SAFEGUARD Act of 2021

Mr. President, I move to discharge the Committee on Foreign Relations from further consideration of S.J. Res. 35, a joint resolution providing for congressional disapproval of the proposed foreign military sales to the Government of Egypt of certain defense articles and services.

Mr. President, according to tradition, King Menes united the two lands of Europe about 5,000 years ago. Although Egypt appears today as a single state on the globe, American foreign policy still treats the country as if it were two completely different lands--one a critical ally of American aid and one a tyrannical nightmare unworthy of American security assistance.

A State Department human rights report details how General Abdelfattah Elsisi converted a country into a prison. Among other horrors, Egyptian security forces engage in extrajudicial killings, torture, as well as harsh crackdowns on anyone who wishes to practice the right of freedom of speech.

As a result of Egypt's abysmal human rights record, the Biden administration recently blocked $130 million in annual security assistance. At first glance, that might sound like a rebuke to Egypt. Before applauding this supposedly principled act in solidarity with the long-suffering Egyptian people, keep in mind that in the same week, the State Department--the Biden State Department--approved a military sale of Super Hercules aircraft, which are used to airdrop troops and military equipment, to the Elsisi regime for $2.2 billion. On the one hand, they blocked $130 million; on the other hand, they approved $2.2 billion.

In what may be only described by definition as a slap on the wrist, the $130 million the State Department blocked is only one-tenth of the annual $1.3 billion the United States has given to Egypt every year since 1987. In fact, Egypt is one of the largest recipients of U.S. military aid.

If the State Department strictly adhered to Federal Leahy laws, it would insist that Egypt abandon its despotic ways before Egypt received any more security assistance. This law was named after our colleague Senator Patrick Leahy. These laws compel the United States to withhold security assistance to countries that have committed gross violations of human rights.

The Biden administration should strictly enforce the Leahy laws and deny Egypt the American dollars it craves until it becomes a place where human rights are honored and respected. Instead, as punishment for their crimes, the ruling class of Egypt will somehow, some way, have to make due with only 90 percent of what they annually expect in largesse from the American taxpayer. Adjusting for inflation, the decades-long transfer of wealth from America to Egypt amounts to over $41 billion. Of the $41 billion, some estimate that the previous President, Hosni Mubarak, and his family stole nearly half. The aid not stolen is used by Egypt to buy American weaponry.

Since 2009, the United States has sold Egypt $3.2 billion in fighter aircraft,

$1.3 billion in tanks and armored vehicles, $750 million in missiles, $36 million in ammunition, and $328 million in military technology, as well as $240 million in naval craft. As the United States prepares for yet another military sale, perhaps we should review how one of our most reliable customers treats their own people.

Human Rights Watch reports that ``Egypt's security apparatus has arbitrarily arrested and prosecuted tens of thousands of persons'' and that ``torture crimes against detainees in Egypt are systematic, widespread, and likely constitute crimes against humanity.''

One such victim of torture is known as Hamza. He was arrested at his home late one night for the crime of participating in a public demonstration. Despite tireless attempts to track him down, his family was unable to locate him for months. Later, it was revealed that the officers who captured him--the officers of the government of Elsisi-- used electric shocks on his genitals, his head, and his tongue. But even that was not enough for Elsisi's henchmen, who later suspended Hamza from his arms until his arms were dislocated at the shoulder.

As a physician, I have treated patients who have dislocated shoulders. It is a very painful injury. Imagine being hauled up by your own government, suspended by your arms until your shoulders are dislocated, and then when they finally cut him down, they left him on the floor without medical treatment for 3 winter days without any blankets.

Such torture would be virtually unbearable for any man. Hamza was not even yet a man; he was a 14-year-old boy at the time of his torture and arrest.

Hamza is not alone. The stories of other victims appear in Human Rights Watch's 43-page report detailing Egypt's systemic torture of children, including a victim as young as 12 years old.

In Egypt, journalism--journalism--is a dangerous profession. The Committee to Protect Journalists ranks Egypt the third worst jailer of journalists in the world behind only China and Myanmar.

