mesut/congress_speeches huggingface dataset:
Small Business Employee Ownership Promotion Enhancement Act (Executive Calendar)
Gary C. Peters (Democrat, MI) \u2014 2017-7-19

each Michigander I talk to has their own unique hopes and dreams, but some aspects of the American dream are truly universal--financial security, the opportunity for your children to grow and prosper, and a dignified retirement. We know there are almost limitless paths to achieve these shared goals. For my parents' generation, this often meant a fair day's pay for a day of hard work, a good wage that grew steadily over time, and perhaps a pension that could support a comfortable retirement, and even the money to help for college tuition for your children. For small business owners, the path could mean bootstrapping a business from scratch, scraping by at first, building a business that made a good product, and doing the right thing by your employees and growing into a profitable business. prgtoken But in today's economy, for so many people, the connection between today's hard work and tomorrow's economic security isn't always so clear. New entrants to our workforce are increasingly unlikely to have a pension they can rely on for retirement. We are also seeing an entire generation of business owners rapidly approaching retirement after spending a lifetime building their businesses. We have a younger generation of employees who are increasingly disconnected from their employers and an older generation of entrepreneurs who are trying to figure out how to retire without disrupting their successful businesses. prgtoken Actually, I see this as a unique opportunity to solve two problems at once. The employee ownership model, including employee stock ownership plans--better known as ESOPs--allows employees of a company to become partial owners. ESOP plans, which often are created as heads of family- run small businesses look to retire, create employee-owners who have a real stake in the company to which they have dedicated their careers. For both management and employees, ESOPs mean that their goals are aligned--a growing, sustainable company that gives a shot at prosperity for everyone, from the highest ranking employee, to midlevel managers, to the front office staff. prgtoken For both business owners and employees, the proven benefits of the ESOP model are clear: Employee-owners have higher wages, more job stability, higher net worth, and larger retirement accounts than non- employee owners in similar companies. For entrepreneurs who want to see the company they built continue to thrive after they are gone, research has shown that businesses see their sales grow faster in the years following their conversion to employee ownership. prgtoken The data is clear on what employee ownership means for a company's bottom line and for workers' performance, but when I have the chance to visit employee-owned businesses, the benefits are as clear as day. prgtoken Last summer, on the first day of my motorcycle tour across Michigan, I visited Sport Truck USA, an aftermarket suspension and offroad distributor in Col
Healthcare (Executive Session)
Patty Murray (Democrat, WA) \u2014 2017-7-19

at a time when millions of people nationwide are speaking out and making absolutely clear ``no to more attacks on women's health and women's rights and no to the kind of hate and division President sowed on the campaign trail,'' it is unconscionable that my colleagues are moving now to confirm a circuit court nominee who is so clearly anti-women, anti-choice, and so clearly unqualified and unfit to serve on the bench. prgtoken Our colleagues may think that no one is paying close attention to this nomination, that perhaps they will just slip this one through. They are wrong. Today I am here, along with many of my colleagues, to take a stand, to make sure that families know just who President is trying to fill our Nation's court system with and call on s to reject this nomination of John to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. prgtoken I consider my decisions about whether to support judicial nominees to be among the most important and consequential choices I make as a Senator. Like Supreme Court Justices, circuit court judges have lifetime appointments. They set legal precedent. They decide on the majority of Federal cases. They can change and shape the lives of generations to come. So it is a responsibility I do not take lightly. prgtoken There are so many troubling aspects of this nominee's record-- previous statements, writings, legal views--they should alarm every American, from his views on LGBTQ rights, race, and campaign finance reform, to his vision of the environment and election laws. prgtoken I would like to start with one aspect of his record that is especially important to me as a woman, a mother, a grandmother, and a U.S. Senator, and that is what this nomination would mean for women. For nearly a decade, has made countless inflammatory, offensive, and troubling comments on a number of issues important to women. It is not possible to go through them all, and, frankly, most should not be repeated on the Senate floor, but I do want to make clear what kind of nominee this is. prgtoken has likened a woman's constitutionally protected right to choose to that of slavery, calling it one of the greatest tragedies in the history of our country. This harmful view is a pattern with . In fact, he consistently uses anti-choice rhetoric, whether he is writing about the right to privacy or other case law. prgtoken On top of that, has attacked essential health programs for women and children. For example, he has called the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting Program--which helps provide at-risk pregnant women the resources they need to raise healthy children-- wasteful. prgtoken He has authored an amicus brief advocating for the Virginia Military Institute to continue excluding women from admission, where he stated that there are ``different developmental needs of women and men.'' prgtoken Most recently, on his Judiciary
NAFTA AND MADE IN AMERICA WEEK
Marcy Kaptur (Democrat, OH) \u2014 2017-7-19

