My administration is deeply committed to the constitutional right established in Roe v. Wade nearly five decades ago and will protect and defend that… - Joe Biden

I’m grateful for the brave women and men — federal, state, and local folks working so hard. They’re all working as one team. I hear that from the governor as well as from the federal folks. In the past 24 hours, my administration has approved four more counties in Florida for individual disaster assistance, in addition to the nine counties we had announced yesterday. What that means is: The federal government will cover — is covering every cost — 100 percent of the cost to clear the massive debris left in the wake of the hurricane in these counties. And it all needs to be cleared out for communities to begin the hard work of trying to get back on their feet.

For so many of you at home, I want to be very clear: This is not about taking away anyone’s guns. It’s ... not about vilifying ... gun owners. In fact, we believe we should be treating responsible gun owners as an example of how every gun owner should behave. I respect the culture and the tradition and the concerns of lawful gun owners. At the same time, the Second Amendment, like all other rights, is not absolute. ... It was Justice Scalia who wrote, and I quote, “Like most rights, the right...” — Second Amendment — the rights granted by the Second Amendment are “not unlimited.” Not unlimited. It never has been. There have always been limitations on what weapons you can own in America. For example, machine guns have been federally regulated for nearly 90 years. And this is still a free country. This isn’t about taking away anyone’s rights. It’s about protecting children. It’s about protecting families. It’s about protecting whole communities. It’s about protecting our freedoms to go to school, to a grocery store, and to a church without being shot and killed.

And yet there was an eerie stillness on Capitol Hill — like a moment of prolonged equipoise between inhalation and exhalation.