Protecting Our Federal Workforce from Forced COVID–19 Vaccination Act

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I rise to discuss the fiscal year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act.

Over the coming days, the Senate will consider this bill, which the Armed Services Committee passed by a broad bipartisan margin of 23 to 3 in July.

I look forward to debating and improving this bill, as we all work toward ensuring our military has the right tools and capabilities to combat threats around the globe and keep Americans safe.

First, I would like to acknowledge Ranking Member Inhofe, whose leadership on this committee and this body has been invaluable. His commitment to our men and women in uniform is unwavering, and he was instrumental in helping to produce this bipartisan legislation.

As we debate the NDAA, we must keep in mind that the United States is engaged in a strategic competition with China and Russia. These near- peer rivals do not accept U.S. global leadership or the international norms that have helped keep the peace for the better part of a century.

This strategic competition is likely to intensify due to shifts in the military balance of power and diverging views of governance. And it is unfolding amidst climate change and the emergence of highly disruptive technologies.

The interconnected nature of these threats will drive how we transform our tools of national power to respond. The passage of the FY2022 NDAA will be a critical step in meeting the complex challenges before us.

Turning to the specifics of this year's Defense bill, the NDAA authorizes $740 billion for the Department of Defense and $27 billion for national security programs within the Department of Energy.

For the first time in years, this legislation, like the President's budget request, does not include a separate overseas contingency fund, or OCO, request. Any war-related costs are included in the base budget.

This bill contains a number of important provisions that I would like to highlight.

To begin, we have a duty to ensure that the United States can outcompete, deter, and prevail against near-peer rivals. The NDAA supports the Department of Defense in this endeavor by providing the resources needed by the combatant commanders to carry out the national defense strategy, or NDS.

Every 4 years, the Department reports the NDS to outline the national security objectives of the administration. The 2018 NDS provided a framework, and the DOD will release a new strategy in the coming months.

In this regard, this bill creates a commission on the national defense strategy for the forthcoming NDS in order to boost our military advantage. Last year, the Armed Service Committee created the Pacific Deterrence Initiative--or PDI--to better align DOD resources in support of military-to-military partnerships to address the challenges posed by China.

This year's bill extends and modifies the PDI and reiterates the committee's intent to improve our force posture in the Indo-Pacific, to increase readiness and presence, and to build the capabilities of our partners and allies to counter these threats.

Future investments under PDI should focus on military and nonmilitary infrastructure in the Indo-Pacific region. This will assist in distributed military operations, and it will be more effective in countering predatory Chinese infrastructure development practices.

The bill also requires the Secretary of Defense to provide recurring briefings on efforts to deter Chinese aggression and military coercion. It compels a briefing on the advisability and feasibility of increasing United States defense cooperation with Taiwan. It is important we help Taiwan improve its overall readiness and acquire asymmetric capabilities most likely to make the Chinese Government question their ability to take the island by force.

I want to emphasize, however, that our Nation's ability to deter China cannot be based on military might alone. We must strengthen our network of allies and partners, which will be essential to any strategy for the Indo-Pacific region. We must also ensure that, as we shift our focus to the Indo-Pacific, we do not lose sight of priorities in other areas, like Europe.

This year's bill authorizes the continuation of the European Deterrence Initiative--or the EDI--recognizing the continued need to invest in support for our European allies and partners as we work toward the shared goal of deterring Russian aggression, addressing strategic competition, and mitigating shared security concerns, the most recent one being the amassing of Russian troops on the border of Ukraine.

Turning to personnel, the key factor that makes the United States the greatest military power in the world is its people. We need to ensure that our uniformed personnel know every day how much we appreciate what they do and that we have their backs.

Congress has done a good job in providing benefits to the military and their families, and this year's Defense bill continues to do that. But our military is showing the strain of two decades of continuous deployments, and I am concerned that there has been a dangerous erosion of trust within the chain of command; and issues such as racism, extremism, sexual harassment, and sexual assault have been allowed to fester and create friction and division.

The Department of Defense is addressing those issues, but Congress must provide guidance and resources. To this end, the bill strengthens the All-Volunteer Force and improves the quality of life of the men and women of the total force: the Active Duty, the National Guard, and the Reserves; their families; and, importantly, the Department of Defense civilian employees, who contribute significantly to the effectiveness of our operations.

It reinforces the principles of a strong, diverse, inclusive force and that force cohesion requires a command climate that does not tolerate extremism or sexual assault misconduct or racism; and that quality healthcare is a fundamental necessity for servicemembers and their families.

Importantly, this NDAA includes the funding necessary to support a 2.7 percent pay raise for both military servicemembers and the DOD civilian workforce. We have also included a provision that would amend the Military Selective Service Act to require the registration of women for Selective Service. I am proud of this position, which passed the Armed Services Committee on a broad bipartisan basis.

Society, the military, and the nature of warfare itself have evolved significantly since the 1948 Military Selective Service Act passed. Back then, women were denied the opportunity to serve in

combat roles and key leadership positions, and entire technologies and platforms didn't even exist.

Today, all military occupations, including combat roles, are open to women, and military success depends heavily on servicemembers with advanced education and technical skills in STEM, cyber, medicine, languages, and more.

To be clear, I am hopeful that we will never have to draft again. If we do, however, it will be under circumstances so dire and existential that to voluntarily choose to enter the fight with anything less than our very best would be supremely foolish and potentially fatal. If we are going to have a Selective Service System, women must be a part of it. Basic equality and military readiness demand parity between the sexes to protect our country and uphold our values. In the meantime, it is time to end outdated sex discrimination and remove it from official policy and Federal law.

The bill also creates a new category of bereavement leave for military personnel that would permit servicemembers to take up to 2 weeks of leave in connection with the death of a spouse or a child. Similarly, in an effort to provide greater care and support to our military men and women, it increases parental leave to 12 weeks for all servicemembers for the birth, adoption, or foster care placement of a child. It establishes a basic needs allowance to ensure that all servicemembers can meet the basic needs of their families, and it requires parity and special and incentive pays for members of the Reserve and the active components.

In addition, I am proud that this bill makes historic changes to the military justice system to combat and discourage sexual assault and related misconduct within the military. Sexual assault is an unconscionable crime and a pervasive problem in the U.S. military and American society writ large.

When it comes to the military, one of the basic ethics is that one must protect your comrades and your subordinates; one cannot exploit them. Sexual assault and sexual harassment is an example of unconscionable exploitation, and it must be eliminated. We must take comprehensive action to halt sexual misconduct, hold offenders accountable, and support survivors. While the military has tried to stop sexual assault in the ranks, it simply hasn't been enough.

I commend President Biden, the Department of Defense, and the Independent Review Commission for their work on proposals, which we have considered during our markup and which are reflected in the bill. We will continue to work with the administration and the House to move toward enacting this momentous change.

Turning now to the areas of air, land, and sea power, with respect to our services, we have taken steps to improve their capabilities, their readiness, and their ability to fight and win.

This bill makes significant efforts to improve the readiness of the Navy and Marine Corps aircraft, ships, and weapons systems. It provides considerable investments in our next-generation Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, including an increase of $1.7 billion to restore a second guided missile destroyer to this year's budget and $125 million for long lead material for our destroyer in fiscal year 2023.

The bill authorizes $4.8 billion for the Columbia-class submarine program and for industrial-based development and expansion in support of the Virginia and Columbia shipbuilding programs, an increase of $130 million.

I was up at Quonset Point, RI, recently, where all submarines start their construction. Along with the Deputy Secretary of Defense, Secretary Hicks, we saw the progress that we are making to build two Virginia-class submarines a year and turning out the first Columbia- class ballistic missile ship to replace the Ohio class.

We are moving forward. And, frankly, many believe--as I do--that undersea strength is the best form of deterrence that we have. And as we deploy more submarines, we will have a greater ability to deter potential conflict.

This bill also increases the Landing Helicopter Assault replacement funding by $350 million and the Expeditionary Fast Transport vessel program by $270 million.

Growing our surface and undersea warfare capabilities will be vital to our success in the Indo-Pacific region, and this NDAA makes important progress in this area. It is consistent with our defense strategy of shifting our focus to the Pacific, which requires a shift of resources to the Navy and Marine Corps.

Similarly, the bill authorizes funding to strengthen naval aviation, including five additional F-35 fighter variants, one additional E-2D Hawkeye aircraft, two additional C-130J Hercules aircraft, an additional KC-130J tanker, two additional CH-53K helicopters, and two MQ-4C Triton unmanned aerial systems.

Now, with respect to the Air Force, the bill increases authorization funding by providing an additional F-35A fighter, five additional F-15 fighters, and extensions on the minimal capacity of several Air Force platforms.

With respect to the Army, I am pleased that the bill advances research and development in important future technologies and makes broad investments in generational Army modernization efforts and continues to upgrade significant enduring capabilities.

Our bill focuses on filling critical deficiencies and increasing investments in rapidly evolving demands. Further, it funds rapid development and fielding of land-based, long-range fires, including the precision strike missile, medium-range capability, and long-range hypersonic weapons.

It also provides funding for future long-range assault aircraft and future attack reconnaissance aircraft, increased funding for the future tactical unmanned aircraft system, and authorizes full funding for the AH-64 Apache attack helicopters and the UH-60 Black Hawk utility helicopters.

