Floor Statements

Madam President, before I begin, I just heard the leader conclude his remarks. He didn't mention the fact today that he is meeting with several constituents of mine from New York, including John Feal and other 9/11 first responders, to discuss a solution to the shortfall in the Victim Compensation Fund.

I am glad the leader has agreed to meet with them. It is a good thing, but it is not enough to have just a meeting. These brave men and women who selflessly rushed to the towers in the midst of danger, when no one knew what would come next, deserve a commitment that their bill will be considered in a timely manner here on the floor.

So, again, I urge Leader McConnell to listen to the 9/11 first responders. Then give them your commitment, Leader McConnell, that you will put their bill on the Senate floor as soon as it passes the House as a standalone bill. It will pass the House; it will certainly pass the Senate, given the cosponsorship; and the President will sign it. The families of those who, just like our soldiers, rushed to danger to protect our safety can breathe a sigh of relief.

Leader McConnell is the one person--this is not a dual responsibility--I wish it were, at least when we are in the minority, but Leader McConnell is the one person who controls the calendar on the Senate floor. He can stand in the way, as he has done before, or he can do the right thing and commit to give this bill the attention it deserves. I will be eagerly waiting to hear what the leader says after he meets with the first responders this afternoon.

Iran

Madam President, on Iran and the NDAA, ever since President Trump unilaterally decided to abandon the Iran nuclear agreement, our two countries have been on a path toward greater conflict. In the past month, Iran has heightened its aggressive actions in the region, prompting responses from the U.S. Government. No one looks at Iran through rose-colored glasses. That is why Americans, myself included, are worried about the current course of events. Escalation happens quickly in the Middle East. Without a steady hand at the helm, without a coherent plan or strategy--things this President has lacked since the moment he took office--the danger of bumbling into war is acute.

Democrats have been urging Leader McConnell to allow us a vote on an amendment to the NDAA concerning a possible conflict with Iran. We have an amendment, led by Senators Udall, Merkley, Murphy, and Kaine-- cosponsored by Republican Senators Paul and Lee--that would prohibit any funds authorized by the current NDAA to be used to conduct hostilities against the Government of Iran.

Again, this is a dangerous situation. Even if the President doesn't intend war, his erratic, inconsistent, and off-the-cuff policies could lead us to bumble into war. When we are at war, it doesn't matter how we got there. The loss of life and the loss of treasure, when we need so much attention here in America, is very real.

So we have an amendment, and we are urging Leader McConnell to allow us a simple vote on an amendment to the NDAA concerning a possible conflict with Iran.

Let me repeat. The amendment is led by Udall, Merkley, Murphy, and Kaine, cosponsored by Paul and Lee. So it is bipartisan. It prohibits any funds authorized by the current NDAA to be used to conduct hostilities against the Government of Iran.

Contrary to what the leader just said, the Udall amendment would not--would not--diminish our military's ability to respond to a provocation or act in self-defense. The way the leader characterized the amendment is just not true. He deliberately distorted the amendment. He knows better. The Udall amendment preserves absolutely our military's ability to act in self-defense, and it would make it perfectly clear that if President Trump wants to send our Nation to war, he would need Congress to authorize it first, as stipulated by our Constitution.

There is no greater power that the Founding Fathers gave to Congress than the ability to go to war. They were worried about an Executive who might be overreaching, who might be erratic, who might be inconsistent--and we have never had an Executive who fits those categories more than this current President--and they wanted Congress to be a check. If the President had to explain why he wishes to go to war, he might be more consistent and certainly less opaque. We should have this amendment on the merits, but we also should have it because this is how the Senate should work.

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

Mr. President, tomorrow my friend John Feal and fellow survivors who were first responders on September 11 will visit with Leader McConnell to press for the passage of legislation to fix the shortfall of the Victim Compensation Fund. This is the fund that awards compensation to the families of 9/11 first responders who died from 9/ 11-related illnesses, often cancers and fatal respiratory illnesses.

It makes me sick to my stomach that every time we have this debate, these suffering first responders, many in wheelchairs, are forced to travel to Washington to shame politicians into supporting their healthcare.

