[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 3 (Wednesday, January 5, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Pages S45-S47]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                     Recognizing January 6 Workers

  Madam President, I want to start by thanking my colleagues Leader 
Schumer and Senator Klobuchar for their work to honor the police 
officers who risked their lives to protect this country 1 year ago 
tomorrow.
  In the year since that dark day, we have learned more about all that 
those officers endured from the terrorists who stormed the Capitol--the 
racist slurs, the physical abuse, the mental injuries. We know things 
were so much worse than they appeared in the original reporting as more 
and more details have come out. These terrorists gouged someone's eyes 
out. They killed a Capitol Police officer and injured 140 others. They 
threatened to kill the Vice President. They brought a noose to the 
Capitol and paraded symbols of White supremacy. In fact, the people who 
broke into the office upstairs from my office in the Capitol--we have 
this on film--used flagpoles with Confederate flags and Trump flags 
attached to them. They brought equipment to take hostages.
  It wasn't only Capitol Police officers who endured this attack and 
put their lives on the line serving our Republic on January 6. Workers 
throughout the Capitol risked everything that day, workers who do the 
radio and television broadcast and work in the media center, workers 
who work the floor, workers who clean up, and workers who do food 
service. They often don't get noticed, like the Capitol support staff. 
Every day, Capitol janitorial and maintenance and other workers, 
essential workers, do their jobs with skill and dedication and dignity. 
They have shown up for work during this pandemic.
  Those workers were here on January 6 doing their jobs when the 
insurrectionists, when the rioters, when the--call it what you want--
traitors stormed this building, barging into this Chamber, acting as if 
no one would ever hold them responsible or accountable for their 
violence, for their disregard for American values and for U.S. laws.
  When the rampage was over, we know it was the largely Black and Brown 
custodial maintenance workers who were left to restore dignity to the 
Capitol. Their work, first of all, allowed us to come back and continue 
our work at 8 that night certifying the electoral votes and securing 
our democracy. As we know, domestic terrorists destroyed; Black and 
Brown custodians cleaned up; and maintenance workers, carpenters, 
painters, and union members rebuilt. Today, we honor them.
  Some of the most enduring and moving images of that day are the 
pictures of these workers sweeping up the mess that terrorists made in 
the people's houses.
  That night, after we voted--the Senator from Minnesota was there. We 
were all here voting in this Chamber. After the police and the National 
Guard--the DC Police, the Capitol Police, and others--after they 
cleared the terrorists out of this building, we came back at 8 and 
voted. I spent the night in the basement in my office. I live a 20-
minute walk away. I really didn't want to walk home that night. But I 
walked around about midnight, walked around this building, over in the 
House and the Senate. I saw the destruction. I saw the window right 
upstairs from me, the half-moon window that terrorists, with their 
flagpoles with their Confederate flags and their Trump flags attached, 
broke through.
  When I was back there at midnight that night, already the cleanup 
from the custodians had started, cleaning up after they had been 
threatened. After they had been called names as Black women, as 
immigrant women, after they had been called names by the terrorists, 
they were back there cleaning up. Already, a carpenter had cut a half-
moon piece of plywood and nailed it to that window to keep this 
building safe and keep the elements out.
  We honor those people today. It is what service looks like. It is 
what love of country looks like. It is what the dignity of work looks 
like. It tells you a lot about what is wrong with our economy. These 
essential workers--the people who prepare the food, the people who 
clean up, the people who provide security--the essential workers, like 
so many of their fellow service workers around this country, don't make 
a lot of money. They don't get much attention. They don't get much 
reward. They don't have much power. We simply don't value and respect 
all work the way we should.
  I think of the words of Dr. King. One of my favorite Dr. King quotes 
is this:

       If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep 
     streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed 
     music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets 
     so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to 
     say, ``Here lived a great street sweeper who did his job 
     well.''

  Dr. King said:

       No work is insignificant. All labor that uplifts humanity 
     has dignity and importance.

  He later said that no job with adequate compensation is menial.
  Look at the words of Pope Francis a few days ago in his Christmas Eve 
address or think back 100 years, 120 years, to Pope Leo, the labor 
Pope, in Rerum Novarum, where he first introduced--at least in my 
view--first introduced the term, I assume in Latin, ``dignity of 
work.''
  Pope Francis, in his Christmas Eve address just a few days ago, said:

       [God] reminds us of the importance of granting dignity to 
     men and women through [their] labour, [and] also . . . 
     granting dignity to human labour itself.

