so I got back after the election last
November to my Senate office six days
after the election and there was a
letter on my desk it was a letter from
an eight-year-old fourth grader in
Charlottesville named Penelope and this
was the letter dear senator Kane I’m
sorry you’re not vice president but
senators important
can you help stop my classmates from
being deported second paragraph the
letter said I’ve done a drawing to give
you encouragement and it fluttered out
of the envelope in sharpies and here it
is in sharpies made me thinner made me
younger Penelope gave me more hair she
gets the details right senators wear
little lapel pins
I love the Cape with the T on it but I
really love the motto be the hero be the
hero help stop my classmates from being
deported this is what an eight-year-old
has to worry about now I meet a lot of
people I meet a lot of people who were
disappointed as I travel around Virginia
and travel around the country but a big
subset of the disappointed are
personally afraid I meet immigrants who
are afraid I was walking through the
basement of the Senate and I ran into a
guy that I know who works there who
Salvadoran American and I said ki what’s
up and he said to me in Spanish I’ll
tell you what’s up people look at my
family and me like we’re criminals now
we’ve lived in this country for 25 years
and we’ve worked I’ve worked in the
Senate for 20 years and they look at us
like were criminals I meet a lot of
women especially young women who were
afraid am I gonna lose jobs to a less
qualified man am I gonna get sexually
harassed at my workplace how come you
guys keep whittling away women’s health
care and there’s never a controversy
about men’s health care
I meet students who are afraid our
leaders don’t even accept climate
science what’s the planet gonna be like
when I get to be an adult I meet parents
who were afraid are you really gonna
take our health care away when I got a
disabled kid and we rely on the ACA and
Medicaid to help our child afford a
wheelchair and be able to get special ed
at school and my colleagues and I when
we talk and when we’re honest many of us
are afraid that a president who demeans
diplomacy raises the risk of unnecessary
war a lot of people are disappointed a
big subset of those who are disappointed
are afraid how do we deal with our fears
230 years ago last month the framers of
our Constitution met and finalized the
Constitution in Philadelphia and they
were afraid of some things first the
national government was a failure after
the glorious win in the revolution for
seven or eight years we just found it
along because there really wasn’t a
national government it was 13 States
kind of battling with each other
veterans who had been promised pensions
there was nobody to pay their pensions
and so they gathered in Philadelphia to
do something different they knew they
needed to create a national government
but they were afraid of that too they
were afraid if they created a national
government if they had a president they
could end up with a despot because what
are they know in 1787 they knew Kings
they knew Monarchs they knew emperors
they knew Sultan’s they knew popes they
were worried about the tendency of an
executive to become a despot and so they
acted on their fear by designing a
system to hand out our super powers by
handing out powers to all kinds of
people to check against the possibility
of a despot they put Congress first and
gave Congress interesting powers powers
to ratify treaties power the purse power
to declare war power to confirm
appointments they created who judiciary
and get this they gave judges life
tenure that was revolutionary then and
it still is why would you create judges
for
they did it so that a judge could stand
up and say that executive order or that
statute is unconstitutional without any
fear of losing their job they gave huge
powers to States and to governor’s they
gave powers when they did the Bill of
Rights a couple years later to the press
to check abuses and hold leaders
accountable but the most important
powers that they handed out were the
powers that they handed out to everyday
citizens the the power to vote which has
been expanded over time the power to run
for office but it’s much more than that
it’s not just campaigning and running
the power to peacefully assemble the
power to petition your government for
redress of grievances the right to bear
arms the right to worship or not as you
please without being preferred or
punished for how you worship what the
founders did 230 years ago is they
handed out super powers to virtually
every institution in person in this
country to try to check against abuses
of power and give us tools to protect
people we love and to deal with our own
fears folks were living through the
stress test of our constitutional
democracy we’re living through exactly
the moment that James Madison and the
others knew we would live through
exactly the moment we have a president
who trashes Congress trashes the courts
trashes the press trashes notions of
religious equality and even equality
generally we have a president who
promised greatness without offering
evidence of goodness and the challenge
that we deal with today and other
generations have dealt with his
challenges were the mechanisms were the
super powers we were given 230 years ago
are they up to the task are they up to
the task that the framers intended and I
think we’re seeing great evidence that
they are Congress after repeatedly
promising to get rid of the Affordable
Care Act when really faced with it has
decided not to
repeal and take healthcare away from
tens of millions of people and instead
now I as a member of the help committee
am involved in a bipartisan effort to
find ways to fix not destroy healthcare
judges are standing up the Muslim travel
ban for example courts are stood up and
said you really can’t do that
the Attorney General said about one
judge in Hawaii this is a quote I can’t
believe that a judge quote on an island
in the Pacific can tell the president
what to do
that’s a complaint you can take two
James Madison
governor’s governors are saying mr.