I am sick of all of these delays; I am tired of temporary reauthorizations; and I have had enough of watching our first responders endure the indignity of waiting for a last-minute, must-pass bill to hide their issue in so Members will not vote against it. It shouldn't be this way, and it shouldn't be this hard to pass aid for our 9/11 responders and everyone who worked on the pile in the weeks and months thereafter.

Who has been standing in the way? At the top of the list, unfortunately, is my colleague the Republican leader. Leader McConnell has to do the right thing here. He is meeting with these brave responders, and that is a good thing, but it is not enough. At the end of the meeting, he should promise them, and promise all of us, that he will put the Victim Compensation Fund fix on the floor as soon as it passes the House as a stand-alone bill--no more delays for these brave people, no more people like Ray Fifer, my dear friend who passed away, having to come to Washington five or six times begging and pleading, not for himself--he knew the cancer was fatal for him--but for his colleagues and allies. Let's do the right thing here.

Let's do the right thing, Leader McConnell.

Iran

Mr. President, on another matter, amid escalating tensions with Iran, the President today announced a new round of sanctions. It remains unclear what, if any, strategy this latest round of sanctions fits into and whether this latest round of sanctions will compel Iran's leaders to alter their current course. I worry that the President continues down a path of escalation.

Besides a small group of hawkish advisers and Republican cheerleaders in Congress, nobody wants a war with Iran. The American people are weary of endless wars in the Middle East, the trillions of dollars wasted, the thousands of American lives lost. Americans want the money spent here at home on things like our crumbling infrastructure. Americans don't want to see their sons and daughters dying in a war that seems to go on forever without a conclusion.

While I am not convinced the President is eager to go to war, I am very concerned that he could bumble us into war. His strategy seems erratic, changing from day to day and week to week. It seems opaque. There is no real discussion outside of his own little clique of advisers, and it seems to sometimes contradict itself.

Exchanges of aggression can escalate and cascade quickly in the Middle East; provocations can spin out of control. The President's lack of a steady hand, lack of transparency, and, above all, his lack of strategy make the danger of escalation even more distinct and worrisome.

It is also worrisome that John Bolton and Secretary Pompeo, the advocates for the conflict, appear to be leading the charge while there is no confirmed Secretary of Defense to pull back the reins, and it is interesting that it seems to be the Department of Defense that are the reins on the President. They know the limits of what we can do without escalation and the kind of endless war that our soldiers and our military leaders have always fought for this country, no matter what the consequences.

So let me be clear: If the President is going to engage the United States in another war in the Middle East, he is going to have to convince the American people, and he is going to have to come to Congress for authorization. One of the best ways to avoid bumbling into a war is to have a robust, open debate and for Congress to have some say. We have learned that lesson in the run up to Iraq.

Democrats have an amendment to the NDAA led by Senators Udall, Merkley, Murphy, and Kaine that would prohibit any funds authorized by the NDAA to be used to conduct hostilities against the Government of Iran. It makes imminent sense to consider this amendment on our annual defense bill. It is germane; it is timely.

Considering the gravity of the situation with Iran, Democrats believe the full Senate should be present to vote on the Udall amendment. Leader McConnell is no doubt aware that several Members of this body will be absent this week for the Democratic Presidential debates. We should wait to have the vote until the full body is present. There is no rush to complete the NDAA. We have passed it very frequently later in the year with no harmful consequences to our military.

We should have the vote on the Udall amendment, which is an urgency, before we bumble into war, and it should occur when every Senator is able to cast their vote. Last week, the Republican leader promised the Senate would hold an open amendment process on the NDAA. We have critical national security issues to debate, including Iran, including election security.

Will the Republican leader keep his word and allow this debate to go forward? For much of this year, Leader McConnell, unfortunately, and now becoming known from one end of America to the another, has turned the Senate into a legislative graveyard, where we hardly ever vote on the prevailing issue of the day.

Will the majority leader let the Senate have this important vote? Or is this another issue, another debate, the ability to fund a war that will be buried in his legislative graveyard?

I hope he will not continue his shameful record of ducking the issues of the day when it comes to something as important as Congress's role in the matter of war and peace.

