[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 175 (Tuesday, October 5, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6916-S6921]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
STATEMENTS ON INTRODUCED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS
By Mr. LEAHY (for himself, Mr. Schumer, Mr. Durbin, Mr.
Blumenthal, Mr. Warnock, Mr. Ossoff, Ms. Baldwin, Mr. Bennet,
Mr. Booker, Mr. Brown, Ms. Cantwell, Mr. Cardin, Mr. Carper,
Mr. Casey, Mr. Coons, Ms. Cortez Masto, Ms. Duckworth, Mrs.
Feinstein, Mrs. Gillibrand, Ms. Hassan, Mr. Heinrich, Mr.
Hickenlooper, Ms. Hirono, Mr. Kaine, Mr. Kelly, Mr. King, Ms.
Klobuchar, Mr. Lujan, Mr. Markey, Mr. Menendez, Mr. Merkley,
Mr. Murphy, Mrs. Murray, Mr. Padilla, Mr. Peters, Mr. Reed, Ms.
Rosen, Mr. Sanders, Mr. Schatz, Mrs. Shaheen, Ms. Sinema, Ms.
Smith, Ms. Stabenow, Mr. Tester, Mr. Van Hollen, Mr. Warner,
Ms. Warren, Mr. Whitehouse, and Mr. Wyden):
S. 4. A bill to amend the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to revise the
criteria for determining which States and political subdivisions are
subject to section 4 of the Act, and for other purposes; read the first
time.
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, it is really with hope, pride, and optimism
that I rise today to honor the legacy of an icon of the civil rights
movement, a hero of democracy, and a dear personal friend of mine: John
Lewis.
More than anything, John Lewis was a man of action. Where he saw
suffering, he tried to end it. Where he saw injustice, he tried to
correct it. Where ``good trouble'' was needed, he showed up for it.
The most fitting way to honor the legacy of John Lewis is to take
action ourselves--the action that he would have. So it is with pride
today that I introduce the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act of
2021. It is a vital piece of legislation to restore the landmark Voting
Rights Act.
Now, this legislation is the culmination of many months of tireless
work across the Halls of Congress, back and forth between the House and
the Senate. But that is exactly what Congressman Lewis would have
wanted to see. That work began by building the record and telling the
story of the current conditions for voters across the country.
But what did that record show?
A shocking picture.
Empowered by the Supreme Court's damaging 2013 decision in Shelby
County v. Holder, States across the country have been advancing and
enacting sweeping voter suppression efforts to make it more--not less--
difficult for American citizens to participate in their own democracy.
Can you imagine that--making it harder for Americans to participate
in their own democracy?
And today, tens of thousands of Americans are being disenfranchised
under the guise of State law. And it is no coincidence that certain
communities consistently bear the brunt of these suppression schemes
across the country.
Throughout our history, we have worked to make our democracy ever
more inclusive, not exclusive. With each generation, we have sought to
empower millions more to be equal participants in America's system of
self-government. So make no mistake: This tidal wave of voter
suppression effort seeks to bend the arc of equal justice and equal
rights backward. We should not allow that to stand.
Action in Congress is desperately needed. The House answered the call
from Congressman Lewis and others to protect our precious, almost
sacred right to vote, and they passed a bold version of the John Lewis
Voting Rights Advancement Act earlier this year.
Today, in the Senate, we will be introducing a version of that bill
that should get the votes needed to restore the Voting Rights Act.
This legislation addresses the Court's 2013 and 2021 decision. This
should be advanced here. It should be passed by the House, and it
surely would be signed into law. And there is no reason for delay.
This legislation addresses the Supreme Court's Shelby County decision
by restoring the Justice Department's preclearance powers to prevent
States from enacting discriminatory voting changes. The legislation
limits the harms caused by the Supreme Court's Brnovich decision
earlier this year by enshrining a private right of action and clear
factors with which voters can bring lawsuits against attempts to
disenfranchise them.
Fundamentally, this legislation seeks to ensure that the Justice
Department possesses the tools it needs to protect the right to vote
for all Americans, regardless of party or race or creed or background.
Now, you wouldn't know by listening to the partisan rancor of today's
politics, but this goal--protecting our right to vote--has never been a
partisan issue.
John Lewis once said: ``We all know this is not a Democratic
Republican issue. It is an American one.''
Truer words haven't been spoken.