president you’re out of the Paris
climate Accord guess what we’re not
backing out our state’s gonna stick with
the Paris climate Accord the press is
doing some amazing work these days to
look at financial improprieties and
questions of collusion with foreign
adversaries but the most inspiring thing
that’s being done is being done by you
the women’s marches that had crowds far
greater than the inauguration the
the the calls letters emails to my
office and keep them coming
but the numbers have gone up multiples
of what they were before people coming
out to townhall meetings
regular citizens saying hold on a second
do this and this is unacceptable we’re
seeing it in amazing numbers in every
congressional office and in fact there’s
no way there’s no way we could have
saved the Affordable Care Act had it not
been for people reaching out in such
numbers my favorite of all were the
protests at airports after the Muslim
travel ban was announced because it was
not pre announced we you didn’t know it
was coming and if there’s bad
controversial news it’s always gonna be
done after business closes on Friday so
it was January 29th and it was announced
and people spontaneously turned out to
airports I don’t know some of you were
at Dulles I I saw there’s protests at
Dulles so I said I’m gonna go see these
protests adults I went to the
International arrival gate to see the
protesters protesters calls up a picture
in your mind these were families with
kids with signs like Virginia is for
lovers we’re we’re not anti-muslim my
favorite was a family with some young
kids and a big poster of Mister Rogers
welcome to my neighborhood I got back to
the Senate after this and I was so
excited to tell my son at college you
won’t believe what I saw Dulles and a
friend of mine Joe Donnelly from Indiana
said Tim it was the same way in
Indianapolis we all turned out but
there’s no International Arrivals there
we-we-we we were hugging people from
Columbus in Chicago and saying we love
you we don’t hate you welcome to the
Hoosier State
Penelope asked if I’d be a hero I think
there’s a lot of heroes out there
battling for but I can’t sugarcoat it I
can’t pretend like the system’s coming
to life have avoided all the bad or
checked all the back because they
haven’t words have consequences actions
have consequences votes have
consequences silence has consequences in
action has consequences and we’re living
through consequence
a lot of them are really painful I don’t
have to tell Penelope she knows when
white-supremacist felt embolden
even emboldened by this president enough
to come to her town and March with
weapons and chant blood and soil and
Jews shall not replace the statements
from Nazi era Germany and when one of
them murdered a beautiful young
paralegal and injured 19 other people
and the events of that day caused the
deaths of two state troopers who I knew
very very well I can’t say to Penelope
and I can’t say to you that these
systems and checks that are coming to
life are sufficient to avoid all the bad
I’d like to tell Penelope about her
request of me because she was writing me
about dreamers that I can keep dreamers
from being deported I can tell that I’ll
do everything I can I’ll tell her that I
think Congress will find a solution
after the president has decided to
unplug the program but I can’t guarantee
to her I can’t guarantee to her that I
can accomplish what she wants me to so
we can’t sugarcoat the reality that we
live in but still to an amazing degree
you see these checks and balances
roaring to life and you see people out
there many who are trying to be heroes
for Penelope and others who were afraid
when I was a young man I lived in a
military dictatorship Honduras I was a
Jesuit missionary there and it was an
eye-opening experience in a lot of ways
one of the ways was this I realized for
the first time wow this click at the top
these generals they run everything and
there’s no rule or institution that they
can’t change at a whim people have no
barrier no protection between themselves
and power even arbitrary power from
those at the top and it made me realize
now that I’m on the Armed Services and
Foreign Relations Committee and I get
around the world a little bit that most
people in the world still live in a
system like that where they don’t have
the super powers assigned to them and
they don’t have those protective
barriers that were erected by Madison
and others instead
1987 that they can use to deal with the
fears that they have I have a prediction
about this chapter in our life it’s a
chapter with some pain and there’s going
to be more but I do think the end of the
chapter is going to be this that in this
country in this country the institutions
and the collective power of the American
public is stronger than any individual
whether that be a president and a
senator or anybody else I really believe
that that is the end of this chapter and
it will speak to the wisdom of what
these founders did what they started to
do 230 years ago now my prediction
depends on something superpowers aren’t
super powers if you know use them so if
you were just a quirky kid in Brooklyn
and you realize that you had spidey
senses and you didn’t know and you
didn’t do anything with them you would
just be a quirky kid in Brooklyn named
Peter but when you use them to fight dr.