Border Security

Finally, Mr. President, on the border, after a week of making the chilling, nasty, obnoxious threats about mass arrests and deportation of millions of immigrants, President Trump backed off on Sunday and demanded concessions from Democrats in exchange.

In doing so, the President reminded the American people that he might be incapable of having a rational discussion about challenges at the border. Look at the things he has gone through--tariffs, closed the border--issue after issue, he makes threats, then backs off because none of them make any sense, none of them have been thought through.

The President seems far more comfortable terrorizing immigrant families than actually coming up with real solutions. I mean, my God, to threaten separating children from their parents as a bargaining chip is the very definition of callousness. That is something that the vast majority of Americans would abhor, and he goes right ahead and does it.

Unfortunately, however, this is typical of the President's approach to the border. For 2 years, the President has said he wants to fix the problems at the border, but just about every action he has taken has made things worse. He shut down the government in a failed attempt to fund an ineffective wall. He threatened to close the border entirely until the business community rebelled and said it would really hurt our economy and our workers. He threatened destructive tariffs with Mexico, and he has cut off security assistance to Central American countries that help curb the violence and lawlessness that contributes to the flow of migrants in the first place.

His administration has separated children from their parents, kept them in cages, let them suffer in horrible conditions in for-profit detention centers that are little better than modern internment camps.

These are not the actions of an administration that is trying to solve a problem. It seems the President is incapable of saying it is a real problem--he thinks it is--and people agree that we have to do something at the border. We all do.

But instead of actually getting experts in and solving the problem, he is emotional, appeals to the dark side of human nature, and then is totally inconsistent and is on to doing the next thing. Any objective observer would say the President doesn't want to solve this problem.

He is, rather, trying to exploit it for what he thinks will be his political benefit, although it sure didn't work in the month before the 2018 election. To exploit an issue like this because he thinks it will benefit him politically, even if it means mistreating children and striking fear into the hearts of millions of people living in the U.S., that is disgraceful.

The thing is we can have a rational conversation about this. This week, the Senate will consider a bipartisan agreement on supplemental appropriations for the border. That is a good thing. I salute Senator Shelby, a Republican, and Senator Leahy, a Democrat, who are coming together on a proposal that got 30 of the 31 votes on the Appropriations Committee. It shows that we can be rational and compromise and get something done on the border, even if it does not meet everybody's needs 100 percent of the way.

Beyond that, we Democrats continue to propose commonsense changes that would address what is happening at the border to deal with the root causes of migration. Doesn't it make sense to tell these people from Nicaragua and El Salvador they can claim asylum in their home countries and not go through the 1,000-mile trek--often expensive because they have to pay coyotes to cross the north border of Mexico and with the United States. Of course, it does.

Doesn't it make sense to have more immigration judges to reduce the backlog in cases? And doesn't it make sense to provide security assistance and help to those three Central American countries to combat the scourge of drug cartels, violent gangs, and lawlessness that has pushed migrants to go north because they don't want their child murdered and raped?

Both parties can support these policies. President Trump can support these policies, but so far, the President has shown a shameful lack of willingness to engage with the real problems at the border, preferring demagoguery and fear-mongering to progress.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, over the past few months, tensions with Iran have escalated. There have been a series of attacks on tankers in the Gulf region, and this morning it was reported that Iran has shot down a U.S. drone.

These events are deeply concerning--all the more so because the Trump administration has not explained to Congress or to the American people how it views these events, how it plans to respond, and, most importantly, what the broader strategy for confronting Iran is.

President Trump left the diplomatic agreement a little more than a year ago. It was obvious to anyone who even had a cursory knowledge of Iran that it would create consequences. With that decision, there is a course set for conflict--conflict whose purpose or strategy has never been articulated to the American people.

The President says on TV: It is a much better Iran than when I took office. Well, they were not building nuclear weapons--and I opposed the Iran agreement, as you know. But they were not building nuclear weapons. They were proceeding along the path of the agreement, and the President, as he seems to, just gets a bug in his head, something he said in the campaign without thinking, and then upends foreign policy-- another example of chaos in this administration. But he has done that. He has done that.

So now the issue is what is our strategy to deal with the consequences? The American people have to know this. We have seen too many conflicts in the Middle East escalate into war--escalate into a 10-year war.

