor to talk about this issue, and I don't think, 
though, that he has all the facts right.
  We just had a major transportation hearing in the Commerce Committee 
before we left for the holiday recess, and we heard from airline 
executives--some who had implemented their own vaccines, some who had 
implemented other mandates and systems on their own, and others who 
basically responded to the Federal Government's desire to say that 
passengers would be required to wear masks. All of them said that this 
was a big success. All of them said that this, along with the Federal 
dollars that went into preserving the airlines, allowed us and our 
economy to recover better than other nations had; basically that when 
the upswing in transportation got to the point where people felt it was 
safe to travel, that those mechanisms themselves helped us have an 
airline sector and industry that could respond so that we literally, by 
Thanksgiving, were up to 85, 90 percent of where we had been the 
previous year.
  So my colleague, I think, would like us to predetermine today exactly 
everything we are going to do on this issue; that we would prohibit the 
President, the Department of Transportation, Amtrak, and the 
Transportation Security Administration from making these decisions in 
the future.
  Now, I can just tell you, I get up every day and I read the press. I 
also went to the gym today, and the first thing they said is, Where is 
your vaccination card or we are not letting you in? So there is the 
fact that businesses--the airlines and small businesses--are using this 
as a tool. Even though DC has the highest explosion of COVID cases in 
the Nation as a percentage right now--I understand that in the 
neighborhood I live in, there was a pretty hearty New Year's Eve, but 
everybody had to show a vaccination card to get into those businesses. 
Those businesses decided they were going to stay open. Those consumers 
decided they were going to participate--not the choice I would have 
made, but they decided to do that, and they showed their vaccination 
card.
  So these businesses, the ones that the Federal Government is involved 
in--Amtrak and our transportation system--they also might have further 
issues in the future that they want to look at, so why pass a bill 
today that restricts them from showing proof of COVID vaccine in order 
to travel?
  The proposals that were made at the time--we didn't really know 2 
years ago now what was going to happen. But I can say--and that is why 
we had our most recent hearings--that we were right that the 
transportation sector was going to be critical to helping us fight the 
pandemic, that it was going to be critical for us to respond in our 
economy, and that it was going to be critical to providing essential 
services to some areas of the United States. The things we did allowed 
that air service to respond, and those business leaders showed up. In 
fact, one of them made a little mistake and said: Oh, you know, I think 
HEPA filters have really, really good responses, and maybe we don't 
need anything.
  Well, he corrected that the next day. He corrected it the next day. 
He said: Oh, yeah, yeah, by the way, I believed in the mask mandate and 
still do.
  An airline executive was questioned by some of my colleagues, who 
said: Why did you implement your own vaccine mandate of your employees?
  He said: Because I wanted to have a workforce, and this is the best 
way I could get this workforce.
  So this isn't a clear-cut issue, but I know, right now, why should we 
prohibit Amtrak or anybody from a decision that some of these small 
businesses are making right in this neighborhood, here in DC or 
probably Baltimore? My colleague has just joined us on the Senate 
floor. These people are making these decisions, and all we are saying 
is that the Federal Government, instead of passing Senator Scott's 
bill, should also have that decision in the future in their toolbox if 
they so choose. Why? Because the movement of commerce and 
transportation is so important to our infrastructure. It is so 
important to us as a nation to keep it going. I don't want to preclude 
any of the tools in the toolbox at this moment.
  So therefore, Mr. President, I object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Hickenlooper). The objection is heard.
  The Senator from Florida.
  Mr. SCOTT of Florida. First off, I want to make sure my colleague 
understands what this bill would do. This bill would prevent Federal 
Agencies, like the Department of Transportation and the Department of 
Commerce, from requiring proof of vaccination for companies trying to 
do business across State lines.
  So what this bill does is say that the Federal Government is not 
going to mandate this. If a private business wants to say that you have 
to have a vaccine to come in, that is a decision that private business 
gets to make. But government shouldn't be in the position to tell a new 
business that they have to require a vaccine. I mean, that is not what 
you do.

[[Page S40]]

  What this does do is it is killing jobs. It is killing people and 
killing the jobs of people who worked their tail off in the prior 12 
months.
  Now, I don't know why this is controversial. The Senate, on a 
bipartisan basis, just passed a Congressional Review Act measure 
striking down President Biden's vaccine mandate. On a bipartisan basis 
we already decided we don't believe in what the President is doing.
  We have got families and businesses all across this country that are 
struggling to keep up with the cost of inflation, and the government 
should be doing everything it can to reduce inflation and get the 
economy going.
  Look, I know what it is like to go hungry because groceries cost too 
much. I watched my mom and my dad struggle for years. When prices rose, 
my mom took in odd jobs. When she struggled, we didn't have as much 
food on the table.
  It is the responsibility of the Federal Government to improve the 
economy and help families get ahead. We know the vaccine mandates are 
absolutely causing prices to rise. When prices rise, people are getting 
hurt, and they are making interstate commerce much more difficult.
  So instead of taking action to help families and curb inflation, the 
Biden Administration is taking every possible step to make it harder 
for them to put food on the table and afford to live in this country.
  The President has already said that this must be handled at the State 
level. I agree. And the Federal Government can take a step in this 
direction by ensuring vaccine passports won't be required for 
interstate commerce.
  They shouldn't be required to get on a plane. They shouldn't be 
required to carry goods across State lines.
  Even our Nation's healthcare providers know that mandates don't work. 
They stopped doing it in most cases. Just last month we saw hospitals 
across this country delay or suspend their vaccine mandates because 
they knew it was killing jobs.
  We know that Biden's unconstitutional mandates are going to make it 
more difficult to retain staff and deliver quality care to their 
patients. I don't understand why my colleague wants to give the 
government more power, more power, more power--upholding regulations 
that are causing prices to rise and forcing people to choose between 
keeping their jobs and getting a vaccine.
  We ought to give people the freedom to live their lives, to do 
exactly what my colleague just said: If a business wants to require a 
vaccine, they should require that. But if they don't, the government 
shouldn't be doing that. Our government should be giving people 
information, and let them make the decisions they want to make.
  I trust American families. I trust American businesses. They are 
smart enough to make informed decisions about their health. But my 
colleague's objection is bad for American families and bad for business 
owners, and I hope she will reconsider her objection.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland.