Executive Calendar

Floor Speech

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Mr. BOOKER. 1255, Elizabeth Frawley Bagley, of Florida, to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Federative Republic of Brazil; that the Senate vote on the nomination without intervening action or debate; that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action.

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Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, as in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 2116 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; further, that the bill be considered read a third time and passed on the motion.

Before I do this, sir, I would like to just read a brief statement if I may, Mr. President.

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Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I am really proud to be New Jersey's junior Senator. Even more so, I am proud that I have called Newark my home for most of my adult life. I can talk about my community for weeks on end. I know the Presiding Officer has heard me talk about Newark for some time.

It is an incredible community where we do not mistake wealth with worth. We know the value of goodness and decency. And a lot of members of my community in the city of Newark are Black and Brown folks, and the special relationship they often have to their hair denotes deep cultural traditions. You go to my city right now, and you will find hairstyles of different types: locks, cornrows, twists, braids, bantu knots, and, of course, what I once had, Mr. President, afros.

You will find barber shops and hair salons aplenty that are dedicated to the upkeep of these beautiful hairstyles. One of my favorite things to do is to go to barber shops to sit in community with folks and connect.

I can write almost a dissertation probably, sir, right now about the role of barber shops in Black and Brown communities. They are incredible community cultural convening places.

But I also want to say that it is not always a source of joy. At times, the conversation has turned to a deep source of hurt and pain. There is a decades-long problematic practice of discrimination against natural hair in this country.

It was brought to the forefront in 2018 when a New Jersey student named Andrew Johnson was forced to cut his dreadlocks in the middle of a wrestling match. The entire ordeal was caught on camera. And as the scissors were brought out to cut Andrew's hair, you can see the deep hurt and pain on the face of this young man. It is the pain felt by many, traumatic at times, of hurtful experiences that make you question your very belonging in a community--the beauty of your hair, its natural style, your immutable characteristics, your cultural beliefs, your connection to your heritage.

No person in America should have to deal with this pain, and that is why I stand here today, urging this body to pass legislation that is dear to my community's heart, dear to communities all across the country. It is named the Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair Act, otherwise known as the CROWN Act.

This bill is ultimately a matter of justice. Hair discrimination is real. It is a continuing and a pernicious problem for Black and Brown people in our country. It can lead to lost employment opportunities. It can lead to violations of students' civil rights. In short, it forces people to change parts of their very being so as to avoid harassment or punishment.

A recent study from Michigan State University found that Black women are 50 percent more likely to be sent home from the workplace because of their hair, and 80 percent of Black women feel the need to change their hair from its natural state to fit in at the office.

Another study from Duke University found that Black women with natural hairstyles are less likely to land job interviews than White women or Black women with straightened hair.

Many students, other than Andrew, have had their civil rights violated. There have been cases in schools that have changed their dress code midyear to place restrictions on hairstyles, targeting Black students with locks and expelling them from school when they refused to cut their hair. Although existing law prohibits some forms of hair discrimination as a type of racial or national origin discrimination, Federal courts, at times, have narrowly construed this protection in a way that has allowed schools, workplaces, and other Federal institutions to discriminate against people of African descent who wear certain types of natural or even protected hairstyles.

That is where the CROWN Act comes in. This commonsense pragmatic piece of legislation is necessary. This legislation clarifies that discrimination based on a hair texture or hairstyle that is commonly associated with a particular race or natural origin--including hair that is tightly coiled or tightly curled, locks, cornrows, twists, braids, Bantu knots, and afros--is a prohibited form of discrimination.

Since the moment I first introduced the CROWN Act with Members of the Congressional Black Caucus, while I am grateful for their work and leadership, we have worked to build more support. In the House, this bill passed with broad bipartisan support because of the strength of the lead of my colleague and friend from New Jersey, Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman. Here in the Senate, Senator Collins has signed onto the bill, making it a bipartisan effort. And it is an effort that replicates what has already been done in 19 States--so-called blue States, such as mine or California, to so-called red States, like Nebraska, Tennessee, and Louisiana.

At its core, the CROWN Act is a commonsense policy. It is legislation that further protects the civil rights of Americans. But on a more profound and deeper level, it is a celebration of what makes up the wonderful fabric of our Nation: the rich, cultural diversity and the connections people have to their very identity.

We know the significance that hair plays for the communities that make up the diverse American fabric. For Black folks, hair is rooted in stories of strength and resistance. During the time of slavery, in Colombia, hair braiding was used to relay messages, including as a way to signal that one wanted to escape the lash of bondage.

As one person eloquently described, the hair of Black women is ``a crown that tells a story--a story of struggle, triumph, pain, pride, and comfort.''

The CROWN Act is a chance for us to make sure that story and the stories of so many other cultures are told, a chance to make sure that those stories aren't punished but become more of an integral part of the larger American story. It is a chance to make sure that those stories aren't stigmatized to the point that some have to make the difficult decision to change their natural hair just to have a chance to land a job, to succeed in school, or to escape discrimination overall.

This is a chance for us to make for a more perfect union, to bend the arc of the Nation just a little bit more toward justice, to end another chapter, another area, of deplorable discrimination, which is why today I ask for unanimous consent to pass the CROWN Act.

And so, I guess, as in legislative session, I now ask for unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 2116 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; further, that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

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Mr. BOOKER. I would like to say a couple of things.

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Mr. BOOKER. Thank you very much for the recognition, Mr. President-- the Presiding Officer.

I really heard the point about workplace safety. This bill does not prohibit employers from addressing safety concerns. Instead, it accounts for employers' legal obligations to ensure workplace safety. Written in the bill, section 6(b) of the bill expressly prohibits that the employment nondiscrimination provision ``shall be enforced in the same manner and by the same means, including with the same jurisdiction, as if such subsection was incorporated into Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.'' In other words, employers will be no more burdened by this bill than they are under the current employment discrimination law.

Under the longstanding, burden-shifting scheme applied by the courts in title VII cases, the employer may defeat a discrimination claim by asserting the workplace safety as a legitimate nondiscriminatory reason for taking adverse employment action against an employee, with the burden then shifting to the employee to prove that the asserted reason was a pretext for discrimination.

So this is addressed, and I appreciate that. But as it was passed in a boldly bipartisan way, it was shown to have incorporated that concern in the bill itself.

Again, this is something that has been passed in States like Tennessee and Louisiana. This has been shown to have wide bipartisan support. It is shown to be needed in the Federal context. And I am hoping that we, through continued deliberations, can actually get that passed.

Mr. President, if I may have leave to say one more thing, I would like to just wish you a Merry Christmas, to the Presiding Officer. I appreciate the cheer and good will that is in this Chamber, and I look forward to happy holidays for everyone.

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