The American people are not for spending a fortune and, more importantly, lives of Americans overseas. They want us to focus here at home, but the kind of adventurism--almost unplanned, unthought out, and, certainly, unexplained adventurism--of the President is the wrong way to go and could lead to severe consequences. And, I must say, even in closed-door briefings with Senators, the administration doesn't have a strategy.

This is not how democracy is supposed to work. This is not how the CEO of a major Nation or even a major company should behave, with no articulated strategy. The President needs to explain to the American people why he is driving us toward another endless conflict in the Middle East.

Saudi Arabia

Madam President, on Saudi Arabia, another matter concerning the administration's foreign policy, today the Senate will vote on resolutions of disapproval for arms sales to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

These 22 resolutions introduced by Senator Menendez would block billions of dollars in military sales, including the transfer of tens of thousands of precision-guided munitions that the Saudis have previously used to bomb innocent civilians in Yemen.

The timing of these votes is significant. Last night the United Nations issued a report that documented evidence that the Saudis meticulously planned the murder of Jamal Khashoggi and ``forensically''--their words--disposed of the evidence.

According to the report, the Saudis referred to Mr. Khashoggi as a sacrificial animal and that dismembering the body would be easy--how gross, how cruel, how beyond words.

Are we going to blithely go along and let the Saudis continue? They are an ally. Everyone knows that. That doesn't mean you let allies do the most horrible things and just treat it as if nothing happened. But in the wake of such monstrosity, the Trump administration is proposing another round of billions of dollars in arms sales to Saudi Arabia.

Well, we should at least have a debate about whether that is the right course of action. Leader McConnell was on the floor saying: What are the Democrats doing here? We are debating, Mr. Leader. You have one view; I

may have another. But the American people are entitled to a debate on this important issue, and that is what the law provides, and that is the tool we use--one of the few tools we have to actually cause debate in this Chamber, which the leader, with his legislative graveyard, has assiduously avoided. With his reducing the amount of time that we can talk about and vet nominees, he has assiduously avoided that, turning this Chamber into a graveyard that the American people despise. But here we have an opportunity to debate, and even here the leader seems to be decrying that fact, in my view.

The administration is claiming emergency power and trying to circumvent congressional review of these arms sales. That premise must be rejected. It sets a dangerous precedent for congressional oversight of future arms sales, and it can lead to renewed conflicts. We are also discussing that, parenthetically, in relation to Iran. Should Congress have some say there? You will hear more from me later on that.

The very least Congress can do is to debate the merits of sending Saudi Arabia billions of dollars in military technology it may use not to confront Iran but to perpetrate one of the largest humanitarian catastrophes of its generation.

Saudi Arabia, even though it be an ally, must be held accountable for its human rights abuses in Yemen and the grotesque murder of Jamal Khashoggi.

Harriet Tubman

Madam President, now, on the Tubman issue, more than 3 years ago then-Treasury Secretary Jack Lew announced that he had ordered an accelerated redesign of the $20 bill with a new design to feature Harriet Tubman's portrait on the face of the bill. The design was set to be released in 2020, the 100th anniversary of women getting the right to vote--a fitting tribute to an extraordinary American and an extraordinary New Yorker.

There are no women or people of color on our paper currency today, even though they make up a significant majority of our population. There haven't been for more than a century. The plan to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 note was a long overdue way to recognize that disparity and rectify it.

But shortly after the Trump administration took office, all mention of the Tubman $20 bill was deleted from the Treasury Department's website without any explanation. Then, Secretary Mnuchin testified that a decision had been made to delay the release of the $20 note until 2028, and Treasury refused to confirm that Harriet Tubman's image would ever appear on it.

The official word from the White House was that the delay was required to accommodate anti-counterfeiting measures. But if you believe that, I have a bridge that I can sell you. It is simply not credible that with all the resources of the Treasury Department, a decade or more would be required to produce a $20 bill.

A century ago, New Yorkers built the Empire State building in a little over a year. We landed a man on the Moon in what seems to be less time. Surely the 21st century Treasury Department can redesign a bill in a reasonable period of time. The questions as to why the White House, the Treasury, and maybe even the President delayed this are looming and real, given the President's attitude toward women and minorities.

