Executive Session

Floor Speech

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Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I come to the floor this evening to share my thoughts on what has been an extraordinarily long, difficult, and truly painful process.

As we took up the cloture motion on the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court, the process that led us to this vote today has been, in my view, a horrible process, a gut-wrenching process, where good people--good people--have been needlessly hurt, where a woman who never sought the public spotlight was, I think, cruelly thrust into the brightest of spotlights; a good man--a good man--with sterling academic credentials, an unblemished professional record, both as the professional lawyer and judge that he was and also as a husband and father of two young girls, has been damaged--damaged terribly.

As both of these individuals, Dr. Ford and Judge Kavanaugh, have been harmed, their families have, too, and we need to, we must, do better by them. We must do better as a legislative branch. We have an obligation, a moral obligation, to do better than this.

I have spent more time evaluating and considering the nomination of Judge Kavanaugh than I have any of the previous nominations to the U.S. Supreme Court that I have been privileged to review. I have had the opportunity to vote on five Justices prior to this, and I took my time. I was deliberate; I was thoughtful. Some accused me of being too deliberate, too thoughtful, taking too much time, but this is important to me. It should be important to all of us, and I know it is important to all of us.

I studied the record. I sat with Judge Kavanaugh for a lengthy period of time--about an hour and a half--and asked the questions that I had, and then I did more due diligence, reviewed the cases, and did my homework, listened to the concerns that were raised by many in my State on issues that were all over the board, whether it was a woman's right to choose, whether it was the Affordable Care Act, whether it was Executive authority, deference to the agencies, Native issues. I took considerable time.

When the hearings came, not being on the Judiciary Committee, I paid attention. I followed the testimony of the judge, the very critical questioning from many of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, and then at the end of the process--or, seemingly, what we believed to be the end of the process--there were more questions. I went back to Judge Kavanaugh and had a good conversation with him.

Then the allegations that we have been discussing and trying to understand more about came forward, and we all moved from focusing on the issues to truly a discussion that none of us ever thought we would be having when it came to a confirmation process for someone to the highest Court in the land.

There was more work to be done. I was one who wanted to make sure there was a process going forward, and when there were more questions that were raised after the initial process, I was one who joined in asking that the FBI step in and do further review.

I have been engaged in this lengthy and deliberative process for months now, and I was truly leaning toward supporting Judge Kavanaugh in his nomination as I looked to that record. But we know that in our role of advice and consent, it is not just the record itself. There is more that is attached to it. It is why, when in the State of Alaska, nominations for judges go forward, you rate them not only on their professional competence--what they have demonstrated through their record--but also on matters of temperament and demeanor, which are very, very important.

So we moved--we shifted--that conversation from so many of the issues that I had been focused on to other areas that are also important in evaluating a nominee for the courts. But I listened very carefully to the remarks, the strong, well-articulated remarks, of my colleague and my friend who sits next to me here, Senator Collins, and I found that I agreed with many of the points that she raised on the floor earlier.

I do not think that Judge Kavanaugh will be a vote to overturn Roe v. Wade, and I also join with her in saying that I do not think that protections for those with preexisting conditions will be at risk.

I also do not think that he will be a threat to Alaska Natives. This was an issue that certainly had been raised, but I had an extended conversation with the judge on just these issues, and I believe that he recognizes, as he told me, that Alaska Natives are not in a place identical to Native Hawaiians. Alaskan Tribes are included on the list of federally recognized tribes, and the fact remains that Native Hawaiians are not. This is a distinction; this is a difference.

I am one in this body who has said that I would like to see Native Hawaiians there, and I worked with my friend Senator Akaka when he was in this body to help advance that; I supported that. But the fact remains that the constitutional status of Alaska Natives and the Indian Commerce Clause are simply not at play with this nomination. I don't believe that. So the question is fairly asked: Do you think he is going to be there on issues that matter to Alaskans, that you have taken strong positions on?

The reason I could not support Judge Kavanaugh in this cloture motion this afternoon is that in my role, in my responsibility as one Senator on this floor, I take this obligation that we have in the role of advice and consent as seriously as anything that I am obligated or privileged to be able to vote on. I have a very high standard. I have a very high bar for any nominee to the Supreme Court of the United States.

The Code of Judicial Conduct rule 1.2--this is one that many, many people in this body know--states that a ``judge shall act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence and the independence, integrity, and impartiality of the judiciary and shall avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety.''

I go back, and I look to that. It is pretty high; it is really high: A judge shall act at all times--not just sometimes, when you are wearing your robe, but a judge should act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence--public confidence. Where is the public confidence?

