A joint resolution to direct the removal of United States Armed Forces from hostilities in the Republic of Yemen that have not been authorized by Congress.

Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 274 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Burgess), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members be given 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Madam Speaker, on Monday, the Rules Committee met and reported a rule, House Resolution 274. It provides for the consideration under closed rules for S.J. Res. 7, with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and for the consideration of H. Res. 271, with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of Committee on Energy and Commerce. It also provides suspension authority for Thursday, April 4.

Madam Speaker, before I begin, I want to recognize that today marks the 230th anniversary of the Rules Committee being formally constituted for the first time.

Now, the Ways and Means Committee--which my Massachusetts friend and colleague, Richie Neal, chairs--likes to point out that they are the oldest standing committee in the House. While that is true, I would like to remind my friends that the Rules Committee is the oldest committee in the House, being first created on this day in 1789 as a select committee. So it is especially appropriate that we are on the floor today to do some important work before us.

For the record, Madam Speaker, the Ways and Means Committee can celebrate their 230th anniversary on July 24.

Now that I have cleared that up, the first measure included in this rule is S.J. Res. 7, and we are taking action on this because Yemen is in crisis. In a country of roughly 28 million people, an estimated 22 million of them are in need of humanitarian assistance.

That is 75 percent of the population facing famine, disease, and displacement. Half the country is at risk of starvation.

The famine and disease facing children is particularly sobering. Save the Children estimates that as many as 85,000 children under the age of 5 have died because of hunger and disease since 2015.

All told, this is one of the world's worst humanitarian crises, the site of the fastest growing cholera epidemic ever recorded and the biggest food emergency on the planet.

Yet, it wasn't caused by some natural disaster. It is entirely man- made, the result of a Saudi-led military conflict. Seemingly every day, bombs fall on weddings, hospitals, buses, and homes, as civilian neighborhoods are regularly targeted.

This is not some abstract war happening half a world away. In fact, the United States is intimately involved in this conflict. We have supported the Saudi reign of terror by providing logistics, intelligence, ground support, and midair fueling of bombers. Virtually all the bombs that fall on Yemen say ``Made in the United States of America.''

Make no mistake, Madam Speaker, the United States is involved in a war in Yemen today. But if our constituents look through the Congressional Record, they wouldn't find a vote authorizing it. That is because this body abdicated its responsibility to declare war when it began 4 years ago.

Now, we took one of our most sacred responsibilities and handed it to the executive branch. It is not the first time we have done it, but it is becoming a habit around here. We first let the Bush administration decide the contours of our involvement abroad, and that continues through the Trump administration today.

If that wasn't outrageous enough, past Republican Congresses used every legislative trick in the book to block Members from even debating our role there. On two separate occasions, they went so far as to strip War Powers Resolutions related to Yemen of their privilege. It was unprecedented.

But when it comes to Saudi Arabia, this administration and my Republican friends were all too content to look the other way when they murdered a Washington Post journalist. They lured him into a consulate in Turkey, they murdered him, and then they used a bone saw to dismember him. We know, based on our intelligence reports, that the highest level of the Saudi Government was involved in that terrible human rights atrocity, and the Trump administration did nothing. They rationalized it. They justified it. They basically turned a blind eye.

When it comes to human rights, this administration has abdicated its moral authority. That should be of concern to everybody in this Chamber, whether you are Democrat or Republican, because if the United States stands for anything, we need to stand out loud and foursquare for human rights. If the President of the United States and his administration don't want to do it, then we should.

No Congress should be complicit in abdicating our Article I constitutional responsibility. Thankfully, this Democratic Congress is doing the opposite. We are reasserting our power, and we are taking a stand when it comes to human rights.

Thanks especially to the dedication of Speaker Pelosi, Chairman Engel, Congressman Ro Khanna, Congresswoman Jayapal, Congressman Pocan, and the entire Congressional Progressive Caucus, we are considering a bipartisan measure that makes clear it is time for the United States' involvement in Yemen to end. No more excuses.

This is virtually identical to the resolution we passed in February. The difference this time is that this is the first opportunity that this House has had to send something on the war in Yemen right to the President's desk.

So I urge all of my colleagues: seize this opportunity. We have a constitutional responsibility and we have a moral obligation to get this done.

Don't let any legislative maneuvers deter us from ending our Nation's complicity in this humanitarian catastrophe. Let's pass this resolution free of changes that would prevent it from going right to the President.

Let me make that more clear: if we change a single word, we will derail this resolution.

Now, the second measure included in this rule is H. Res. 271, in response to a war of a different kind: the Republican war on healthcare. The Trump Justice Department recently moved in Federal Court not only to strike down preexisting condition coverage under the Affordable Care Act, but to overturn this law completely.

If the President succeeds in Texas v. U.S., the protections for preexisting conditions will be gone. The Medicaid expansion will be nullified. Insurance premiums will skyrocket. I could go on and on and on and on.

Striking down the Affordable Care Act would be a tragedy felt by every single American. We would return to the days when our health insurance marketplace was like the Wild West, when insurers were free to decline or limit coverage because someone had acne, or received an organ transplant, or even because they were a victim of domestic violence. That is how messed up our system was, and that is the system that this President and many of my colleagues want to return to.

Now, for the life of me, I cannot understand what President Trump and his allies in Congress have against Americans getting healthcare. For nearly a decade now, they have worked endlessly to sabotage the Affordable Care Act through Congress, the courts, and administrative actions. Apparently, they are not happy that 20 million people have gained healthcare coverage because of this law, or that 130 million Americans with preexisting conditions can get care. We should be celebrating these advancements. But, instead, some on the other side won't be satisfied until the Affordable Care Act is repealed completely.

Now, this Democratic majority has taken a different course. On the very first day of this Congress, we brought the full weight of the House of Representatives to bear in this lawsuit. As a result, the House Counsel has already intervened in this case to protect the healthcare Americans depend on.

Now, this resolution is our chance to speak with one voice against the administration's attempts to abolish the ACA. I have seen my friends on the other side issue sternly worded press releases and strongly worded letters to the administration. But now it is time to back up words with votes, and then I hope they will work with us moving forward as this majority takes action to reverse the administration's healthcare sabotage and strengthen healthcare for every single American.

Madam Speaker, I believe that healthcare ought to be a fundamental right for every single person in this country. It is unconscionable to me that rather than working with us to strengthen the Affordable Care Act and rather than working with us to expand healthcare protections, my Republican friends have chosen instead to wipe it out. I don't know how anybody could think like that. I don't know what motivates the President of the United States and some on the other side of the aisle to move in that direction.

Now we are told by the President that even though he doesn't have a plan to replace this, if he succeeds in nulling and voiding the Affordable Care Act, he said: Well, we will provide you one in the year 2021.

So, Madam Speaker, the man who has spent all of his time trying to rip protections away from people with preexisting conditions, the person who wants to not allow you to keep your kids on their insurance until they are 26, the leader of our country who doesn't believe in capping insurance when it comes to people with lifetime illnesses, the person who doesn't want to lower the cost of prescription drugs--I could go on and on and on and on--says: I want to repeal it, I want it gone, I want the courts to null and void it; and then just trust me, and then we will come up with some magical plan, some secret plan, after the election.

I don't think the American people are going to fall for that kind of nonsense, and they shouldn't because healthcare is not a Democratic issue or a Republican issue. It is a moral issue. It is not even an issue, it is a value that all of us should share.

So I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support us in sending a message loud and clear to the administration that we have had enough of their attempts to sabotage the healthcare bill, we have had enough of their trying to take health insurance away from the American people, and that we are going to stand here and make it very clear that we do believe that everybody is entitled to good healthcare in this country.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I have to give the Republicans credit for one thing. They are consistent on the issue of healthcare, in trying to avoid talking about the issue at hand.

We are not talking about universal healthcare, although I support universal healthcare. We are not talking about Medicare for All, although I personally support Medicare for All. We are not talking about the Canadian system or the German system or any other system.

We are talking about preventing this President and his Republican allies from null and voiding the Affordable Care Act, thereby taking away healthcare protections for every single American. We are talking about preventing the President from throwing

tens of millions of people off health insurance. We are talking about protecting the over 100 million people in this country who have preexisting conditions. That is what we are talking about.

I loved it when the gentleman from Texas said that the first vote that the Republicans asked for in this Congress was a procedural motion to protect people with preexisting conditions. Does the gentleman not know that people with preexisting conditions already have protections under the Affordable Care Act?

I mean, it sounds to me--and it seemed to me at the time--that that Republican procedural vote was about covering your rear and not about serious legislating, about trying to get the American people to believe that we really do care about healthcare and we really do care about protecting people with preexisting conditions, even though we all know here that that is just not the case.