I have asked the Department of Treasury inspector general to launch an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the Treasury's decision. The official reasons given aren't credible. The whole thing smacks of politics. President Trump has referred to efforts to replace Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill as pure political correctness. To recognize more than half the people in our society, to recognize more than 25 percent of Americans who are people of color, all of whom have worked so hard to strive for this great country--is that political correctness? What is wrong with this President? What is wrong with this President, and what instincts is he appealing to? What bad instincts is he appealing to? It seems to be his practice, his way, his MO.

So among the questions the inspector general should examine is what role President Trump played in this apparent effort to renege on Treasury's 2016 commitment to honor Harriet Tubman.

Whatever the President's sentiments toward Jackson are, there is no reason to reverse the original Treasury Department decision to recognize Harriet Tubman's historic legacy on the $20 bill, which would still feature our seventh President on the reverse side.

I hope the inspector general will get to the bottom of this, but in the meantime, I hope President Trump himself is asked to answer for these delays. It would truly be a sordid state of affairs if the President or his team, for political reasons, interfered with and infected the process for designing American currency.

Background Checks

Madam President, now, finally, on background checks, in the early hours on Monday, a heavily armed man approached the Federal building in downtown Dallas and started shooting. This was a civilian walking into the middle of an American city with military-grade weapons, a mask, and body armor, and he was prepared to inflict the maximum level of damage possible.

It is to the credit of the incredible first responders that this accident did not result in the loss of innocent life, but it is remarkable that events like this now seem all too routine, and so the news cycle barely covers them before moving on.

Barely a week goes by without an incident like this somewhere in America. We are the only Nation in the developed world where these kinds of things--these horrible things--happen with regularity. Virginia Beach, Highland Ranch, Poway, and Aurora, IL, are all examples of shootings that have taken place this year alone.

Later today, I will join several of my colleagues from the House and the Senate, including our former colleague, the great Gabby Giffords, to urge Leader McConnell to bring background check legislation to the floor of the Senate. It has been 114 days since the House passed the measure, which more than 90 percent of Americans support, including more than 80 percent of Republicans and the majority of gun owners. But it seems that Leader McConnell has set aside another plot in his legislative graveyard for this potentially lifesaving bill.

For too long, the gun lobby has reflexively opposed gun safety reforms, even the most obvious and noncontroversial reforms, like closing loopholes in background checks, and, for too long, the Republican majority has marched in lockstep with them.

The American people demand we do these rational acts. The House has passed it overwhelmingly with a bipartisan vote. Where are Republicans? Are they still cowering before the NRA? I remind them, the NRA is a lot weaker today than it was a few years ago. It is time to do the right thing and stop being scared.

Let's move this bill to the floor. Let Leader McConnell finally let us debate an issue long overdue.

Election Security

Madam President, finally, as we continue to debate the NDAA, I urge Leader McConnell once again to allow and support amendments to protect our elections from future attacks.

Election security is a national security issue of the highest urgency. There aren't two sides to this debate. No one can defend doing nothing as the Russians, and maybe the Chinese, the Iranians, and the North Koreans, mess with the wellspring of our democracy--our elections.

As we have seen time and again from reports by the FBI, intelligence agencies, and the Mueller report, our elections came under attack from Russia in the last Presidential election. FBI Director Wray has warned that they are coming for us again, and he thinks it could be worse than in 2016.

Leader McConnell will not deny that this is true. So what are we waiting for? We know the threat is there. We know we can take steps to minimize it. So why won't Leader McConnell let us act?

We have several options for legislative action, many of them bipartisan. People on both sides of the aisle--Democrats and Republicans--care about this issue and have worked on legislation together, something not done frequently enough around here, and Leader McConnell just sits on these bills.

Last week, Senator Warner asked unanimous consent to simply say the FBI should be informed when a foreign power tries to influence an election. I believe Senator Blumenthal will try

to do the same thing today. Is Leader McConnell going to instruct one of his Republicans to block it again? Will he have the courage to block it himself if he wants it blocked?