We are at a critical junction in a technological race with our near- peer competitors. We have enjoyed a technological lead over the last many decades. That lead is shrinking, and we have to not only develop the best of new technologies; we have to get them in the hands of our troops as quickly as possible. And that is what we are trying to do in this legislation.

Again, the issue is deterrence first, and what will help deter any conflict will be the realization of our adversaries that they are going up against the most sophisticated, technologically capable military in the world, manned by the most dedicated and skillful women and men in the world. That is what we are hoping to encourage.

Likewise, with respect to the Army, the bill supports the modernization of its ground combat vehicles, including the M1 Abrams tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, Paladin self-propelled howitzer, tactical-type vehicles.

Having the platforms and the personnel is critical, but they have got to be ready to go, and we have taken great pride in trying to improve the readiness of our forces.

This NDAA authorizes more than $2.8 billion for additional military construction projects after funding other large projects in the budget request. This bill also includes a number of provisions that will help acquisition outcomes by strengthening the ability of DOD to analyze the defense industrial base, evaluate acquisition programs, and implement acquisition reform efforts.

It also streamlines processes to allow the Pentagon to invest in and incorporate advanced commercial technologies to support defense missions and strengthen DOD small business programs to allow partnerships with innovative, high-tech companies.

From post-World War II until very recently, we were really in an industrial age, and the United States led the world. We have now moved to a post-industrial age where the new technologies, the new innovations aren't coming out of government labs or the Bell Labs; they are coming out of small business; they are coming out of young people who have come up with great ideas.

And what we want to do and what we want to empower the Department of Defense to do is to be able to get those ideas, develop them, and incorporate them rapidly into our military forces.

That means we have to develop partnerships with small business and think in a different way. We have to think about a more entrepreneurial acquisition system rather than ``this is the way we have always done it and are going to keep doing it.''

We also have another area that we have to pay attention to, and that is

the area of the modernization of our nuclear triad. I recognize the concerns voiced by some of my colleagues about the cost of, and genuine disagreements about, our Nation's nuclear policy. From my perspective, nuclear deterrence is the bedrock of our national defense. For our nuclear deterrent to be credible and to ensure these weapons never need to be used, they must be capable and ready for use.

The deterrence that we have enjoyed for many, many decades has been gained by the acknowledgement by all other nuclear powers that we are more than capable to respond. Our allies and partners depend on the U.S. nuclear umbrella. That is one of the reasons why the proliferation which President Kennedy thought would be almost universal has not developed. And modernization of our strategic forces is necessary to ensure their dependability.

One thing I think everyone agrees on, and I think often gets lost in the discussion, is another factor: arms control and modernization of our nuclear forces are inherently linked together. We must reinvigorate our efforts on arms control so that we do not have a situation where the proliferation issue becomes more obvious and more dangerous. So even as we modernize, we should seek ways to promote strategic stability, like the extension of the New START agreement and follow-on talks to cover new strategic weapons and further reduce nuclear stockpiles. The best way to reduce nuclear weapons is through negotiated mutual arms reductions rather than unilateral actions. That has been the history of the Cold War, which with the Soviets and the United States we were able, with every Presidency, to come up with some type of agreement. Unfortunately, we took, I think, a less aggressive posture in the last administration, but we have to renew significantly our arms control efforts and make them clear that it is mutual interest of Russia but also China because China is a growing nuclear power with a very deliberate plan to increase significantly their nuclear arsenals.

We have to get a situation where there is at least a trilateral negotiation between the United States, China, and Russia for our own mutual benefit. And part of that is also not just looking at numbers but looking at the safeguards that each country places on the use of nuclear weapons.

We do not want a situation where there is an accidental launch that triggers a catastrophic response. We have much to do. But I will emphasize again that simply rebuilding our triad without rebuilding our diplomacy is not the best path forward.

What we have tried to do in this bill is to enhance deterrence through a number of factors, including recapitalizing the nuclear triad; ensuring the safety and security and reliability of our nuclear stockpile, our delivery systems, and our infrastructure; increasing capacity in theater and homeland missile defense; and strengthening nonproliferation programs.

We have--particularly our land-based missile systems--installations that were built in the 1960s. They are roughly 60 years old. They are showing wear and tear. And the delivery vehicles are also old. That is part of our modernization program. The Columbia class is the first of our new ballistic missile submarines. We have to replace the Ohio class because, frankly, that fleet will literally wear out. They won't be capable to go to sea at some point in the future. And that is why we are beginning right now. We are also looking at a new, sophisticated armor that will complement the other two legs of the triad.

And because this involves the Department of Energy and the National Nuclear Security Administration, we authorized $20 billion for this effort. We have funded the Department of Energy's other defense activities at $920 million and its nuclear energy activities at $149.8 million. This is all part of having an effective deterrence.

Now, as we have seen, our adversaries are developing other capabilities at an alarming rate. With regard to hypersonics, it is especially clear that China is working to develop capabilities that evade current missile defense capabilities possessed by the United States and our allies. To address these threats, the bill authorizes the Missile Defense Agency to develop a highly reliable missile defense interceptor for the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense System. It also authorizes the procurement of the Iron Dome short-range rocket defense system, David's Sling Weapon System, and Arrow 3 Upper Tier Interceptor Program to support our closest ally in the Middle East, Israel.

There was a barrage emanating from Israel's neighbors of approximately 4,500 missiles over the last year. And Iron Dome, which was created by the Israeli Government, knocked down a significant number of those missiles protecting the State of Israel. So this is not an academic exercise; this is supporting a close ally.

And it is also clear, as I mentioned before, China is expanding its nuclear weapons stockpile at a faster rate than we have seen from any other nation. It appears that China is seeking to at least reach parity with the United States and Russia in its efforts to become a world- class military. To respond to this and other countries' proliferation efforts, the NDAA authorizes $239.84 million for Cooperative Threat Reduction Programs to stop the proliferation of nuclear, chemical, and biological threats around the world.

If you take those three aspects--improving our military capability, invigorating our diplomacy, and actively using Cooperative Threat Reduction--to lower the ability and capability of those that have nuclear weapons, that is the best path ahead.

Now, we have understood over the last several years that what is causing a great deal of destruction in this world in every aspect is technology, including cyber space activities. And we, again, are trying to hone and invigorate our technological innovation in this area.

Innovation has long given us the strongest economy and military in the world. But it must be nurtured and maintained through careful investments and strong leadership in both the public and private sectors.

I believe we have an advantage because we have such a great educational system, a great entrepreneurial system, the creativity and talent of the American people, but we have to focus on needs for our military and national priorities.

And our top priority for Congress must be maintaining strong investments in technology areas that we know will shape future conflicts. This year's NDAA includes multiple provisions to accelerate the modernization of the Department of Defense by investing in research and development of cutting-edge technologies and delivering them in a timely manner to the force. Specifically, it authorizes an increase of more than $1 billion for science and technology programs that fund cutting-edge research and prototyping activities at universities, small businesses, defense labs, and industry, including in critical areas such as artificial intelligence, microelectronics, advanced materials, 5G, and biotechnology.

The bill also authorizes an increase of more than $500 million in funding for DARPA, the Defense Advanced Projects Agency. DARPA has been conducting high-risk, high-payoff research for years, including such areas as quantum computing and assisting with universities to accelerate their research. Importantly, the implements a number of recommendations from the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence, which the Armed Services Committee established in a previous NDAA. The $500 million of funding for DARPA will be extremely critical to the future and will produce, I think, some breakthrough technologies that not only DOD will use but will become commercial products for our national economy.

And recognizing, again, the competition between the United States and China on certain militarily-relevant technologies, the bill strengthens the language of the CHIPS Act to ensure the national network for microelectronics research and development to support the development of world-leading domestic microelectronics technology and manufacturing capabilities.

Now, I mentioned one of our problems is that we are moving from an industrial age, in which we were the dominant power in every dimension, to a new post-industrial age, where technological innovation has been distributed. Other countries, because of the

nature of cyber and other technologies, are beginning to catch up with it and, in some cases, pass us. Often, and especially in the Department of Defense, one of our problems has been procurement and acquisition practices. The Department's approach has been convoluted, poorly communicated, and burdened with inertia that makes partnering with private industry far too difficult. As America confronts threats around the globe that are evolving at unprecedented speeds, we must find a better way to identify our defense needs, communicate them, and deliver them in a timely manner.

There are several areas that, if transformed, could allow DOD to more effectively do this. The fiscal year 2022 NDAA makes important progress by establishing an independent commission to review and assess the planning, programming, budgeting, and execution--or PPBE--process and identify areas for reform.

The PPBE process has, for many decades, since the 1960s, given DOD leaders a way to evaluate the resources they need and to deliver them to the troops. However, as I mention consistently, it is a bit of a relic of the industrial age.

It came in 1961 under Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, the former chief executive of the Ford Company. And at that time, it was the most sophisticated way to manage resources and do research, but that was the height of the industrial age.

We are now in a situation much different. So we need to modernize the procurement system and the acquisition system that we have in place. We have to make it more rapid, more agile, more capable of absorbing new products and getting them into the hands of the troops.

So in addition to establishing this independent review commission, the NDAA requires the DOD Comptroller, along with the DOD's Chief Information Officer and the Chief Data Officer, to submit a plan to consolidate the IT systems used to manage data and support the PPBE process.

One of the things we have discovered is there is no really integrated data plan in the Department of Defense--the largest Federal entity. There are multiple different brands of software systems, different brand of hardware. Some can talk to others, some can't. There is no successful company today that has such a, shall we say, slightly immature information processing system, and we have got to change it.