We should remember that reauthorizing the Voting Rights Act on a
bipartisan basis is the way we have always done it. The core provisions
of the Voting Rights Act have been reauthorized five times. Remember
that, five times. Every time, this has been done with overwhelming
bipartisan support in Congress. It was signed by President Nixon. It
was signed by President Reagan. It was signed by President George W.
Bush. They all signed the Voting Rights Act reauthorizations into law.
They knew the profound importance of the landmark law for our
democracy. In fact, the most recent Voting Rights Act reauthorization
was in 2006.
And do you know what the vote was in the U.S. Senate?
Ninety-eight to zero. And many Senators still serving today, both
Republican and Democrat, voted to support that legislation.
The toxic partisanship of American politics today has obscured what
has, for decades, united us across party lines. This is the belief that
protecting our right to vote--the very right that gives democracy its
name--is bigger than party or politics. It is the belief that a system
of self-government--a government of, by, and for the people--is one
that is worth preserving for generations to come. It is the belief that
government exists to serve the will of the people, not the other way
around.
And that, Mr. President, is what I believe.
And so, today, I hold the memory of John Lewis--of his advocacy, of
his passion, of his zealous belief to our better angels--to urge all
Senators, regardless of party, to join me in restoring and
reauthorizing the Voting Rights Act. The John Lewis Voting Rights
Advancement Act gives us that opportunity. Congressman Lewis, I know,
would have wanted us to come together and find a path forward to
addressing the many threats facing Americans' foundational right to
vote.
I will tell you what he would not have accepted. He would not have
accepted inaction. So let's try to live up to the memory and the
example of John Lewis--a heroic man of action, one of my dearest
friends in my years in the Congress. And I know he is watching over us.
Let's make him proud.
Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, first, let me thank my friend, our
chairman of the Judiciary, Senator Leahy, not only for introducing this
legislation but for his dedication to voting rights over the many
decades that he has served in this body. Few have done more to push
voting rights to make sure people have the right to vote without some
of the barriers that have always been placed in the way by people who
want to discriminate against people--particularly people of color--when
it comes to voting. So I thank him.
Mr. President, the story of American democracy is a messy tale of
starts and stops. For over 240 years, our march to establish the United
States as a full democracy has always seemed to involve two steps
forward, one step back.
Today, I am proud to join my colleagues, Senators Leahy and Durbin,
as they lead this Chamber in another bold step forward by introducing
the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, a long-overdue update to
the Voting Rights Act of 1965. No piece of legislation has done more to
protect the franchise than the Voting Rights
[[Page S6917]]
Act of the sixties. Its critical preclearance provision compelled
jurisdictions with recent histories of discrimination to secure Federal
approval before amending their election laws.
For decades, the Senate reauthorized the VRA's preclearance
provisions with bipartisan votes because both parties understood that
this powerful Federal tool made our democracy stronger. Sadly, in 2013,
a conservative majority on the Supreme Court gutted the VRA's
preclearance and cleared the way for some of the most repressive voter
suppression laws we have seen in generations.
For those Supreme Court Justices who said this is not necessary, I
think they should look at what as happened since preclearance was
eliminated. It is just awful, and it was one of the lowest moments of
the Supreme Court in recent memory: the Shelby decision.
Now, because of that Shelby decision, in 2021, 19 States, just in
this year, 2021, have enacted 33 laws that will limit Americans' access
to the ballot, according to the Brennan Center for Justice at New York
University. What we are seeing across the States today is nothing short
of Jim Crow in the 21st century, aided and abetted and allowed by the
Shelby decision, which so tied the hands of the Justice Department when
discriminatory legislation was being enacted at the State level.
The Senate must fight back. We must restore the preclearance
provisions of the Voting Rights Act and retailor it to meet the
challenges of the 21st century. That is what the John Lewis Voting
Rights Advancement Act will do. As an important complement to the
Freedom to Vote Act, it will reestablish the VRA's preclearance
coverage formula--based on an updated, robust catalog of modern-day
voter suppression laws--while adopting new provisions to address the
next generation of suppressive voting. This new bill also responds to
the Court's troubling ruling in Brnovich earlier this year, which even
further weakened the VRA's protections against State practices that
hinder minorities seeking to vote.
