Political Quotes

“I am going to conclude for the sake of the staff and yourself and others who are here, who, as I mentioned earlier, are at risk. We are all at risk with this pandemic. But just to summarize as quickly as I can, we returned this week when we were supposed to be back in our States. We returned this week because there was pressing legislative business. One of the items before us, raised by Senator McConnell, the Republican leader, was the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act reauthorization. There are some Senators who have questions and objections to the bill that passed the House. Those Senators on the Republican side and on the Democratic side came to the floor last Thursday and said: We will agree to an extension of this law if you will give us a chance to actually debate our concerns on the floor of the Senate. That request was rejected last week by Senator McConnell. So tonight we were going to have the showdown vote to see whether or not we move forward on this, and, lo and behold, moments before that vote, Senator McConnell agreed to what he refused to agree to last Thursday. Yes, we will have a temporary extension, and we will have debate and amendments before that extension expires. So one of the reasons that we were drawn back to Washington, when we were counseled by all the medical experts not to take unnecessary airline flights, was for a matter that was resolved without a vote tonight.…”