A joint resolution to direct the removal of United States Armed Forces from hostilities within or against the Islamic Republic of Iran that have not been authorized by Congress.

Mr. President, I have come to the floor today as a U.S. Senator, of course, but also as a former soldier who served in uniform the last time a President rashly sent our men and women into an unjustified war in the Middle East.

I spent nearly a year in Walter Reed Army Medical Center recovering from injuries I earned in Iraq. Every morning, as I struggled to sit up straight, every time I was rolled into yet another surgery, I made sure to read the poster I had next to my hospital bed. It was a framed copy of the Soldier's Creed, the words that those lucky enough to wear the Army uniform live by.

That same framed copy now hangs by my desk here in DC. As I glanced at it

this morning, I realized there is perhaps no greater proof that Donald Trump never deigned to serve a day in his life than the mockery he makes of the Soldier's Creed's commitments every single day he has been in office.

The creed may be associated with the Army, but the sentiments hold true for all of those who wear the uniform of this great Nation. Its 13 lines tell us to be disciplined, physically and mentally tough, trained, proficient, and to look out for those who look out for us, to look out for one another.

Donald Trump is supposed to be our servicemembers' Commander in Chief. The very, very least we should expect of him is to epitomize the standards that we ask our troops to swear by, to live by. The very, very least we should expect of the Commander in Chief is to be as competent, disciplined, and professional as the men and women whose very lives hinge on his capacity to lead, on that competence and professionalism we expect to see in the White House.

The creed makes clear that our troops will never quit, that they will never leave a fallen comrade behind. Yet ``Cadet Bone Spurs'' is someone who will always quit. And every hour he orders our servicemembers to remain in unnecessary, growing danger, he is proving that Donald Trump does not give a damn about leaving a comrade or so, so many comrades behind. Every moment that Donald Trump leaves our heroes mired in the muck of this illegal war of choice with Iran, he is showing that he cares more about saving face than leading our troops.

So I come to the floor today with a simple question. Our military men and women go out there every day and do their jobs, no matter the risks--all on Donald Trump's orders. So I ask you, Mr. President: Why the hell can't you do your job too? Why can't you live up to the same level of proficiency as our troops?

Look, I am proud of every mission I completed in Iraq, but I would never ever wish another endless, needless, unjustified war like the one I served in on anybody else. I wouldn't wish it on the heroes who are packing up their rucks right now, knowing they may never touch American soil again. I wouldn't wish it on their families, who are being forced to spend their days anxiously awaiting news from half a world away. And I wouldn't wish it on the American people, who want their President to focus on bringing the costs down here at home, not starting new, expensive, taxpayer-funded wars continents away.

But Trump either doesn't understand or he simply doesn't care about that. From the moment this conflict began, the President has tried to shroud his incompetence behind the valor of our servicemembers. When asked to justify his illegal actions, Donald Trump has tried to hide his cowardice behind our heroes' courage. He has tried to act as if questioning why we are at war is the same as questioning the skill and bravery of our troops themselves. It isn't.

And I am here to call bullshit on the President of the United States because I know that our military will always do the best job possible. When given a mission, our servicemembers will say: Yes, I will serve. They don't say: Why me. They don't ask: Will I be safe? No. They dust off their boots, they show up, and they do what is asked of them to the best of their ability every single time, time after time, tour after tour, no matter the risk, no matter the sacrifice. They will always, always execute their orders to the maximum capability of their professionalism, and they are proud to do it.

That isn't the problem. The problem here is that the person who is supposed to be leading them spends more time talking about his Marie Antoinette ballroom than he does sitting in the Situation Room, trying to get us out of this war.

The problem is the guy who claims to be making America great again looks at the word ``America'' and only sees the letters ``M'' and ``E'' in the middle of it.

The problem is that the Commander in Chief not only has no idea what the end state is like for his war of choice but probably doesn't know what the term ``end state'' means at all.

The problem is that even in the last 2 weeks, the man who is in charge of our Nation's nuclear codes has himself gone increasingly nuclear. He is not believing literal war with Iran is enough. He has now gone on to proverbial war with the Vatican, choosing to pick fights with the Pope, of all people--the Pope.

Rather than trying to engage in any semblance of real diplomacy to end the conflict in the Middle East, he has threatened to annihilate an entire civilization, terrifying people overseas and here at home, who are understandably worried about retaliatory strikes.

Now, after 1 half-assed day of so-called negotiations with Iran, he has whipsawed to the next risky frontier in the region--a dangerous, complex, partial military blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, launching it at our Nation's expense with no justification, no explanation, or any real plan as to what comes next. His only plan seems to rely on the valor, willingness to sacrifice, and professionalism of our military men and women. But let me tell you, that is not enough. They need a true commander.

But Trump is Trump, and he is actively, unabashedly telling us how to ignore what we are all seeing with our own eyes. He is trying to declare ``mission accomplished,'' despite his obvious failures at every single turn. He is declaring ``We did it. We're winning'' after all signs point to the opposite. We are still at war. Americans are still at risk. Civilians across the region are still dying for no reason that anyone can truly articulate.

In reality, the only thing that Donald Trump has accomplished over the last 6 weeks is more chaos. Because of his choices, a new, young Ayatollah is in charge who seems even more radical than his father was. Thirteen American heroes have been killed and hundreds more wounded. More Gold Star parents are grieving their children.

More American families are struggling to avoid the spiking gas prices. They are unsure if they can pay even more every time they go to the gas station, but they have to because they need to get to work; they have to take their kids to school; they have to take their aging parents to the doctor. The farmers of Illinois, the farmers of this great Nation have seen, at a time when we should be planting, their input costs skyrocket because of Donald Trump's war of choice.

Look, war is always tragic, but when it is preventable, when it is unjustified, it is not just tragic, it is a travesty. Trump wouldn't let himself be dragged by the bone spurs to serve in Vietnam, so how dare he--how dare he--drag our Nation into a war of his choice today? But this draft dodger--this five-time draft dodger--is too infatuated with maximum pressure to make a serious effort at even minimum diplomacy.