The logical solution is to let us debate the bills. If Leader McConnell will not cooperate on this matter, Democrats are going to stand up for our democracy on our own, if we have to. We are going to ask unanimous consent to allow debate on these bills. We will insist on amendments to the NDAA. Leader McConnell has suggested he wants an open amendment process, so let's press the matter, and we will continue to push for more election security funding as part of a deal on budget caps.

There are not two sides on this one; there are just not. There is only one right answer: action to safeguard our election. I urge Leader McConnell to let us move on this issue. Stop stalling, stop obstructing. The legislative graveyard is full enough as it is. Let's come together, Democrats and Republicans, to protect our grand, imperiled democracy.

I yield the floor.

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

Now, if there is one word to describe the State of the Trump administration, it is ``chaos.'' The administration's policy at the border is in chaos; the administration's foreign policy is in chaos; and the Trump administration itself is in chaos: the vacancies in so many agencies, people within the administration fighting with each other, and the President tweeting away, even if it is unconnected to the people who actually administer the policies.

So even though this has been a constant theme in the Trump Presidency--the chaos within--it is getting worse and more alarming.

On the border, the President announces a new cockamamie policy almost every day: a national emergency to build a wall, tariffs with Mexico, shutting down the border entirely, mass arrests and deportations inside in our borders. Many of these ``policies'' were announced by tweet with little or no thought or force of action behind them. Not one of them has been implemented, even though the President could implement many on his own. Most were tossed aside as casually as they were announced, and it is easy to see why. The policies he has announced at the border are cruel, inhumane, ineffective, and most are impossible to carry out.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration is cutting off security assistance to Central American countries--the one thing his administration was doing to stem migration and address the root causes in the first place. Even on the issue the President talks about most, the chaos of his administration is making the problem exponentially worse, not better.

It doesn't get any better when it comes to the administration's foreign policy. In response to increased activity from Iran, the President has now announced two deployments of 1,000 troops or more without even explaining to the American people what is happening and why. As Commander in Chief, he owes it to the American people, and especially our troops, to clarify what he hopes to achieve in the Middle East. What is the strategy? What is the goal? What is the limit of what we will do, and what are the things we will do? Any foreign policy expert will tell you outlining these things helps the strategy and helps build support for it. Does the President have clear goals? Does he have a strategy or, once again, when he wakes up in the morning and thinks--one day, he tweets about it, and the next day he thinks something else and tweets something different or even contradictory.

We have no earthly clue to the President's strategy or goals because, like everything else in his administration, his foreign policy is wracked by chaos.

The Trump administration, in terms of its personnel and leadership, is in chaos as well. Yesterday the President's choice for Secretary of Defense withdrew. Where was the vetting? Why wasn't this known by the White House long before he got to this level? So now the most powerful military in the world has been without a Senate-confirmed Secretary since Secretary Mattis resigned in December of last year--6 months without a confirmed head of the DOD. How can we conduct a foreign policy, a military policy with no head of DOD?

The administration is escalating tensions in Iran and sending troops overseas without a permanent Defense Secretary, someone who is really in charge and thoroughly vetted at the helm. It is not just the Defense Department where chaos reigns. The positions of Homeland Security Secretary, OMB Secretary, SBA Administrator, Ambassador to the U.N., and even the Chief of Staff in the White House are all in the acting capacity.

It is a revolving door. People want to leave. Most people of substance can't stand the chaos and misdirection from the President, and we have had less focused attention to issue after issue from this President than any in a very long time because of chaos. The institutions of our government under Donald Trump lack steady and experienced leadership. It is a crisis of competence. The President is making decisions without proper counsel, preparation, or even communications between the relevant agencies. It is policy by whim. The withdrawal of his Secretary of Defense nomination is only the latest example of an administration in chaos.

I raise these points not to disparage the President but because the swirling chaos in his administration hurts the American people. It has frustrated our ability to find real solutions at the border and stunted progress on issues Americans care about, like infrastructure and healthcare. Above all, I fear the chaos in the White House could lead our country closer to a conflict with Iran that most Americans want to avoid.

In short, the amateur hour must end. The U.S. Government is not an episode of ``The Apprentice.'' It is real life with real consequences. It is deadly serious business. For the sake of the country, the Trump administration needs to get its act together.