When I hear the gentleman say that the Republicans care deeply about people's healthcare and want to make sure that everybody gets coverage, it is just not true. The reason I say that so emphatically is because I have been around here for the last few years, and I have watched the dozens of votes that the Republicans have brought up, one after another after another after another after another, to repeal healthcare protections for people in this country without proposing an alternative.

Now, the President is saying: Trust us.

Madam Speaker, I include in the Record a Politico article that just appeared that is entitled ``Trump punts health care until after 2020.''

[From POLITICO, April 1, 2019]

Trump Punts Health Care Until After 2020

(By Quint Forgey and John Bresnahan)

just last week the president had seemed to go all in on a new effort to

wipe out obamacare

President Donald Trump signaled Monday that congressional

Republicans would wait until after the 2020 elections to vote

on a GOP replacement for Obamacare--putting off a presumably

savage legislative battle on a hot-button campaign issue

until after his re-election bid.

``Everybody agrees that ObamaCare doesn't work. Premiums &

deductibles are far too high--Really bad HealthCare! Even the

Dems want to replace it, but with Medicare for all, which

would cause 180 million Americans to lose their beloved

private health insurance,'' the president tweeted.

``The Republicans . . . are developing a really great

HealthCare Plan with far lower premiums (cost) & deductibles

than ObamaCare,'' Trump continued. ``In other words it will

be far less expensive & much more usable than ObamaCare. Vote

will be taken right after the Election when Republicans hold

the Senate & win . . . back the House.''

Trump claimed that the as-yet-unseen Republican proposal

``will be truly great HealthCare that will work for

America,'' writing online that ``Republicans will always

support Pre-Existing Conditions.''

The unexpected string of tweets added drama to a week that

has seen Obamacare return to the fore as a policy issue.

The president's pledge comes days after his Justice

Department endorsed a federal court ruling to eliminate the

Affordable Care Act in its entirety, moving to invalidate the

landmark health care law despite objections within Trump's

orbit from Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar and

Attorney General William Barr. The ruling by District Judge

Reed O'Connor had suggested that the Obamacare statute, which

has passed muster with the Supreme Court, was actually wholly

unconstitutional.

The president appeared on Capitol Hill the next day, saying

that the Republican Party ``will soon be known as the party

of health care.''

Trump's call to again put Obamacare repeal on the table for

Hill Republicans was seen as a potential disaster-in-the

making by GOP leaders, who knew their incumbents and

candidates were badly hurt by it last November. And it was an

invitation to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to pound home

the issue once more, as she plans to do with a House vote

this week condemning the administration's decision not to

defend Obamacare in court.

Trump's efforts to eradicate Obamacare have also endangered

some of the administration's health initiatives, such as

lowering prices for prescription drugs and combating opioid

abuse and HIV.

In public and private, Republican leaders made clear that

they didn't want anything to do with the president's most

recent maneuver. They begged Trump to back down and made

their displeasure known to other administration officials, as

well.

GOP lawmakers even took the position that if Trump wanted

to lay out his own health care proposal, then they would be

willing to look at it. But Senate Republicans--facing a tough

electoral fight to maintain their majority in 2020--have

refused to sign on to a new administration drive before

seeing the specifics, giving them room to disavow any Trump

proposal if it hinders their own political outlook.

``I look forward to seeing what the president is proposing

and what he can work out with the speaker,'' Senate Majority

Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said in a brief interview

Thursday, adding: ``I am focusing on stopping the Democrats'

`Medicare for None' scheme.''

McConnell is up for re-election this cycle, as are

vulnerable GOP incumbents including Cory Gardner of Colorado

and Susan Collins of Maine, who said she doesn't want the

Justice Department to push to strike down Obamacare.

The Affordable Care Act has been a thorn in the side of

Republicans since it was enacted in 2010. After the GOP took

back the House in the midterm elections that year, GOP

lawmakers repeatedly passed legislation designed to repeal

Obamacare.

Once Trump was elected president on a promise of different

and better health care options, Republicans seemed on the

path to finally scrapping the law, only to see a 2017

``skinny repeal'' effort fail unexpectedly in the Senate.

That attempt collapsed when Arizona Sen. John McCain--upset

with the irregular way the legislation was being handled--

stunned his colleagues by voting against it.

The President says: Repeal everything, and then we will share our secret plan after the election.

Give me a break. The bottom line is that the American people want us to be on their side, not on the side of big health insurance corporations, not on the side of big drug companies. They want us to be on their side.

It wasn't too long ago when people would be provided insurance that didn't cover anything. It was junk insurance. There are people on the Republican side and people in this White House who are eager to get back to those bad old days.

Stop trying to take away people's healthcare. Stop trying to get in bed with corporate interests that basically are fighting every attempt to make sure that people have access to good, quality care in this country.

By the way, if they repealed the Affordable Care Act, that repeals essential benefits protections, which guarantee that every insurance company has to provide you coverage when you get sick. That wasn't always the case.

This is a ridiculous fight that we are having here. I cannot believe, after the midterm elections, after it was made crystal clear by the American people to the Republicans that they wanted no part of their effort to take away healthcare in this country, that here we are doing it all again.

Now, maybe they didn't intend it this way. The President wasn't on message and came out for repealing the Affordable Care Act outright, and now they have to kind of scramble to try to, again, cover their rears. That is what is happening here.

It is really disillusioning, I think, for people who are observing these proceedings that we are back again fighting over whether or not people are entitled to good healthcare, whether people are entitled to protections under our healthcare laws.

I think this is a ridiculous fight for the Republicans to be waging. But if they want to fight it, they own it. I think they will see, in 2020, that the American people are having none of it.

Madam Speaker, on the war in Yemen, we cannot wait. The starving children in Yemen cannot wait on this President or on my Republican colleagues to do the right thing.

Just to highlight how bad the war is, here are a few statistics. I noticed the gentleman from Texas barely talked about how horrific the situation is in Yemen, but let me give you a few statistics.

Madam Speaker, 130 children under 5 die each day from hunger and disease as a result of this war. The number of cholera cases in Yemen is 1 million. You heard that right. This is the largest cholera outbreak in recent history. Finally, 3-year-olds in Yemen have lived through 18,000 air raids already.

As I mentioned in my opening statement, the bombs that are dropping on civilian populations say ``Made in the United States of America.'' All of us should be outraged by that, and not only by the Saudi Government's behavior in Yemen, but the Saudi Government's behavior in general.

Yet, what is the response by this administration and their Republican allies? Send Saudi Arabia more weapons.

Sell them more weapons. Turn a blind eye to what is going on in Yemen. Let's make believe that the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi never happened.

Again, we need to stand firmly on the side of human rights.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Let me just say you have got to love the Republicans. I mean, they have been in charge of this House for 8 years previously. They were in charge of the entire government the previous 2 years. They had the House, the Senate, and the White House. They didn't even need a supermajority in the United States Senate to be able to get whatever they wanted through, and they couldn't do it.

So the bottom line is this: You had your chance. The American people rejected your attempt to take away healthcare from millions of people. The American people believe people with preexisting conditions ought not to be discriminated against by insurance companies, and so they are having none of what you are selling here.

So you can make excuses all you want, but, unfortunately for the country, you were in charge of the House, the Senate, and the White House for the previous 2 years.

Madam Speaker, I am happy to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Khanna), who has been a leader on the issue of Yemen, and I commend him for his efforts.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I have great respect for the gentleman from Texas, the former chair of the Ways and Means Committee. But I just want to remind my colleagues again that my Republican friends have been in charge of this institution for 8 years. They were in charge for 2 years of the House, the Senate, and the Presidency, and they showed us what they were about.

The gentleman says that they are not going to let the courts take away protections for people with preexisting conditions. Well, my Republican friends tried to do that on dozens of occasions. They brought legislation to the floor that would have ripped protections away from people with preexisting conditions. That is their record. It is there for anybody to see.

Now they are saying: ``Oh, we are now for protecting people with preexisting conditions''? Their whole existence in the majority has been about taking protections away from people. Give me a break. I mean, people know what is going on here.

I appreciate the resolution that the gentleman wants to offer to say we all should work together. Look, I am happy to work with my Republican friends to find ways to improve protections for people.

But I want to remind them, when they were in the majority, they didn't want anything to do with us because we wanted to protect people's healthcare. We wanted to protect people with preexisting conditions. We wanted to make sure that parents could keep their kids on their insurance until they were 26. We wanted to lower the cost of prescription drugs. We wanted to put a cap on people with chronic illnesses so that they wouldn't go bankrupt. We wanted to make sure that insurance companies had to offer you real protections. We had essential benefit protections there.