  Those are Pope Francis's words.
  No work is insignificant. All labor has dignity. We ought to treat it 
that

[[Page S46]]

way, starting with honoring these workers.
  Last year, I joined my colleagues in a resolution to honor all the 
workers who risked their lives that day: custodians, maintenance 
workers, Capitol Police officers, journalists, the floor staff, the 
workers in our offices. All of them served this country. All of them 
risked their safety to preserve our democracy. All of them deserve our 
gratitude.
  Today, though, or tomorrow, actually, but I will ask tonight because 
my colleagues--because of Senator Isakson's funeral, many will be there 
tomorrow. I ask my colleagues to join me and Senators Klobuchar and 
Schumer and Senators Casey and Booker in a resolution honoring 
specifically the Capitol janitorial and maintenance staff--all 
essential workers--for their bravery and service to our country on 
January 6.
  One of my favorite parts of this job--and the Presiding Officer knows 
this because we have had these conversations and because of her 
appreciation for work and for the people who work so hard and get so 
little--one of the joys of this job is to do what Abraham Lincoln used 
to do. When staff wanted him to stay in the White House and win the war 
and free the slaves and preserve the Union, Lincoln said: No, I have to 
go out and get my public opinion bath.
  One of the joys of this job is to talk to the workers here just about 
their lives or about what happened on January 6. One custodial worker 
and I were talking. She has been in this country for 30 years. She has 
been a citizen for 20 years, and she has worked in this job for 30 
years. She has been a citizen for 20 years. She and a number of others 
were locked in a room where terrorists were pounding on the walls and 
were screaming racial epithets and were screaming anti-immigrant 
utterances, all of that. Yet she still works here. She was one of the 
ones who had to clean up after them.
  As I said, the terrorists destroyed; the Black and Brown maintenance 
workers cleaned up; and the union trades people rebuilt.
  This resolution that I am going to offer tomorrow reaffirms the 
Senate's commitment to strengthening their rights as workers and 
providing support and resources to ensure their health, well-being, 
safety, and protection from further attacks. Their support should 
include higher pay. It should include collective bargaining rights for 
all of them. It should include paid sick leave and vacation leave. It 
should include comprehensive health insurance with mental health 
resources.
  Don't think that many of these--you all understand that many of these 
police officers, many of these custodial workers, many of the movers 
and the plumbers and the others who were locked in their rooms or 
offices or buildings during this--I am not a mental health expert at 
all, but many of them, I am sure, suffer from issues of nightmares and 
other kinds of anxieties that we need to help them with.
  I hope my colleagues will join me, not as Republicans or Democrats 
but as Americans, as Members of this body. These workers serve us all. 
They allowed us to do our work for America that night. After we 
essentially were run out of this room and were safe for several hours, 
they allowed us, because of their work, to come back here and be safe 
and do our jobs that we took an oath of office on January 3, 2021, to 
do. This building wouldn't function without them.
  No one should have to endure what they did at the hands of domestic 
terrorists.
  To all of the Capitol custodians and service workers who come to work 
in this building each day to ensure our democracy functions, thank you, 
thank you, thank you.
  I have this resolution honoring the Capitol's essential workers, 
applauding them for their service. I had intended to try to pass this 
resolution by unanimous consent tomorrow, but I recognize that many of 
my colleagues are out of town at the funeral honoring one of the really 
good men who served in this body, Johnny Isakson from Georgia.
  I hope we can take this resolution up and pass this commonsense 
resolution next week when we return.
  Thank you.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I am really pleased and honored to 
follow my colleague from Ohio and to join in supporting the resolution 
that he is offering to pay homage and to express gratitude to the 
essential workers in this building, in the Capitol Complex, in this 
temple of democracy, for all they have done, not only on January 6 but 
in the aftermath of that brutal assault on our democracy.
  We talk in abstract now about the institution and the assault on this 
institution, but the lasting and enduring trauma for those workers that 
we will recognize in this resolution is tremendously important. It is 
important to them, but it is important to us as well that we recognize 
our duty and our obligation to them for the dignity of their work and 
what they did to enable us to come back on that evening, January 6, and 
do our duty--and do it in a bipartisan way, coming together on that 
day.
  We were all witnesses to a brutal crime. We were all witnesses to an 
insurrection and a riot that stands as a dark and terrible milestone--
the anniversary tomorrow of probably the most abhorrent attack on our 
democratic institutions. And all of us who were witnesses can never 
forget the horror of that day--the sheer physicality of the attack, the 
blood in the hallways, the sights and sounds of rioters with bats and 
pipes bearing Trump banners and Confederate flags and seeking to do 
physical harm to us and to kill the Vice President. That kind of 
physical, brutal, cruel attack, with the hope--in fact, intent--of 
killing and injuring, had its effect. In fact, people died.
  Our Capitol Police bravely defended us, with determination and 
courage, and so did many other heroes that day--the National Guard and 
the DC Police. But let us never forget that mob was called here to this 
very Chamber by the former President in a cynical bid to keep himself 
in power through a coup that would subvert the will of the people on 
election day. And we were here--we were all standing and then sitting 
at our desks when we were rushed from the Chamber because of the threat 
of physical assault on us.
  In the end, their efforts were thwarted. Congress certified the 
election result that night as planned. We were undeterred, undaunted by 
the violent and deadly attack on the Capitol and our democracy.
  But that day was not a one-off. It was not an isolated or aberrant 
incident. In fact, it was a symptom and a symbol of a deeper, 
destructive violence of violent extremism--a virus of domestic 
terrorism that continues to infect our Nation; in fact, the most 
persistent and lethal threat to our national internal security.
  According to the intelligence community and the FBI, it is violent 
extremism and White supremacy. That attack left scars and wounds that 
remain unhealed, the lives that were lost, and many of our staff, many 
of those maintenance workers, many of the cafeteria and janitorial 
staff struggle with lingering trauma from the violence that they faced 
on that day.
  The attack reminded us of how fragile and in danger our democratic 
institutions are when our leaders, when we as leaders, fail to protect 
them. The mob that assaulted our Capitol was fueled by the Big Lie--the 
baseless falsehood that massive fraud occurred during the 2020 
election.
  That Big Lie was propagated and supported by the President and his 
enablers, and they have continued to fuel those delusions. Donald Trump 
has incited continually the kind of falsehoods that lead to a sharp 
rise in threats against lawmakers in the Capitol here and a higher 
comfort level with violence at every level--in school boards, in 
statehouses.
  The Big Lie has now become a pretense. It has become a pretense for 
some Republican leaders and State governments across the country to 
pass legislation making it harder to vote--meaning that fewer people 
have fewer times and fewer places to cast their vote.
  At least 19 States have passed 34 new laws that restrict voting 
rights based on that Big Lie--the bogus, false claim of fraud. And 
Republicans in a number of States are vesting the power to overturn 
election results--literally, to deny the results of the vote count 
rather