Once again, the Trump foreign policy doctrine has proven reckless, senseless, and dangerous--a doctrine in which fact and fiction are one and the same, one in which our Commander in Chief seems to come to military decisions by virtue of temper tantrums and announces them via tweet in the middle of the night and one in which avarice outweighs advice every single time.

Look, unlike Trump, I actually know what it is like to leave your blood soaking into the desert sand a half a world away. I know what it is like--I know what it is like--and what is at stake for the troops this administration is sending into harm's way. We must safeguard their valor and their professionalism by doing our jobs.

I can tell you this: It is a whole lot easier to cover your eyes and order other Americans to sacrifice their children and sacrifice themselves if you don't have to do any of the sacrificing yourself. It is easier to send other people's children to fight in a war if you know your own children are cozy in a penthouse suite somewhere. It is easier to ignore the everyday realities of war from inside the hallowed halls of the White House where you have McDonald's being DoorDashed to the Oval Office. But it is nearly impossible--it is near impossible--if you have been actually outside the wire yourself.

So I have come to the floor today to keep true a promise I first made over two decades ago. I ran for Congress not because I wanted to be in Congress, not because I wanted to be a Congresswoman or a Senator. I ran for Congress to honor the men and women who carried me out of that bloody war zone.

I made a promise that when the drums of war started beating again, I would be in a position to make sure that our elected officials fully consider the true cost of war--not just in terms

of money but in human lives and in the sacrifices of the men and women who wear the colors of this great Nation. That was the vow I made to the troops I deployed with and to all of those who have served since I hung up my uniform.

I am here today under this great Capitol Dome to keep that most sacred oath because right now, thousands of our troops are ready to do their jobs even if it means laying down their lives. And it is tragic, it is disgusting to me that even as they prepare to do their jobs, our President and some Members of this Chamber seem so eager to neglect their own.

So as those drums of war echo louder than they have ever in years, I am here to remind Donald Trump that he does not have the authority to unilaterally force us into war. He may never have read the Constitution, but I have.

So let me direct his attention to article I, which makes clear that only Congress--only Congress--has the power to declare war. We are the ones tasked with deciding when and how Americans are sent into combat. We are the ones charged with that most solemn duty. Yet Trump is acting as if article I simply doesn't exist, as if obeying the Constitution is optional, as if our founding document is just a yellowing, crumbling piece of paper that he can crumble up and toss into the garbage can at will.

This should not, must not be a partisan issue. No matter if you are struggling to pay rent or if your name is plastered in fake gold on a building on Fifth Avenue, no one can ignore the Constitution, especially if you have sworn an oath to defend it. No matter if you are a Mar-a-Lago worker who is pulling down double shifts or if you are the President of the United States, no one is above the law.

Look, I believe fully that there are certain solemn and urgent times when our military must be called upon to defend us. There are certain moments when the threat in question is significant and imminent, instances when military force is the most effective tool at hand, and when using it is necessary to protect America and her interests.

The thing is, from what little information the Trump administration has shared publicly that he hasn't immediately contradicted--and sometimes in the same sentence--this was not one of those times. If the administration thinks that I am wrong and there was an imminent, reasonable, actual threat to America, then guess what. The floor is theirs.

Come to the Senate. We are just 20 minutes from the White House. It is not hard to find. It is even faster in your motorcade, Mr. President. It is not hard to find us. We are the building with the big dome on top. We are only a 20-minute walk.

Trump knows where the Capitol Building is. It is the spot he told the insurrectionists to march toward on January 6.

So, if his team actually believes that the war is justified, then they need to come to Congress and do their jobs: Explain their case and give the American people a say through their elected representatives, the Members who sit at every one of these desks in this Chamber.

They need to respect the American people enough to finally tell them why they are being forced to bear the costs of this conflict, both in dollars and cents and daughters and sons.

They need to respect our servicemembers enough to prove why war with Iran is worth having more children grow up without their moms or dads. They need to make it clear that they have thought this through and well enough that they can actually articulate what an end state with this war of choice in Iran would even look like.

When their case has been made and when the debate here in Congress is completed, then the Members of this Chamber must vote. It is our duty. Yes, it is our burden. It is the least we can do for those who are willing to sacrifice everything to safeguard this democracy.

But if the Trump administration refuses to do that--if they refuse to adhere to the Constitution--well then, it begs the question: What are you hiding? What are you hiding, Mr. President? We already know you are incompetent. What else are you hiding?

Look, we have now been at this war of choice--of Trump's choice--for a month and a half. Thousands are dead or are grieving, wounded, and suffering. Only someone as inept and unfit, someone as callous and cruel as Trump would see this as winning. Only a draft-dodging coward would think that this is the right way to engage in a war. Only a man so unqualified to be Commander in Chief would be proud to keep on risking our heroes' lives without even having a concept of a plan for how to get them back home without risking more graves at Arlington.

We can't let this chaos continue unchecked. As our troops continue to sacrifice whatever is asked of them, we Senators--we Senators--need to do the absolute minimum required of us. That is why, this week, I am calling up my War Powers Resolution, demanding that the Trump administration finally end this illegal war, and calling for some actual public oversight and accountability on behalf of the American people. It will come to the floor for a vote shortly.

So, to my Republican colleagues, you have a choice--a simple one, really. You can vote with me to end this conflict and show that you actually care about putting America first, like you claim; or you can vote to put Trump's ego first, proving that, when push comes to shove, you care more about protecting Trump's thin skin than the Constitution that you swore to defend.

At this point, it is pretty clear. Donald J. Trump will always be more interested in looking out for his own self-interest rather than truly serving America's interest.

So my question is, if any of my Republican colleagues are actually brave enough to stand up and tell Donald J. Trump--the five-time draft- dodging coward--``enough.''

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I just listened to my colleague on the other side of the aisle who raised concerns about my War Powers Resolution, and I am disappointed--but not in any way surprised--that they continue to carry the President's water on this war.