octopus and save New York you’re
spider-man right superpowers are only
superpowers if you use them so –
Penelope’s requests about be the hero
you’re a hero when you run for office
you’re a hero when you vote you’re a
hero when you march when you organize
when you peacefully protest you’re a
hero when you pester your congressman
senator city council person’s school
board member about something that
matters to you you are using the
superpowers that James Madison and
others gave to you be the hero be the
hero i i i guess i should just conclude
and mention that I told Penelope I was
gonna be talking him about her today and
I told her she was lucky she wrote me
and asked me to be their hero and I said
you’re the hero because you did what you
ought to do you wrote to your member of
Congress and said here’s something that
worries me can you help me out Penelope
you’re a hero and you have a whole lot
of people out here
all around this country who are battling
everyday to be your heroes and when
Penelope heard me say this well guess
what she decided to do a drawing for you
guys – thanks so much
[Applause]
November to my Senate office six days
after the election and there was a
letter on my desk it was a letter from
an eight-year-old fourth grader in
Charlottesville named Penelope and this
was the letter dear senator Kane I’m
sorry you’re not vice president but
senators important
can you help stop my classmates from
being deported second paragraph the
letter said I’ve done a drawing to give
you encouragement and it fluttered out
of the envelope in sharpies and here it
is in sharpies made me thinner made me
younger Penelope gave me more hair she
gets the details right senators wear
little lapel pins
I love the Cape with the T on it but I
really love the motto be the hero be the
hero help stop my classmates from being
deported this is what an eight-year-old
has to worry about now I meet a lot of
people I meet a lot of people who were
disappointed as I travel around Virginia
and travel around the country but a big
subset of the disappointed are
personally afraid I meet immigrants who
are afraid I was walking through the
basement of the Senate and I ran into a
guy that I know who works there who
Salvadoran American and I said ki what’s
up and he said to me in Spanish I’ll
tell you what’s up people look at my
family and me like we’re criminals now
we’ve lived in this country for 25 years
and we’ve worked I’ve worked in the
Senate for 20 years and they look at us
like were criminals I meet a lot of
women especially young women who were
afraid am I gonna lose jobs to a less
qualified man am I gonna get sexually
harassed at my workplace how come you
guys keep whittling away women’s health
care and there’s never a controversy
about men’s health care
I meet students who are afraid our
leaders don’t even accept climate
science what’s the planet gonna be like
when I get to be an adult I meet parents
who were afraid are you really gonna
take our health care away when I got a
disabled kid and we rely on the ACA and
Medicaid to help our child afford a
wheelchair and be able to get special ed
at school and my colleagues and I when
we talk and when we’re honest many of us
are afraid that a president who demeans
diplomacy raises the risk of unnecessary
war a lot of people are disappointed a
big subset of those who are disappointed
are afraid how do we deal with our fears
230 years ago last month the framers of
our Constitution met and finalized the
Constitution in Philadelphia and they
were afraid of some things first the
national government was a failure after
the glorious win in the revolution for
seven or eight years we just found it
along because there really wasn’t a
national government it was 13 States
kind of battling with each other
veterans who had been promised pensions
there was nobody to pay their pensions
and so they gathered in Philadelphia to
do something different they knew they
needed to create a national government
but they were afraid of that too they
were afraid if they created a national
government if they had a president they
could end up with a despot because what
are they know in 1787 they knew Kings
they knew Monarchs they knew emperors
they knew Sultan’s they knew popes they
were worried about the tendency of an
executive to become a despot and so they
acted on their fear by designing a
system to hand out our super powers by
handing out powers to all kinds of
people to check against the possibility
of a despot they put Congress first and
gave Congress interesting powers powers