I rise because President has dubbed this week ``Made in America Week.'' But one can't pretend one's way to creating jobs in the United States, even if you are President. prgtoken A key index that gives you a clue to the truth of job creation in the United States is the trade deficit: How many more products and services are country exports, rather than imports from offshore sweatshops? prgtoken Well, for every month of the administration--that is what the red line is--the jobs hole for America is growing deeper. prgtoken You see here that the May 2017 deficit on this scorecard confirms the failing trade record, with a $46 billion trade and jobs deficit for May alone--larger than last year, larger than every other month. prgtoken The President spoke endlessly about trade during the campaign and promised turning NAFTA into a good deal for Americans. Without a doubt, working people of the Midwest put him in the Presidency because he promised to renegotiate NAFTA, that bad deal. Now it is his turn to live up to the bargain. prgtoken There is an old expression, ``Don't tell me what he says, show me what he does.'' prgtoken Well, President could start by onshoring all foreign goods he makes abroad--everything from ties, suits, bracelets, and so forth. prgtoken I haven't seen any inclination to date by this President reshoring items so that he creates jobs again in this country. He contributes to a growing trade surplus, not a deficit. [From the guardian.com, July 18, 2017] 's ``Made in America'' Week: the President's Hypocrisy Is on Display (By Adam Gabbatt) The White House celebrates US-manufactured products this week, even though 's vodka, menswear and even board games have been made overseas. has declared this week ``Made in America'' week. According to the White House, it's an opportunity for the president to showcase ``products that are made in America''. Unfortunately for , that description would rule out many of the products he and members of his family have made and sold. From Donald J Collection clothing to Vodka to : the Game, the president has a track record of not making things in America. The week was scheduled to kick off at the White House on Monday, with walking around some tables looking at products made in all 50 states. So in honour of the president's communist-dictator-esque photo opportunity, here's a look at some not-made-in-America gear. Alcohol Vodka (``The finish is disappointingly harsh''-- InternetWines.com) was an ill-fated attempt by to branch into the spirits world. The vodka (``No discernable flavor''--Chicagoist) was manufactured in the Netherlands by a company cal
Healthcare (Executive Session)
Richard Blumenthal (Democrat, CT) \u2014 2017-7-19

I am here to oppose the nomination of John to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. prgtoken I have been a member of the Judiciary Committee since I was sworn in as a U.S. Senator 6 years ago. I have participated in dozens of confirmation hearings. Over time, I have become accustomed to hearing nominees attempt to dodge our questions. I have rarely come across a nominee who was as reluctant to respond to my questions as John , and I have rarely felt so unsure and concerned about how a nominee would assume the responsibility of a Federal judgeship if confirmed. prgtoken I should emphasize to my colleagues, as well as to the people of Connecticut, there is no nomination I take more seriously than a Federal judgeship, having been before numerous Federal judges, district court judges, courts of appeals judges, and the U.S. Supreme Court on four cases. Having seen as a law clerk, as well as a practicing lawyer, the enormous impact and profound importance of this position, I take no job more seriously and regard no more steadfastly any responsibility that we have. prgtoken Mr. has previously stated that originalism was the ``only principled way'' to interpret the Constitution. When our ranking member, Senator Feinstein of California, then, very reasonably, asked Mr. if judges should always use originalism to interpret the Constitution, his response was this: ``My personal views on constitutional interpretation will be irrelevant if I am fortunate enough to be confirmed to the 6th circuit.'' prgtoken With all due respect to Mr I could not disagree more strongly. Asking judicial nominees about how they would approach the task of interpreting the law is extraordinarily relevant to this job. First, judges are not robots. They have views regarding how to interpret statutes and the Constitution. Applying those views is not inconsistent with judicial impartiality, but, especially for a judge on the U.S. court of appeals, those views matter greatly. The American people have a right to know what those views are for an appellate judge, who often cannot simply follow the letter or the exact words of the Constitution or the Supreme Court's interpretation of it. There are all kinds of gaps that may be left and questions that may be unanswered. Circuit court judges are routinely asked to address constitutional questions that the Supreme Court has never addressed or has answered incompletely, and, sometimes, yes, incorrectly. It changes its constitutional view because of a circuit court judge who has the temerity to say that the Supreme Court either hasn't spoken to the issue or, perhaps, has spoken decades ago, at a time when that interpretation of the constitutional law had relevance and correctness, but not now. prgtoken To do our job reviewing judicial nominees of the President, we need to know how Mr. plans to do his job. His refusal to answer causes me extraordinary
Fossil Fuels (Executive Calendar)
Jeff Merkley (Democrat, OR) \u2014 2017-7-19

