[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 115 (Wednesday, July 13, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Page S3246]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           U.S. SUPREME COURT

  Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, now on an entirely different matter, 
this week, I have been discussing the historic term the Supreme Court 
just concluded--the most consequential and pro-Constitution term since 
Brown overturned Plessy almost 70 years ago.
  Back in 2015, in one fell swoop, the Obama-Biden administration took 
aim at domestic energy production, harmed the separation of powers, and 
attacked the rule of law.
  Remember, after Americans elected Republicans in 2010 to place a 
check on the leftwing agenda, President Obama infamously said he would 
just ignore the will of the people and work around Congress. Here was 
his quote. He said, ``I've got a pen.'' He said, ``I've got a phone.''
  Thus began a whole series of unconstitutional power grabs by the 
executive branch, a sort of crime spree against the Constitution. For 
example, when Democrats could not get harmful and unpopular 
environmental restrictions through Congress because the people's duly 
elected representatives did not support them, the bureaucrats at the 
Obama EPA decided to pretend that some obscure lines in an old law 
actually gave them enormous sweeping regulatory powers to manage our 
economy which nobody had ever noticed before.
  The EPA effectively wrote and passed a giant piece of legislation, 
the so-called Clean Power Plan, as one branch of government acting 
alone. They tried to make law without involving actual lawmakers. The 
Obama EPA just up and decided they could start giving orders and 
issuing edicts and remake our country's electricity grid by brute 
force.
  Of course, the pretext was simply false.
  As Justice Scalia once wrote, ``Congress . . . does not alter the 
fundamental details of a regulatory scheme in vague terms or ancillary 
provisions--it does not, one might say, hide elephants in mouse 
holes.''
  When the legislative branch actually intends to hand over giant 
chunks of our power to unelected bureaucrats, we make it pretty darn 
clear. The Obama-Biden EPA had no lawful authority to grab control of 
electricity generation all across America. And that is exactly what the 
Supreme Court affirmed last month.
  The ruling was a huge win for American ratepayers and anybody who 
wants affordable and reliable energy; but it was also a landmark legal 
victory for our very system of government. The Supreme Court applied 
the plain text of the law and reaffirmed that the unelected 
administrative state is not allowed to reach way beyond the powers that 
Congress has actually given it. With any luck, this will be part of a 
sea change that has been a long time coming.
  Remember a few months ago, a young district judge in Florida applied 
the plain, straightforward text of a statute and overturned the 
administration's illegal and unilateral mask mandate for public 
transportation. That was the Centers for Disease Control stepping way, 
way over its boundaries.
  And this past January, the Supreme Court put the brakes on President 
Biden's blatantly illegal attempt to have the Occupational Safety and 
Health Administration, OSHA, force 84 million American workers to get 
the COVID vaccine whether they wanted it or not.
  As Justice Gorsuch wrote in concurrence back then:

       The central question we face today is: Who decides? The 
     only question is whether an administrative agency in 
     Washington . . . charged with overseeing workplace safety may 
     mandate the vaccination or regular testing of 84 million 
     people . . .

  Justice Gorsuch continued:

       Or whether . . . that work belongs to state and local 
     governments across the country and the people's elected 
     representatives in Congress.

  On issue after issue, our courts are beginning to answer that 
question the way the Constitution commands. ``Who decides?'' is the 
question. The answer: The people decide and the Members of Congress 
they elect.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BROWN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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