I would welcome the chairman of Senate Committee on Foreign Relations scheduling oversight hearings for Secretary Rubio. I mean, as a former member of the committee, the Secretary should be used to testifying before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.

He should schedule them because we and the American people are owed actual answers on this administration's conduct, planning, and diplomacy during this war of their own making.

And right now, American servicemembers are already in harm's way 6,000 miles east. These troops are ready to do their jobs no matter the risk or the sacrifice required of them, just as our brave American troops have always done time after time and tour after tour.

So to me, it is tragic that even as they continue to do their duties, our President and Members of Congress from the Republican side of the aisle seem so ready to neglect their own duties.

I want a democratic Iran. I want to see its people free from the iron grip of its brutal authoritarian regime, and I am not about to shed a tear for the previous Ayatollah's death. But that does not mean we should not be gravely concerned by the consequences of Trump's actions in his war of choice.

Look, I know there are solemn and urgent times when our military must be called upon to defend us. To determine when that is, there are four questions we should be asking. No. 1, is the threat significant? No. 2, is the threat imminent? No. 3, is the military the most effective tool for the goal at hand and that there are no other tools that can do the job? And No. 4, would the military be counterproductive to its most solemn mission of protecting America?

With this unconstitutional, unjustified, and unwanted regime-change war in the Middle East, Trump has traded deterrence for instability and chaos and made all of us less safe in the process. It is time for us to rein him in.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I am back again talking about something that is very, very important to everybody in the United States of America. There should be alarms going off about what is happening. I know we have a lot of bad things happening all over the world. We are in conflicts. We are in situations where we are trying to control our own destiny when we are not getting a lot of help from a lot of people that we should be counting on.

But let's talk about the United States of America for a second. Let's talk about our farmers. Our farmers are in trouble. We better wake up and smell the roses because what is happening in this country should be a crime. We have lost, just in the last few years, 150,000 farms and over 25,000 farmers--150,000. And we take pride in what we do in this country. We do everything as first class as we possibly

can and we are running people out of business right and left and it is getting worse.

Nobody is listening. Nobody is out there pounding on all of our doors saying, ``We need help,'' other than the ones right now that are in desperate and dire need.

Again, we have a lot of problems. But you think we have problems. We start and continue to lose these farmers that we have in this country, and we continue to eat the trash that is sent in from these foreign countries, we are going to have many, many more problems.

It is a big deal because there is not one State in this country that doesn't deal in farming in some capacity--not one State. We are all involved in it. We all have skin in the game.

Agriculture is the backbone of who we are and what we are. And if we are going to continue to be the place that everybody wants to move to, to be a part of, and not a Third World country like a lot of these places that we are allowing to ship food in from, we better wake up.

You know, for some reason, the past administration either didn't understand the importance of agriculture or our farmers or, to put it bluntly, they really didn't even give a damn about it, to be honest with you. Instead, they were focused on outsourcing our food, our lumber, our fish. Anything to do with farming or agriculture, we, for some reason, were turning over everything to people outside our country. And the people that are the cream of the crop, that are true Americans in this country, are our people in agriculture.

You would think that we would have learned a thing or two back during COVID. I can remember standing up here back in the early part of COVID, back in--what was it--2020 and talking about how in the world have we allowed this country to outsource everything that we do medically? Because when we looked up and COVID was rampant, we were looking around for masks, we were looking around for drugs, looking around for things that save people lives. And guess what. We don't make any of that stuff anymore. We outsourced it all. Now we are doing the same thing to farmers.

You know, it is very dangerous to be reliant on countries like China, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, Brazil, all these people that are either socialists or communist countries. We can't continue to do this. We can't do it.

We built this country on hard work and effort and not by handouts and not by cheap things that we buy to keep this country going, such as what is coming from China or some of these Third World countries.

One thing that we need to be doing to help our farmers is we need to be tariffing the heck out of these countries that are sending in food that is taking over our grocery stores and our restaurants that they say is great food, it is reliable, it is best in the world, when it is nothing but trash. That is all it is, is total trash. For some reason, because we think that the price is a little bit better, we are getting involved in that--in terms of our grocery stores and our restaurants-- and we are serving things that we shouldn't be serving and it is causing a lot more problems.

You know, we have got the best food safety programs and standards in this country by far. We have got to know where it was raised. We have to know what has been sprayed on the food or where the fish was caught. All the things that go along with food safety go along with farming.

You know, over the past decades--past few decades, the beef-packing industry has shrunk to the point that there are only a few plants processing the majority of our Nation's cattle today, and that is beyond stupid--really, it is. Think of what we have done. We have outsourced most of our food processing, especially when it comes to beef, to these gigantic processing companies that, by the way, are owned--two of them--by foreign entities.

President Trump did an Executive order to try to get to the bottom of what these foreign-owned meatpacking companies were doing because their prices were going so high. They were price-fixing. And what do you think is going to happen when you run into a situation where you allow people to control the market?

Think about it. These foreign entities are controlling America's meat supply at the expense of American farmers and their families--people that work hard, like all of us in this country--not to mention that the consolidation of these few processors has threatened Americans' food supply.

You know, in 1980, these foreign processors controlled about 36 percent of the beef market. Think about that. In 1980, they controlled 36 percent of the beef market. Now, today, these processing plants--two of which are foreign-owned--control 85 percent of the U.S. beef- processing market, and we are asking for huge problems.

I am not a mathematician, but I know that those numbers mean that our American-owned small meat processors have been pushed out of business, and that is what they have done. That is how they do it. They try to control everything, so they put in these four meatpacking processing plants across this country, they control it all, and the little guys are gone.

And this country was built on small businesses, small farms-- everything that produced good product for U.S. citizens. That is how we were raised. That is how we were brought up.

We need to open up competition and find ways to support American meat-processing plants. We have got to do it. We have to do it. I mean, that is the job of our Agriculture Department. They have started working on that, started trying to open up more to see what we can do. But we cannot continue to allow four meatpacking processing plants to control everything that we do when it comes to beef.