Similarly, management transformation is badly needed with the Department. As I said, it is one of the largest bureaucracies in the world, and the Government Accountability Office has put the Pentagon's approach to business management on its high-risk list, citing its vulnerability to waste, fraud, and abuse, inability to pass a financial audit, and a culture that remains resistant to change. To spur transformation, this NDAA requires the Secretary of Defense to improve Pentagon management by leveraging best practices and expertise from commercial industry, public administration, and business schools.

I am confident these steps will allow us to leverage the best of American ingenuity and market talent that drives innovation. At the end of the day, we should think about management as a defense capability like any other. We hope we are opening up a new day of more efficient and sophisticated management, more integrated communication, and doing it in a way that will produce results that will get the best technology into the hands of our fighting men and women.

One factor that we all are aware of every day is the challenge of cyber security. The cyber domain impacts everything we do, so there is absolutely no surprise that it has impacted the Defense Department and its industrial base. We need to ensure that our industrial base has improved cyber security, that they are not the back door through which our adversaries will use to enter and gain access to even more critical elements of our national security. As the recent SolarWinds, Microsoft Exchange Server, and Colonial Pipeline breaches painfully illustrated, traditional ``perimeter-based'' cyber defenses are simply inadequate to deal with sophisticated threats. Our adversaries are clearly advantaged in cyber domain and are likely to succeed in penetrating static defenses. Therefore, this NDAA requires the development of a joint ``zero trust'' cyber security strategy and a model architecture for the Department of Defense information network. It also authorizes an increase of $268.4 million across DOD to support cyber security efforts.

We all recognize that cyber is a persistent threat to everything we do. As one very thoughtful gentleman said years ago at a function I was at, ``Breakthrough technology like cyber has two effects. It makes good things better and bad things worse.'' And that is exactly what we are witnessing every day. So we have to exploit the good things and get them into our system and be much more vigilant at protecting us from the bad things.

Similarly, as the COVID crisis has made clear, we need a coordinated industrial policy to ensure that we have a robust, secure, and reliable technology and industrial base, especially in critical and emerging technology.

We need to give the DOD the tools and expertise to understand its supply chain and its physical security challenges, its financial challenges, and influence from commercial market trends. To that end, this bill directs the Comptroller General to conduct a comprehensive assessment of research, development, test, and evaluation authorities and other similar authorities and brief Congress on its findings.

The pandemic has shown many interesting things. Many companies and suppliers to our defense thought their products were coming from the United States, only to discover that critical components came from elsewhere and sometimes countries that were not particularly friendly to us. So we have to look seriously at our supply chain.

Finally, while I spent most of my time speaking about future challenges and how we prepare the Department of Defense to face them, we cannot lose sight of the events surrounding our withdrawal from Afghanistan.

After nearly 20 years of war, enormous sacrifice by American and coalition military, diplomatic, and intelligence personnel and vast U.S. investment, the Afghan state has failed, and the Taliban has taken control.

The Armed Services Committee has undertaken a series of hearings seeking to understand the collapse of the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces. While there is temptation to close the book on Afghanistan and simply move on to long-term strategic competition with China and Russia, we must learn the lessons of the last two decades to ensure that our future counterterrorism efforts in Afghanistan or anyplace else continue to hold violent extremists at bay.

The top-line defense number in this bill, together with the allocations set by Chairman Leahy for defense and nondefense funding across the 12 appropriations bills, provides a realistic balance for funding the military and the rest of the Federal Government.

Once we have completed work on this important authorization bill, we need to complete the appropriations process. It would be a tremendous mistake and harmful for our national security, our economic prosperity, and our public health to resort to a continuing resolution to fund the government for an extensive period.

I have calculated, roughly, that if we go into a yearlong continuing resolution, the Department of Defense will lose $36 billion, and the consequences of that would be staggering, particularly at this moment where we face challenges across the globe.

We have near-peer competition with Russia and China, dangerous developments in East Africa, and situations across the board where we need to be ready to go looking at the threats, not looking internally at how we are going to pay to keep the lights on.

Again, to avoid this self-inflicted damage, we have to pass a budget, as well as this authorization bill.

Let me conclude by once again thanking Ranking Member Inhofe and my colleagues on the committee for working thoughtfully on a bipartisan basis to develop this important piece of legislation.

I would also like to thank the staff who worked tirelessly on this bill throughout the year--and tirelessly is an understatement. While we were leaving after our last vote, they were staying hours later to get this bill in shape to pass and then to begin our dialogue with the House. It is the staff of both sides. I salute my Republican

colleagues' staffers and my staffers for their job.

I look forward to a thoughtful debate on the issues as we go forward.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be recognized for such time as I shall consume.

First of all, this is a big deal, what we are embarking on now. It is something that--people understand it is the most important thing we do around here.

Let me just say that my partner Jack Reed and I have been doing this a long time. I have often said how fortunate I am. You know, we hear all year out there in the real world about how everybody hates everybody in Washington; we want to compete with each other. But, you know, every year when we do the NDAA--that means the National Defense Authorization Act--it is the biggest and the most important bill of the year. Even though people think it is all happening inside this 2- or 3- day period, it is not. It is something that goes on all year long, and we have gotten to know each other very well. We know there are some areas where we have differences, but very rarely do we have differences that would impair our mission, and our mission is the most important mission that we have year-round.

So I appreciate very much Chairman Reed, what he has been doing along with me, what we have done together. The NDAA has a long history of bipartisanship, and Senator Reed and I have worked together to get this bill through the committee with an overwhelming, bipartisan, 23-to-3 vote to bring it to the floor. That is where we are today. That is something you don't hear about in Washington, that you can pass something out of a committee by a vote of 23 to 3, but we did, and we did it because this is a bill that is done by the Members.

The world is getting more dangerous by the day. We know that is the case. One notable example is what is happening now at the Ukraine border. Just weeks after conducting its largest military exercise in 40 years, Russia came dancing in, advancing a huge military buildup on the border. In fact, the Defense Minister from Ukraine was in my office this morning and was talking about all the things that are going on there.

According to the image that we have by satellite, we are seeing tanks, we are seeing missiles, and we are seeing artillery. Here is why I am really concerned: We are seeing even military ambulances. Why would Putin be putting in military ambulances if he was not expecting casualties? The answer is, he wouldn't. So we have an idea what is going to happen.

In addition to this equipment, the experts are reporting that 90,000 Russian combat troops are amassed along Ukraine's border. These troops are in a more threatening posture than they have ever been before. They are in the south and in the north. They are knocking on the door of Kyiv. All that is going on right now.

It might sound crazy that Russia would want to deploy so many forces now in November to a region where the winters are brutally cold, but there is something not many people really think about; that is, frozen ground is easier to move around heavy equipment like tanks and artillery.

I am not the only one who is sounding the alarm on this. Earlier this year, Senator Rounds and Congressman Trent Kelly and I visited Romania, which, like Ukraine, sits on the frontlines of Russian aggression. At that time, Romanian military officials warned us that Russia was moving from a defensive to an offensive posture in the Black Sea. We are seeing that now. Everything we have predicted is happening now, and that assessment of the shift was actually right.

Putin is capitalizing on what he perceives as U.S. weakness. He knows that our NATO allies are disturbed by the catastrophe in Afghanistan and that many of the European nations fear that the United States is no longer interested in trans-Atlantic security.

The President shouldn't have done what he did, and we all--I think most Americans know that. It was a disaster, the way he put this thing together in Afghanistan, and now we know where we are on this. It is tempting to say that we have seen this before, but I don't think we have just like this.

So this is about Americans, NATO, the credibility and the capability, and that is why the NDAA is so important every year but especially this year. But, first, let's be frank: Russia is far from our only threat. In 2008--this is a document that a lot of people have looked at and thought, why didn't we do this before? This was back, I think, in--what was it? About 5 years ago, it was put together. We had what we considered to be the top six Democrats and the top six Republicans on defense, and they put this book together. It is a very brief book, but we have been--this has been our Bible. We have been doing this now for a long time, and the things that we were predicting at that time are actually becoming a reality.

It tells us for the first time--and this is significant. People don't understand this. For the first time, we have two major adversaries at the same time. This hasn't happened before. And, you know, we are talking about Russia. Yes, that is significant, and you have heard me say this before--the Chinese Communist Party has been investing heavily in modernizing its military. Over the last two decades, their military spending has gone up 450 percent--just in the last two decades. Now, we are not doing that over here.

You know, I have to say--and everyone realizes this--these communist countries have a great advantage. They can move and move quickly, and they don't seem to have any limitations. Now, we are seeing the results of that investment. They have tested hypersonic missiles that we don't even have anymore. I have to say that again. Hypersonic missiles are something they have and they are using. They have tested. We have seen it. We don't even have it, and we don't have any counter to that. They are leapfrogging us in other critical areas, like artificial intelligence, and they are rapidly expanding their nuclear arsenal and infrastructure.

These investments in military capability are done with real purpose. They are a threat to Taiwan and other allies in the Indo-Pacific. Ambassador Bi-khim Hsiao was in my office this morning--Ambassador from Taiwan--and we were looking at things that are going on there, just like we are looking at from the Russian area.

But the threat China poses to our own interests can't be overstated or underestimated.