our Nation's courts are supposed to be bastions of justice. They are intended to be run by men and women of sober contemplation and scholarly reflection, with the temperament to put aside their own personal feelings and biases and consider the facts of the case before them in order to make the best judgments possible; men and women committed to a full and fair judiciary--a judiciary that respects our constitutional rights. prgtoken I am sorry to say that the nominee for the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals does not meet those standards. This man is unfit to serve on the bench. As revealed by his own words in a series of blog posts written under a pseudonym, John does not have the temperament or the impartiality to sit on a court where jurists such as William Howard Taft and many eminent others have sat. prgtoken Mr. himself acknowledged during his confirmation hearing that ``many of the blog posts used flippant or intemperate language''-- something I believe is unbecoming of an individual nominated to sit on the Federal bench. But it wasn't just flippant language. It wasn't just intemperate language. He wrote in an extreme rightwing, partisan fashion. His confirmation would threaten women's rights and the rights of LGBTQ Americans. It would threaten Americans' voting rights. It would threaten issue after issue, topic after topic, of the rights embedded in our Constitution. prgtoken Let's take a few moments to look at his words and his record. Let's look first at women's rights and the extreme views he has held on this issue. prgtoken In 1993, he filed an amicus brief in a Supreme Court appeal defending the Virginia Military Institute's policy of not admitting women, stating that the military-style atmosphere of the institute ``does not appear to be compatible with the somewhat different developmental needs of most young women.'' He was basically indicating that young women cannot handle the same rigors as men or serve in the same capacities as men--certainly a myth that has been shattered time and time again. He is locked into an 1800s view of the world. I know that my daughter, I know that her friends, I know that my colleagues who serve in the Chamber certainly don't believe that a woman is incapable of serving in the same roles in which a man can serve. prgtoken There was a 2008 blog post Mr. wrote conflating a woman's legal, constitutional right to choose with slavery. He wrote: Slavery and abortion rely on similar reasoning and activist justices at the U.S. Supreme Court . . . . first in the Dred Scott decision, and later in Roe. prgtoken It is hard to imagine how an individual takes the extraordinary human condition of slavery and the lack of freedom involved in that and compares it to a woman making decisions, with the advice of her own doctor, about her own body. One is slavery, and one is freedom--clearly not the same thing. How could any woman walking int
VOTE ON LIFESAVING LEGISLATION
Robin L. Kelly (Democrat, IL) \u2014 2017-7-19

I rise, yet again, to beg this House for action. Let us have a vote on lifesaving legislation. prgtoken Just this weekend, 57 Americans were shot in just one U.S. city. Tragically, 11 of them passed away, including a 10-year-old boy and a revered community activist who worked to create jobs for at-risk kids. prgtoken The violence did not take a rest after the weekend. On Monday, 13 more people were shot and 3 were killed. prgtoken , what are we doing here? prgtoken People, Americans, American kids are dying every day in every community, in every State, in every district, yet this House, the people's House, continues to do nothing. prgtoken Why, ? Why is that? prgtoken Well, I think greed and dollars. prgtoken My 101st victim I want to share with you is Gustavo Garcia, who was 10 years old Gustavo would have turned 11 next month. He would have started fourth grade at Arnold Mireles Academy next month. Instead, he was murdered in the back seat of an SUV by an assault weapon, a weapon of war that this House has allowed to be legal and spill blood on our city streets. prgtoken These weapons have one purpose: killing people. They are not for sportsmanship. They are not for personal defense. They are for theaters of war. They are designed to devastate, maim, kill, and destroy. That is why assault weapons were banned from our streets until this House, poisoned by NRA dollars, allowed the bill to expire. prgtoken , Gustavo Garcia was 10 years old. He had an entire lifetime ahead of him the operative word in that sentence is ``had.'' Now he has become ``Dollar NRA No. 101.'' $102, William ``Willie'' Cooper, who was 58 years old. Willie was working to change Chicago and give our children a future. He founded the Lilydale Outreach Workers for a Better Community and helped mediate more than 50 conflicts that could have turned deadly. prgtoken Willie was everything you could want in a neighbor, a community leader, and a friend. He was kind, concerned about others in his community, someone who truly loved all of his fellow men. Now he is ``$102.'' He was assassinated also with an assault weapon in front of the nonprofit he founded to help young people find jobs. prgtoken Time and time again I hear from the other side of the aisle that work is transformative, it gives people purpose and direction in life. I could not agree more. prgtoken , nothing stops a bullet like an opportunity. What Chicago needs is jobs for our young people, not guns flooding from States likes Wisconsin and even the Vice President's home State of Indiana. prgtoken , it is about jobs. So I join Senators Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth to introduce three pieces of legislation directly targeted to support at-risk youth and the amazing businesses that take a chance on them to change their lives. To date, these bills have simply been referred to committee. prgtoken , when is the agenda of this House going to turn to the actual issues devastating Ame
Healthcare (Executive Session)
Al Franken (Democrat, MN) \u2014 2017-7-19