You know, when I was growing up, it was common to see ``Made in America'' labels on everything at the store. ``Made in America.'' We were all proud of it. Now, it is rare. Most of the labels we see are ``Made in China'' or ``Made in India.'' I want to challenge everybody: When you go in the store and you think that this product is made in America, all you have to do is look at the box or the can or whatever. You will be very, very surprised where that product is made. Very surprised. And most of the time, it is not going to be made in the good old U.S.A., and it is hurting our American farmers. It is hurting us bad.

They can put a name on it, they can put a label on it, but that doesn't mean a hill of beans. Unless it says ``Made in America,'' we are selling our country out, we are selling our farmers out--people that have built this country.

In addition to growing our own food and producing our own medicine, we need to be using our own cotton. I want you to think about this: Our cotton farmers are broke. They have had three bad years, and it is getting worse and worse every year.

Now, this is planting season. They are putting all the cotton in the ground. They are putting fertilizer. They have got all these people out there working these tractors and machines worth hundreds of thousands of dollars that they use to plant this cotton. And if you look at it at the end of the day, the cost of putting this cotton in the ground is far and above the amount of money that they will receive when they sell this cotton.

Used to, that didn't happen. Used to, we were not challenged as much. But what have we done? We have allowed foreign countries to do everything they possibly can to outgrow and do things at a rate faster than us, and then we are allowing all this cotton to come in from other countries. Brazil is one.

And, again, if we continue to allow Brazil--without tariffing these people and let them know: Hey, if you are going to send your cotton in here, we are going to have a tough time, and we are going to lose our farmers so we are going to start tariffing your cotton and put a pricetag on it when it comes to this country.

We do not owe Brazil one thing. Our farmers don't owe them anything. We owe our farmers in this country. You know, in my State of Alabama, we are one of the top cotton producers in the country, and we bring in more than $400 million of revenue every year to the State of Alabama. You know, our stores are filled with shirts, jeans, towels, bedding, but the problem is that you look on that tag, most of them are made overseas--everything with cotton. I mean, we don't really use cotton in this country anymore unless it comes from overseas.

American cotton farmers produce the highest quality of cotton in the world. I mean, but they are undercut by all this foreign junk that we are bringing in. So there is a lot of work that goes into cotton production, and one thing about our cotton farmers, they work 365 days a year. They make the best product they possibly can, but, unfortunately, we are held to a standard that a lot of people and a lot of things that go on--whether it is textile mills or people that are involved in the cotton business use the foreign cotton, and we don't use near as much in our country.

So my point here is that Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi and I, we are introducing a bill called the Buying American Cotton Act. Now, here is the reason we are doing this: We have to save our cotton farmers. If we don't do it in the next few years, it will be over. They will all be gone. And every American in this country, when you buy something with cotton in it, that cotton is going to come from a foreign entity.

We have to do something to help them, and there is a way to do it without costing a lot of money. There is a way to do it in this building. All we have to do is pass the Buying American Cotton Act to incentivize folks to buy American cotton and bolster our American cotton producers instead of arguing about bailouts when our cotton farmers go under and they need help. Of course, we always, as the Federal Government, try to help them out, but you can't help them out enough where they can really survive in a long period of time.

So what we want to do is get away from the subsidy part and give them an opportunity through the Buying American Cotton Act to give tax credits when people buy American cotton. That is all we want to do. When people buy American cotton, they get a tax credit for it.

If you buy Brazilian cotton, you don't get a tax credit. We have to do something to help our farmers--especially these cotton farmers. When farm income improves, everything else improves. The safety-net programs go down, not to mention the additional economic activity that a strong rural economy will contribute to when you get this tax base done with farmers making a profit. Again, they haven't made any profit going on 4 or 5 years.

Instead of spending money--that is the reason we did this bill. Instead of spending money, we wanted to make sure that these farmers don't need a subsidy at the end of the year. If we give tax credits to entities that buy American cotton, we will not have to pay subsidies anymore. This is an end-all solution to helping the cotton farmers across this country.

Cotton is not just for T-shirts and stuff either. Cotton is for medical supplies, you know, military, critical materials that we use across this country. Cotton plays a key part in national security.

A nation that cannot supply its own basic materials is a nation that has surrendered its independence. And so that is why I am up here today. We are getting ready to celebrate our 250th anniversary, and our farmers have been a huge part of that. For 250 years, we grew our own food; we cut our own timber; we caught our own fish. We did everything we possibly could. But what have we done? Corporations have run out the private sector in this country--the small businesses in this country. They moved it to corporations out of this country, and they have put us in harm's way. They have really put us in harm's way.

So the Buying American Cotton Act puts our farmers in a situation where we do not have to, as a government entity, bail them out every year when they are losing money because they won't lose money, because if we buy their cotton in this country--we are the biggest buyers of cotton all over the world, the United States of America, so let's help our cotton farmers.

And one other thing I want to say about this: I have talked about this several times on the floor. It is getting pretty serious, and it is something that, again, we look at it and say: Oh, it is not going to continue to happen.

Just recently, we estimated that China has bought and owned, as of today, 300,000 acres of American farmland. I want you to think about that--300,000 acres that the Chinese own. Who is our biggest adversary? China. And we are allowing them to buy American farmland in this country, and a lot of it is by our military bases. Now, I wonder why that happens? And I don't think we are stupid, but we are crazy if we continue to let this happen.

It is an urgent and national crisis, and we have got to make sure that we keep an eye on this. And we understand there are some States that are going and telling China now that they cannot buy farmland because they run it through different entities. And that is one thing that we need to make sure that at the end of the day, that we keep an eye on this.

But I want to come up here today and let people know, our farmers are in the fourth quarter, OK? And if we don't have a good year this year, we are going to have a serious--serious--problem with our farmers going out of business. And when farmers go out of business, they are big contributors to our country when it comes to tax base, buying things, producing things, and making our country much stronger.