Meanwhile, North Korea--so it is not just those two countries. North Korea is out there. Iran is out there. They are also continuing their threatening behavior. North Korea is conducting missile tests of its own, and Iran continues to back proxies striking at U.S. troops and our interests--most recently, we have seen in Syria.

The terrorist threat in Afghanistan is also resurging thanks to the disastrous drawdown that continues to undermine U.S. credibility. We know that ISIS-K and al-Qaida have the desire and intent to strike our homeland. This is something that a lot of people don't understand. A lot of people don't believe the threat that is out there. Now we know when they will be able to strike us, and it is closer than you think. As soon as 6 months from now, the Senate Armed Services Committee was told just last month this could happen.

So I don't say this to be dramatic. This is a reality, plain and simple. The world is more dangerous than it has ever been in my lifetime--by the way, people have reminded me over and over again yesterday and today, since it was my birthday, how long that lifetime has been--and we have seen a lot, but we haven't seen anything like this before.

National security needs to be the top priority. Without a strong military defending our way of life, nothing else matters. We can talk about other things, but it doesn't really matter if we can't do that.

Since World War II, we have ensured peace through the world by projecting strength. Our military should and must serve as a strong deterrent to our adversaries, and they have to know that they can't beat us. Some people are questioning that, but they have to know that they can't beat us, and we have to show them that they can't. Yet we are fully aware that they have things we don't have. They have technology we don't have. This is something we haven't dealt with before.

President Biden's inadequate defense budget request, the irresponsible drawdown in Afghanistan--something he shouldn't have done; the administration should not have done--and the lack of commitment to shared nuclear security are calling that into question. It is evidence that we aren't prioritizing national defense, and we already have seen what happens when we don't prioritize national defense. We see upticks in destabilizing, threatening behavior--exactly what Putin is doing right now. Just imagine what would happen if Putin and Xi thought they stood a chance to beat us if we didn't turn things around, and that could happen.

It is a reality today that people don't understand and should understand. Americans take for granted the idea that our military is the best. You know, when I go back to not just my State of Oklahoma but all around the country, people assume that.

You know, I am old enough to remember what was happening at the tail end of World War II. We learned a lesson. We learned to be prepared, and for a long period of time, we had the best of everything. We had the best modern equipment, all of this, and that isn't the case today. Americans take for granted that we have the best of everything, but we don't. It is just not true anymore.

Don't just take my word for it, you know, just take it from me; a couple of weeks ago, our Nation's No. 2 military adviser, General Hyten--no one disagreed--I don't know of anyone who would actually argue with General Hyten. He was explaining how China is on pace to surpass us if we don't do something to change what is going on today. That is General Hyten. I don't know a more knowledgeable person anywhere in America or elsewhere.

We can meet these challenges. We can put our country back on the right track. That is going to take real investment and real strategy. Congress has a very important role to play here. We pass the National Defense Authorization Act and Defense appropriations each year, and every year, we give our military what it needs to set this thing right.

Now, I am proud to say that this year's NDAA goes a long ways to making our country more secure. I am not saying it is perfect, but it is very good and a necessary start. And that is what this is all about now. It is what we are going to be passing--I am talking about tomorrow or the next day--and going into this long process that includes both the House and the Senate.

So let's start with one of the biggest ways to strengthen our national defense: authorizing an additional $25 billion in funding for the Department of Defense. This is just a floor for defense spending.

Now, it is important that we understand this President has not been a good President in terms of building the national defense. He just isn't. You know, his budget request shortchanged our national defense. In fact, if you put his budget numbers in terms of defense and nondefense, the amount that goes to nondefense averages about a 16- percent increase, and the amount that goes to defense is a 1.6-percent increase. Now, that is the President's budget. It is not my budget. It is not our budget. It hasn't passed, but nonetheless, that gives you an idea of where we are right now. The emphasis is not on defense. It should be, and it is not.

President Biden's budget request shortchanged the national defense. It didn't even keep pace with out-of-control inflation. Inflation right now--the figure is above the 1.6 percent, and that is where we are today. It actually cut funding for our military even as we face the growing threats that I mentioned. And we are talking about the-- compared to the inflation thing that is happening right now. So I am glad the Armed Services Committee almost unanimously adopted my amendment to increase the Department of Defense's budget top line. This is the bare minimum of what we need to meet the threats that we face. This is what underscores everything we do.

The bill also makes sure this money is spent the right way. As we have for the past few years, we are using the 2018 national defense strategy--that is this book I referenced just a minute ago--as kind of our roadmap, and we are using this for that.

The NDAA focuses on the Indo-Pacific, which is our priority theater, by emphasizing investment in the region through the Pacific Deterrence Initiative, the PDI, which we started in last year's bill.

The way this works is we are--it is continuing as time goes by. We have a bill, and the bill is activated, usually in December, but then we are already into the next year. So while this seems--people say: You are only talking about one bill a year. It doesn't really work out that way.

It strengthens our supply chain so we are not reliant upon China, but we are doing that right now. It addresses the threats posed from information warfare, and it deters the foreign malign influence. It also stands strong against Russia.

Perhaps most importantly, it provides critical lethal aid to Ukraine, and we know that these things are working. While radios and cold- weather gear are needed, they won't deter Putin's strategy and his ambitions. Weapons like the Javelin anti-tank missiles, on the other hand, remind him that invading and annexing Kyiv will have real and concrete costs.

We know Russia and China are expanding their nuclear arsenals. Our nuclear stockpile serves as the cornerstone for our deterrent, so we have to keep it safe, secure, and effective. That is why the NDAA supports the nuclear modernization our military commanders say is their top priority.

It provides support for our allies and partners around the world. Unfortunately, our allies and partners are questioning our commitment right now after what happened in Afghanistan, and they are feeling like they were being told and not consulted. They didn't even know--that withdrawal that should not have taken place but did take place in Afghanistan is one that they were not even aware of.

It provides the reassurance of American credibility that they desperately need to rebuild and cement those relationships. With strong allies and partners around the world, we will ensure the balance of power in our favor, but we are not there yet.

When it comes to hard power, this bill makes serious investments in equipment we need to fight and win wars now--growing our naval fleet, expanding next-generation fighter capability, and providing for the largest investment in military construction in a decade.

It looks to the future too. We know that we need to accelerate innovation and develop the technology that is going to help defeat whatever our enemies might throw our way. Yet, in many of these emerging technologies, we risk falling behind. In some cases, we already have fallen behind. It is kind of hard for us to accept that in America, as we went through several decades--I think since the Second World War--not falling behind, but we have now. So this year's NDAA invests in defense technology that would put us back ahead of our competitors. That is our goal. Things like microelectronics, artificial intelligence, hypersonic weapons, 5G--these are the areas that we are working on to get back in the driver's seat. We have fallen behind. It is hard to say that, that America is falling behind.

You know, General Hyten said recently something that I really think is important for everyone to hear. He said that we must ``focus on speed and re-inserting speed back in the process of the Pentagon . . . and that means taking risk, and that means learning from failures, and that means failing fast and moving fast.''

I have to say that General Hyten is certainly one of the greatest warriors of our time. We should be listening to him.

We have serious problems. We have to get policies and authorities in place to let the Pentagon move quickly and, as General Hyten put it, ``fail fast.'' As he retires this week, I think it is clear

why he is a national hero. He knows what is going on.

Now, too much is hampered by bureaucracy at the Pentagon. The NDAA encourages the Pentagon to move faster, to take risks, and to jumpstart the innovation that we need to succeed, but we have to realize the impact.

This is really the most important thing this bill does. We take care of our troops. People talk all the time about how much we spend on military. I hear a lot of people around who don't think we need a strong military. A lot of them talk about why we spend more on our military than Russia and China put together.

Yes, that is true; but we have costs that others don't have. Communist countries don't have the cost of taking care of their people. In fact, the most important thing we do is take care of our troops. Even though China and Russia are building up and modernizing their militaries, they don't take care of their people--they don't claim to take care of their people--and we do. The most expensive thing we do in our military is to take care of our military. We take care of the schools and the people who are out there taking the risk.

This bill takes care of our troops in so many ways. It improves their healthcare. It provides education and childcare for their children, and makes sure their spouses can have meaningful employment as they move from area to area. It is a unique problem that our spouses do have, as they are moving around the country.

And so, again, we are competing with China and Russia and other countries, and none of them have this problem. This is the greatest expense that we do. Our servicemembers represent the very best in the country. If they do have to go into harm's way, it is our responsibility that they are the best prepared, best equipped, and the best led forces in the battlefield, and the bill does that.

But we don't want them to go to war. We want to prevent those wars from happening. As I said earlier, the best way we do that is by projecting strength, sending a message to our adversaries that there is no chance that they can beat us.

The NDAA is the major way that we send that message. And that is why the NDAA--the National Defense Authorization Act, the most significant bill of the year--has been enacted into law every year for the past 60 years. This will be the 61st year.

So we are going to get it passed, but it almost never comes up this late in the year. This is the disadvantage we are working from, but it always gets done eventually. We still have a lot of work left to do after this and not a lot of time to do it.

You know, we can't afford late starts. If you do late starts, sometimes it ends up being just down to four people. Both my partner and I have been in this situation where we have been down to what they call the big four, making all these decisions ourselves. That is not what we are supposed to be doing. That is not what we want to do. But that is why the NDAA has been enacted into law every year for 60 years.