So we are happy to build on that. What we are not happy to do is to work with them to take these things away, and that is what their leadership has been all about for 8 years in the House. And then when they controlled the House, the Senate, and the White House, that is what they tried to do.

Thankfully, some thoughtful Republicans in the Senate didn't go along with it, so they didn't get their way. And now they are trying to use the courts to try to undermine what this body has done.

Madam Speaker, let me inquire of the gentleman from Texas how many more speakers he has.

Okay. Then I will reserve the balance of my time.

We were expecting one more speaker, but she didn't show up. If the gentleman is ready to close, I am ready to close.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I just find it a little bit interesting that for the last couple of days, my Republican friends have been assailing us for introducing a sense of Congress resolution, and here we have a sense of Congress resolution from them.

I guess you can't make this stuff up.

But in any event, look, I will say to my colleagues, you don't need to defeat the previous question to make clear that you believe that people with preexisting conditions should be protected, because this sense of Congress wouldn't do that.

We have a law that does that now, a law that, unfortunately, my Republican friends have been trying to repeal for years.

So if Members want to protect people with preexisting conditions, then they ought to support us on our sense of Congress resolution.

So, Madam Speaker, when it comes down to it, both of these resolutions that we are offering today are about what this Congress is willing to tolerate, whether we are willing to tolerate our Nation's involvement in the Saudi-led war in Yemen, despite never having authorized it in the first place. Do we really want our Nation to be partners with a regime that murders journalists like Jamal Khashoggi?

President Trump has said of Saudi Arabia: ``They have been a great ally.'' Well, I disagree.

And I hope that this Congress will now speak with one voice that we will not look the other way when it comes to the murder of a U.S. reporter, that we will not look the other way when it comes to the murder of innocent people in Yemen, bombing school buses, bombing weddings, bombing funerals.

Enough. We have to say enough. We are no longer okay with the U.S. and Yemen going on unchecked for another year.

This is about whether this Congress is going to tolerate the administration trying to rip away millions of people's healthcare as well. I know I am not--and many of my colleagues aren't either--willing to tolerate that.

This morning, I joined with many Members of Congress in the House and Senate, including Leader Pelosi and Senator Schumer. We marched from the House and the Senate to the Supreme Court to call on this administration to stop its assault on Americans' healthcare.

Abolishing the Affordable Care Act may be just a talking point to the President, but this law is literally a matter of life and death for people. Millions and millions of Americans could lose their insurance coverage. Premiums and out-of-pocket costs could skyrocket, and lifesaving healthcare could once again be out of reach.

The President and his allies claim to support protections for preexisting conditions, they claim that the Republican Party is the party of healthcare, but their actions say otherwise.

When this House voted on the first day of this Congress to allow us to intervene in Texas v. U.S., more than 190 Republicans sided with the President on his brutal assault on Americans' healthcare.

The majority is not going to stand for it.

Enough is enough. Enough with the unauthorized wars abroad, enough with the assault on people's healthcare.

Madam Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on the previous question, this rule, and the underlying resolutions.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I thank Mr. McGovern for yielding me the customary 30 minutes.

Madam Speaker, we are here again considering one nonbinding resolution and a second resolution that will never become law. Both of these prevent us from focusing on the real business of Congress, which is to legislate.

The first, H. Res. 271, is a resolution condemning the Trump administration's recent position in the case of Texas v. United States.

So let's revisit that for a minute. Republicans are supportive of protecting access to health insurance for individuals with preexisting conditions. This resolution today will not advance the development of any policies to improve healthcare for the American people. There are options that the Democrats could have brought to the floor to lower healthcare costs and increase access to care; such legislation would indeed be worthy of our time. But, instead, we are debating expressions that basically amount to political posturing.

The first vote the Republicans called this year was a motion to require legislation protecting individuals with preexisting conditions. Surprisingly, the Democrats voted against that previous question. In 2017, as part of the proposed replacement for the Affordable Care Act, Republicans included legislation that would have preserved access for those with preexisting conditions.

Speaker Pelosi has already intervened on behalf of the House in Texas v. United States. While the Department of Justice has weighed in, the department is not litigating the case. As with every other legal case, this will play out in the courts. If Congress must act following the final legal decision, certainly we stand ready to do so. In fact, if the Democrats wanted to void this case, they know their options. They could repeal the individual mandate or they could reinstitute the tax on the individual mandate or they could provide a severability clause that was somehow left out when the Affordable Care Act was passed the first time. But we have seen them do none of those options.

The legal process will take time, and no Americans will lose access to their healthcare while the legal process is being heard. Unlike the case of Texas v. United States--which we know will not affect coverage because the judge in that case has issued a stay--individuals covered by what are known as association health plans may actually lose their coverage due to uncertainty in the legal outcome of that case. For last week, a Federal judge in the case of the State of New York, et al. v. Department of Labor, last week a Federal judge ruled that the Department of Labor's final rule on association health plans was not legal.

Association health plans provide employers who otherwise might struggle to provide health insurance for their employees to access the group market through an association, based either on geography or a line of business. The Washington Post recently reported that there are initial signs that association health plans are ``offering generous benefits and premiums lower than found in the ObamaCare marketplaces.''

Association health plans have provided additional choices for Americans seeking innovative healthcare options, but these choices may soon disappear as a result of the lawsuit State of New York, et al. v. the Department of Labor.

The Democrats are using the case of Texas v. United States to delay explaining their real ideas. Their real idea is a one-size-fits-all healthcare. The so-called Medicare for All would be a terrifying reality for our Nation. The Democrats' Soviet style, government-

run, single-payer healthcare bill would not provide access to quality healthcare for Americans. Instead, it would lead to a massive tax increase, eliminate private insurance, and bankrupt the already dwindling Medicare trust fund.

Constituents in my district back in Texas are struggling to afford their health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, and I am certain that we are not the only ones suffering from high premiums and very high deductibles.

Madam Speaker, what good is health insurance if you are afraid to use it because you can't afford your deductible?

This is an issue that I would actually like to see us tackle. But I am confident that a government-run, single-payer system would only further deteriorate our Nation's healthcare.

As the son of a physician who chose to leave Canada because of their system of socialized medicine, I worry that the central state control of healthcare would further damage the doctor-patient relationship. As a physician, I do not believe that the government should hinder a doctor's ability to act in the best interest of his or her patient. I wish the concept of government dictating a physician's practice and decisions was unthinkable, but I find myself here today having to deconstruct the idea of further government control of healthcare.

The House Democratic proposal would implement a global budget, and once that has been set, hospitals and institutions would be required to stick to that for all outpatient and inpatient treatment.

What happens if the budget runs out?

Are the patients simply told: Sorry, we ran out of money, you may try again next year?

Today we should be focusing on the parts of the health insurance market that are working for Americans. For example, 71 percent of Americans are satisfied with their employer-sponsored health insurance. This provides robust protections for individuals with preexisting conditions under ERISA law--a 1970 law, not the 2010 Affordable Care Act. Quite simply, the success of employer-sponsored insurance is not worth wiping out for single-payer healthcare.

Since President Trump took office--and this is important--since the President took office, the number of Americans in employer-sponsored health coverage has increased.

How much has that increased?

I can't precisely tell you because our Congressional Budget folks have not seen fit to give us new coverage numbers.

But since the President took office, how many people are employed that were previously unemployed?

The number is somewhere between 3 and 6 million, and a significant number of those individuals have employer-sponsored health insurance who had no insurance before.

The coverage numbers under President Trump, if the story is ever told, have gone up. Today, there is a greater percentage of Americans in employer-sponsored health coverage than at any time since the year 2000. That is why it is astonishing that House Democrats would want to abolish that insurance option entirely.

Instead of building on the success of our existing health insurance framework, Democrats' radical single-payer, government-run policy would simply tear it down. It would eliminate employer-sponsored health insurance, eliminate all private insurance, eliminate Medicaid, and eliminate CHIP.

Existing Medicare beneficiaries would not be exempt from harm, as the policy would raid the Medicare trust fund, which is already slated to go bankrupt in 2026.

Our Nation's seniors count on the existence of Medicare for their retirement healthcare needs. They have paid into it their entire working lives. How are we supposed to inform them that not only do the Democrats want to endanger their access to Medicare services, but, unbelievably, they will want to increase their taxes also?

There is no question that this policy could be catastrophic for America's patients today and for generations to come.

At least now there is some degree of honesty. Remember, a previous administration said, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. Now at least there is some degree of honesty.

You can't keep your doctor. You can't keep your insurance. You can't keep your personal liberty. You get nothing. Effectively, it would end all the parts of our healthcare system that are, in fact, working for the American people.