So I plead with people: Please start understanding what is going on here because if we don't put our foot down and we wait too long and our farmers are gone and they have sold their land, we have got a big problem ahead of us.

And, again, I think it is a huge national security threat when you are having to buy everything out of the country. Again, go back to one thing: Did we learn anything from COVID? Evidently, we didn't. And next time we look up and you are going to have to buy everything coming from another country--especially when it comes from ag--we have got huge problems.

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

Mr. President, today is April 15. Americans all across the country know that it is tax day in America.

We just heard the minority leader come to the floor, and it sounds like he is almost despondent that this year the American people are able to get higher tax refunds than in the past.

Because of what we have been able to do and pass, people are keeping more of their hard-earned money. For people that are filing their taxes for the first time under this new tax law, the Working Families Tax Cuts, they are seeing that they are keeping more. And this is what we promised: to put more money in people's pockets.

I hear about it at home in Wyoming. I was home, traveling in the State, and recently spoke to a group of veterans. They were meeting with their families in Dubois, WY. We had a ``welcome home'' for our veterans.

I was also in Sundance, WY; Gillette, WY; Laramie, WY. I visited with students. I was in Lusk, WY, as well as Newcastle. I sat down with farmers, ranchers, and small business owners. Across the board, we talked about new opportunities that they are experiencing as a result of the law, since Republicans cut taxes dramatically, and how that appears to them in their daily lives and what it means to them and their families.

And those families in Wyoming aren't alone. Americans all across the country are seeing smaller tax bills and larger tax refunds.

So the Internal Revenue Service has released data today on the tax refunds. The average refund this year is over $3,400 per family. Now that is nearly $250 per month in people's pockets. That is much higher than it was last year. These are the refunds that people are getting.

And yet, when I hear the Senator from New York, he referred to the amount of money that people are getting back in their refunds, and I think he said the word ``dud.'' Maybe to him that is a dud. Maybe to him, in New York City, that is a dud.

For working families in Wyoming, $250 a month means a lot of money in their pockets. When they go to the gas station, the grocery store, when they

plan what they want to do over the summer--all of those things--this is real money in the pockets of Wyoming families and American families. And the best we can hear from the minority leader is, it is a dud.

That is not what I am hearing around my home State. It is probably not what you are hearing in your home State of Oklahoma. People understand that money in their pockets matters to them, and it matters to their families, even if the Democrats don't believe that or the minority leader doesn't see it the way we see it.

But in so many ways, he doesn't--because we think it is important for people to keep more of their hard-earned money, and it is a direct result of the bill that we passed, the Working Families Tax Cut law.

So what have the Democrats said to do about that? Well, they tried to do the opposite last year. They wanted to pass a $4 trillion tax increase on the American people--not $4,000, not $4 million, not $4 billion--$4 trillion of increased taxes. That is where they were headed.

They weren't just heading that way. They voted for that. They voted for the largest tax increase in American history.

And Senator Schumer, today, talked about a poll. And what did he say? He said Americans think they are paying too much in taxes right now. Can you imagine what they would have been saying if they were paying what they are paying now plus 4 trillion additional dollars in taxes?

Why in the world would, then, the minority leader come to the floor and put together a group and lead the charge to raise taxes by $4 trillion, if he comes to the floor and talks about the fact that Americans think they are paying too much in taxes?

I think we are paying too much in taxes. I want to cut more taxes. That is what the people of Wyoming want. That is what Americans want. That is certainly what Republicans want.

So it was just interesting to hear the minority leader talk about these refund checks that are putting more money in people's pockets and saying: Well, it is a dud.

It is not a dud for the people of Wyoming. They are encouraged by what we are doing, and they want us to do even more. And we need to do more.

The Democrats talk about a $4 trillion tax increase. That is raising taxes on families, on workers, on small businesses, all across the board. Well, Republicans permanently lowered taxes, and we did it for hard-working families and small businesses.

You know, in doing so, we made it easier for all Americans--whether they are working, whether retired--to keep more money in their pockets. More than 53 million Americans have benefited from at least one of the new Republican tax cuts. That is a lot of people.

So if you are a senior and receive a Social Security check, you are benefiting for the first time from our ``no taxes on Social Security'' pledge. This is a new $6,000 deduction for seniors.

Mr. President, 30 million seniors have already benefited, and everybody doesn't even have their taxes in yet. The deadline is tonight at midnight.

Well, if you are a mother or a father with children, you are benefiting from the expanded child tax credits. That is $2,200 per child, per year.

Millions of parents have enrolled their children in Trump Accounts. That is a big deal. For parents with newborn children, the savings accounts get $1,000 deposited into them straight from the U.S. Treasury. It happens immediately when your child is born. And I am happy to report that there are groups of individuals around the country who are matching those contributions in the Trump Accounts and adding more in individual States or to young people born in different locations--all of this in an effort to get these young people off on a good start.

In Wyoming and across the country, more than 6 million Americans are benefitting from the ``no tax on tips'' provision in the Working Families Tax Cut law. These are our waiters, our barbers, our bartenders, the tour guides. They have claimed an average deduction of over $7,000 on the no tax on tips.

More than 25 million Americans have benefited from no tax on overtime. They are the firefighters, the police officers, the nurses, the linemen, the coal miners in Wyoming and in your home State. They have claimed an average deduction of over $3,000 on overtime.

So hard-working Americans are being rewarded--rewarded for working more--working more. Think about that. That is not what the Democrats are proposing. What we did was put incentives in for people working more, to keep more of what they earn.

Democrats are looking to take more for the government. We are looking to find ways to let people keep what they earn.

So the extra money goes right into their bank accounts, not to the bureaucrats in Washington or the Democrats that want to take that money to spend it. That is why they wanted to raise taxes by $4 trillion. They wanted to tax more so they could spend more. It is all wrong.

