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Floor Speech

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Mr. PADILLA. I understand that this is a very important subject for my passionate colleague from South Carolina, but I also think there is a very fundamental misunderstanding, at a minimum, about what sanctuary policies are and what sanctuary policies are not.

Now, as I was listening to my colleague, he has tried to paint a picture of sanctuary States or sanctuary cities as nothing but lawless, and I get that it is maybe a favorite sound bite for rightwing media, but the fact of the matter is it is not true.

Sanctuary policies do not mean that there are no laws or that the Federal Government can no longer enforce Federal law in those jurisdictions. What sanctuary policies are is simply an affirmation that immigration enforcement is the job of the Federal Government and that State and local authorities cannot be co-opted or forced into performing inherently Federal responsibilities. It means that while Federal Agencies carry out immigration enforcement, State and local law enforcement will choose to focus their time, their energy, their resources on public safety in the local communities.

So let me say that again as clearly as I can: Sanctuary policies do not prevent ICE from going into any State or any city to arrest the violent criminals that the administration says they are after when they are being released from prison.

And, by the way, it is not like ICE does not know when someone is arrested. In fact, the Federal Government is notified every single time an individual is booked into a jail or prison. This means nothing is preventing ICE from picking up individuals when they are released from custody.

But instead of prioritizing picking up the dangerous, violent criminals they talk so much about, what is ICE doing instead? They are out roving streets in communities across the country and arresting people based on the color of their skin or the language that they speak or their perceived occupation.

There is a term for this, by the way. These are now known as the Kavanaugh stops because of Supreme Court Justice Kavanaugh--and, by extension, the majority of the Supreme Court--sanctioning this practice. It is wrong.

Now, I know my colleagues disagree with sanctuary policies as they are--official, technical. He describes sanctuary policies as ``killing this country.'' I have heard that a few times. And that by enacting sanctuary policies, leaders in these States are somehow ``openly defying federal law.''

Again, wrong. You can have your own opinion, but you can't own the facts. Far from defying Federal law, courts have actually upheld sanctuary laws and policies. I will reference just one. In a 1997 ruling in Printz v. United States, Justice Scalia wrote:

The Federal Government may neither issue directives requiring the States to address particular problems, nor command the States' officers, or those of their political subdivisions, to administer or enforce a federal regulatory program . . . such commands are fundamentally incompatible with our constitutional system of dual sovereignty.

That sure doesn't sound like anyone is defying any Federal law to me. And nobody is accusing Justice Scalia as having been a leftwing radical.

And, yes, we do have more recent examples of courts rejecting the Trump administration's attempts to strong-arm cities and States into acting as Federal immigration agents.

Let me just say this: These policies that my Republican colleagues are determined to attack are not the reason for the chaos that the American people have been watching in horror unfold in the cities of Los Angeles, in Chicago, in Minneapolis, and so many others. Sanctuary policies aren't the reason why American cities and citizens are being pepper-sprayed or tear-gassed, beaten, unlawfully detained, or even shot in broad daylight like Renee Good and Alex Pretti. What is endangering the American people's safety and security is an out-of- control administration that has empowered a mass paramilitary force of ICE and CBP agents to act with impunity, without accountability, without oversight, and without consequences.

If we truly want to talk about public safety, then we need to be talking about reining in an out-of-control Department of Homeland Security, not scapegoating States and cities that choose to prioritize their local resources for their local public safety.

So, for the sake of the American people's safety and well-being, I object.

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Mr. PADILLA. Mr. President, elections are the bedrock of our American democracy, and despite what the President and his big circle of election-denying, conspiracy theorists would have Americans believe, the truth is that our elections are, indeed, free; that our elections are, indeed, fair; and that our elections are, indeed, secure.

That is why the revamped, new-and-made-worse SAVE Act, which was passed by the House last night and is designed to compel States to give over to Donald Trump their voter rolls, is not just a solution in search of a problem; it is also a very bad solution at that.