Quite simply, single-payer healthcare would be another attempt at a one-size-fits-all approach to healthcare. We know this: Americans are all different. A universal healthcare plan will not meet the varying needs of each and every one of us as individuals. Single-payer is not one-size-fits-all. It is really one-size-fits-no-one.

Again, to restate the obvious: Since the beginning of this Congress, we have heard it. Through the last Congress, we heard it. Republicans support protections for individuals with preexisting conditions.

Instead of spending our time here today worrying about the judicial branch, we could focus on our job as members of the legislative branch. We should be actively working to better our healthcare system, not spending time taking votes that will fail to accomplish any real objective.

Madam Speaker, the second resolution included in this rule directs the removal of the United States Armed Forces from hostilities in the Republic of Yemen that have not been authorized by Congress.

We considered this resolution once before. At that time, Republicans successfully passed a motion to recommit that declared the House's opposition to anti-Semitism. However, this version of the bill does not include that important provision, and we are again debating legislation that is, in fact, based on a false premise.

The resolution is fundamentally flawed. United States forces are not engaged in hostilities between the Saudi-led coalition and the Iranian- backed Houthi forces in Yemen. Previously, the United States was providing midair refueling to Saudi Arabia but ceased this assistance in November 2018. The United States continues to provide limited intelligence-sharing and limited logistics support, which does not amount to engagement in hostilities.

The Trump administration is focused on countering al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula and the Islamic State, mitigating the humanitarian crisis in Yemen and assisting our allies.

The United States does not command, coordinate, accompany, nor participate in counter-Houthi operations or any hostilities other than those directed at al-Qaida and the Islamic State.

I might, here, just add: Those activities against the Islamic State have been significantly successful over the last 2 years.

This resolution sets a dangerous precedent. America has a security agreement with Saudi Arabia, just as we do with 117 other countries, including our NATO allies Canada, Australia, South Korea, and Israel. If this resolution were to become law, it could set a precedent that could prevent us from assisting allies and prevent us from meeting our treaty obligations. Rather than condemning a type of assistance that is no longer being provided by the United States, we should be finding ways to aid the millions of Yemenis at risk of starving to death.

Limiting how our forces can engage in the region will only further exacerbate this conflict and not help bring it to a conclusion.

Madam Speaker, I urge opposition to the rule, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.

Madam Speaker, here is one of the uncomfortable truths of the Affordable Care Act: Under the law, every Member of Congress was supposed to be covered under the Affordable Care Act. Obviously, the pay and benefits of a Member in Congress exceed the subsidy limits, so these would be unsubsidized healthcare.gov policies. But then-Speaker of the House John Boehner, then-Leader of the United States Senate Harry Reid, and President Obama himself all intervened. They were fearful that Members of Congress might leave.

There might be a brain drain in Congress--if such a thing was, in fact, possible--if Members of Congress were required to put their health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, so they created an exception for Members of Congress, and Members of Congress only. They are the only people in the United States who can do this. There is a tax-free subsidy that a Member of Congress can walk into the D.C. exchange and get their coverage in the D.C. exchange.

I rejected that option because: Number one, I didn't think it was right. Number two, I didn't think it was legal. I thought it was going to be taken away from us. Apparently, no one else shared my concern because it still exists.

It does make me wonder why we would not offer a health reimbursement account, and I have brought this up several times in committee, where that same tax-free subsidy could be available to any American to walk into a health insurance plan of their choosing. Why not give the people of the country what Members of the Congress so generously bestowed upon themselves?

I didn't take the option to go into the D.C. exchange. I didn't take the option of the tax-free subsidy that went along with it. I bought an unsubsidized health insurance plan in healthcare.gov, signed up for it October 1, 2012. Many of you may remember that. We were in the process of shutting the government down at the time. It was in all the papers.

I started that process October 1, 2012. The check cleared the middle of January 2013. I went that entire time not knowing if I would have health insurance in healthcare.gov the next year because I couldn't get an answer to any questions.

You couldn't call the people at healthcare.gov. You would try, and you would be put on hold. You would stay on hold for a long period of time. You would eventually get to talk to a person. You would get cut off. You would have to start all over at the beginning. It was a miserable process.

The point is, Members of Congress should have gone through that. We should have had to deal with what we pushed off on the American people, at least those people in the individual market.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Brady), the Republican leader of the second oldest committee in the United States Congress, the Committee on Ways and Means.

I have as many as I need.

It will be me.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to move a resolution that reinforces our long- held views that every American should have preexisting condition protections.

On the opening day of the 116th Congress, House Republicans brought a measure to the floor that called on lawmakers to legislate on locking in protections for patients with preexisting conditions. Unfortunately, in a fit of partisanship, the Democrats blocked this effort.

If the Democrats were serious, they would take up legislation immediately to protect patients with preexisting conditions. Instead, Democrats are trying to score political points.

Our position is simple and clear: Republicans stand ready to protect those with preexisting conditions in a manner that will withstand judicial scrutiny. This is why, if the previous question is defeated, House Republicans will move a resolution that:

Maintains that no American should have their health insurance taken away or lose protections for preexisting conditions due to the Democrats in Congress enacting an unconstitutional law;

Instructs Congress and the Trump administration to immediately ask the Court for a stay in this decision;

Guarantees that no American citizen can be denied health insurance or coverage or charged more due to previous illness or health status;

Includes commonsense consumer protections;

Provides more choice and affordable coverage than the Affordable Care Act;

Lowers prescription drug prices for patients;

Strengthens Medicare for current and future beneficiaries; and

Rejects the Democrats' radical, one-size-fits-all, government-run healthcare that would outlaw the employer-based coverage of more than 150 million Americans.

Finally, it is important to note that Texas v. the United States, the case that is working its way through the courts, did not immediately end ObamaCare and will not affect insurance coverage or premiums for calendar year 2019. Several legal steps remain before the courts reach a final conclusion.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to include the text of my amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Madam Speaker, if the gentleman is agreeable, I am prepared to close.

So, in closing, while Republicans stand ready to legislate, we are again considering unnecessary resolutions. The first seeks to condemn the position of the Department of Justice in Texas v. the United States, the case in which the Department of Justice is not a party.

As I have stated several times, Republicans support protecting coverage

for preexisting conditions. I would hope we could work together to find a way to make health insurance affordable for all Americans rather than considering a divisive messaging resolution.

The resolution to remove the United States Armed Forces from hostilities in Yemen is not only unnecessary, but may prevent future assistance for our allies.

The brave men and women who are assisting Saudi Arabia in the fight against al-Qaida and the Islamic State are working to find solutions to the humanitarian crisis that is unfolding in Yemen, a mission for which we should be unified in our support.

Madam Speaker, with that, I urge a ``no'' vote on the previous question, and a ``no'' on the underlying measures.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I rise to support the joint resolution of disapproval and to urge my colleagues to do so as well.

Let's be clear, there is no national security emergency at the southwestern border. The President and his administration continue to mislead Americans about what really is happening at the border in order to fulfill a misguided campaign promise to build a wall. After weeks of threats and toying with the idea of declaring a national emergency to circumvent Congress, the President, in my view, wrongly issued such a proclamation on February 15 under the authority of the National Emergencies Act.

This proclamation redirects military construction funds provided by Congress to the Department of Defense for projects deemed important to the readiness, welfare, and missions of our Armed Forces. This action is an extreme overreach of Executive authority. No President has ever declared a national emergency to circumvent Congress for a construction project he failed to get approved through legislation.

In fact, this authority to use military construction funds in an emergency has only been used twice for projects in the United States-- first by President George Herbert Walker Bush during Operation Desert Shield and then by President George W. Bush in the aftermath of the 9/ 11 terrorist attacks--and those projects addressed

immediate and recognized needs of our warfighters. While the administration claims President Obama also used this authority, the distinction is, he used it for its true intent, to provide facilities quickly in overseas locations for our warfighters in combat zones. To say those needs are the same as President Trump's campaign pledge to build a wall is simply wrong and misleading.

The President tries to justify this emergency as responding to a humanitarian crisis at the border, but the wall is not an effective solution to that crisis. What he ignores is the fact that the House and Senate overwhelmingly approved $22.54 billion in border security funding in the recent appropriations bill to enhance physical barriers at ports of entry, to hire additional law enforcement personnel, to address the humanitarian needs of migrants, and to increase counternarcotics and counterweapons detection technologies used at the border. Moreover, I would argue that to truly stop the influx of migrants at our southern border, there has to be a much more coordinated international effort led by the Department of State to address the conditions in Central America that cause migrants to leave their homes. Stopping mass migration at the source is the most effective and humane policy.