We have to be brutally honest. This country has to look at itself in
the mirror. Racial barriers to the ballot are, regrettably, part of our
past, our present, and now, with some of these decisions, part of our
future. When the Nation was founded, you had to be a White male
Protestant property owner in many of the States to vote. Today, we have
come a long way in our struggle to live up to our country's founding
promise, and this bill takes the next step by restoring the proper role
of the Federal Government to protect Americans' constitutional right to
participate in our democracy.
As Senator Warnock has so eloquently stated, we must put out the fire
that is presently engulfing our democracy, and that is what the Freedom
to Vote Act will do. We must build a state-of-the-art fire department
to prevent future fires. That is what the reforms of the John Lewis
Voting Rights Advancement Act will do.
This is a good bill. This is an urgent bill. As majority leader, it
is my intention to hold a vote on this legislation in the near future.
I am proud to designate this ``S. 4'' to mark its critical restoration
of the section 4 preclearance formula.
We hope that all of our colleagues will join us in good faith in
advancing solutions to ensure all Americans have their voices heard in
their democracy. If some of our colleagues on the other side have
different ideas of how to protect free and fair elections, we urge them
to put them forward. But we will not be deterred just because some of
our colleagues choose to stand silent with their arms crossed, content
to play politics with the health of our Republic. On this issue, the
Senate must act, and we will act.
I want to thank again my colleagues Senators Leahy and Durbin for
their diligence and leadership on this important piece of legislation
and for all they do to make sure this Chamber always works to
strengthen our precious democracy.
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I want to thank the majority leader for
his encouraging and kind words and especially thank my friend and
former chair of the Judiciary Committee, Senator Pat Leahy of Vermont,
for inviting other colleagues to come to the floor to speak in support
of the right to vote.
Time and again in history, we have asked men and women to stand and
risk their lives and, in fact, give their lives for the most
fundamental premise of our democracy: the right to vote. They have
fought. They have bled. They have died for that right.
Now it is under attack again--not from any foreign source. Over the
past few years, our Nation has witnessed the most heavily coordinated
assault on the right to vote in modern memory. Since the start of 2021,
Republican legislators throughout the country have introduced over 425
pieces of legislation with provisions to make it more difficult for
Americans to vote. Thirty-three of these laws were actually enacted in
19 States. Some of these laws have set new limits on voting by mail;
others cut hours for polling locations. Each of these proposals is
designed to achieve the same outcome: create barriers for Americans
when it comes to the ballot box.
One of the strongest champions of democracy in American history was
my old friend and colleague John Lewis of Georgia. Days before his
passing, John wrote: ``Democracy is not a state. It is an act, and each
generation must do its part to help build what we called the Beloved
Community, a nation and world society at peace with itself.''
It is now this generation's turn to act, John, because nothing less
than the survival of America's democracy is at stake.
At a moment when lawmakers across the country are railing around the
Big Lie to strip away our constitutional rights, we in this Senate must
have the courage to step up and protect those rights. If the supporters
of the former President of the United States are going to defame our
democracy, we have to fight to defend it. We can begin by
reinvigorating one of the most important pieces of legislation in
modern American history: the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
I am sure there are folks who are watching this at home, saying: Wait
a minute. How can a piece of legislation signed into law more than 50
years ago be the solution to today's challenge to democracy?
That is because over the past several years, there has been a
sustained effort to chip away at the protections guaranteed to every
American under that Voting Rights Act.
For instance, in 2013, the Supreme Court issued the decision in
Shelby County v. Holder, essentially nullifying a key provision in the
Voting Rights Act, section 5. Prior to the Court's ruling in Shelby,
section 5 required that localities with a track record of
disenfranchising voters of color through tactics as brutal as poll
taxes and literacy tests would have to seek Federal approval for
changes they make in their voting rules. This requirement is known as
preclearance, and it could have prevented many of the restrictive
voting provisions being enacted in States like Georgia and Texas today.
Just this past summer, the Supreme Court weakened another section of
the Voting Rights Act with its decision in Brnovich v. Democratic
National Committee.
With these wrongful rulings, the Supreme Court has fueled State-led
efforts to suppress voters, particularly voters of color. In fact,
Justice Elena Kagan wrote in her dissent to Brnovich that ``in the last
decade, this Court has treated no statute worse'' than the Voting
Rights Act of 1965.
It is time for Congress to uphold our constitutional obligation and
restore the Voting Rights Act to its full potential. That is why we
join together today to introduce a bill that would not only restore the
protections of the Voting Rights Act but strengthen them.