The Working Families Tax Cut law protects 2 million family-owned farms and ranches in my State and in the Presiding Officer's from the dreaded death tax. The small business owners in our communities talk about that when I walk Main Street, and I saw it in Newcastle, WY, 2 weeks ago. Instead of being forced to sell their land or their small businesses to pay taxes to Washington so Democrats can spend more, families in Wyoming are now able to plan for their futures for generations to come.

The Working Families Tax Cut law also allows businesses to immediately deduct up to $2.5 million in new equipment. That means more jobs, more growth, more people in the workplace. It means more opportunities for farmers, for ranchers, and for Main Street America.

Because of lower taxes and more opportunities, workers across our Nation are seeing bigger paychecks--another thing that the Senate minority leader referred to as a ``dud'' earlier today. Real wages are up this year. This is significant progress.

The only people who seem to be upset about lower taxes, bigger refunds, and higher wages are the elected Democrats in this body, who voted for a $4 trillion tax increase, and the minority leader, who led the charge. Democrats want to raise taxes on the American people. They believe that the money you earn isn't yours. They want it so they can spend it. Democrats believe that the money you earn belongs to the government. That is why the Democrat Party is known as the party of high taxes.

It is not just here in the U.S. Senate; it is in the States and the big cities that are run by Democrats across the country.

This year, in the State of Virginia, a Democrat Governor was elected and sworn into office. So Democrats in Virginia now control the house, the senate, and the Governor's mansion--a big flip in Virginia. Since they took over in January, Democrats have introduced 50--50--new tax increases. That is the Democrat mindset: Raise taxes. Get power. Raise taxes.

Democrats want to raise taxes on barbershops, on nail salons, on dry cleaners, and gymnasiums. They are proposing new taxes on firearms and on ammunition in Virginia. That is what has happened now that Virginia has elected Democrats.

Democrats like to use the word ``affordability.'' Apparently, the Democrats' idea of affordability is higher taxes paid by working families so they can spend more money on liberal social programs. That is where we are in America today.

Republicans know the best way to make America affordable is with good jobs, growing paychecks, lower taxes, and that is exactly what we are seeing here today, on April 15, as people file their taxes and see the larger refunds this year--refunds of over $3,400, over $250 a month.

The American people know the money belongs to them, not to Washington. They have earned it. They should keep more of it. Republicans trust people at home to know best what they want to do with that money--what they want to spend, what they want to save, what they want to invest.

So this tax day, I come to the floor to say the American people have more money in their pockets because Republicans--all of us--have passed the Working Families Tax Cut law. Republicans are going to continue to fight for an America where families get to keep

more of what they earn and make the decisions about how to spend it.

I yield the floor.

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from West Virginia (Mr. Justice).

Mr. President, first, I want to salute Senator Duckworth for bringing this critical issue to the floor so that the American people can hear

what our views are on this war but also reflect their views. I also want to salute her for her heroic service in the U.S. Army.

Thank you, Senator.

I rise today to discuss the war in Iran. Forty-six days ago, President Trump unilaterally launched this war. He declined to make his case before the American people. He refused to consult Congress. He failed to present evidence of an imminent threat, and he ignored his advisers, who warned him about the peril of such an operation.

President Trump believed he alone had the judgment to engage our Nation in a major conflict, and he alone had the ability to secure a quick, complete victory.

After more than 6 weeks of war, what has the President accomplished? Thirteen American servicemembers have tragically lost their lives. More than 300 have been wounded. Thousands of civilians across the Middle East have been killed and injured, and hundreds of thousands displaced. The United States has lost dozens of aircraft, sustained significant damage to our bases, and burned through an alarming amount of our missile inventory and other munitions.

Global oil prices have surged more than 45 percent, and the cost of gasoline and household goods in our communities have risen significantly. American families are bearing the cost of a war they wanted nothing to do with and have gained nothing from.

In sum, the President took a difficult status quo and somehow managed to make it far worse.

On February 27, the Strait of Hormuz was open to maritime traffic. American farmers could count on fertilizer shipments. Our high-tech chip makers, in whom we have invested billions of dollars, could count on helium deliveries.

Today, the Strait of Hormuz is closed. Incredibly, it is now President Trump who is blockading the strait, rather than Iranians. This is a bizarre and incoherent strategy. A blockade will push prices even higher, with ripple effects on food, fuel, and consumer goods across this country--indeed across the world.

Additionally, Iran has demonstrated that it responds to military pressure with defiance, not concession. This blockade is unlikely to change Iran's negotiating position, and I worry it will do nothing more than place our servicemembers in greater danger.

Only under President Trump's chaotic tenure would a month and a half of fighting result in the United States being in a weaker strategic position than before the war began. Here are the facts. Iran still retains its nuclear program. Its ballistic missile capabilities and drone arsenal, although diminished, still pose a threat. Moreover, the regime has learned it can effectively control the Strait of Hormuz when it chooses. President Trump has badly damaged America's standing with our allies, emboldened our adversaries, and lost any moral authority he had on the international stage. The American people, including many of his own supporters, strongly disapprove of this war.

At this stage, we must ask: What comes next?

The President has shown he will not listen to military and regional experts and is uninterested in earning the support of the American people.

While that is a decision he can make, if he is unconstrained by anything other than his ``own morality,'' then Congress has a duty to constrain him through the powers we hold as the constitutional check and balance on the President.

Congress controls the purse. Congress declares war and ratifies treaties. Congress represents--and answers to--the American people. It is long past time for Republicans to stop avoiding their constitutional duties and start reining in the President's ability to unilaterally wage war. At a bare minimum, it is long past time they hold public hearings with Cabinet officials to provide accountability for the American people.

Now, I am relieved that the cease-fire appears to be holding for the moment. The administration should use this time wisely and immediately return to negotiating a diplomatic agreement. That means engaging in serious, structured conversation with Iran to address nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles, their proxy activity, but also the sanctions that are in place and the security guarantees that the Iranians will demand.