In its statement opposing the resolution before us today, the administration characterizes increasing numbers of ``family units, unaccompanied minors, and persons claiming a fear of return'' as a national security threat and a national emergency. Let us be clear. These groups of people present no military threat to our Nation. General O'Shaughnessy, Commander of U.S. Northern Command, confirmed this in a hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee on February 26, when he said: ``The threats to our nation from our southern border are not military in nature.'' So I have a hard time understanding why the administration thinks it is acceptable to use Department of Defense dollars for a wall that would provide little to no value to the Department of Defense in countering the very real military threats our Nation does confront across the globe.

Some have argued that the wall is a necessary response to the opioid crisis we are experiencing. There is no doubt we have a serious substance abuse crisis in this country. According to the Centers for Disease Control, over 70,000 people died in 2017 of drug overdoses. That means more people died that year because of drug overdoses than due to car crashes or gun violence. These numbers are staggering, and no community is immune. Congress has worked in a bipartisan manner to combat this crisis, passing landmark legislation and historic increases in funding, but the administration has failed to live up to its commitments. A wall will not fix this problem.

Indeed, while the administration would have the American people believe these drugs are coming across the southwestern border between ports of entry--where they want to build this wall--the facts from the Drug Enforcement Agency's 2018 National Drug Threat Assessment reveal otherwise.

In the case of heroin, in their words, ``The majority of flow is through [privately owned vehicles] entering the United States at legal ports of entry.'' This will not be stopped by building a wall.

When it comes to fentanyl, according to the National Drug Threat Assessment, smaller quantities but of higher purity are ``transported into the United States in parcel packages directly from China or from China through Canada.'' A wall on the southwest border will not stop packages of fentanyl coming through the mail from China. Again, according to the DEA, the fentanyl that is smuggled in from Mexico is most commonly, in their words, ``concealed in [vehicles] . . . through [southwest border ports of entry]''--not through the terrain where the President wants to build a wall.

To underscore this point, just 2 days ago, Customs and Border Patrol announced the seizure of the biggest shipment of cocaine recovered at the ports of New York and New Jersey in 25 years. About 1.6 tons of cocaine were seized from a shipping container that arrived at the port in Newark, NJ. President Trump's wall would not have stopped this shipment.

Instead of addressing, for example, the high-purity fentanyl and fentanyl precursors coming from China or improving law enforcement's ability to detect and seize drugs at the ports of entry, this emergency declaration for a wall will divert billions of dollars from our troops and other national defense priorities and will not make our country any safer. Canceling or delaying military construction projects will have damaging impacts to the military services. These projects are intended to improve deteriorating airfields and piers, provide modern training and maintenance facilities, rehabilitate antiquated and hazardous hospitals and schools, remediate environmental contamination at former bases, and contribute to alliance and partnership responsibilities around the globe.

Bypassing congressional intent that these funds be used on vetted military construction projects in order to build a border wall Congress has rejected time and again is an affront to our Nation's system of checks and balances. It is also an abuse of the power of Congress granted to the President to use in times of true security emergencies or in times of war to address the immediate needs of our Armed Forces.

Furthermore, the administration wants to use another authority, title 10 United States Code, section 284, which allows the Department of Defense, without requiring an emergency declaration, to ``provide support for the counterdrug activities or activities to counter transnational organized crime of any other department or agency of the Federal Government,'' to include the ``[c]onstruction of roads and fences and installation of lighting to block drug smuggling corridors across international boundaries of the United States.''

This seems to be within the realm of the President's contemplation, but because there is only about $238 million remaining in this counterdrug account, the administration plans to reprogram roughly $2.5 billion appropriated in other DOD accounts into this counterdrug account to use for the wall. We know much of the funds being transferred would not be used for their original intent.

For example, the Army will have excess funding in military pay because it will not meet anticipated end strength, and fewer personnel opted into the new blended retirement system than anticipated, which created savings. However, instead of transferring these dollars to higher priority defense needs, DOD will have to use these amounts for the wall.

Ironically, the $238 million now remaining in the counterdrug accounts will not be used for its original purpose of providing critical intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and other detection capabilities for drug interdiction in the Caribbean, Central and South America, and Asia. It will be used to build a wall that will not solve the Nation's drug problems. We are literally taking money that is now being used to help interdict the flow of drugs through the Caribbean, in the Pacific, et cetera, and will put it into the ground in Mexico, where the drugs are not passing through.

We also know DOD has immediate and compelling needs of its own that we should be addressing. The Air Force and the Marines need billions of dollars to clean up and rebuild Tyndall Air Force Base and Camp Lejeune after hurricanes devastated both installations last year. According to the Marines, it is about $3.5 billion to Camp Lejeune, and--according to some numbers I have seen for Tyndall--it is about $5 billion for Tyndall. Instead of fixing Camp Lejeune and Tyndall Air Force Base, the President is going to take that $8 billion and put it into a wall through the deserts of the Southwest.

What is more important to the national security of the United States than rebuilding our major Marine Corps facility on the Atlantic Coast and rebuilding our major Air Force facility in the Florida Panhandle? I think, clearly, we should invest in our troops in the Marines and Air Force. We know all of the services continue to have readiness gaps in aircraft maintenance, depot maintenance, and ship overhauls. We know there continues to be a shortage of childcare facilities in certain locations, but these very real needs in our military are put in jeopardy because of the President's obsession with building a wall on the border.

As I indicated, the President intends to fill the 284 account by reprogramming funds. Congress authorizes this reprogramming process to allow the Department of Defense to conduct a certain amount of transfers of funds between accounts for unforeseen problems. By tradition and custom, reprogramming is done with the specific approval of the defense oversight committees, but this time, when DOD transfers dollars to pay for the President's wall, Congress will have no say. The administration will only notify Congress it is happening. Again, this is another example of complete disregard for the legislative branch's role, as directed by the Constitution, in approving and appropriating funds for the activities of the executive branch.

Furthermore, the amount of funds that can be reprogrammed in a year has a $4 billion limit, and DOD will use a significant portion of that $4 billion to transfer money for the wall. This means that billions of dollars of other high-priority defense needs will not be met this year, needs like ship maintenance, unexpected fuel costs, vehicle upgrades, and other equipment shortfalls we will see at the end of this year. The Department of Defense is in a situation where they have ships that have to be refueled, they have ships that have to be overhauled, they have equipment that must be prepared for the readiness of the troops that they will not have the money for because it has been spent already, and they have exhausted their reprogramming not serving the needs of the military but building a wall in the middle of the deserts of the Southwest.

We need to address the real issues at our southwest border. To do so, I will continue to support effective border security measures, such as those in the recently passed Homeland Security Appropriations Act to invest in new technology and equipment, increase the number of Customs and Border Protection agents, and make smart physical improvements at ports of entry.

This law also included funding to increase the number of immigration judges to help reduce the backlog in our immigration system, provide humanitarian aid for Central American countries, and address humanitarian concerns at the border.

These efforts are important and appropriate for the true nature of the situation, but I cannot support diverting billions of dollars of money from the needs of our men and women in uniform to fulfill a campaign promise. Therefore, I will vote in support of the resolution to terminate the President's inappropriate declaration.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I would like to discuss the situation in Yemen and express my continued support for the resolution that is currently before us.

The conflict in Yemen is approaching its 4th year and has resulted in the most severe humanitarian crisis in the world. The human cost of this war is truly hard to fathom. According to the United Nations, approximately 20 million people--or more than two-thirds of Yemen's population--have no reliable source of food or access to medical care; roughly 10 million Yemenis are on the brink of famine; more than 3.3 million Yemenis have been displaced from their homes; and credible reports indicate that approximately 80,000 children have died of starvation and another 360,000 children suffer from severe acute malnutrition.

The international community must come together to demand an end to the violence in Yemen and a sustainable political agreement. I strongly support the efforts of the U.N. Special Envoy for Yemen Martin Griffiths, in partnership with the United States and other engaged nations, to expeditiously negotiate an end to the conflict and bring relief to the Yemeni people. The December 2018 Stockholm Agreement and resulting ceasefire around the port of Hudaydah was a critical confidence building measure that will hopefully provide a foundation for continued negotiations.

I commend my colleagues Senators Sanders, Murphy, and Lee for their steadfast efforts to keep focus on the suffering of the Yemeni people. As the events of the last 4 years have made clear, there is no military solution to this civil war.