Mr. President, now on climate, when I come to the floor to speak on matters of legislation, it is almost always about legislation here in Congress. But in our Federal system of government, the States, too, have enormous power to shape the current events in our country.

Today, I want to talk about a bill in my home State of New York that I believe will do just that. A few weeks ago, I endorsed the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, a bill that would put New York on a course for a net zero economy, meaning negligible to no carbon pollution by the year 2050. It is an ambitious target, but we need ambition because we live in unprecedented times.

We are witnessing human-caused climate change in the storms, floods, droughts, wildfires, and other extreme weather that has throttled our country in recent years. It has caused loss of life and destruction of livelihoods all over the country and all across the world. We must prioritize the urgency of climate change, and we must recognize the need to take bold steps to confront it aggressively.

It is unfortunate that here in Congress, because of our Republican colleagues, we don't do a thing, not one single thing on climate change. The bills the House has sent over and the bills that Democratic Senators have proposed end up in Leader McConnell's legislative graveyard. Nothing happens, and climate gets worse.

Thank God the States are doing something, and that is why I supported the climate bill in New York State. That is why I am so proud today that my State's legislative leaders have reached an agreement that will clear the way for its passage, with a vote in the Senate as soon as this evening.

I look forward to watching my State pass the most robust climate policy package passed by any State in the country. I am proud of that fact. I hope that it serves as an example for other States to follow, another catalyst for the national debate about how we can tackle climate change, and a reminder that we, in Congress, must do our part.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I speak in leader time.

Mr. President, last night, the Defense Department announced that 1,000 additional troops would be deployed to the Middle East. This is the second deployment of 1,000 or more troops in the past 30 days, ostensibly to deal with Iran's increased activity in the region.

Despite these two announcements, the President has yet to address the Nation about these developments. The President has yet to articulate a strategy about American involvement in the region. He has yet to send a single military commander to testify before the Armed Services Committee. And he has yet to explain what his policy of ``maximum pressure'' on Iran is supposed to achieve. All we have heard is the Secretary of State, our chief diplomat, rattling the sabers of war.

As U.S. troops again prepare to deploy to the Middle East, this administration has an obligation to explain to the American people exactly what is happening and why. If they have a case, they must make it public. Americans are rightly skeptical and tired of endless wars in the Middle East--a reticence that many on the Republican side don't seem to share. Americans know that smaller actions have a tendency to escalate into larger actions even when there is no congressional authority and no check.

The administration has offered to send various officials to give classified briefings, but, frankly, that is not nearly good enough. We have learned a hard truth from our experience in Iraq--that the drums of war start beating behind closed doors. The President must make his pitch to the Nation instead of another closed-door meeting with Senators. As the Commander in Chief, he owes that to every American but especially to the American servicemembers, and their families, whom he is sending into the Middle East.

Mr. President, Leader McConnell has indicated he plans to have the Senate consider legislation next week on the administration's request for supplemental appropriations to handle migration at our southern border. As I have said many times, Democrats want to provide the necessary resources to secure our borders and ensure that everyone who arrives there is treated humanely; however, the sheer chaos of this administration's policy, the sheer mismanagement, the erratic nature when the President says one thing one day and another the next, mean that we must be precise and careful about how we do it.

The fact is very simple: President Trump's immigration policies are inhumane, erratic, fleeting, and impossible to carry out at the same time.

Right now, on the Homestead Air Force Base in Florida, the Trump administration has authorized a for-profit company to build a temporary shelter for migrants that is little better than an internment camp. We have heard routinely about the separation of children from parents, about the horrible conditions at the DHS facilities, about children-- children--in cages. That is as un-American as anything.

This past week, I read in the New York Times the story of a 4-month- old boy. It wrenched my heart. He was separated from his parents--a cleavage so severe at an age so young that the boy has suffered a great trauma. He is now more than a year and a half old. He is back in his home country of Romania with his parents. He still can't walk on his own. He still hasn't spoken.

What are we doing to these innocent children? What are we doing? Stories like these are heart-wrenching; the policies that create them, unconscionable; and so often, the policies are announced according to the President's whim. Every day, the President seems to have a different crazy idea, often contradicting his previous thought--a national emergency declaration to build a wall, tariffs for Mexico, shutting down the border entirely.