It also means taking a realistic approach to opening the Strait of Hormuz. The Iranians have a complex, layered network of sea mines, fast attack boats, air and sea drones, missiles, and hidden launch sites in the cliffs around the strait that provide them with many effective options to threaten ships in the passage. Even if the United States cleared the strait of mines and began escorting commercial ships with our own Navy vessels, militarily suppressing and defeating Iran's ambush network is not a sustainable long-term option. A diplomatic arrangement is the only real answer. And I must say that to achieve this diplomatic arrangement, the President needs and should announce a group of experts--not real estate developers and golfing buddies--to go over there. This is not going to be settled by the friends of the President cutting a deal.

It took us almost 2 years and complicated discussions about nuclear policy, nuclear objectives, et cetera, to get the JCPOA. It is going to take us a while to settle this issue, too, and we can't settle it with a casual group negotiating on a weekend.

The President said he was shocked that Iran closed the strait and bombarded gulf nations in response to his attack. That is rather astounding because everyone with a modest knowledge of the Iranian regime was not particularly shocked. Indeed, the course of this war was entirely predictable. Generations of American military and political experts have examined the Iran problem and repeatedly reached the same conclusion: War with Iran would not achieve our goal.

Indeed, President Trump was given the same warning by his advisers. According to press reports, Gen. Dan Caine the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs warned the President of becoming entangled in a prolonged conflict and expressed concerns about U.S. casualties and the difficulty caused by a lack of allies. General Caine also raised the possibility that Iran would block the Strait of Hormuz, stating it was long believed Iran would deploy mines, drones, and missiles to close the world's most vital shipping lane.

A separate intelligence official reportedly emphasized, in his words:

It wasn't just predictable. It was predicted. He was told

in advance.

The President ignored the advice and decades of historical lessons and attacked anyway.

At this juncture, the administration has realized that the Iranians are not going to capitulate and that the difficult work of diplomacy cannot be wrapped up in a mere 21 hours of negotiation. Facing this reality, the President has several options.

First, the President could simply declare victory, as he has done so often, and leave the region without a deal. But what would he leave behind? A battered Iran with more antagonistic and radical leaders who may have concluded the only way to avoid future attacks is to acquire a nuclear weapon. With hundreds of pounds of enriched uranium on hand, that possibility is very real--and could be accelerated with Russian, Chinese, or North Korean assistance.

Second, the President could launch new military strikes to try to force the regime to surrender. However, this would inevitably result in renewed attacks against our forces in the region and a prolonged closure of the strait. And as I mentioned earlier, the regime has already demonstrated that its threshold for pain is high and its regard for its people is low. An extended military campaign would not change the Iranians' negotiating demands.

Now I would propose a third route. The President can resurrect serious negotiations with Iran across the full range of issues dividing our two nations. The agenda must be broad enough for both sides to claim benefit. That is the only way you get to a deal, and we hope ``The Art of the Deal'' is present in this situation.

The United States must address nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles, and malign proxy activity, and Iran will seek guarantees against further military operations, sanctions relief, and other assurances.

President Trump was foolish, in my view--and reflecting Senator Kaine--to

tear up the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action he inherited from President Obama, but with diplomacy, his administration may be able to regain some of the important pieces that he previously abandoned.

But there is an additional obstacle to peace that must be addressed: Prime Minister Netanyahu. Prime Minister Netanyahu has spent the better part of 30 years gathering support for what he believed to be an inevitable confrontation with Iran. His personal and political fortunes are entirely aligned with the continuation of this war. As he faces an election and a criminal trial, he is using the war as personal and political armor. Unless Trump is willing to force Netanyahu to stand down, Israel will continue operations regardless of what America does.

Mr. President, this war was ill-conceived, I oppose it, and if it is still ongoing after 60 days, I will vote against an authorization of military force to continue it. I am proud to be here today in support of Senator Duckworth's proposal. From day one, Trump lacked any clear objectives and realistic views of the consequences, but peace can be accomplished. The path forward requires honesty from President Trump about what military force can and cannot achieve, the discipline to negotiate seriously, and the courage to lead our allies rather than alienate them.

Unfortunately, this President, I believe, cannot be trusted to chart this path. He has shown an intractable instinct for destruction first and diplomacy last. He will never secure a peaceful conclusion to this conflict as long as Congress allows President Trump to wage war whenever and however he sees fit. Yes, we have to stand up and be true to the oath we all took: to preserve and protect the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of this War Powers Resolution. I urge them to choose the path of peace before the costs of President Trump's war become irreversible.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise in support of my colleague's War Powers Resolution.

I am proud to be a cosponsor with Senator Duckworth, and I am very humbled to be here in the Chamber and listen to her--to listen to her recount her own experience as to her own vow as a Member of this body and to take the very painful lesson that she absorbed when her future was completely altered by her wartime service and put it to a positive use in trying to protect others like her.

Senator Duckworth proves a point that gets proven over and over and over again: that our military serves with distinction and bravery and that they serve with professionalism and excellence. But so often, the issue for them is the quality of the civilian decisions about whether they go to war or not. So often in my lifetime--in Vietnam and Iraq and now in Iran--that brave service was compromised--really, betrayed--by poor civilian decision making and for improper political reasons, rather than a careful assessment of what was in America's best interests.

I have been asking the question since this war began: Have we learned nothing from 25 years of war--unproductive war--in the Middle East?

It is pretty apparent to me, in having asked that question over and over again, that this administration has not.

This administration has not factored in the 14,000-plus deaths in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They have not factored in the more than 65,000 American troops and contractors who were injured. They have not factored in the hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths. They have not factored in the fact that the U.S. military engagements did not produce a safer region. They have not factored in the $8 trillion spent during those 25 years. They have acted as if that history is now wiped away, and we can engage in a war in the Middle East without reflecting upon these lessons that are written in blood and in the precious resources of our Nation.

So I am not going to ask the question again today, ``Have we learned nothing from 25 years of war?'' because I think the answer to that, sadly, is plain.

So let me ask a different question: What have we learned in 45 days of war in Iran? What have we learned?