We built this bill around Member requests. This is unique. This is something people need to understand. We are getting our requests from the Members that are serving with us here in the Senate. We are going to have an open amendment process. We are going to have an open amendment process, and this is what we have committed ourselves to do, to make sure we are doing. So you will get another chance to mark up this bill.

So what we are doing right now is very important. You got to keep in mind, it is going to be done by the House; it is going to be done by the Senate. It is going to be something that is the most significant thing that is happening this year. But we could never work too hard or too long for our troops and national defense.

I know some of my colleagues are concerned about one provision we've got--that we have in this bill at this time, which was added in markup and included in the House bill too. Now, I oppose the addition of this provision, which changes the military draft--what the military draft does. And I want you to hear this because, if enacted, it would expand the draft so that it is not just about finding combat replacements to serve on the frontlines; it also requires women to register for the Selective Service, not just men.

I've always said, as a product of the draft myself, I know what the draft is. I was there and I served. I have always said that I understand that and I think the draft is essential. It changed my life, certainly. But I am strongly opposed to drafting our daughters and our granddaughters. So this is going to be coming up. We are going to be talking about this. Everything is going to be out in the open. Get ready for that fight, because that fight is coming, OK?

That is why I submitted an amendment to strike this provision from the underlying bill, and I will work to get it out of any conference report as well, OK?

Last week, we marked Veterans Day, and that should be a reminder to all of us why we do this. In fact, we have got 2.2 million reasons to do this--2.2 million future veterans--our volunteer force, who put their lives in harm's way and who rely on this bill getting done. And that doesn't even include their families, who are sacrificing so much. So that's out there, we know, and that is going to happen.

I know my colleagues understand this. I know they understand our responsibility to our troops and to the American people. And so I look forward to our debate on this bill, and then passing it in the traditional, bipartisan way, as we always do; and, together, we are going to fulfill our constitutional duty and meet these challenges that we face, and we have little time to waste in doing this.

So this is the most significant bill of the year. That is what we are going to do. We are going to get it done. And let's go do it right, OK?

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, this is now the 17th time I have come to the Senate Chamber specifically to speak against President Biden's vaccine mandate.

I have pledged before, and I pledge again today, to continue this fight until we beat the mandate.

Now, thankfully, progress has been made on this front. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit last week halted enforcement of President Biden's general mandate. It did so directing their rulings specifically to the OSHA portion of the mandate. This is the one that applies to all workers everywhere and any place of employment with more than 100 workers.

I, along with millions of Americans, am grateful that the U.S. court system performed its role in protecting the separation of powers and otherwise protecting the limits on government written into our laws and our Constitution.

It is also encouraging to see the government Agency charged with enforcing the general mandate; that is, OSHA, has now halted the enforcement of the mandate and is complying with the order issued by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

This, however, does not end President Biden's vaccine mandates. That

mandate in particular remains the subject of ongoing litigation, and there are other requirements placed on other specific groups of workers outside of the OSHA mandate and, therefore, outside the scope of the order issued by the Fifth Circuit.

Now, I have spoken previously on the situation that members of our Armed Forces face and on things that people who work in the healthcare profession face--difficult things, challenging things, things that threaten their livelihoods and cause a lot of problems for workers.

I have offered various bills to help those groups of Americans keep their jobs and make sure that they have the right to make their own medical decisions.

I am fighting against the mandate. I am not fighting against the vaccines. I support the vaccines. I am vaccinated. I have encouraged others to be vaccinated. I see the development of these vaccines as something of a modern medical miracle, one that is protecting so many millions of Americans from the harms of COVID.

But this one-size-fits-all dictate from Washington certainly isn't the answer and, under our system of government, can't be. I have heard from hundreds of Utahns who are personally at risk of losing their jobs and their livelihoods due to this mandate. Many of these Utahns have religious or health concerns about the vaccine.

President Biden promised these mandates would include exemptions for those people in those categories specifically, but in reality they are being dismissed or placed on unpaid leave or pushed into retirement with reduced benefits.

These are good people, everyday people. Many are dedicated frontline workers. Far too many are just trying to make ends meet and feed their families. It shouldn't be too much to ask to allow them to continue doing that unencumbered by their own government in their efforts to do that.

These mandates will just push people out of work and make many of them not only unemployed but unemployable outcasts in their chosen professions, professions for which they have spent years studying and learning and receiving certifications just in order to work. What a tragedy.

This wouldn't just harm those affected directly by the mandates. It absolutely would harm those directly affected by them, but the harm extends much further than those directly affected. It would affect all of us, in fact.

The American economy is currently facing a labor shortage the likes of which we haven't seen in decades. Businesses across the country are struggling to find enough workers just to keep their doors open, let alone produce and serve at full efficiency. President Biden's mandate will add to our high unemployment and our low labor force participation rates, and it will put even more pressure on inflation--inflation that is making it harder for Americans everywhere, especially the poor and middle-class Americans, people living paycheck to paycheck who find that every dollar they earn is buying less of everything, from gas to groceries, from housing to healthcare.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jay Powell recently warned that ``hiring difficulties and other constraints could continue to limit how quickly supply can adjust, raising the possibility that inflation could turn out to be higher and more persistent than we expected.''

The mandate is only worsening the problem.

Now, I believe the Biden administration recognizes the harms this mandate will cause for our workforce. It is evident in the administration's date of compliance extension to January 4 that this is the case.

Now, I have to ask an obvious question here--or one that I think should be obvious, should be intuitive. If the forced vaccination of our entire Federal workforce, including employees and contractors and subcontractors--if forcing the vaccination of every one of these workers--were truly an emergency so drastic that all workers, contractors, and subcontractors, even those working remotely in their own homes, must be vaccinated immediately, then why would they risk delaying compliance?

They can't have it both ways. If they want to say that this is an emergency; this is dire, so dire that we have to force every contractor, subcontractor, and Federal employee to get vaccinated immediately and we have to fire them if they don't--if that is truly so emergent--then why delay it to January 4? Why delay it at all?

Now, to be sure, it would be bad. And, to be sure, I am glad they have extended it. Perhaps, maybe, this means they are reconsidering this awful, horrible step, this horrible thing that they are inflicting on those who can least afford to absorb something like this. But it really does undercut the emergent nature of the situation, and it undercuts their underlying reasoning that this has to happen immediately, so immediately that we have to fire all of them if they won't submit to Presidential medical orthodoxy.

This mandate is even so drastic that it includes all workers and all contractors, including all those who work remotely, who don't even go into a workplace. And it also includes even those who have natural immunity from a previous case of COVID-19, something that some studies have indicated will provide 27 times the immunity of a vaccine.

Again, vaccines are great. I have been vaccinated. I have encouraged others to do the same. Vaccines are protecting hundreds of millions of Americans right now. But why not take into account their natural immunity, and why on earth would you fire someone who already has natural immunity or who works from home? That makes absolutely no sense.

This mandate simply goes far beyond what is reasonable. It begs all sorts of questions. Why are you doing this?

So, today, I am offering a bill to help another group--yet another group of people--a group consisting of people not protected by the Fifth Circuit's halting of the general vaccine mandate. Federal workers are still facing a vaccine requirement from the Biden administration. Almost 3 million workers in this country are employed by the Federal Government. Many of them have reached out to me and my office and are concerned about losing their jobs due to this mandate. I know I am not the only one. I know that every single Member of this body has received phone calls, letters, emails, and other pleas for help from people who don't want to lose their jobs.

This is a response to them. This is an effort to try to help them and part of my ongoing effort to reemphasize the fact that it doesn't have to be this way. My bill, the Protecting Our Federal Workforce from Forced COVID-19 Vaccination Act, would prohibit an executive Agency from requiring its employees to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. It is a simple solution to prevent more unemployment and to protect countless Americans from being forced out of the workforce.

This bill will help protect Americans' right to make their own medical decisions and will help protect our economy as it strains under multiple crises and as the holiday season comes around.

I encourage and sincerely implore all of my colleagues to support it.

To that end, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 3243, which is at the desk. I further ask that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I appreciate the thoughtful remarks and the insights of my friend and distinguished colleague the Senator from Michigan. He is someone with whom I enjoy working, and one of the many things I appreciate about him is that he puts a lot of thought into everything he does. And I have always known him to be considerate, and I appreciate that about him.

I also am in agreement with the fact that in an ideal world people would be getting vaccinated more than they are. And in that world, if more people got vaccinated, I do think there would be fewer hospitalizations, fewer deaths, and fewer COVID infections. And there are a lot of data sources supporting that.

I also agree that we are all tired as a country, as individuals, as families, regardless of what State we live in. We are tired of the pandemic, of the ERs being overcrowded, and things like that. These are all things we want to do away with. And I also agree with my colleague from Michigan that those things really would be alleviated if more people got vaccinated.

In my mind, the question that we are discussing here isn't about a disagreement over the objectives that we have got; it is more about how to get there, who has authority to take what action and what consequences might attach to government actions.

Notwithstanding the fact that my friend from Michigan and I both agree that the American people, to the extent they have been vaccinated, are benefiting as a whole from being vaccinated, it doesn't mean that everyone is going to agree.

It doesn't get rid of disagreements that exist, in some cases, because of our religious belief or other moral conviction--one that I don't happen to share and probably most of us in this body don't happen to share, but that some people have.

There are some people who, for religious or moral reasons, believe that they shouldn't be vaccinated. There are others who have a specific medical condition that has involved receiving medical advice from board-certified medical doctors that someone shouldn't get this particular vaccine.