to ratify treaties power the purse power
to declare war power to confirm
appointments they created who judiciary
and get this they gave judges life
tenure that was revolutionary then and
it still is why would you create judges
for
they did it so that a judge could stand
up and say that executive order or that
statute is unconstitutional without any
fear of losing their job they gave huge
powers to States and to governor’s they
gave powers when they did the Bill of
Rights a couple years later to the press
to check abuses and hold leaders
accountable but the most important
powers that they handed out were the
powers that they handed out to everyday
citizens the the power to vote which has
been expanded over time the power to run
for office but it’s much more than that
it’s not just campaigning and running
the power to peacefully assemble the
power to petition your government for
redress of grievances the right to bear
arms the right to worship or not as you
please without being preferred or
punished for how you worship what the
founders did 230 years ago is they
handed out super powers to virtually
every institution in person in this
country to try to check against abuses
of power and give us tools to protect
people we love and to deal with our own
fears folks were living through the
stress test of our constitutional
democracy we’re living through exactly
the moment that James Madison and the
others knew we would live through
exactly the moment we have a president
who trashes Congress trashes the courts
trashes the press trashes notions of
religious equality and even equality
generally we have a president who
promised greatness without offering
evidence of goodness and the challenge
that we deal with today and other
generations have dealt with his
challenges were the mechanisms were the
super powers we were given 230 years ago
are they up to the task are they up to
the task that the framers intended and I
think we’re seeing great evidence that
they are Congress after repeatedly
promising to get rid of the Affordable
Care Act when really faced with it has
decided not to
repeal and take healthcare away from
tens of millions of people and instead
now I as a member of the help committee
am involved in a bipartisan effort to
find ways to fix not destroy healthcare
judges are standing up the Muslim travel
ban for example courts are stood up and
said you really can’t do that
the Attorney General said about one
judge in Hawaii this is a quote I can’t
believe that a judge quote on an island
in the Pacific can tell the president
what to do
that’s a complaint you can take two
James Madison
governor’s governors are saying mr.
president you’re out of the Paris
climate Accord guess what we’re not
backing out our state’s gonna stick with
the Paris climate Accord the press is
doing some amazing work these days to
look at financial improprieties and
questions of collusion with foreign
adversaries but the most inspiring thing
that’s being done is being done by you
the women’s marches that had crowds far
greater than the inauguration the
the the calls letters emails to my
office and keep them coming
but the numbers have gone up multiples
of what they were before people coming
out to townhall meetings
regular citizens saying hold on a second
do this and this is unacceptable we’re
seeing it in amazing numbers in every
congressional office and in fact there’s
no way there’s no way we could have
saved the Affordable Care Act had it not
been for people reaching out in such
numbers my favorite of all were the
protests at airports after the Muslim
travel ban was announced because it was
not pre announced we you didn’t know it
was coming and if there’s bad
controversial news it’s always gonna be
done after business closes on Friday so
it was January 29th and it was announced
and people spontaneously turned out to
airports I don’t know some of you were
at Dulles I I saw there’s protests at
Dulles so I said I’m gonna go see these
protests adults I went to the
International arrival gate to see the
protesters protesters calls up a picture
in your mind these were families with
kids with signs like Virginia is for
lovers we’re we’re not anti-muslim my
favorite was a family with some young
kids and a big poster of Mister Rogers
welcome to my neighborhood I got back to
the Senate after this and I was so
excited to tell my son at college you
won’t believe what I saw Dulles and a
friend of mine Joe Donnelly from Indiana
said Tim it was the same way in
Indianapolis we all turned out but
there’s no International Arrivals there
we-we-we we were hugging people from