I would argue that we have learned at least three things: War is costly. An unwise war is deeply unpopular. Those who would make diplomacy impossible

make war inevitable. I think those are the lessons that the last 45 days have taught us.

First, war is costly.

As my colleague laid out, 13 members of our armed services--one who lived in Spotsylvania County, VA, who had purchased a home, who was within a few months of retirement and was wanting to retire to that home with his family--have died. Spouses and kids and parents and friends and brothers and sisters are mourning the losses from this unwise and illegal war.

Hundreds of our troops have been injured, and stories come out about the depth of those injuries and the lack of planning that left them exposed to the attacks that caused them to be injured. While I wish it were otherwise, it is likely that there will be more such stories.

There is also the cost in dollars. We are spending, by some estimates, between $1 billion and $2 billion a day. We are expecting to see the President, sometime soon, send over a new request for a dramatic increase in funding to fund this Iran war.

But let me talk about costs in a different way, just the cost to everyday Americans' pocketbooks.

Today is tax day. Today is tax day. President Trump is the ``taxer in chief.'' Last year, he imposed chaotic tariffs on the world's economy, right before tax day, and those tariffs cost American families a couple of thousand dollars each. With this one-man tariff war that President Trump started without having congressional authority--that was, ultimately, in significant part, struck down as illegal by the Supreme Court in February of this year--last year, right before tax day, President Trump stood up and showed by his actions that he was the ``taxer in chief.''

This year, on tax day, we are seeing Americans pay more for food, pay more for energy, and pay more for building supplies because of the actions of this President--in particular, just the price of gas at the gas pump in Virginia and nationally. The price of gas has gone up $1 a gallon since February 27, just because of President Trump's unilateral decision to take us to war.

Virginians buy 8 million gallons of gas a day. So that is $8 million Virginians are having to shell out of their pockets--that they weren't having to shell out--because Donald Trump started this war.

This is happening in Illinois. It is happening in Connecticut. It is happening in Nebraska. It is happening in every State, and it is happening all over the world. We are reading about economies that are shutting down 1 day a week. We are reading about street protests in allied nations over the cost of petroleum, all driven by this one man's deciding to take us to war.

So the first lesson from the last 45 days: War is costly.

The second lesson is, an unwise war is deeply unpopular. This war is deeply unpopular with the American public.

Most of us took the last 2 weeks of recess to travel around our States. I represent Virginia, which I believe is one of the most pro- military States in the country. I spent significant time in the Hampton Roads area, which is the center of American naval power, where we build ships and subs, and it has the biggest Navy base in the world.

I spent a lot of time with Virginians over the last 2 weeks. This war is unpopular. Virginians are deployed, and they don't know why, and they don't know when they will come home.

The USS Ford carrier, today, passes the record for the longest deployment of a carrier in American modern history. They were supposed to be home with their families before Christmas, and they are still deployed away from their families, with significant maintenance issues reducing the quality of life on that ship.

This war is unpopular. But, of course, it is unpopular. If you go to war without a clear rationale--and the President has floated five or six of them. If you go to war without a clear plan, without apparently anticipating what everyone would have anticipated with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, if you go to war without allies, if you go to war without Congress, the war will be unpopular. With no plan, no rationale, no allies, and no congressional debate, the war will be unpopular.

This was so easy to predict at the beginning. For some reason, the President thought the magic of his own personality could turn a war of choice into something that would be embraced by the American public. The American public is too smart for that.

So an unwise war is deeply unpopular. That is a lesson of the last 45 days.

Then, the last lesson, I believe, is a profound one that we have to acknowledge, and that is this: Those who make diplomacy impossible make war inevitable.

The President, the Vice President, and his U.N. Representative--even within the last 2 hours, in a hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee--said the war was necessary to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. There is no intelligence that said that Iran was near getting a nuclear weapon. If what President Trump wanted was to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, then he committed one of the most egregious blunders in the history of the United States, in his first term, when he tore up a diplomatic deal that did precisely that.

The United States and our European allies and adversaries--China and Russia--engaged in a 20-month negotiation with Iran that led to an agreement. On the first page of the agreement--page 1--Iran reaffirms that it will never seek to purchase or develop any nuclear weapons. We had the agreement with Iran for no nuclear weapons. We had mechanisms of inspection. We had limitations on centrifuges and limitations on the enrichment of plutonium or uranium.

We had a diplomatic deal, and the President tore it up. The deal was working according to our allies. The deal was working according to President Trump's first Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense, who urged him to stay in it.

The deal was working, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency that was investigating and inspecting Iranian facilities, but President Trump took a deal that guaranteed no nuclear weapons ever, and he tore it up. The United States doesn't walk away from diplomatic deals; other nations do that. But the President established a dangerous precedent. And many of us said to him at the time: If you tear up a diplomatic deal, you are paving the path to war. It might be soon or it might not be soon, but you are paving a path to war.

If you make diplomacy impossible, you make war inevitable, and that is exactly what Donald Trump has done. Those troops who have died, they have died because Trump tore up a diplomatic deal. The costs that are being experienced by American consumers, we are suffering those costs because Donald Trump tore up a diplomatic deal. The injuries to civilians, to schoolchildren, the injuries to American troops, those are occurring because Donald Trump tore up a diplomatic deal.

We still have a seal that is available right here on the walls of the Senate that has the eagle representing the United States and in each claw it is holding the arrows of war or the laurel branches of peace, and the seal of the United States always has the eagle looking to the laurel branches. We are supposed to prefer diplomacy first.

But Donald Trump has decided that a Department of Defense now needs to be a Department of War, and rules of engagement to protect civilians now can be dismissed and called stupid and things that we don't need to follow.

I hope this body still believes that America should prefer diplomacy first. I hope this body still believes in the United States being a values-based nation, not a bully nation. That is what this vote is about, and that is why I am so proud to join my colleague to support it, and I will continue to be on the floor with my colleagues every week until we stop an illegal and unwise war.

I yield the floor.