I am not a doctor. I am not a scientist. I don't purport to understand these things. But I do know what I hear from Utahns, which is that a number of them have cited medical conditions of one sort or another; previous personal or family medical history that has signaled particular sensitivity to vaccines in general; or, in some cases, when people have autoimmune conditions of one sort or another or a combination of them.

In some cases, doctors are concerned about inflaming that condition, inflaming the immune system of particular patients, and on that basis advise their patients with particular, somewhat unusual medical histories not to be vaccinated.

There are others, still, who might not fit into either of these categories, but might consist of people who have already had the coronavirus and have recovered from it at some point over the last 18 months.

There are studies indicating that natural immunity is real, and that have suggested that natural immunity can convey comparable immunity to that available under the vaccine. Some of the studies have indicated that that immunity could not only be as strong as, but, in some cases, 27 times stronger than that conferred by the vaccine.

I had both. I had the coronavirus over a year ago and I still chose to be vaccinated in addition to that. My own experience with the coronavirus wasn't all that pleasant. It wasn't an experience that I care to relive. In consultation with my doctor, I concluded that it was a good thing for me to get it. I was willing to get it, especially upon learning that it might help protect me even further if I also had the vaccine in addition to having natural immunity.

But, you know, not everyone is going to reach the same conclusions. And one of the struggles that we have had as a country involves difficult questions that people face when they disagree--when they have a genuine disagreement. We have to be careful about how we use government power because the government power necessarily involves the use of force.

Most of the time, mercifully, it doesn't have to involve the direct actual use of force. It can involve the implicit or implied or future or prospective use of force. In other words, you comply with this or that law or regulation or government dictate of one sort of another, then you are fine. If you don't, you know that at some point there will be consequences.

A lot of people comply voluntarily after they received--I don't know--a notice from a law enforcement officer or agent. Or maybe they wait until someone has sued them, and then they get a court order. But they know that at some point, if they refuse to comply, the government can enforce what it is requiring.

So whenever we involve government in these kinds of decisions, we have to be able to defend the actual or threatened or potential use of force in order to justify what we are doing. And we have to ask: Is this moral? Is this an appropriate case to use violence?

Because if it is not an appropriate case to use violence for something, there is kind of a problem with putting government into the equation, because ultimately you have to rely on government to be willing to threaten violence and carry out violence; meaning to show up at somebody's house with a summons, an arrest warrant, or something like that and take them away.

All that involves force. And again, mercifully, most of the time it doesn't have to come to that. Most of the time, Americans, you know, comply with the law just because it is a good thing to comply with the law.

But we really should ask the question whether a government action is morally justified in any circumstance to such a degree that the use of violence would be warranted if it came to that.

I struggle to accept the proposition that it is OK to use violence to force someone to get a COVID-19 vaccine. As

much as I love the fact that the vaccines are available and are a real blessing--something of a modern medical miracle--I can't get comfortable with the idea of using violence to force people, who have another opinion, to comply.

It seems morally problematic and morally unjustified--for that matter, indefensible--for the government to tell someone, ``If you don't get this shot, you will get fired;'' and, in fact, to tell their employer, ``You must fire this person if this person doesn't get the vaccine, even if this person has a good-faith religious belief against it, even if this person has natural immunity or has some particular medical condition causing his or her board-certified medical doctor to advise against receiving the jab.''

That isn't moral to say to that person, ``You didn't comply with a Presidential medical edict, so you are fired;'' and to tell the employer, ``If you don't fire that person, you are going to be the subject of punitive fines that will cripple any business.''

And I literally mean any business. I don't think there is a business in America subject to these mandates that could survive the crippling, deliberately cruel fines that are levied under them--not a one.

This isn't right. It is not moral. Deep down we know it.

In fact, according to a recent poll conducted and reported by Axios-- hardly a rightwing publication--it involved a question, and the poll question was something along the lines of: Should a person who declines to be vaccinated be fired for not being vaccinated?

And 14 percent agreed that that is OK--14 percent. Only 14 out of 100 Americans said: Yeah, that makes sense, that is OK; fire this person, fire him, fire her. They don't matter.

It is compounded when you look at the tragedies imposed by the individual circumstances. The soldier; the sailor; the airman; the marine; the TSA worker; the Federal contractor; the employee of a subcontractor of a company with one Federal contract who does mostly non-Federal work; the mom, the dad working in a factory, in a school, in a floral shop--if any of those either have a Federal contract or have more than 99 employees, all of those people are having their livelihoods threatened.

It is not just a job. It is, in many cases--as is the case in the healthcare industry, for example--people who have spent a lifetime acquiring the skills and professional certifications, the degrees, the training, the education necessary in order to participate in that profession.

Many of these people, by the way, throughout the darkest hours of the pandemic, were the people working hardest to protect Americans, to make sure they had access to the healthcare they needed.

Those same people are now being told: You are not good enough. You don't deserve a job. You are going to be fired, even if you have a medical condition that precludes it.

Even if this could be morally justified, which it can't, one must ask the question asked by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit: Does Congress, does the Federal Government, have the power to order such a widespread vaccine mandate?

It doesn't.

The OSHA mandate, for example, constitutionally, it would have to be predicated on Congress's authority under the Commerce Clause, which gives us the power to regulate trade or commerce between the States, with foreign nations, and with the Indian Tribes.

Even as that provision of the Constitution has been interpreted really broadly since 1937--even under that broad interpretation, one that has seen only three acts of Congress over the last 84 years being deemed outside of Congress's authority under the Commerce Clause--when you have to almost try hard to pass legislation predicated on Commerce Clause authority that doesn't fall within it, but even under that, this doesn't pass the test.

It is not, by its nature, economic activity. In fact, it is not activity. You are punishing nonactivity.

Even under these high watermark precedents from the New Deal era establishing a very deferential standard of review for exercises of Commerce Clause authority by Congress, this doesn't even pass that. And even if it did, which it doesn't, you would still have to identify the case of the OSHA mandate a definable delegation of authority from Commerce using some intelligible principle authorizing this kind of action.

You will not find that. It is not there. I have reviewed upside down, sideways, backwards, forwards the statutory text at issue with regard to OSHA. It does not provide this authority. The moral authority is lacking. The constitutional authority is lacking. There is no power delegated by the Congress to OSHA to do this. It is not defensible.

I am glad that delays on some of these mandates have been imposed. I am glad that OSHA is at least agreeing to comply with the order of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit; and, at least for the duration of that litigation, enforcement will be halted.

I hope and I fully expect that the ultimate resolution of that case will be consistent with what the Fifth Circuit ruled last week. In fact, I have little doubt that it will be.

This is, in some ways, the most brazen act of Presidential overreach that we have seen in a single directive, since President Harry Truman, on April 8, 1952, issued an order seizing every steel mill in the United States for steel production related to the Korean war effort. Mercifully, the U.S. Supreme Court was able to intervene and, within a couple of months, invalidated that action.

This one is even clearer than that; but, more importantly, this one is more emotionally compelling than that.

That unconstitutional act of Presidential overreach affected a handful of steel companies. It certainly affected thousands upon thousands of workers. It didn't have the ability to affect directly or indirectly every single man, woman, and child in America. This one does.

That is one of the reasons why these moral and statutory and constitutional questions matter so much. That is why I have been coming to the floor every day, and why I will continue to do so indefinitely as long as it takes.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, on September 9, President Biden told the American people that he was losing patience with them and they needed to get vaccinated right now. He laid down a series of Executive orders on Federal employees, on Federal contractors, on companies that had-- individuals that had 100 employees or more, on individuals that worked in any healthcare-related, anything that dealt with Medicare or Medicaid. It reached out to millions of people.

He set a date that was within 3 months, knowing full well it would take months to actually write the rule and it would create chaos across the country as everyone tried to figure out how to do this mandate.

I fully believe that was the purpose of setting a close deadline; it was because it would have that much chaos in the country dealing with the vaccine mandates. Well, mission accomplished. It has created chaos across our economy and across lots of families.

What is the situation right now in America dealing with COVID?

We are on the backside of our second peak. We have seen hundreds of thousands of people lose their lives to COVID. We have seen hospitals fill, get back to order; fill again, get back to order.

But in the meantime, three vaccines have been developed, multiple different treatments have been developed, a multitude of tests have been developed, which has been the primary issue that we have every year with the flu.

We don't panic every year on the flu because we have testing. We have treatment. We have vaccines. We now have, for COVID, testing, treatments, and vaccines. It becomes much more manageable.

In the meantime, right at 80 percent of all Americans who are 12 years old or over have already had at least one dose of one of the vaccines.

Let me run that past you again: 80 percent of Americans have had at least one dose of one of the three vaccines, of those 12 years old or older.

About 45 million Americans have recovered from COVID; had it, tested positive, and have recovered. The vast majority of Americans, by far-- like, not even close--the vast majority of Americans have been vaccinated or have recovered from COVID or both.

But is the administration OK with that?

No, they are not. The administration has laid down their own law to say, if Americans do not get the vaccine--those 20 percent left that haven't gotten the vaccine that are 12 years old or older, if they don't get the vaccine, this administration is going to find some way for them to lose their job; which, for many people, will also mean lose their insurance; lose their pension; and, sometimes, lose their home.

But the President's response is: I don't care. Go get the shot. That is what I want you to do.

Well, Mr. President, mission accomplished.