[[Page S47]]

than respecting the will of the people, whether it is the vote canvass 
boards or legislative committees or other State officials having the 
power to strike down and overturn the results by refusing to certify 
them or literally disregarding them.
  All of this voter suppression is poisonous. It is toxic to our 
democracy. And we have an obligation, on this solemn anniversary of 
that horrific attack, to recommit ourselves to holding accountable 
those domestic terrorists and violent extremists who stormed the 
Capitol and hunted us--lawmakers and others--ransacked the halls that 
we regard with so much reverence, defaced and debased not just the 
building but the concept of democracy. And we should pursue not only 
prosecutions against the 700 or 1,000 people who can be held criminally 
responsible for defacing the Capitol or illegally entering or other 
acts of violence but everyone who aided and abetted them. They must be 
held accountable, no matter what their rank or their office, no matter 
how high the facts and the law will go. I urge the Department of 
Justice to pursue them, to prosecute them, to make sure that they are 
held accountable.
  We also need to fortify those institutions. And that is why passing 
the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement 
Act have to be among our priorities and changing the rules to make that 
possible.
  My colleagues and I will bring to the Senate floor for a vote in the 
coming weeks, no later than January 17, those measures in an effort to 
change the rules to enable their passage. We need to do whatever is 
necessary to pass those measures, including limiting the filibuster.
  There is a direct through line from the Big Lie in the January 6 
assault, incited by Donald Trump, to violent extremism and domestic 
terrorism, to voter suppression and the overturning of elections, 
eventually to the destruction of our democracy. During the peaceful 
transition of power that eventually did take place last January, 
President Biden reminded us that a better world is not something that 
is given to us; it requires hard work. Unity is not inevitable; it is 
achievable through what we do to make it possible. Democracy is not a 
spectator sport.
  The values and norms and institutions of our democracy are fragile, 
as threatened now as they are precious, and they depend on people 
fighting for them in times of adversity. And truly now we are in a time 
of adversity.
  What haunts me, as I think back on January 6, is how close we came to 
losing our democracy, how close we came to shattering the traditions 
and norms--much as the windows of this building were shattered--and how 
a few people continue to believe they could demagogue and enable Trump 
to stage that coup.
  There is no forgetting what some of our colleagues did. There is no 
denying it. But we have sought to work together because we come here 
and we are sent here for a common purpose, which is to meet the needs 
of Americans, especially in a time of pandemic and economic hardship.
  This past year has truly been one of hardship and heartbreak for so 
many. And as we think back to that day, a year ago, we need to redouble 
our determination to hold dear the democratic values and institutions 
that mean elected representatives truly represent the people. That is 
what elections do. That is why every vote should count and every vote 
must count. And that is the purpose of the Freedom to Vote Act and the 
John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.
  We have our part to do. We need to do it. And I hope my colleagues 
will not only relive and remember but act on it--the common purpose of 
that day when we came back to count the vote--to make sure that we can 
come together again not just to honor the people who enable us to do it 
but also to honor the people of America who elect us to do it.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.