So it is high, and even in the face of the worst thing that could happen, a sexual assault allegation, even in the face of an overly and overtly--overtly--political process, politicized process, and even when one side of this Chamber is absolutely dead set on defeating his nomination from the very get-go, before he was even named, even in these situations, the standard is that a judge must act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the independence, integrity, and impartiality of the judiciary and avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety.

After the hearing that we all watched last week, last Thursday, it became clear to me--or was becoming clearer--that the appearance of impropriety has become unavoidable.

I have been deliberating, agonizing, about what is fair. Is this too unfair a burden to place on somebody who is dealing with the worst, the most horrific, allegations that go to your integrity, that go to everything you are?

I think we all struggle with how we would respond, but I am reminded that there are only nine seats on the Bench of the highest Court in the land, and these seats are occupied by these men and women for their lifetime. So those who seek one of these seats must meet the highest standards in all respects at all times, and that is hard.

We are in a time when many in this country have lost faith in the Executive branch, and it is not just with this administration. We saw much of that in the last as well.

Here in Congress, many around the country have just given up on us. They have completely said: We have had enough. But I maintain that the public still views--I still view--that there is some small shred of hope that remains with our judiciary, this judiciary that must be perceived as independent, as nonpartisan, as fair and balanced in order for our form of government to function.

It is that hope--it is that hope--that I seek to maintain, and I think that is why I have demanded such a high standard to maintain or regain that public confidence because it is so critical that we have that public confidence in at least one of our three branches of government.

I think we saw from the vote earlier today and we have seen from the statements of several of our colleagues that it does appear that Judge Kavanaugh will be seated on the Supreme Court without my vote. It is my hope--it is truly my hope--that Judge Kavanaugh will share that same hope of rebuilding, maintaining a level of public confidence, that he will strive for that ideal every day. It is my hope that he will be that neutral arbiter, the umpire who calls only the balls and the strikes, and that he will be that force for stability.

I believe that Judge Kavanaugh is a good man. He is a good man. He is clearly a learned judge, but in my conscience--because how I have to vote at the end of the day with my conscience--I could not conclude that he is the right person for the Court at this time.

This decision has been agonizing for me. It is as hard a choice, probably as close a call as any that I can ever remember, and I hope--I hope and I pray--that we don't find ourselves in this situation again.

But I am worried. I am really worried that this will become the new normal, where we find new and even more creative ways to tear one another down, and good people are just going to say: Forget it. It is not worth it.

I am looking at some of the comments and the statements that are being made against me and against my good friend, my dear friend from Maine--the hateful, aggressive, truly, truly awful manner in which so many are acting now. This is not who we are. This is not who we should be. This is not who we raised our children to be.

So as we move forward, again, through a very difficult time for this body and for this country, I want to urge us to a place where we are able to engage in that civil discourse that the Senate is supposed to be all about--that we show respect for one another's views and differences and that when a hard vote is taken, there is a level of respect for the decision that each of us makes.

There is something else that I do hope. Again, I refer to my friend from Maine. I will note that if there has been a silver lining in these bitter weeks--which, quite honestly, remains to be seen--I do think what we have seen is a recognition by both sides that we must do more to protect and prevent sexual assault and help the victims of these assaults.

There has been a national discussion. There has been an outpouring of discussions, conversations, fears, tears, frustration, and rage. There is an emotion that really has been unleashed in these recent weeks, and these are discussions that we need to have as a country.

We need to bring these survivors to a place where they feel they can heal, but until they come out of the shadows and do so without shame, it is pretty hard to heal.

I have met with so many survivors, and I know that every single one of us has. I have heard from colleagues as they shared with me that they have been truly surprised--many stunned--by what they are learning is the prevalence of this, unfortunately, in our society today.

In Alaska and, as the Presiding Officer knows, in his State, the levels of sexual assault we see within our Native American and Alaskan Native communities are incredibly devastating. It is not something that we can say we will get to tomorrow. We heard those voices, and I hope that we have all learned something. We owe it to the victims of sexual assault to do more and to do better and to do it now, with them.

I am going to close. I truly hope that we can be at a place where we can move forward in a manner that shows greater respect, greater comity. We owe it to the people of America to return to a less rancorous confirmation process.

In the spirit of that comity--and again, while I voted no on cloture today and I will be a no tomorrow--I will in the final tally be asked to be recorded as present, and I do this because a friend, a colleague of ours, is in Montana this evening, and tomorrow, at just about the same hour that we are going to be voting, he is going to be walking his daughter down the aisle, and he will not be present to vote. So I have extended this as a courtesy to my friend. It will not change the outcome of the vote, but I do hope that it reminds us that we can take very small steps to be gracious with one another and maybe those small gracious steps can lead to more.

I know that as hard as these matters are that we deal with, we are human and we have families that we love. We don't spend nearly enough time with them. I am sure we can do one small thing to make that family a little bit better. That is a better way for tomorrow.

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