Columbus in Chicago and saying we love
you we don’t hate you welcome to the
Hoosier State
Penelope asked if I’d be a hero I think
there’s a lot of heroes out there
battling for but I can’t sugarcoat it I
can’t pretend like the system’s coming
to life have avoided all the bad or
checked all the back because they
haven’t words have consequences actions
have consequences votes have
consequences silence has consequences in
action has consequences and we’re living
through consequence
a lot of them are really painful I don’t
have to tell Penelope she knows when
white-supremacist felt embolden
even emboldened by this president enough
to come to her town and March with
weapons and chant blood and soil and
Jews shall not replace the statements
from Nazi era Germany and when one of
them murdered a beautiful young
paralegal and injured 19 other people
and the events of that day caused the
deaths of two state troopers who I knew
very very well I can’t say to Penelope
and I can’t say to you that these
systems and checks that are coming to
life are sufficient to avoid all the bad
I’d like to tell Penelope about her
request of me because she was writing me
about dreamers that I can keep dreamers
from being deported I can tell that I’ll
do everything I can I’ll tell her that I
think Congress will find a solution
after the president has decided to
unplug the program but I can’t guarantee
to her I can’t guarantee to her that I
can accomplish what she wants me to so
we can’t sugarcoat the reality that we
live in but still to an amazing degree
you see these checks and balances
roaring to life and you see people out
there many who are trying to be heroes
for Penelope and others who were afraid
when I was a young man I lived in a
military dictatorship Honduras I was a
Jesuit missionary there and it was an
eye-opening experience in a lot of ways
one of the ways was this I realized for
the first time wow this click at the top
these generals they run everything and
there’s no rule or institution that they
can’t change at a whim people have no
barrier no protection between themselves
and power even arbitrary power from
those at the top and it made me realize
now that I’m on the Armed Services and
Foreign Relations Committee and I get
around the world a little bit that most
people in the world still live in a
system like that where they don’t have
the super powers assigned to them and
they don’t have those protective
barriers that were erected by Madison
and others instead
1987 that they can use to deal with the
fears that they have I have a prediction
about this chapter in our life it’s a
chapter with some pain and there’s going
to be more but I do think the end of the
chapter is going to be this that in this
country in this country the institutions
and the collective power of the American
public is stronger than any individual
whether that be a president and a
senator or anybody else I really believe
that that is the end of this chapter and
it will speak to the wisdom of what
these founders did what they started to
do 230 years ago now my prediction
depends on something superpowers aren’t
super powers if you know use them so if
you were just a quirky kid in Brooklyn
and you realize that you had spidey
senses and you didn’t know and you
didn’t do anything with them you would
just be a quirky kid in Brooklyn named
Peter but when you use them to fight dr.
octopus and save New York you’re
spider-man right superpowers are only
superpowers if you use them so –
Penelope’s requests about be the hero
you’re a hero when you run for office
you’re a hero when you vote you’re a
hero when you march when you organize
when you peacefully protest you’re a
hero when you pester your congressman
senator city council person’s school
board member about something that
matters to you you are using the
superpowers that James Madison and
others gave to you be the hero be the
hero i i i guess i should just conclude
and mention that I told Penelope I was
gonna be talking him about her today and
I told her she was lucky she wrote me
and asked me to be their hero and I said
you’re the hero because you did what you
ought to do you wrote to your member of
Congress and said here’s something that
worries me can you help me out Penelope
you’re a hero and you have a whole lot
of people out here
all around this country who are battling
everyday to be your heroes and when
Penelope heard me say this well guess
what she decided to do a drawing for you
guys – thanks so much
[Applause]
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