Let me tell you a story of an individual that works in the eastern part of my State, who works for one of those companies that is 100 people or more. He didn't want to have the vaccine. The reason is not even important, but he said he didn't want to take the vaccine. So what happened in his company of 100 or more? They fired him a couple of weeks ago.

You are welcome, Mr. President. Thanks for firing him.

Oh, it gets better. He lost his house because he couldn't pay the mortgage, and this adult man has now moved in with his family while he tries to figure out what happens next for him.

Do you know why?

Because the President said he was losing patience and he didn't care if this guy lost his house, lost his job, lost his insurance. The President was just saying, go get it, or else.

Well, thanks. Right before Thanksgiving, he is experiencing the ``or else.''

One of my constituent's husband is facing termination. He is from another one of those large companies. He has worked for them for 30 years. He has a

secret clearance from the DOD. And his doctor gave him an exemption because his cardiac numbers fluctuate so much. And he is one of those high-risk individuals for blood clots, which can be a side effect of the vaccines. So his doctor has encouraged him not to take the vaccine.

So he went into his job. He asked for the medical exemption, and he was given two forms to sign. The first of the forms said he had to agree to take the vaccination or he would lose his job. The second form agreed that, if he took the vaccination, he would not sue the company if he had a negative reaction.

So here is a man who has to choose between taking the vaccine, knowing that his doctor has told him not to do it, and if he does take it, if he has a negative reaction, the company wants to be held harmless for it. And he has to sign a document saying the company will be held harmless for it or lose his job.

Do you know why?

Because President Biden said he was losing patience.

So this family gets to sit around over Thanksgiving not talking about football but talking about whether he is going to lose his job or possibly have a blood clot in the hospital.

Which would you like to have that conversation on over Thanksgiving?

There is a company that does electrical engineering that also has one of those Federal contracts they talk about. Some of the employees don't do the Federal contracting. They work for other issues. Fifty people of the 250 in the company have said they don't want to take the vaccine, and so they are in the process of losing their jobs. And that company will not be able to fulfill its Federal contract because hiring 50 more electricians is not that simple right now with the economy that we are currently in.

A constituent told us that her employer is going to lay her off on December 8 because she hasn't had the vaccine yet. So she will spend Thanksgiving discussing this with her family as she approaches the time where she is about to be laid off. She works in one of those companies that has a Federal contract. She reached out to her primary care doctor, who is at the VA, by the way, and the VA instructed her that they are not writing exemptions for medical exemptions.

She is on her own.

Why?

Because the President is losing patience, and he has decided he is going to throw all of these families in chaos or they are going to lose their job, because he said so.

Why have I been fighting this mandate since September 9 when the President actually announced it?

Because it was obvious to me what was coming. It was this.

Everyone could see it, apparently, but the White House. Americans are stubborn people. That is what has made us the most prosperous, freest people in the world. We are entrepreneurs. We take risks. We understand the consequences for our risks. But we also go do because we can; we are Americans.

And now the President of the United States has announced: I don't care; you are going to get this, or else.

So what is the real effect of this? All of this chaos?

Oh, this is just part of it. There is a whole lot more.

How about the EMS folks that are in rural Oklahoma, that are having a hard time actually keeping some of their drivers and folks in because they have chosen not to take the vaccine?

What happens in 3 weeks from now when people get sick at their house or have a heart attack and EMS can't respond because those folks got fired from their jobs because the President said, I am losing patience? What happens?

I will tell you what happens. People die. Other families are going to struggle through this process as they are figuring out where they are going to go to work because they lost their career, because the President said: I have lost patience with you.

Tell me this: For the person that is the JAG officer in the military, works in the National Guard, and for whatever reason--whether it is a religious accommodation, medical accommodation, or whatever it might be--they chose not to take this vaccine, when they get a dishonorable discharge, what happens to them?

They lose their law license is what happens to them. They are disbarred, and they are no longer practicing their profession.

What happens to the State trooper in Oklahoma that also serves on our National Guard?

When they get dishonorably discharged, they don't just lose their military career; they lose their civilian career.

What happens to the nurse or doctor that serves with the National Guard? When they get drummed out, what happens?

They lose their military career and their civilian career. That is what happens.

Do you know why?

Because the President decided he was losing patience with the American people and they have to do what he says to do, not what they want to do. That is why all this chaos is happening.

I heard from a constituent, 28 years of Federal service--28 years of Federal service. I am not going to give the administration that they work in, but they work behind the scenes in an exceptionally important, exceptionally difficult task--serving their neighbors as a Federal employee. She doesn't want to retire, but she doesn't want to take this vaccine either.

So do you know what she is doing?

She is retiring.

And what is going to happen in this agency in Oklahoma when they lose this cornerstone person at this Agency?

They will struggle to figure out what she did, how she did it. And people in Oklahoma will get less help in that Agency because a long- term, vital civil servant is about to get run out of civil service because President Biden decided he lost patience with her.

That wasn't in her civil service contract. That was never negotiated with any other collective bargaining rights agreements, never. There is no addition in any collective bargaining rights agreements for Federal employees that they have to get a vaccine mandate if the President decides that they do, but he decided--that is, President Biden decided--he was going to take this on.

And so she is going to be discussing over Thanksgiving what she is going to do post-retirement, wishing that she could stay a little longer to be able to build up a few more years, and thought she was going to be able to, but, instead, she got ran out because she and the President had a difference of opinion about a brandnew vaccine.

Now, I have said to this group before several times--and I will say it again--I have had the vaccine. I encourage others to take the vaccine. Eighty percent of Americans who are 12 years old or older have had the vaccine.

There are plenty of Americans who have had the vaccine who support the vaccine but do not want their next door neighbor to get fired because they disagree on the vaccine. In fact, I don't know a lot of people who do, though I have met some that are just that heartless to be able to say: I don't care what you think. I want to feel better forcing you to go get the vaccine.

I have met some of those folks, but I don't meet many of them. Most of them say: I freely made the decision; they should be able to freely make the decision, as well.

But apparently that is not where the President is and, unfortunately, that is not where some of my Democratic colleagues are because multiple times we have brought an end to the vaccine mandates to multiple committees in multiple places over the last several months and it gets knocked down every time.

Just this week, we filed a Congressional Review Act dealing with just the OSHA piece. We have another one coming dealing with all those on CMS to make a simple statement: We have got to stop this vaccine mandate. It is causing chaos in our families. It is causing chaos in our economy, and anyone who doesn't think it is is not talking to people at home.

So we will bring this in the next 18 days to the floor of this Senate, and we will force a vote on it and put everyone on record: Do you stand with the American people, who strongly affirm the vaccine but strongly oppose the mandate, or will you be one to say: I don't care. I stand with the President. I am losing patience with people, this 20 percent that haven't done the vaccine. I

am losing patience with them, and I am just going to force them to do it, as well--because that decision is coming to every single person in this body.

This could be turned off right now, and one section of it already is turned off. The Fifth Circuit Court reached in on the issue of private employers and said that this was way overly broad of the President. No kidding. It was unconstitutional for the President to reach into companies and to say: I don't care who it is, how important they are to the company. If you don't make them do the vaccine, you have to fire them.

The Fifth Circuit said you cannot do that. Thank you, Fifth Circuit, for finally joining in on that.

OSHA has now said that they are not going to enforce that, but there are lots of other companies that have done it anyway. And, I will tell you, for this individual in Eastern Oklahoma who has already been fired and lost his house, it is too late for him for suddenly the Biden team to say: Just kidding. We are going to pull that back. His life has already been wrecked by you.

What else is happening? I have reached out to multiple different Agencies to be able to talk this through. It has been fascinating to me, when I have talked to different Agencies. By the way, the Federal Agency mandate for all Federal employees is next week to be able to have that done. But when I talk to leaders of Agencies of multiple different Departments across this town, none of them seem to know how many of their employees have actually been vaccinated yet--none of them. They all say: Well, we think it is quite a few.

I say: How many folks have not been vaccinated?

We have x number of folks who have been reported to us, but they don't seem to know. It has become chaotic.

For Federal workers, their unions have finally stepped in--finally. I have been shocked at how slow the Federal unions were to this. They finally stepped up and asked for an extension of the President to say: Don't put the mandate down for next week. Give people more time because, literally, people are sitting around over Thanksgiving deciding whether they are going to keep their job or not.

And if 10 to 20 percent of the workforce across the Federal workforce leaves, we are in such chaos that there is no way we will be able to finish serving people as we desperately need to be able to do across the Federal Government.

What would I recommend? I had some very frank conversations with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, or the EEOC. It was interesting to me, when I visited with the EEOC. That is the group that protects workers--Federal workers or private--from discrimination and protects workers from inappropriate termination. When I talk to the EEOC, what I hear from them is that they weren't consulted through the process of developing this new vaccine mandate and all the exemptions that should be in place.

Can I just tell the workers of my State and the workers across the country a simple thing? If your employer will not accept your religious accommodation that you put in or your medical exemption that you put in--if they do not accept those--you need to go to the EEOC and file a complaint because the EEOC has rules about terminations that are inappropriate terminations. If individuals are being terminated from private companies, even if they are Federal contractors or Federal employees, I encourage you to go to the EEOC and file a complaint if they are not hearing your medical accommodation or your religious accommodation. That is your right as an American.

When the President of the United States is running over your rights, you have every right to be able to appeal that personally. You don't have to hire an attorney. You can file that complaint on your own to be able to make sure that your employer knows that you are filing an EEOC complaint against them for inappropriate termination, for not accepting your medical exemption and your religious accommodation.

