Mitch McConnell was mentioned in TRIBUTE TO RAY ZACCARO on pages S387-S388 covering the 2nd Session of the 117th Congress published on Jan. 20 in the Congressional Record.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
TRIBUTE TO RAY ZACCARO
Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I believe we are all familiar with the question: If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? Well, here in the U.S. Senate, we can ask the question: If we accomplish something important but fail to communicate that to our constituents, did it actually happen?
The majority of the American people have so much on their plates that they are not following the intricate, daily workings of this Chamber, so they expect their Senators to speak to them on a regular basis about the work they are doing on their behalf.
As the author and former Presidential speechwriter James Humes has said: “The art of communication is the language of leadership.” That is why each and every one of us, in turn, relies on the dedicated men and women to help us communicate with folks back home.
I am here on the floor today to say farewell to a member of my team who has been so instrumental in helping me communicate to the people of Oregon.
For the past now 71/2 years, Ray Zaccaro has served as my communications director. What a 71/2 years it has been, especially when you consider how drastically the media and communications landscape has changed in that 71/2 years. We have gone from local newspapers and cable news in serving as the dominant means of mass communication to Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and Snapchat and TikTok and others that are far too numerous for me to keep track of, but that is why we have a communications team.
One day, produced video content performed the best. The next, it was suddenly selfie-style videos. Videos used to do very well on Facebook. When the algorithms changed, they didn’t do so well. Then Instagram reels took off, and on and on and on. It is incredible how fast the communication world keeps changing. Since March of 2020, it has only gotten more chaotic as the pandemic has turned everything upside down, including how we consume information and how we communicate.
Ray Zaccaro expertly helped me and the entire team navigate this ever-shifting media landscape. As recording studios shut down, he mobilized the communications team to quickly transition to use a vast array of tools, including Skype and Zoom, so that we could continue to get our message and timely information to the people of Oregon.
That foresight and quick action are just extensions of his entire approach to communication–always challenging the members of our team to think outside the box and never being afraid to suggest new ideas, no matter how crazy they might initially seem. It doesn’t matter if they work in communications or on the legislative team or with constituent services. He believes everyone on the team has a role to play in helping to develop and tell the story of what we are working to do. And he has proven right, time and time again, over the last 7-plus years.
When Jeff Sessions, as Attorney General under the previous administration, gave his “zero tolerance” speech, I said to my team: It sounds like he is planning for a policy of tearing children out of their parents’ arms down at the border, and I am sure that is hyperbole because no American administration would ever do that to children.
A member of my team said: There is one way to find out. Go down there yourself.
Well, Ray, who is sitting behind me on the bench, took that idea and ran with it. We went down there the following Sunday, down to Texas, and he used his cell phone to livestream our attempts to try and ascertain exactly what was happening to young boys and girls.
At a detention facility in McAllen, we were the first legislative team to witness that, indeed, Team Trump was ripping children out of their parents’ arms. I will never forget, as Ray and I walked into that facility, there was a group of press outside who said: What are you going to find?
I said: I have no idea, but I will talk with you all when we come out.
Ray and I went in and saw those children in cages. And as we were being given a tour, I remember this group of young boys who were in one of the cages. They were being asked to line up–there were about 10 of them–from the shortest to the tallest, and the youngest was knee-high to a grasshopper. He was just maybe 4 years old.
I asked: Where did these young boys come from?
He said: Well, we brought them in that door over there, and we took them away from their parents.
And in that warehouse room, the parents were in other cyclone fence cages. And if the boys peered really hard, they might possibly see a parent or a sister, a father or mother, an uncle somewhere in that warehouse, but they had no idea what fate awaited them.
We went outside and talked to the press outside and told them what was happening. And in a flash, it was national news about what was going on by our government in their treatment of young children.
We went up the road to Brownsville. We had heard that there were a few hundred boys possibly being held in a former Walmart. I thought that was an astounding story, not possibly true, but should we go and check it out? Ray and I decided we would.
We went up to this former Walmart. It had barriers to keep you from parking in the former Walmart parking lot so we walked across the grounds to the door, where, by cell phone, I called up the number that was inside and said: We are here. I am a U.S. Senator, and we would like to have a tour, please, of your facility, if we could speak with your manager or your manager could come out and talk with us. Eventually, the manager did come out. His assistant had said he would be talking to us, but, actually, what he did was he called the police. And he didn’t come out until the police cars were arriving.
I think Ray, who was livestreaming the whole thing, secretly wanted me to be arrested and carried off in handcuffs to magnify the impact of the story. I am sorry, Ray, that it didn’t come to that, but the story had a tremendous impact.
They would not let me into that Walmart to see what was going on, but the national scandal that ensued in the days that followed meant the press of the United States of America got in the following weekend, and a national debate started about who are we as citizens of the United States of America and who is our government and what are we doing to these children?
It turned out there were not a few hundred boys in that facility; there were a few boys short of 1,500 in that single former Walmart.
The work that Ray did that day revealed the truth of Trump’s actions and shocked this Nation and moved this Nation to action. Horrified, as we continued to learn about the realities of the situation, Ray kept up the drumbeat with his contacts in the media throughout months that followed to ensure that that story of traumatized children and how we can help them continued, and those children were never forgotten.
Let me be clear. It wasn’t just the power of the story or the opportunity to get his boss–me–on television; he kept up the drumbeat because he is a passionate person who cares deeply about others.
Countless members of Team Merkley could recount stories about a time when Ray went out of his way to help them, to provide comfort and support when they were going through a difficult moment in their lives, or just a call to check in on how someone is doing or a full-blown Italian feast delivered to the home of a fellow team member grieving the loss of a loved one. And as his work with those migrant children separated from their parents at the border showed, he doesn’t have to know you personally to care deeply.
One time Ray was out with me in Oregon for a series of townhalls, and a constituent showed up who was having a personal crisis. Ray went out of his way to make sure that man got the help he needed, while still continuing to do the other aspects of his job: attending to members of the media, guiding and supporting staff in their respective tasks, and ensuring that the constituent had everything he needed.
That is just who he is, the type of person who will drop everything if someone needs help, who will offer up his own apartment so his boss can come film an important, last-minute video when the planned location fell through.
I couldn’t begin to count how many late nights and early mornings we spent together sitting for media interviews. I am thinking right now, here on the floor of the Senate, of a night a few years ago, when I was here through the night, speaking for over 15 hours straight to protest the theft of a Supreme Court seat by our former President and then-
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Throughout the night, there was Ray, in between running back and forth to the office to take calls from reporters and producers, returning to flip floor charts as my speech proceeded.
Thank you, Ray, for all that you have done for the team, for the people of Oregon, and for the people of this Nation. Thank you for your tireless efforts to utilize communication tools at our disposal to protect our democracy and enhance the important issues that face our Nation, from healthcare to housing, to education, to living-wage jobs, to equality of opportunity, to taking on climate chaos. Thank you for bringing the passionate and longstanding commitment to democratic politics and principals that were forged in your early experiences back home in Long Island, and you brought them to Capitol Hill.
It is hard to picture what our Team Merkley experience will be after you leave because you have been such an integral part for so long. But know that while you will be deeply missed, we all wish you nothing but the best in this next chapter of your life as you continue fighting to build a better world.
Thank you.
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SOURCE: Congressional Record Vol. 168, No. 13
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