Tomorrow, we will hold a hearing on this critical legislation in the
Senate Judiciary Committee. It is called the John R. Lewis Voting
Rights Advancement Act. By all means, passing this law should be a
bipartisan endeavor. Historically, it always was. It wasn't until very
recently that the Republicans--the party of Abraham Lincoln--decided
that they would no longer join in our effort to reauthorize the Voting
Rights Act. It wasn't that long ago that it was bipartisan and passed
easily. The last time Congress voted to do so, in fact, the Republican
minority leader, Senator McConnell, came to the floor and said: ``This
is a piece of legislation which has worked.''
[[Page S6918]]
Well, let's make sure we keep it working for America. In our Nation,
there is no freedom more fundamental than the right to vote, and the
John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act will help ensure that every
American can exercise that right that he famously called the
``precious, almost sacred'' right.
I want to thank Senator Leahy, Senator Blumenthal, and my colleague
Senator Warnock for joining us on the floor and a number of our
colleagues for the collaboration and hard work on preparing this
legislation for introduction and our House colleagues who passed their
version of the bill earlier this summer.
I particularly want to thank the man for whom this bill is named. I
was honored to count him as a friend--even more when he came in on more
than one occasion at my invitation to campaign in the State of
Illinois. I was honored to join him on a Sunday morning walk, which I
will never forget, over the Edmund Pettus Bridge, John and I talking
about that moment in history. It is something I will treasure for a
lifetime.
We, in his name, need to honor him and to honor the principles that
he gave his life for, making certain that everyone has an opportunity
to help us build a beloved community.
Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am so proud and honored to be with
my colleagues Senator Leahy, Senator Durbin, and Senator Warnock--all
of us who are championing the Senate version of the John R. Lewis
Voting Rights Advancement Act. I think any of us would be honored to be
spearheading a bill named for one of our heroes.
This bill has particular significance to all of us because we lived
through the time--the summer of 1965--when States mercilessly attacked
John Lewis and 600 others as they crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge in
Selma, AL, in peaceful protest to protect their right to vote.
In the wake of that attack, as the Nation came together to grieve,
President Johnson joined with Congress to pursue, as he put it, ``an
end to voting discrimination in America.''
Roughly a week after the attack, President Johnson called for
comprehensive voting rights legislation. Two days later, Congress
announced that it would take up that legislation. So by early August,
just 5 months after ``Bloody Sunday'' in Selma, the Voting Rights Act
was passed by Congress with broad bipartisan support and became, again
in the words of President Johnson, ``one of the most monumental laws in
the entire history of American freedom.''
Today, with the introduction of this legislation, we honor the legacy
of John Lewis. We honor everyone involved in that great movement at the
time that advanced civil rights and liberty, the most fundamental being
the right to vote, and we honor the fight itself to protect the
franchise.
A century after the Civil War ended, our Nation had failed to
eradicate the blight of racial discrimination in voting. The promise of
equality--political equality as well as economic equality--remained
unfulfilled for Black citizens.
The Voting Rights Act did what even the 14th and 15th Amendments
failed to do, proving to be a uniquely powerful tool with the capacity
to meet ever-new forms of discrimination through its preclearance
regime.
Then, in 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Shelby County--well known
to all of us--gutted, absolutely eviscerated the highly effective
preclearance regime, jeopardizing the progress the Voting Rights Act
made over the course of half a century.
As Justice Ginsburg said in her moving and powerful dissent in
Shelby, until Congress enacted the Voting Rights Act's preclearance
requirement, early attempts to cope with the vile infection of racial
discrimination in voting ``resembled battling the Hydra. Whenever one
form of voting discrimination was identified and prohibited, others
sprang up in their place.''
Today's reinvigorated efforts to deprive members of minority groups
from equal access to the ballot box through more subtle, second-
generation barriers prove that a new preclearance regime is needed now
more than ever.
This year alone, we have experienced the most destructive legislative
session for voting rights in generations, with States and localities
enacting a torrent of new voting restrictions, all of it designed to
suppress the vote, to curtail the franchise, to move back the clock on
voting rights.
Between January 1 and July 14 of this year, more than 400 voting
restriction bills have been introduced in 49 States--49 States--and 18
States successfully enacted 30 laws that make it harder for people to
vote.