I remain deeply concerned about the significant number of civilian casualties that have resulted from airstrikes by the Saudi-led coalition. I strongly supported the decision last fall to cease U.S. aerial refueling support to the coalition, an outcome I long advocated for. It is appropriate for the U.S. to help the coalition avoid civilian casualties, but those efforts have not yet yielded sufficient results. Secretary Pompeo acknowledged this fact when he told Congress in September that ``Recent civilian casualty incidents indicate insufficient implementation of reforms and targeting processes'' and ``Investigations have not yielded accountability measures'' into the behavior of coalition pilots flying missions into Yemen. It is clear that the coalition has not sufficiently minimized the impact of the war on Yemeni civilians, and more must be done. The U.S. should use all available leverage to affect better outcomes.

The resolution before us would make clear that Congress does not support the introduction of U.S. forces into hostilities in Yemen absent an affirmative authorization for the use of military force. I believe that any U.S. assistance to members of the Saudi-led coalition should be explicitly limited to the following objectives: enabling counterterrorism operations against al Qaeda and ISIS; defending the territorial integrity of Saudi Arabia and UAE, including against specific, imminent ballistic missile and UAV threats; preserving freedom of navigation in the maritime environment around Yemen; and enhancing the training and professionalism of their armed forces with a primary focus on the adherence to the Law of Armed Conflict and the prevention of civilian casualties. With particular regard to defense against ballistic missile and UAV threats, the United States cannot be in the position of providing targeting information in Yemen that would be misused by the Saudi-led coalition either deliberately or through carelessness.

Continued U.S. engagement is critical to helping to resolve the conflict in Yemen, but any assistance to the Saudi-led coalition should be provided in accordance with the principles outlined above, activities which I do not believe conflict with the War Powers Resolution. From a policy perspective, the provision of U.S. support that could be used to enable offensive operations against the Houthis runs counter to our objective of ending the

civil war and risks exacerbating the suffering of the Yemeni people. Beyond the humanitarian crisis, the conflict continues to negatively impact the strategic security interests of the United States, Saudi Arabia, and UAE, including by emboldening Iran and relieving pressure on al Qaeda and ISIS. It is time for this war to end, and Congress should take every opportunity to make its voice clear on this point.

Order of Business

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I wanted to come down here and participate in this debate. It is the second one we have had in a couple of months on the floor of the U.S. Senate regarding this resolution with regard to U.S. policies and participation in helping Saudi Arabia--a difficult ally but nevertheless a longstanding ally of the United States--in its conflict with regard to Yemen. There have been a number of speeches, as there were last time we debated this issue a few months ago on the Senate floor.

I do want to call out my Senate colleague from the great State of Utah, Senator Lee, who has been down here passionately arguing the issue of constitutional authority that the President may or may not have with regard to our U.S. military activities with regard to the conflict in Yemen. Senator Lee is a great constitutional scholar. He is someone who cares deeply about this issue, as do I. He is one of the leaders in the Senate on this issue. That is where he has been focused. That is why I believe he is part of this resolution that we are going to be voting on here in a few minutes on the Senate floor.

I happen to disagree with him that under the War Powers Act, the United States of America doing air refueling of Saudi aircraft--not above Yemen, not above our conflict zone, but above Saudi Arabia--would constitute hostilities. I think that is too limiting a view of that statutory prohibition in the War Powers Act. I know Senator Lee comes at this very honestly; I just happen to respectfully disagree with him.

I say to the Presiding Officer, as you have been watching this debate, the vast majority of my colleagues, all of whom I have deep respect for--Senator Durbin, Senator Sanders, Senator Murphy, and Senator Menendez--have all been on the floor the last hour or so making the case that if we, the United States, limit our involvement in this war in Yemen, somehow it is going to get better.

We all want the humanitarian crisis in Yemen to end. We all want that. I think all 100 U.S. Senators want that. The arguments that have been made--and by the way, they were made a couple of months ago. We debated this for a week. Nearly every U.S. Senator came down here on the floor. They have just done it again. They said: The Saudis are involved in this war in Yemen, a civil war--they are--and the involvement of the United States is actually increasing the humanitarian crisis.

These are the arguments. I have been listening. By the way, they were the arguments a couple of months ago. Senator after Senator after Senator made that argument. Well, I just wanted to provide a counter- argument. I am hoping my colleagues are listening because we should not pass this resolution. We should not pass this resolution.

One thing that all of these debates--and I listened and I watched. Certainly, we debated this a couple of months ago for almost a whole week. Do you know what word never came up from my colleagues in these debates--almost never? The word ``Iran.'' Why is that important? As the Presiding Officer probably knows, the Houthis are actually backed by the Iranians. The Iranians are the biggest state sponsor of terrorism in the world. Right now, we are having this debate all about the humanitarian crisis in Yemen, which we want to stop--we want to stop-- but this resolution would say: OK, one of the best ways to stop it is we, the U.S. Senate, are going to tell the U.S. military that in terms of military assistance regarding Yemen, they can't work at all anymore. We are not going to allow that.

Somehow our lack of involvement is going to, A, help end the war, and B, help end the humanitarian crisis. That is the argument. That is what we are voting on right now. I happen to think that argument is wrong. I think that, but I am going to talk about some people who have testified on this very issue in the last couple of weeks who have a lot of knowledge on this issue. I am going to replay a little bit of what they said because I think it is important for other Senators to hear this. Yes, we have a lot of experts, but I am going to talk about some of the people who have talked about this recently, who I think have a little more expertise on this issue than the vast majority--I would say actually every Member of this body, with all due respect.

Let me go back to this point. Right now, as the Ayatollahs in Tehran watch this debate, they are very pleased. They are very pleased. Why? Because nobody is talking about them. Nobody is talking about them. Well, I am going to talk about them.

First of all, with regard to what started as a humanitarian crisis-- which has been going on for a long time, but this war really kicked in when Iranian-backed Houthi rebels seized power in 2015. There is not a lot of discussion about how this began, but that is how it began. Tehran has been trying to establish a Hezbollah-like entity on the Arabian Peninsula in Yemen, increasing capabilities to target cities in Saudi Arabia with ballistic missiles supplied by Iran. This is all part of Iran's broader strategy in the region to encircle our traditional allies--Saudi Arabia, the Gulf Arab States, and, of course, Israel-- with proxy fighters in Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen. Yet nobody is talking about Iran.

Let's talk about the humanitarian crisis in Yemen. U.S. humanitarian aid has totaled almost $697 million in the last 14 months. Yes, the Saudis could do a much better job, but they have invested over $1 billion in trying to end the suffering.

Iran--the country that started this war, the country that nobody on the Senate floor is even talking about--has not spent a dime to relieve the suffering. Now, of course, they have supplied weapons and ballistic missiles in the tens of millions of dollars but nothing to relieve the suffering.

(Mrs. BLACKBURN assumed the Chair.)

There is something else here that I wanted to reemphasize on the floor of the Senate. The horrible death of Mr. Khashoggi is something we have all condemned. It is very important that we do that. It is very important that we get to the bottom of it. Again, there has been a lot of discussion on that death, and any death is a problem, but let's talk about some other deaths, again, caused by the Iranians--a country we are not even talking about in this debate.

In 2005, 2006, and 2007, they started supplying Iraqi Shia militias with very sophisticated, improvised explosive devices that killed and wounded over 2,000 American soldiers--2,000 American soldiers.

Where is the outrage on that? How come no one is talking about that issue? Where are the editorials about that issue--killing our servicemembers?

The whole concept in which we have to view this issue is through the lens of the Iranian efforts to spread terrorism and to push their malign interests, including in Yemen. Yet, once again, it is all about the Saudis, and no one is talking about Iran. No one is talking about Iran.

What has happened in the last couple of days since we debated this issue 2 months ago? Well, we had an Armed Services Committee hearing. It was classified, but I am going to talk about things that I asked some of the witnesses--all of the witnesses with regard to operations in Yemen and Saudi Arabia--and the answers are clearly not classified.

I asked: Will stopping U.S. support to help the Saudis end the conflict in Yemen? No. Would it prevent more civilian casualties? No. Would it give leverage to our negotiators and speed up the peace process? No. Would it support Israel's interests in the region? No. Would it support the U.S. interests in the region? No. Would it help embolden Iran with its regional malign goals? Yes.

These are the experts in the U.S. intelligence community and the Pentagon giving these answers. This is about 3 or 4 weeks ago. They are questions that I was asking.

Let me give you another group of experts. Just last week, we had a hearing. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee had a hearing for the nominations of our new Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, General John Abizaid, and our new Ambassador to Iraq, a career Ambassador, Ambassador Tueller, a career Foreign Service officer. That Ambassador had just spent the last several years as Ambassador to Yemen.

I had the honor of introducing General Abizaid at his confirmation hearing just last week. He was the U.S. Central Command commander. By the way, he was the U.S. CENTCOM commander when this spread of these IEDs killing American soldiers started and began. I happen to have been a Marine Corps major, a staff officer to General Abizaid for 1\1/2\ years during this time. I had the honor of introducing him.