I rise also in opposition to the nomination of John Kenneth . Mr who has been nominated to serve as a judge on the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, has the dubious distinction of having anonymously written scores of blog posts that aren't just offensive--which, believe me, they are--but that call into question the nominee's ability to be a fair and impartial arbiter of the law, which is the job of a judge, especially a circuit court judge. In my view, the nominee's lengthy record of inflammatory and intemperate writings stands as evidence that Mr. falls far short of the high standards that the Senate should demand of nominees to the Federal bench. prgtoken Over the course of nearly 10 years, Mr. wrote under the pseudonym ``G. Morris.'' He wrote under a pseudonym on a political blog operated by his wife, where he published hundreds of incendiary posts. prgtoken Let me be absolutely clear. Being politically active or expressing political opinions is not a disqualifying characteristic in a judicial nominee--at least, not in my view. But as I said during Mr. 's hearing, it is important for the Senate, in attempting to determine whether a nominee is qualified to serve as a Federal judge, to assess that nominee's judgment as a judge--to assess his or her judgement--and that is what I would like the President and all our Members to consider. prgtoken In the hundreds upon hundreds of posts that Mr. anonymously published on his wife's blog, Mr. did not demonstrate what any Member of this body would characterize as good judgment. It was far from it. During his hearing, I questioned the nominee about a series of posts in which he seemed to fixate on President 's Kenyan heritage. In one post, Mr. discussed an article that suggested a reporter was detained by the Kenyan Government because he was investigating ``'s connections in the country'' and that authorities had locked up the reporter in order to prevent him from publishing what he discovered. The article Mr. quoted from and linked to was published on World Net Daily, a website known for peddling conspiracy theories, bogus claims, and White nationalism. In fact, World Net Daily is widely known for trafficking in birtherism-- the widely debunked and racist belief that President was not born in this country. Nonetheless, Mr. presented the World Net Daily article as fact. This is a guy who has been nominated to be a circuit court judge calling a World Net Daily article fact. prgtoken So during his confirmation hearing, I asked Mr. --and I asked him over and over again--how he decided which sources to rely upon in his writings and how he determined a particular source was credible. In my view, whether a nominee is capable of discerning real news from fake news or blogs that traffic in conspiracy theories from legitimate journalism directly speaks to the nominee's judgment. Again,
REMOVAL OF NOMINATION OBJECTION
Chuck Grassley (Republican, IA) \u2014 2017-7-19

on June 20, 2017, I notified the majority leader of my intent to object to any unanimous consent request relating to the nomination of Steven A. Engel, of the District of Columbia, to be the Assistant Attorney General for the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel, until he adequately responded to my questions regarding his views on the OLC's May 1, 2017, opinion, ``Authority of Individual Members of Congress to Conduct Oversight of the Executive Branch.'' prgtoken As I have previously noted, the opinion erroneously states that individual Members of Congress are not constitutionally authorized to conduct oversight. It creates a false distinction between oversight and what it calls nonoversight requests. It relegates requests from individual Members for information from the executive branch to Freedom of Information Act requests. I have written a letter to the President requesting that the OLC opinion be rescinded. The executive branch should properly recognize that individual Members of Congress have a constitutional role in seeking information from the executive branch and should work to voluntarily accommodate those requests. prgtoken My June 12, 2017, letter to Mr. Engel asked him several questions about the opinion, including whether the opinion prgtoken met the OLC's own internal standards requiring impartial analysis, whether individual Members of Congress are ``authorized'' to seek information from the executive branch, and what level of deference the executive branch should provide to individual Member requests. prgtoken Mr. Engel promptly responded to my letter on June 23, 2017, and to a second June 27, 2017, followup letter on July 12, 2017. I ask unanimous consent that Mr. Engel's responses be placed in the Record following my remarks. prgtoken I also met with Mr. Engel in my office on July 19, 2017, to further discuss and clarify his views on the authority of individual Members to request information from the executive branch. Mr. Engel's responses, both in writing and in person, indicate that he agrees each Member, whether or not a chairman of a committee, is a constitutional officer entitled to the respect and best efforts of the executive branch to respond to his or her requests for information to the extent permitted by law. He also agreed: No. 1, that the May 1, 2017, OLC opinion on this topic failed to consider adverse legal authority, specifically Murphy v. Dep't of the Army, 613 F.2d 1151 (D.C. Cir. 1979); and No. 2, that, if confirmed, he would review the opinion; and No. 3, consider whether a more complete analysis of the issue is necessary. prgtoken I am satisfied that Mr. Engel understands the obligation of all Members of Congress to seek executive branch information to carry out their constitutional responsibilities and the obligation of the executive branch to respect that function and seek comity between the branches. Therefore, I agree a vote should be sch