These laws make mail voting and early voting more difficult. They
manipulate the boundaries of districts to reduce minority
representation, and they have led to the purge of up to 3.1 million
voters from the rolls in areas that were once covered by the Voting
Rights Act preclearance requirement.
In short, this threat is more than just speculative, far from
imaginative or suggestive. The threat is real and urgent. In fact, it
is more than a threat. It is action now moving forward in States.
Today's legislation would confront this resurgence of voting
restrictions very directly. The new John Lewis Voting Rights
Advancement Act includes new formulas to revive preclearance.
By focusing specifically on jurisdictions with a proven history of
discrimination and on preventing specific known discriminatory
practices from taking effect in areas of increasing diversity before
they can do damage, this new preclearance coverage formula responds to
the Supreme Court's concerns and will allow the Voting Rights Act to
keep pace with present conditions and America's rapidly changing
demographics.
The bill also reinvigorates the Department of Justice's ability to
challenge discriminatory laws already in effect, reversing the Supreme
Court's latest attack on Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act in Brnovich
v. Democratic National Committee. That 6-3 partisan decision was a
stunning display of judicial overreach--a highly political, highly
partisan decision that gives new meaning to the phrase ``judicial
activism,'' a case of judicial overreach.
Protecting the right to vote, very simply, should not be a partisan
issue. In fact, voting rights are widely supported throughout American
society--on the left, right, center, private, and in public sectors.
Since the original inception of the Voting Rights Act of 1965,
overwhelming bipartisan majorities of both Houses of Congress
reauthorized the Voting Rights Act five times.
Let me repeat: Both Houses of Congress, bipartisan majority,
overwhelming vote, five times since the original passage of the Voting
Rights Act in 1965.
And for nearly a century after the Civil War and before the Voting
Rights Act, the scourge of racial discrimination in voting challenged
our Nation's core commitment to these ideals of democracy. From that
century of sacrifice and suffering came the Voting Rights Act and its
extraordinary commitment to realizing our Nation's highest ideals; and
for decades, it worked with bipartisan support overwhelmingly.
The Judiciary Committee, under the leadership of Senator Durbin and
Senator Leahy, has documented powerfully the need for this Act.
And my Subcommittee on the Constitution has held one hearing already.
We will have another shortly that will set the record--in fact, provide
the evidentiary support--that the Supreme Court erroneously found
lacking in its Shelby decision.
As a tsunami of voter suppression bills crashes against the shores of
our democracy, my hope is that today we can renew a bipartisan
commitment to protecting voting rights in this country.
I am proud to help lead this effort in the Senate, and I want to
thank my colleagues again for being on the floor today.
Mr. WARNOCK. Mr. President, as a proud son of the great State of
Georgia and a voice for our State here in this Chamber, I am deeply
honored to join my colleagues here today to introduce this important
legislation in honor of one of Georgia's and America's most influential
public servants.
I am grateful for the comments of Senator Blumenthal, and I want to
thank Senator Leahy and all of my colleagues for their leadership in
introducing this bill that carries on the legacy of Congressman Lewis's
pivotal
[[Page S6919]]
work to protect the sacred right to vote.
John Lewis was my parishioner, and as I stand in support of this
legislation named in his honor, I think of the many conversations I had
with him over the years. I think of the Sunday mornings we boarded a
bus, taking souls to the polls because I believe that voting, as he
did, is a sacred undertaking. At root, it is about people's voice. And
in that sense, it is about one's humanity.
I learned so much from Congressman Lewis and the lessons from his
lived experiences working deep in the trenches to defend and advance
voting rights. He laid it all on the line. When President Johnson took
his pen and signed this legislation, making it law in a real sense,
what he etched had already been affirmed in blood--the risk that John
Lewis took, the ultimate sacrifice that others made as they lost their
lives fighting for the vote, the voice, the humanity of every child of
God.
And one of the most important tools that came out of that activism,
that came out of that human sacrifice--one of the most important tools
in this legislation is the process of preclearance. This process
required that jurisdictions with a proven history of voting rights
violations get approval from the Department of Justice or our Federal
courts before making changes to local voting administration.
And, for decades, this was the tool that helped enfranchise countless
voters, ensuring that they would have access to the ballot to exercise
their constitutional right, and it kept some of the worst voter
suppression efforts at bay.
