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Floor Speech
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Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise today with so many of my colleagues to recognize the anniversary of one of the hardest days our democracy has faced, and I also want to focus on some of the work that we have done to respond and the work we still must do.
Five years ago, insurrectionists--they tried to overturn an election. They assaulted our heroic Capital Police officers and attacked not only this building but American democracy itself.
The President wants to rewrite the story of what happened that day, but he wasn't at that Capitol when the violent mob attacked. I was there.
As the incoming chair of the Rules Committee, it was my job and Roy Blunt's job to make sure all of the electoral ballots were counted. That morning began with pomp and circumstance. Senator Blunt and I and the Vice President led a train of elected officials from the Senate to the House to start the ceremony.
Three pairs of young women held the mahogany boxes with the electoral ballots for the entire country and then came the insurrection. We got back here. I remember speaking--my desk was up there. I remember the police telling me that this was happening, and I had to, in my role, tell the Senators to get away from the windows, and we were brought to an undisclosed location.
Capitol Police officers were attacked, pepper-sprayed, clubbed, and trampled. We were in that room together. I remember praying. I remember incoming President Biden on the TV. I remember the Senators trying to call the National Guard to see if anyone could help.
I remember in there coordinating, talking to Senator Schumer while Senator Blunt talked to Senator McConnell about what we were going to do. And we vowed that morning, whatever happened, we were going to come back, and we were going to finish our job, no matter what time it was.
So Senator Blunt negotiated the negotiations about the number of objections. I worked on keeping everyone in that room and other things, and then, together, we got it done.
And at 3:30 in the morning, the only Senators left were Senator Blunt and myself and Vice President Pence, along with those same six women carrying those mahogany boxes from this Chamber to the other. But this time, it wasn't pageantry. It wasn't a parade. It was just the Vice President, Senator Blunt and myself and those boxes. But this time we were walking over broken glass. We were walking past marble pillars spray-painted with racist vulgarities.
But we made the walk. We got to the House. The House Members were there. Speaker Pelosi, at the time, was there waiting for us, and we did our jobs. That was January 6.
Tragically, five brave officers who reported for duty that day ultimately passed away, and the courage of these officers will be remembered forever.
And rewriting of history cannot stand. As we know today, the White House released a web page that described the day as ``patriots march to the Capitol'' and blamed the Capitol Police, and it doesn't even mention the injuries and the over 100 officers injured.
I remember them in the room protecting the Senators with scratches on their faces.
It was clear that this can never happen again.
Then, as I chaired the Rules Committee, Ranking Member Blunt and I, along with Chair Gary Peters and Ranking Member Portman from the Homeland Security Committee, immediately launched a bipartisan investigation of what the failures were with security, planning, and response. We had a number of bipartisan hearings that stretched on for just a few months, and then we came out with major recommendations with then-Police Chief Manger, who implemented nearly every single one of them. Hundreds of changes were made.
Never again will police officers who are meant to guard us have worse equipment than people who are trying to invade the Capitol. Never again will they go to a bus and have their gear, their riot gear, locked in the bus. Never again will you hear the haunting words of an officer on the police radio say: ``Does anyone have a plan?''
We also had to help protect our democracy against future assaults. I worked on a bipartisan basis to update the antiquated Electoral Count Act in the Senate and helped usher that through, along, again, with Senator Blunt. We worked with the House Members to improve what the insurrectionists thought was some kind of a loophole that they could use to stop the will of the people. That law has now been changed. We worked to get better benefits for our officers, and we worked to change the number of officers to make sure that this wouldn't happen again.
Despite our bipartisan efforts after January 6 to protect this Capitol and our democracy, 5 years later, President Trump and his allies continue, sadly, to spread a false narrative. He has called January 6 a ``day of love.'' He has described the prosecutions of people for crimes related to the January 6 attack on the Capitol and on law enforcement as a ``grave national injustice.'' He has pardoned more than 1,500 criminals.
For this administration, it is the very heroes who defended our Capitol--our democracy--on January 6 whom they now consider a threat. I don't think career Federal prosecutors are terrorists or despicable people, as they have called them. I think they are public servants, and I think they are patriots.
We have seen repeated attacks on access to the ballot box from this administration. We must pass the Freedom to Vote Act, which would guarantee access to the ballot. As we mark the somber fifth anniversary of January 6, we know that democracy only held then because of those who defended the peaceful transfer of power. Those are the people whom we honor today: the Republican Senators who were willing to uphold that vote even though the candidate they supported did not win; the Republican Senators who actually, in this Chamber, spoke out and condemned the coup; the officers who protected us that day from something much worse than the fright that people experienced; and those who ended up dying and those who were injured. Those are the ones whom we honor today, not the insurrectionists.
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