Take just a few examples. When a 26-year-old man died in police custody, a prominent Egyptian journalist, Islam el-Kahly, was arrested for covering and reporting on the detainee's death. He is only one of many well-known journalists to be imprisoned for the crime of keeping his people informed.

Photojournalist Mahmoud Abu Zeid was arrested in 2013 for covering the violent break up of a sit-in protest--a peaceful sit-in protest--in Cairo. Zeid was released after 5 years in prison, but he is still not free. He is required to report to the police station at 6 p.m. every night, where it is unknown whether the officer on duty will keep him or not, whether he will be imprisoned every night of his life.

Perhaps no activity is more dangerous than running for Egypt's Presidency. General Elsisi was reelected--if you can call it an election--in 2018 with 97 percent of the vote, whose Soviet-style results were made possible only after opposition candidates were effectively eliminated.

Two candidates, Sami Anan and Ahmed Konsowa, were imprisoned. A third candidate to run against Elsisi, Ahmed Shafik, was placed under house arrest. A senior staffer to one of the candidates, Hisham Geneina, was brutally attacked by three men, resulting in serious damage to his left eye and orbital bones. When another candidate, Mohamed Anwar al-Sadat, withdrew from the race, he said: ``It's like committing suicide to run against someone like this.''

President Biden pledged to put human rights at the ``center of our foreign policy.'' Torture of children, arbitrary arrests of dissidents and journalists, sham elections, and the violent crushing of peaceful opposition--if these are not gross violations of human rights, nothing is.

The United States cannot proudly proclaim human rights to be the center of our foreign policy while it arms a regime that has a war against its own people. We should end military sales to Egypt's criminal masters. Partially taking away some military aid while offering new sales that are 10 times what we withheld shows weakness in the face of repression.

Our weapons are an incredibly important part of America's power, and we should not willy-nilly and without judgment give them to anybody and everybody around the world. They could be used as leverage for improving human rights. Instead, we just give them, and there is this vicious cycle of enriching those who produce the munitions and no concern for human rights.

Mere slaps on the wrists cannot hide the inescapable fact that the United States has handsomely rewarded Egypt as it degenerated into one of the most autocratic places on the globe. America should in no uncertain terms demonstrate we will no longer strengthen a strongman.

My resolution is to cancel military sales. It offers a choice-- whether the United States will side with the Egyptian people or with their oppressors.

Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the motion to discharge S.J. Res. 35.

I am a little perplexed by the Parliamentarian's decision that this can move forward because there is a statutory timeframe that says that the resolution needs to be brought forth in order for it to have validity.

My understanding of the Parliamentarian's decision is that even though--if there was passage of this resolution--it would not have validity because it is past the timeframe, it still can be brought. That seems to be a pursuit of the Senate's time in a way that is an extraordinary amount of time on unlimited numbers of discharge resolutions that potentially exist that, having passed the statutory timeframe, can still be brought to the Senate floor even though whatever the vote is has no consequence. I fail to understand that.

Since that is the ruling, let me just say that I appreciate that the Senator from Kentucky has concerns about human rights in Egypt, and I agree that we must absolutely continue to raise concerns in a way that will meaningfully bring about positive change. I believe we should be doing more to prioritize a country's human rights record in the context of our broader relationship.

In fact, last year, with several of my colleagues, I introduced S. 1473, the Safeguarding Human Rights in Arms Exports Act, or what we call the SAFEGUARD Act, to ensure that human rights issues full attention and arms exports decision making are considered.

And I invite all of my colleagues from both sides of the aisle to support and cosponsor this important legislation.

As I think everyone in this body knows, for years I have led the fight in the Senate against arms sales to countries that commit significant and repeated human rights abuses such as Saudi Arabia.

Last Congress, the Senate approved 23 resolutions of disapproval that I introduced when the Trump administration sought to short circuit our rights to consider these sales according to law.

Joint resolutions of disapproval are just one tool that we have, and we must make sensible distinctions about the types of systems we consider. In this particular debate, as I have argued before, a critical distinction is between arms that are inherently offensive and lethal and those that are not. Some are defensive; some are simply logistical.