And then, in 2013, the Supreme Court, in Shelby v. Holder, asked the
Congress to update the coverage formula that determines which States
are subject to preclearance. The Supreme Court said that this
preclearance formula had somehow been outdated and Congress ought to
bring it up to date. That is what they asked us to do in 2013.
Since then, Congress has been unwilling to act. Preclearance has been
allowed to atrophy. And we have seen the results not only in Georgia,
but in Texas, in Arizona, in Pennsylvania, all across our country.
Earlier this year in Georgia, State leaders enacted a voter suppression
law that will undoubtedly make it harder for some people to vote. If
the tool of preclearance were in place right now, SB202 in Georgia
likely would not even be on the books.
I think of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in her dissenting opinion.
When that decision came down, she said:
Throwing out preclearance when it has worked and is
continuing to work to stop discriminatory changes is like
throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are
not getting wet.
We threw away our umbrella, and we have found ourselves in the midst
of a torrential rainstorm. Voter suppression laws are mushrooming all
over the country. We are witnessing right now what happens to our
democracy without the protections of preclearance and the other vital
provisions of the Voting Rights Act.
The lack of robust voting rights protections has ramifications for
every American, as we have seen efforts ramp up this year at passing
sweeping, State-level voter suppression laws--not laws that only impact
Black people and people of color, to be sure, but also students,
seniors, whomever certain politicians are afraid of will somehow get in
the way of their craven march to power.
And so this bill, the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, is
about Congress finally doing its job--finally doing what the Supreme
Court asked us to do in 2013. It should have been done a long time ago.
The updated Voting Rights Advancement Act we are introducing today
restores the Voting Rights Act of 1965. It strengthens our democracy by
reestablishing preclearance, and it makes it better by updating it to
also protect against specific practices we know suppress the vote, like
polling place closures and new types of voter roll purges happening not
only in the South, but all over the country.
Our bill also restores Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act to protect
minority communities from discriminatory voting practices after the
Supreme Court diminished Section 2 earlier this year.
Mr. President, just like the Freedom to Vote Act me and many of my
colleagues introduced just a few weeks ago to set national standards
for voting so every eligible voice is heard, the John Lewis Voting
Rights Advancement Act we introduce today is designed to meet future
challenges and address additional antidemocratic efforts aimed at
suppressing the vote all over our country.
Since I was elected on January 5, since that terrible day on January
6, when this very Capitol was assaulted, we have seen more than 400
proposals in 49 States. So the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act
builds for us a fire station to protect against future fires, but the
house of democracy is already on fire. And so we need the John Lewis
Voting Rights Advancement Act, but we also need the Freedom to Vote
Act. We have got to put out the fire. We have got to build a fire
station for future fires.
Mr. President, I know there is a lot on our plate, but we can't waste
any time getting these bills passed. We can walk and chew gum at the
same time.
John Lewis walked across a bridge in order to build a bridge to a new
American future. We already had infrastructure. He understood that the
infrastructure of our democracy was in trouble, and so he walked across
a bridge in order to build a bridge.
So the House has already passed a version of this act. And I know my
friend, Senator Joe Manchin, has been having conversations about the
Freedom to Vote Act with our friends across the aisle. We are happy to
talk to anybody on both sides of the aisle. A similar version of this
legislation has been voted up by this Chamber repeatedly in the past
with strong bipartisan support. Some 16 Republican Senators who were
either here or in the House when it passed in 2006 98-0 are here today,
and I ask them: What is the difference?
Voting rights are not just another issue. Voting rights are a
preservative of all other rights. Voting rights are about the
foundation of our democracy. And I believe that if the world's greatest
deliberative body can't find a way forward to get this done, history
will judge us harshly, and rightly so.
Reinhold Niebuhr said that humankind's capacity for justice makes
democracy possible, but our inclination to injustice makes democracy
necessary. This work, this assignment, which we have right now, is both
possible and necessary. We can do it, and we must do it. It is the most
important thing we can do this Congress, and I hope we will do it now.
Mr. LUJAN. Mr. President, it is an honor to speak in support of the
John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act to protect the voting rights
of all Americans.
Our democracy is at its strongest when every American can participate
and make their voice heard--something that our friend, our colleague, a
mentor to many of us, the late John Lewis--it is what he fought for his
entire life. But in too many communities across America, voter
suppression efforts are making it harder for Americans to vote,
especially Native Americans, who continue to experience geographic,
linguistic, and legal barriers.