This is an individual who is a great American, by the way, who spent his life in the Middle East. He retired as a four-star general, speaks Arabic, has a master's degree from Harvard on Middle East studies, and was an Olmsted scholar at the University of Amman in Jordan. He knows a lot about this issue that we are debating, as does Ambassador Tueller, who had just spent the last several years as the U.S. Ambassador in Yemen. He is a career Foreign Service officer who is getting ready to go to Iraq as our Ambassador.

We have a lot of expertise here, but, with all due respect to my Senate colleagues, these gentlemen have spent their lives in the region. I am just going to quote from a couple of the questions and answers that came from General Abizaid and Ambassador Tueller on what is going on in the region.

Here is an important one. Ambassador Tueller was asked about the humanitarian crisis in Yemen. Remember, this is the current Ambassador to Yemen--a very, very knowledgeable career political officer, a career Foreign Service officer. He said: But almost 100 percent of the humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen has been caused by the Iranian-backed Houthis that overthrew the Yemeni Government, destroyed the institutions of state, and caused approximately a 40-percent decline in the GDP of the country.

Let me say that again. This is the current Ambassador to Yemen, who is getting ready to be Ambassador to Iraq. He was asked who was responsible. Right now, if you listen to the Members of the Senate, it is all the Saudis, and the Iranians have nothing to do with it.

Here is a guy who knows more than anybody, with all due respect to the people in this body, on Yemen: One of the things I often feel badly about is because we have a relationship with Saudi Arabia, and understandably, hold them to a higher account. We do focus on the consequences of Saudi actions. That is what is going on in this debate right now. But almost 100 percent of the humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen has been caused by the Iranian-backed Houthis that overthrew the government in 2015, destroyed the institutions of state, and caused approximately a 40-percent decline in the GDP of the country.

He continued: I see very, very little reporting, for example, of the millions and millions of mines that the Houthis have planted around the country, that in fact have caused more civilian casualties and continue to cause civilian casualties going into the future. That is a great concern, and I think the American people need to be concerned about the humanitarian issues caused by the Iranian-backed Houthis.

This is last week in the Senate Foreign Relations committee. Now, you wouldn't know it in this debate because everybody is saying the whole problem is Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia is a problem. They are an ally. They are a difficult ally. They are a complicated ally. But one of the experts in our country on this issue says that almost 100 percent of this is the Iranian-backed Houthis who caused the humanitarian crisis.

Let me just make a couple of more points. This is General Abizaid. I see the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee is on the floor, and I hope he will talk to this because this was in front of his committee. Iran and its proxies want us out of the region.

By the way, that is what this resolution would help us do. This is General Abizaid last week: They see that their agenda is served by having the United States disengaged and out to not counter their malign influence. I think it is very important that we work to ensure that the relationship with Saudi Arabia allows us to continue our influence in the region. I think, as we continue to apply pressure to them, what I hope is that we can create conditions with some of the elements to begin to abandon sort of the Houthi ideological project, a project that because it is an Iranian project really in Yemen will never bring stability to Yemen.

Again, what is going on here is that the Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen are causing the humanitarian crisis. The Iranian regime wants us out of the region, including in Yemen, and the U.S. Senate is getting ready to vote on a resolution that does just that.

Again, the Ayatollahs are watching this debate, and they are very pleased. They are very pleased with what is happening.

Let's hear one more final thing that General Abizaid said, again, in this hearing just last week--a man who understands so much more about what is going on in the region than my colleagues here on the Senate floor: One thing we can't afford in Yemen, we can't afford to withdraw U.S. expertise to the coalition about how to fight.

He is talking about the Saudis.

He continued: Does anyone think that if we leave and take our assistance with regard to the Saudis, that is going to help the humanitarian situation in Yemen?

The question almost answers itself, and here is General Abizaid, the former CENTCOM commander, at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee just last week, saying that is not a good idea: If we want them, the Saudis, to fight right, we need to continue to give them that expertise.

That is exactly the opposite of what this Senate resolution is getting ready to do.

He continued: As far as competence in military operations conducted by the Saudi coalition, I think they have much work to do. We all agree with that. It is very important for us to continue to talk to them about the targeting system--we all agree with that--and about the way that they go about hitting the various targets, and about the professionalization of their forces, and when mistakes are made, that they do like what we do, which is to convene a board of officers, talk about the mistakes, and then take corrective action necessary to gain better and better expertise.

This is still General Abizaid, just last week: I am hopeful that there is a way to move forward with regard to easing humanitarian problems in Yemen, and that it will continue. And if I am confirmed-- which we all hope he will be very soon--will tell the Saudi Government they need to do that.

But the former commander of U.S. Central Command--and I spent 1\1/2\ years with him in the region, seeing him in action every day-- emphatically stated that if we don't work with the Saudis in terms of military assistance, it is going to get worse.

The current Ambassador to Yemen testified last week that almost 100 percent of the humanitarian crisis in Yemen is caused by the Houthi rebels backed by the Iranians. Yet, if you listen to the debate today and if you listen to the debate 3 months ago on the floor of the Senate, almost nobody even talks about Iran.

So given that the experts believe this strongly, given that they have more knowledge--and they are not political; one is a career four-star general, and one is a career Foreign Service officer--and given that they think this is a really bad idea to vote for this resolution, I am not sure how it advances American interests. I am not sure how it advances humanitarian interests in Yemen, which we all want to advance. It certainly will not advance the peace process, which we all want to move forward.

The only entity in the Middle East that will be cheering a resolution in support of American withdrawal with regard to the Saudis is the biggest state sponsor of terrorism in the region, and that is Iran. That is not just me saying it. That is literally some of the most prominent experts in the country who have spent their lives focused on these issues.

I urge my colleagues to vote no on this resolution that we are going to take up here very soon.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I stand with Senator Sanders and with Senator Murphy as a cosponsor of the legislation before us, S.J. Res. 7, which would remove U.S. Armed Forces from Saudi Arabia's war in Yemen.

There were 56 Senators who voted in favor of this resolution just a few months ago, in December, or at the end of the last Congress. That vote was, of course, a victory for the Constitution and for the separation of powers, to say nothing of prudence, of peace, and of justice. The House of Representatives passed its own version of this resolution earlier this year. Now it is back to us. Now it is our turn. Now it is our job to get this passed. We have the opportunity today to reassert Congress's constitutional role over declaring war and over putting American blood and treasure on the line.

In this particular case, the evidence is clear that we ought not be involved in this unconstitutional, unjustified, and, ultimately, immoral war. The Yemeni war has claimed the lives of tens of thousands of people, including those of countless innocent civilians. It has created countless refugees, orphans, widows, and it has also displaced countless families. The numbers are nothing short of staggering.

Since 2015, more than 6,000 civilians have died, and more than 10,000 have been wounded. The majority of these casualties--over 10,000 of them--has been as the result of airstrikes led by the Saudi-led coalition. In one attack last year, the Saudis dropped a U.S.-made bomb on a schoolbus that killed 40 young children on a school trip and wounded another 30 children in addition to that.

Yemen is now facing rampant disease and mass starvation. An estimated 15 million people do not have access to clean water and sanitation, and 17 million don't have access to food. Photographs from Yemen depict malnourished children who have every rib in their tiny bodies exposed and jetting out as manifestations of their starvation. Over 85,000 children have died of starvation since 2015.

In short, the situation in Yemen has become the worst humanitarian crisis in the world, and the United States has been abating the horrors of this war. Indeed, our country has actually made the crisis worse by helping one side bomb innocent civilians. I don't say that lightly. It is with great soberness that I raise this very real and very serious accusation.

So it begs the question: How did we get entangled in this crisis to begin with? How did we get involved? Why and how and under what circumstances did this become our war to fight?

In March of 2015, Saudi Arabia launched a war against the Houthi rebels. Shortly after the Houthis ousted the Saudi-backed government in the capital city of Sanaa, the Obama administration--without consulting Congress, of course--authorized U.S. military forces to provide logistical and intelligence support to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia-led coalition fighting that war. U.S. military support has continued ever since then, for the last 4 years, including with midair refueling, surveillance, reconnaissance information, and target selection assistance. In other words, we have been supporting and, in fact, have been actively participating in the activities of war. We are involved in this conflict as, no less, cobelligerents.

Some of my colleagues have argued to the contrary and have suggested that we are somehow not involved in this war in Yemen. Yet, if we are honest with ourselves, we know that isn't true. We know that this argument falls dead flat on its face. As Defense Secretary Jim Mattis himself acknowledged in December of 2017, just a little over a year ago, our military has been helping the Saudis with target selection assistance or with ``making certain they hit the right thing.''