Today, we are considering a sale of 12 cargo aircraft, which I believe squarely falls in the category of largely defensive, nonlethal arms. This aircraft is used for transporting military and other cargo, including humanitarian supplies, as well as personnel in-country and internationally. Egypt has earlier model C-130s since the 1980s, but its current fleet is aging and becoming more expensive to maintain.

The United States and Egypt have a long and valuable relationship that goes beyond the security realm. Egypt is also an important security partner for other U.S. allies in the region. This, of course, does not mean that it is above reproach--it is not--or that the nature of that relationship is static. It is not.

Indeed, I supported the Secretary of State's determination made last month not to release $130 million in withheld foreign military financing because Egypt's government has not made, in his view, sufficient progress in human rights, especially with regard to the

treatment of peaceful activists and the continued targeting of independent civil society organizations.

I have used my prerogative as chair of the Foreign Relations Committee in the arms sales process before, and I will continue to do so in the future regarding systems that may consistently relate to these concerns.

But in the end, our relationship with Egypt has to be one of maintaining a balance between the foreign policy and national security concerns of the United States and our partners.

We should, however, continue to raise human rights concerns and press for meaningful reforms. We should continue encouraging the government to uphold its own commitments, but to this end, because these are purely, not only--they are logistical at best, I urge my colleagues to reject this motion to discharge.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, tonight we are going to consider S.J. Res. 35 and 36, and they are the resolutions of disapproval regarding arms sales to Egypt. Egypt has been a key partner of the United States since the 1979 Camp David Accords.

It continues to play a critical role in Middle East peace. Egypt is a valuable counterterrorism partner and is essential to U.S. accession in the region and the U.S. success in the region. Look, for those who haven't had the good fortune of being there, when the peace broke out between Israel and Egypt decades ago, Egypt played a key role in making that peace. And ever since then, the border between Egypt and Israel on the Sinai has been peaceful, notwithstanding the fact that they have incidents there all the time.

But the Egyptians and the Israelis, brokered by the multilateral force that is there, keeps the peace, and it has been a great success story in the Middle East, one of the few that has had duration. And so in that regard, Egypt has been very valuable in helping keep the peace in the region.

The Biden administration and Democratic Senate and House leaders agreed on these sales because they are in the interest of the United States and, indeed, of the world and particularly of the Middle East. These sales of cargo aircraft and radar support the United States-Egypt relationship and are in keeping with Egypt's legitimate defense requirements.

Human rights are a critical element of our foreign relations. They always have been, and they always will be. And Egypt has problems it needs to fix.

The United States has withheld aid and taken other measures to highlight our concerns to the Egyptian Government. Indeed, Egypt is not a perfect partner, and we have almost no perfect partners when we are dealing with foreign countries on national security.

Nonetheless, each of these is transactional, and they have to be weighed and viewed individually. These sales that we are talking about here to Egypt present no direct human rights concerns and should be separated from that conversation.

So, on substance, I oppose the resolution.

In addition to that, there is a bigger issue here. The statutory 30- day congressional notification period for these sales expired last Wednesday, March 2. The Parliamentarian has now ruled that the statutory 30-day period is effectively irrelevant and that any Senator can offer for privileged consideration a resolution of disapproval for any arms sales notified over the course of an entire Congress.

If this stands and continues, it would have a chilling effect on U.S. alliances and partnerships worldwide, and it could set a new procedure as far as dilatory tactics are concerned on the Senate floor.

The 1987 precedent that the Parliamentarian cites as justification is from a time when there was a bipartisan agreement to extend the timeline for simple procedural reasons. This is not the case now. And I disagree with the Parliamentarian's interpretation thereof.

It always amazes me around here that we can get a Parliamentarian ruling that is in direct--I mean direct contradiction of a statute, which is what we have here.

I ask--and I would urge--Senate leadership to work to ensure the intent of the statutory 30-day notification period is restored. Perhaps we should repass the statute and say we really, really mean it. Nonetheless, that is where we are, and this really needs to be corrected.

Vote on Motion to Discharge

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. Inhofe).