That is why I am proud that the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement
Act includes the Native American Voting Rights Act, which I was proud
to introduce in August in the Senate and spent years fighting for in
the House, developing this legislation with voting rights advocates
across America. This much needed legislation would protect the sacred
right to vote and reduce barriers to the ballot box for voters living
on Tribal lands--vital progress to protect the sacred right to vote for
all Americans.
This past year, America has seen unprecedented efforts to restrict
access to the ballot box, to make it harder to vote, and silence our
voices, especially Native voices. It is unacceptable, and it is all the
more reason why the Senate must pass robust voting rights legislation
that empowers Tribes and Native American voters, because our democracy
is strongest when everyone participates.
It is our moral imperative to protect the right to vote, to combat
the discrimination that has long kept Americans from exercising this
right. With millions of Americans calling on this body to deliver on
voting rights legislation, I strongly support the John Lewis Voting
Rights Advancement Act. It is
[[Page S6920]]
the right thing to do. It is the time to get this done.
______
By Mr. CARDIN (for himself, Mr. Durbin, Mrs. Feinstein, Mr.
Kaine, Mr. Merkley, Mr. Markey, Ms. Rosen, Mrs. Murray, Mr.
Peters, Ms. Klobuchar, Mr. Padilla, Mr. Wyden, Mr. Lujan, and
Mr. Sanders):
S. 2937. A bill to authorize humanitarian assistance and civil
society support, promote democracy and human rights, and impose
targeted sanctions with respect to human rights abuses in Burma, and
for other purposes; to the Committee on Foreign Relations.
Mr. CARDIN, Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Burma
Unified through Rigorous Military Accountability Act of 2021, BURMA,
which is cosponsored by Senators Durbin, Markey, Merkley, Feinstein,
Kaine, Rosen, Murray, Peters, Klobuchar, Padilla, Wyden, and Lujan,
We are doing so in tandem with simultaneous introduction of a
companion bill today in the House of Representatives by House Foreign
Affairs Committee Chairman Meeks, along with Representatives Chabot and
McCaul and others. The purpose in short is to provide a legislative
foundation to certain steps the Biden administration has undertaken by
Executive order and to push the executive branch to be even more
forward-leaning in addressing the February 1 coup d'etat and the
ongoing human rights being committed by the Burmese military, the
Tatmadaw. The legislation includes authorization to impose sanctions on
individuals and entities who helped stage the February 1 coup d'etat
and are responsible for the subsequent repression of fundamental
freedoms, human rights abuses, use of indiscriminate violence towards
civilians, and other gross atrocities; authorization to prohibit the
import of precious and semi-precious gemstones from Burma into the
United States; authorization for a new position at the State
Department, a Special Coordinator for Burmese Democracy, to promote an
international effort to impose and enforce multilateral sanctions on
Burma and coordinate U.S. Government interagency efforts on Burma;
authorization for support to civil society and for humanitarian
assistance in Burma, Bangladesh, Thailand, and the surrounding region;
requires the Secretary of State to make a determination whether the
persecution of the Rohingya in Burma constitutes genocide; and a call
for the United States to take more decisive action with regard to Burma
at the United Nations.
Throughout its independence, Burma's history has suffered decades of
repressive military rule and civil war with ethnic minority groups, and
what we are seeing today in Burma is no different.
In 1988, thousands of people took the streets to protest the
government. Under the leadership of then-General Ne Win, who ruled for
26 years following a coup, security forces cracked down on protestors,
killing thousands of citizens. During these uprisings, Aung San Suu Kyi
emerged as a charismatic national icon, preaching democracy and
nonviolence as she highlighted the political situation in Burma.
In 1990, the military junta agreed to hold the first multiparty
elections in 30 years in which Aung San Suu Kyi's party, the National
League for Democracy, won 81 percent of the seats in the government
with over 70 percent voter turnout. However, the ray of hope in Burma
was quickly diminished when the military refused to recognize the
results and hand over power. Aung San Suu Kyi was detained and remained
under house arrest for nearly 15 years--until her release in 2010 as
the country continued to be ruled by the military.
In 2011, President Thein Sein agreed to a series of reforms,
including granting amnesty to political prisoners, relaxing media
censorship, and implementing economic policies to encourage foreign
investment. Aung San Suu Kyi became a member of Parliament when her
party won 43 of the 45 vacant seats in the 2012 by-elections, as
ongoing negotiations between civilians and military officials
continued.