In other words, we are helping a foreign power bomb its adversaries in what is, undoubtedly, indisputably, a war. Previously, we were helping them even with midair refueling assistance--that is, helping Saudi jets that were en route to bombing missions and other combat missions on the ground inside of Yemen. If that doesn't constitute direct involvement in a war, I don't know what does.

Other opponents of our resolution claim somehow that our involvement in Yemen is constitutional, that it is lawful under the War Powers Act of 1973. It is true that under the War Powers Act, the executive branch is authorized to use Armed Forces in cases of emergencies and in other certain, rigid, well-established time constraints. Yet, you see, the conflict in Yemen does not constitute a threat to the safety of American citizens, and our involvement has far surpassed any emergency time allotted under the War Powers Resolution.

The Houthis, while, perhaps, no friends of the American people, make up a regional rebel group that does not itself threaten American national security. In fact, the longer we fight against it, the more we give reason to it to hate America and to embrace the opportunists who are our true enemies in the region--those who make up the regime in power in Iran. The more we prolong the activities that destabilize this region, the longer we harm our own interests in terms of trade and broader regional security.

The War Powers Act also states that the assignment of U.S. Armed Forces to coordinate and to participate in the hostilities of a foreign power, of a foreign country, itself constitutes a conflict of war. Some have argued that we have not been engaging in hostilities and, therefore, somehow, have not violated the War Powers Act. This claim falls flat in several respects.

First, the claim itself is categorically untrue. As we heard before, we are literally telling the Saudis what to bomb, what to hit, and what and whom to take out.

Second, these opponents are relying on an old, 1976 memorandum that is internal to the executive branch and internal to the Department of Defense itself that was written by a lawyer within the Department of Defense. Talk about the fox guarding the henhouse. It defers to a Department of Defense lawyer's memorandum from 1976 that uses an unreasonably,

unsustainably, indefensibly slim definition of the word ``hostilities.'' This definition may or may not have been relevant then. I don't know. I was only 5 years old at the time it was written. Yet we no longer live in a world in which ``war'' means exclusively two competing countries that are lined up on opposite ends of the battlefield, in two columns, and that are engaged in direct exchanges of fire across the same ground. That is not how war is waged anymore.

War activities, of course, have changed dramatically since 1976. Like bell-bottoms and so many fads of that era, this is a dynamic that has changed today. Our war in today's America increasingly relies on high technology and on high-technology solutions. Our wars have involved cyber activity, reconnaissance, surveillance, and high-tech target selection. These, by the way, are the precise activities that we ourselves are undertaking in Yemen. It is not just that we are involved somehow on the sidelines. These activities themselves constitute war.

Even aside from this overly narrow, cramped, and indefensible definition of the word ``hostilities'' and separate and apart from the definition of the word ``hostilities,'' under the War Powers Act, we ourselves do not have to technically be involved in hostilities in order to trigger the responsibilities of the Congress under the War Powers Act in order to make sure that the legislative branch actually does its job to declare war or to authorize the use of military force under the War Powers Act and under the Constitution. The War Powers Act, in fact, is triggered so long as we are sufficiently involved with the armed forces of another nation when those armed forces of another nation are themselves involved in hostilities, which they indisputably are.

The Saudi-led coalition directing the activities in the civil war in Yemen against the Houthis is undeniably involved in hostilities. We are undeniably assisting the coalition in those movements, in those activities, in those acts of war. We, therefore, by definition under the plain language of the War Powers Act itself, are subjected to the terms of the War Powers Act. The Saudis are, without question, involved in those hostilities. We can't doubt that. No one here can credibly claim to the contrary.

Finally, some argue that this resolution might somehow harm or undermine or hurt our efforts to combat terrorism in the region specifically with regard to al-Qaida and ISIS. Importantly, however, this resolution explicitly states that the resolution would not impede the military's ability to fight these terror groups. In fact, U.S. involvement in Yemen has, arguably, undermined the effort against al- Qaida's affiliates. The State Department's Country Reports on Terrorism for 2016 found that the conflict between the Saudi-led forces and Houthi insurgents has actually helped al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, as it is often described, and ISIS' Yemen branch to ``deepen their inroads across much of the country.''

It appears that our involvement in Yemen accomplishes no good at all, only harm--and significant harm at that. Recent events are bringing that into an even clearer light. In October, there was the killing of Jamal Khashoggi. Then, just the week before last, news broke that the Saudis tortured a man while he was detained there in 2017. He had dual citizenship in the United States and Saudi Arabia. Shortly before that, a report also came out that suggested that Saudi Arabia had transferred American-made, American-manufactured weapons to al-Qaida-linked fighters and to other militant groups. In other words, the Saudis are likely using our own weapons in violation of our own end-user agreements with them, by the way, to commit these atrocities of war. That is not OK.

It is becoming clearer and clearer that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is not an ally that deserves our unwavering, unquestioning, unflinching support. It is not an ally that deserves our support or our military intervention, especially when our own security--the safety of the American people--is not on the line, and I haven't heard anyone in this body maintain otherwise.

Indeed, perhaps we ought not be supporting this regime at all. At a bare minimum, we ought not be deferring unflinchingly to this regime, and we ought not be fighting an unjust war on its behalf half a world away, putting at risk not only U.S. treasure but also, potentially, U.S. blood and the blood of countless innocent civilians who are in the line of fire as a result of this. To the contrary, to continue supporting them in this war would be bad diplomacy and would undermine our very credibility on the world stage.

Look, regardless of where you stand on this war, these decisions matter, and we ought to take them seriously. In fact, each and every one of us has sworn an oath to take things like this seriously.

The Constitution puts the war-making power--the power to declare war--in the hands of Congress. There was a good reason for this. It has everything to do with the fact that Congress is the branch of the Federal Government most accountable to the people at the most regular intervals, and our Founding Fathers wisely understood that it was dangerous to allow the powers of government to accumulate in the hands of the few or in the hands of one person.

One of the reasons they put the war-making power in the hands of Congress is they wanted to make a strong break away from the system that had evolved in our old system of government, the one involved in our old capital based in London, where the chief executive himself had the power unilaterally to make war.

This was a decided break from that tradition. There were other traditions that we continued, that we adopted. Many of our rights, our liberties, our processes in government were patterned after the British model. This one was not. It was deliberately the choice of the Founding Fathers not to continue with that tradition, and that is why we and only we can declare war.

You see, it is not that we are flawless. It is not that we are any smarter than people in other branches. Quite to the contrary, it has only to do--and everything to do--with the fact that we are more accountable to the people at more routine intervals.

When you put the power to declare war or authorize the use of military force in Congress, you guarantee that this decision will be made carefully and deliberately in full view of the American people. Public debates have a way of bringing the American people into the discussion, into the deliberation.

You see, there is no such thing as a clean war. There is no such thing as a war that is detached from moral peril, from moral consequences, from grave and heartbreaking results in which innocent men, women, and children lose their lives or are subjected to the worst privations known to human beings.

It is for that very reason that we owe it to those affected by war-- not just the brave men and women who fight for us and protect us but for people all over the world and for the good name of the United States to be protected--that as we publicly debate the moral consequences of war, the grave implications that war has for our country and others involved in the conflict are the business of all of the American people and should never be reserved for one person.

We need to carefully weigh the risks and merits of engaging in any conflict in an open and in an honest manner. So instead of placing this power in the hands of a King or even just in the executive branch generally where it can be used unilaterally to declare war, the Founders placed it here in Congress, knowing that we are more accountable to the people than the other branches, and the power would be less likely to be abused here.

There is a lot at stake. There is a lot at stake whenever the lives of American military personnel are placed on the line and whenever the lives of innocent men, women, and children are on the line, too-- precious lives, each of immeasurable worth. These decisions result in the shedding of blood, the shedding of blood that will be on our hands if we fail both to exercise our constitutional prerogatives and to take that very responsibility very seriously.

Over the last 80 years, we have tragically seen what happens when the muscle of the legislative branch begins to atrophy as a result of the failure of those who occupy these very seats to exercise their legislative muscle. When we fail to exercise that power that the

Constitution entrusts to us, entrusted to us in that document to which each of us has taken an oath, we imperil the entire system and the safety of our country. We also cheapen the moral certainty with which our Armed Forces need to be able to proceed in order to make what they do right and legally and morally justifiable.

So today, I respectfully and with all the passion and energy I am capable of communicating urge my colleagues once again to vote to end our involvement in this unauthorized, unjustified, unconstitutional, and immoral war.