This bill is built on a myth that is rooted in the Big Lie of election denial that has poisoned our democracy for years, which is that supposed noncitizen voter fraud occurs with any meaningful frequency. It is the same Big Lie that is still being perpetrated by Kurt Olsen, who is the President's ``Stop the Steal'' lawyer now working in the White House and on President Trump's decision to send the Director of National Intelligence to Fulton County, GA, last month, to seize paper ballots from the 2020 election--ballots that have already been counted at least three times in three different ways and that have all reached the same election outcome.

The fact of the matter is that audit after audit and investigation after investigation in red States and in blue States have all reached the same conclusion, which is that voting by noncitizens--which, by the way, is already a felony--is so exceedingly rare that it is statistically almost nonexistent, which tells us something very important, though. It means our current laws are working; so we don't need new documentation requirements like passports and birth certificates.

By the way, 21 million Americans cannot readily access these documents. We shouldn't be risking the disenfranchisement of 69 million American women who have changed their names from what is printed on their birth certificates, most of whom made that change when they got married, and we don't need to force approximately 60 million Americans who live in rural communities to drive up to hundreds of miles to prove their eligibility in person. That is not election security. That is actually voter suppression.

It is important for the American people to understand that this Republican effort to jam the SAVE Act through--as they call it--isn't happening in isolation. There is a bigger picture here. This bill is part of a broader effort by Trump and his Republican enablers to lay the groundwork for the rigging of upcoming elections, including the midterms this November. Now, November might seem like a long way off, but the midterms have already begun. Primary ballots have been mailed out in many jurisdictions, and the first round of early voting begins today in some jurisdictions.

It is pretty clear which way the political winds are blowing. The American people are rightly frustrated by Donald Trump's failed economic policies that are raising costs for working families, and the American people are increasingly outraged by the cruel, violent mass deportation campaign unfolding in communities across the country, which has already cost two innocent American citizens their lives.

It seems to me that the SAVE Act is really only intended to save Republicans and Trump from facing the consequences of their failed policies, but rather than change their policies, Republicans would rather change the election rules.

How many times have we heard the President openly question our election system and why the Federal Government shouldn't run elections?

At one point, he said:

[I]f you think about it, the state is an agent for the federal government in elections. I don't know why the federal government doesn't do `em anyway.

Well, let me answer that question for the President. It is really simple.

It is because the Constitution says otherwise. The Constitution clearly entrusts elections to the States and to Congress, not to the President.

But those efforts to interfere are underway and ongoing. We have seen the Department of Justice sue 24 States that happen to be led by Democrats. They are targeting their voter rolls in addition to the intimidation and strong-arm tactics.

We also know that Donald Trump says he regrets not issuing an Executive order in his first term that directs the military to illegally seize voting machines. He is not shy about this, folks. He thinks he has the Department of Homeland Security now more willing to carry out such illegal actions this time around. So, yes, the threat is real.

Or consider his former White House adviser who has called on the President to deploy ICE to intimidate U.S. citizens who will be trying to vote this November. So let's be absolutely clear: That is already illegal. Armed Federal agents at polling locations is voter intimidation and has no place in our democracy. Think about that. Think about that. Using Federal force to intimidate voters at the polls? It is hard to imagine anything more un-American.

So that is why, today, colleagues, I am announcing a new amendment to the Department of Homeland Security funding bill that is still being negotiated and deliberated. It is an amendment to explicitly bar any Federal funds from being used to deploy Federal law enforcement or military personnel to polling places or election offices for the purpose of voter intimidation or election interference.

It is amazing we would have to say that. It is amazing that we would have to think about addressing that, but that is what the President wants. Now don't put it past him to try. It is time to send the administration a clear message that the United States of America's elections will be decided by the voters, not by force.

Colleagues, we as a Congress have a responsibility to act to protect the elections entrusted by the Constitution to us and to the States before it is too late.

We have a responsibility to reject this SAVE Act, to keep Federal law enforcement away from polling locations, and to make clear once and for all that elections and our sacred right to the ballot box belongs to the people.

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