Interestingly enough, when I approached the Office of Management and Budget a month ago about how they are going to handle religious accommodation, they said: It is not the business of Federal workers to decide and individuals' faith. We are just going to accept that.

But when the document came out, there was a six-part test of whether you are religious enough to be able to turn down the vaccine. They literally created a six-part test that every supervisor can go through and check to determine if you are religious enough to be able to turn this down.

This would be the first time that I know of that the Federal Government has actually reached into an entity, to individuals, and said: We are going to decide for you how religious you are.

That is how crazy this has become.

I encourage you, again, if individuals have said that you are not religious enough to be able to ask for this accommodation, go to the EEOC, file a complaint against your employer--whether that be a Federal Agency, whether that be a private entity--and make sure that they are well aware of what is going on.

If you work in a Federal Agency and you have an initial appeals process that actually goes through, go through that. Go through that process. But if you are denied or not heard, you do have rights as an American, and I would encourage you to be able to stand up for your rights as an American against unjust hiring and unjust firing in this process.

Let me read this last letter to you. As we have fought through this process and find every leverage point I can find for the people in my State to be able to make their own decisions, it has been difficult to be able to talk to people in the struggles that they have.

Let me read one. This gentleman wrote to me:

I retired after 20 years of Active-Duty service in the

military to enjoy time with my family and the supreme

blessings of freedom and peace our country has secured at the

expense beyond human measure. Now, many of our undaunted

servicemembers and veterans alike face possible unemployment

because we refuse to take a vaccine. Some are being coerced

into taking it because they can't support their families

while unemployed. The very people who risked their lives and

the well-being of their children face persecution for a

personal medical choice.

His comment to me: This is not American.

I agree. That is why we are fighting this. That is why we are continuing to push this. That is why we are bringing a Congressional Review Act up to put every single person in this body on record: Do you support forcing people to take a vaccine or be fired, or not?

I do not, and I hope that 99 other of my colleagues also do not.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I want to commend my colleague from Oregon and his comments. As a matter of fact, I don't disagree with pretty much anything he said.

I had my first good meeting with Mr. Sams this morning, and I would agree, I think he is qualified. I am particularly impressed with his background as a Native American, as a veteran.

One thing I like to talk a lot about is how our Alaskan Native American populations serve at higher rates in the military than any other ethnic group in the country--special patriotism. Mr. Sams certainly carries that tradition on quite well.

And I have already talked to Senator Wyden. I intend to work with him and Mr. Sams just on a few more issues, a few more discussions. Again, we had a very good conversation this morning.

This is nothing about his qualifications, but I wanted to make sure the administration is aware of some issues, at very high levels, as it relates to this position, this job. And, again, I agree with my colleague from Oregon; this is an extraordinarily important Federal Agency. As a matter of fact, it is so important for my State that I want to explain a little bit to my colleagues, many of whom don't really know what the National Park Service does. But to my State, it is enormously important; it is powerful; and it can touch on people's lives in huge ways.

Let me just give you a little bit of the numbers. The Federal Government manages roughly 66 percent of the lands in Alaska. Of that, the Park Service controls 55 million acres. Two-thirds of all National Park Service land--two-thirds of the land that Mr. Sams will be in charge of is in my State. A lot of people don't recognize that. A lot of people don't understand that. Alaskans understand that--two-thirds.

So he is one of the big, important landlords of the great State of Alaska. And, as you can imagine, this Agency has outsized influence in Alaska beyond what these numbers represent--for hunting, for fishing, for transportation, for culture, and for people's livelihoods.

And this has been an Agency, to be quite frank, that has been abusing its power in Alaska for decades--Democrat administrations and Republican administrations.

In 1980, this body passed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act--what we call in Alaska ANILCA. The Congress took 100 million acres of Alaska lands. We weren't supportive, by the way, Alaska--100 million acres. That is bigger than almost any State represented in the U.S. Senate, bigger than two Minnesotas.

And a huge part of ANILCA laid out how the National Park Service would interact with Alaskans. For decades, Alaskans were saying that the way in which the National Park Service was treating Alaskans--by the way, Alaska Natives in particular--was not according to the law, was not according to ANILCA.

And it wasn't just Alaskans saying this. In the last 4 years, there have been two U.S. Supreme Court decisions--they are referred to as the ``Sturgeon'' decisions--where an Alaskan who wanted to go hunting sued the National Park Service, and it went all the way to the Supreme Court. And the U.S. Supreme Court twice in the last 4 years, 9 to 0--9 to 0--agreed with Alaskans that the National Park Service was not following the law as it related to ANILCA.

As Justice Kagan, who wrote one of the opinions, said, ``Alaska is often the exception, not the rule'' to issues relating to Federal lands and access.

Now, as you can imagine, the National Park Service did not like getting slammed by the U.S. Supreme Court twice 9-zip, but we liked it. It was a vindication of what Alaskans, for decades, have been saying about the abuse of power of the National Park Service.

So I want to work with Senator Wyden and Mr. Sams on further conversations, soon--we are not trying to block this; I know the National Park Service needs leadership, and I think he would be a good leader--but to look at making sure the implementation of these two U.S. Supreme Court decisions, 9 to 0, are followed through by the entire bureaucracy. It is not much to ask.

These are topics I raised with Mr. Sams today. He seemed to be in agreement with me. But these issues are enormously important to the people I represent.

And I am going to mention one final thing, and it is not really in Mr. Sams' area of expertise, but I mentioned this to him as well.

All Americans have been experiencing economic, pandemic-related pain over the last 20 months. My State, I think, has been hit as hard as any other State, particularly on the economic side. And I want to just raise this topic right now because I am going to come down on the Senate floor and talk about it a lot more here. But it relates to some of these issues.

This administration, the Biden administration, in the last 10 months, has issued 19 Executive orders or Executive actions solely focused on my State--19. There is no other State in the country--not Maryland, not Oregon, no other State in the country--that is getting this kind of attention from the new administration, and it is attention that we don't want because almost every one of these Executive orders and Executive actions is hurting working families, is hurting our economy, is hurting access to our lands at a time when we are already hurting.

I just want to ask my colleagues, respectfully, especially on the other side of the aisle, could you imagine a Republican administration coming in and saying, ``We are going to issue 19 Executive orders and actions targeting Maryland or Delaware or Oregon or Massachusetts''? Senators would be on the floor, rightfully, sticking up for their State and their fellow citizens.

This is a challenging time right now. Working families are hurting with inflation, high energy costs, and we have an administration in the White House that thinks it is fine to target the great State of Alaska. Well, it is not fine. It is not fine. It is a war on working families in my State, and I would hope all of my colleagues would recognize that this isn't appropriate. This isn't appropriate.

And it is not just these actions. The White House has made it known that it has gone to financial institutions throughout the country-- banks, insurance companies--saying: Don't invest in American energy projects in the Arctic--also known as Alaska.

So I am not going to hold this against Mr. Sams. My colleague from Oregon I have a lot of respect for. But, literally, every major project that is resource development, employs people, helps working families-- by the way, there are some that aren't economic. There is a law that we passed in the U.S. Senate 3 years ago to help Alaska Native Vietnam veterans. It was my bill. I care deeply about these great warriors who were really screwed by their country when they came home from Vietnam.

The administration has delayed the implementation of that bill for 2 years. There will be Vietnam veterans--Alaska Native Vietnam vets--in my State who will die before they get the benefit because they just thought they could do another hit on Alaska.

So I ask my colleagues to just put yourself in my State's position. None of you would accept that. And I am going to start talking about it, and I am going to start raising these issues. And I hope I can get some of my colleagues--Republicans and Democrats--to maybe reach out to the White House, going: Hey, this really isn't appropriate. Alaska has had a rough time. Everybody has had a rough time in America, but really? Nineteen Executive orders and actions?

These are just the Alaska-specific ones. There are broader Federal ones that impact us too. But I want to work with Senator Wyden. I want to work with Mr. Sams, particularly on that issue I raised earlier. I think he is

going to be very well qualified. I admire his desire to serve, his background, and especially his Navy background.

And I intend to lift my hold very soon, but right now I am objecting. But my goal would be to have this nominee, who is qualified, after further discussions with me and Senator Wyden, moved to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate. But, for now, I object.

Mr. President, I want to thank my colleague from Oregon, and I will commit to working with him to try and get this done before we head out to recess.

We know the treasures of Alaska. As I mentioned, two-thirds of all the Park Service in the country is in my State, which is why I want to make sure I am having followup conversations--I had a good one already with Mr. Sams--to get commitments on a few additional issues that matter deeply not just to the Park Service and for America but, really, to my State. But you have my commitment to work with you and Mr. Sams on a few more of these issues.

And, if I may, for all my colleagues, right--and I am glad to hear Senator Wyden mention this--this shouldn't be happening with one State. There is a Biden White House war on the State of Alaska. No one is getting treatment like this, and it shouldn't be this way. If a Republican President were in attacking Maryland or Oregon like that, I would call the White House going: Hey, lay off, guys. Lay off.

So I sure hope some of my colleagues--Republican and Democrats--can send the message to Joe Biden, the President, that you know, the war on working families in Alaska is not really a good idea. They are Americans, too, and they have got a lot of resources to produce for our great Nation, which we need right now.

So with that, I yield the floor.