In 2015, Myanmar held its first nationwide, multiparty elections--
considered to be the freest and fairest elections in decades--since the
country's transition away from military rule. Her party boycotted the
2010 elections, resulting in a decisive victory for the military-backed
Union Solidarity and Development Party. In the 2015 elections, Aung San
Suu Kyi's party won a landslide victory, taking 86 percent of the seats
in the Assembly of the Union. Although she was prohibited from becoming
the President due to a clause the military demanded be inserted in the
constitution specifically to keep her from office, she assumed the role
of State Counsellor of Myanmar. Yet, despite the facade of civilian
governance that had been established in Burma, the real political power
continued to rest in the hands of the military.
Three years on, following decades of ongoing persecution, including
confinement to ghettos, stripping away of citizenship rights,
restrictions on healthcare and fertility, military unleashed a
horrifying display of state-sanctioned violence in Rakhine state in
August 2017, which resulted in wide-scale human rights violation,
including tens of thousands of deaths, sexual violence, torture,
unlawful arrest and detention, and widespread destruction of the
Rohingya people's homes and communities. Over 736,000 survivors fled to
refugee camps in Bangladesh, where they remain to this day, in urgent
need of humanitarian aid, increased support--and justice.
Since 2019, I joined my colleagues in the Senate in calling on
directing the State Department to determine whether attacks by the
Burmese military and security forces against the Rohingya constitutes
genocide. The United States has still not issued a determination on
whether the atrocities committed against the Rohingya constitute
genocide, even though human rights investigators funded by the State
Department concluded in 2018 that ``there are reasonable grounds to
believe that genocide was committed.'' U.N. investigators have also
found evidence that infers genocidal intent. This is something my
colleagues and I address in our BURMA bill. The United States should
lead in calling what happened what it is: a genocide.
On February 1, 2021, the Burmese military led a coup against the
democratically elected legislature, just hours before the Parliament
was scheduled to be seated terrifying setback for the emerging
potential for democracy and rule-of-law in Burma.
Since seizing control, the military forces have killed over a
thousand people across the country as they crack down on civilian
protestors who have mobilized to oppose the ongoing assault on the
country's nascent political institutions and traditions. Rather than
follow the outcome of the parliamentary elections held last November,
the Burmese military has detained Aung San Suu Kyi, President Win
Myint, and other civilians, including other government officials. The
military has also cut internet and telephone communication, and it has
stopped flights in the country.
For years, the Burmese military has been responsible for much of the
violence against minority groups in Burma, including the Rohingya. More
than 1 million Rohingya have fled the country and become refugees as a
result of the military's atrocities against them. This coup d'etat
further damages democratic institutions in Burma and makes the entire
region less stable.
As the death toll in Myanmar continues to rise, the United States
must not be indifferent to Burma's fate. The Burmese military has also
been responsible for horrible atrocities committed against minority
groups in Burma, including the Rohingya, which has led more than 1
million to flee the country and become refugees. In recent months, the
Tatmadaw, the country's military, escalated its brutal campaign, using
COVID-19 like a biological weapon to terrorize and control the people
of Burma. The military has arrested government officials, doctors,
nurses, and journalist, including U.S. citizen Danny Fester.
The bill aims to authorize sanctions on individuals and entities who
helped stage the February 1 coup d'etat and are responsible for the
subsequent repression of fundamental freedoms, human rights abuses, use
of indiscriminate violence towards civilians, and other gross
atrocities; authorizes increased humanitarian assistance for Rohingya
refugees and provides support for civil society and independent media;
prohibits the import of
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gemstones from Burma into the United States; calls for the United
States to pressure the United Nations to take more decisive action with
regards to Burma; and requests a genocide determination regarding the
persecution of the Rohingya.
It is important for the international community to continue to
pressure the military junta to restore democracy for the people of
Burma. The behavior of the Tatmadaw has not and will not change--thus
the need for additional & forceful actions by the United States and
international community to bring justice, accountability, and restore
democracy.
I remain committed to continuing to work with the Biden
administration and my colleagues in Congress to ensure that the United
States and international response to the military coup is coordinated
and targeted to have a strong impact on those responsible, while also
encouraging a peaceful transition of power back to the civilian
government. I continue to stand in solidarity with the people of Burma
and condemn the ongoing violence against them.
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