III 

116TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION S. RES. 532 

Condemning and censuring the Senator from New York, Mr. Schumer. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

MARCH 5, 2020 

Mr. HAWLEY (for himself, Mr. DAINES, Mr. BRAUN, Mr. SCOTT of Florida, 

Mr. TILLIS, Mrs. LOEFFLER, Mr. CRAMER, Mr. SASSE, Ms. ERNST, Mr. 

LEE, Mr. CRUZ, Mr. PERDUE, Mr. SCOTT of South Carolina, Mr. 

INHOFE, and Ms. MCSALLY) submitted the following resolution; which 

was referred to the Select Committee on Ethics 

RESOLUTION 

Condemning and censuring the Senator from New York, 

Mr. Schumer. 

Whereas the Senator from New York, Mr. Schumer, is the 

Leader of the Democratic Caucus and a former member 

of the Committee on the Judiciary of the Senate; 

Whereas, at a protest at the Supreme Court of the United 

States on March 4, 2020, Senator Schumer inveighed 

against 2 Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the 

United States by saying, ‘‘I want to tell you, Gorsuch, I 

want to tell you, Kavanaugh, you have release the whirlwind, and you will pay the price.’’; 


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•SRES 532 IS 

Whereas Senator Schumer went on to warn Justice Gorsuch 

and Justice Kavanaugh, ‘‘You won’t know what hit you 

if you go forward with these awful decisions.’’; 

Whereas the statements of Senator Schumer are an attempt 

to unduly influence the judicial decisions of the Supreme 

Court of the United States and to undermine the vision 

of the founders of the United States of the ‘‘complete 

independence of the courts of justice’’, as Alexander 

Hamilton wrote in Federalist No. 78; 

Whereas the statements of Senator Schumer could be read to 

suggest a threat or call for physical violence against 2 

Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United 

States; 

Whereas the Chief Justice of the United States immediately 

rebuked Senator Schumer, stating that ‘‘threatening 

statements of this sort from the highest levels of government are not only inappropriate, they are dangerous’’; 

Whereas, according to the Institute for Economics and Peace, 

political violence in the United States has increased over 

the last decade; 

Whereas, in 2018, the United States Marshals Service investigated 4,542 threats and inappropriate communications 

against the judiciary; 

Whereas 4 Federal judges have been targeted and murdered 

since 1979 and 2 family members of another Federal 

judge have been murdered; and 

Whereas Senator Schumer has acknowledged that threatening 

statements can increase the dangers of violence against 

government officials when he stated on June 15, 2017, 

following the attempted murder of several elected Members of Congress, ‘‘We would all be wise to reflect on the 


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•SRES 532 IS 

importance of civility in our [N]ation’s politics’’ and that 

‘‘the level of nastiness, vitriol, and hate that has seeped 

into our politics must be excised’’: Now, therefore, be it 

1 Resolved, That the Senate— 

2 (1) censures and condemns in the strongest 

3 possible terms the Senator from New York, Mr. 

4 Schumer, for his threatening statements against As5 sociate Justice Neil M. Gorsuch and Associate Jus6 tice Brett M. Kavanaugh; and 

7 (2) calls on all members of the Senate to re8 spect the independence of the Federal judiciary. 

Æ 


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