Political Quotes

“I congratulate the Senator from Kansas on his eloquent remarks, expressing the feelings--certainly mine and those, I believe, of virtually every Member of this body--that we are here not as Democrats or Republicans but to work together to do whatever we can to address the concerns that are literally unprecedented. This is an unprecedented time in our country. I cannot remember a time in my life or in our history when the government has literally closed down the country in order to contain a disease. That is literally what we are doing. Whether it is the Federal Government by its travel restrictions, or whether it is the State governments suggesting that schools be closed, or whether it is mayors saying that restaurants must be closed, we are closing down the country to contain a disease. Because the government is doing that on behalf of all the people, we are going to have to pay the costs of closing down the country to contain this disease. Today, the news is that the auto industry across the country is closing down, at least temporarily. There are layoffs. I have watched over the last 40 years as Tennessee has gone from almost no auto jobs to proudly calling itself, in many ways, the No. 1 auto State. One hundred forty thousand Tennesseans work in auto jobs in Tennessee; that is one-third of all of our manufacturing jobs. They are spread through 88 counties.…”