Last night, the President tweeted that ICE was planning mass immigration arrests and removal. The President seems to just invent a new policy in the morning by tweet with the sole purpose of rallying his base.

Ideas like deporting millions of immigrants inside our border have been dismissed by government officials in charge of immigration as unrealistic. The very people the President puts in charge say this policy can't happen. It doesn't bother him. Maybe he was doing this to talk about it at his rally tonight, his election rally in Florida. But I will tell you something. He tried this before the 2018 election--big crisis at the border. It didn't seem to work. What appeals to a base--a rather narrow base of the President's supporters does not appeal to the American people when it comes to being erratic, inhumane, harsh, and ineffective on immigration.

Members of both parties should be weary--weary--about giving the administration additional funding if it is not going to be used to secure our border or provide better conditions for migrants and asylum seekers, especially children.

Again, just remember what the President has called for in the last few months, none of which have happened and none of which have curbed the flow at the border--so many different things, none of which make sense. Remember the national emergency declaration to build a wall. Remember the tariffs with Mexico. Remember the shutting down of the border entirely. And now mass immigration arrests and removal. It is a policy that is erratic, unsuccessful, ineffective, and maybe worst of all, inhumane--even taking a 4-month-old from his parents and leaving that child with a trauma probably for the rest of his life.

We Democrats have a proposal that is common sense, that would actually do things. At one point, the President seemed to support it, but that was fleeting like every one of his other proposals on immigration. Here is what we propose. I hope the President is listening, and I hope, at least, our Republican colleagues are listening, because we can actually get something done.

We propose to provide more immigration judges at the border to reduce the backlog in cases.

We provide for the allowance of asylum seekers to apply for asylum within their home countries. Why are these people fleeing? The President would have Americans believe they are all drug dealers and MS-13 members. There are a few of those, and they shouldn't be let in, and they shouldn't be given any mercy. Yet the vast majority of these people--you have seen the pictures--is made up of parents and children. Sometimes their daughters have been threatened with rape by gangs or their sons have been murdered or they are going to burn down their houses or burn down their businesses if they don't go along with the gangs. Who wouldn't flee? Who wouldn't? So let them apply for asylum and not have to pay the coyotes and not have them make this dangerous trek of 1,000 miles from their own countries. It is a good proposal. At one point, the President entertained it. Let's do it.

Finally, we provide security assistance to Central American countries in order to crack down on the drug cartels, the violent gangs, the corruption, and the lawlessness.

These are the things we should be doing--having more immigration judges to reduce the backlog; allowing for asylum seekers to apply for asylum in their home countries; and providing security assistance to crack down on the drug cartels, violent gangs, and the coyotes.

Yesterday, unfortunately, the State Department did the opposite. It announced it would cut off all further security assistance, including over $400 million of already obligated assistance to Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, until the countries reduce the number of migrants coming to the United States. Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.

What an insane, insane new policy idea from the President--even crazier than some of the others. The Trump administration is actually doing the

one thing that will make the migration problem drastically worse. He will then blame somebody else, but everyone can see what is going on. It is almost as if the administration wants the problems at our borders to continue so the President can demagogue the issue for political purposes. This policy is complete nonsense.

So, as Leader McConnell moves to the administration's supplemental border requests in the near future, I urge my Republican colleagues to study our legislation. Unlike what the administration is doing and proposing, our policies are reasonable, measured, and actually suited to the problem at hand.

Mr. President, I have been talking a lot to this day on election security, and I will just make a final pitch.

We hope that Leader McConnell will stop stonewalling the need to improve the security of our elections and prevent Russian or Chinese or Iranian or North Korean interference in 2020, which would gnaw at the roots of our democracy. There are lots of ways we can do it. We have UC statements on the floor and legislation we could bring to the floor that is bipartisan. We have an NDAA bill within which we will request some election security measures, and we have the appropriations process by which we can give money that is badly needed to the States.

We hope our Republican colleagues will join us in this. Preventing foreign countries from interfering in our elections is not a Democratic or a Republican issue; it is an American issue. It is the very thing George Washington and so many of the other Founding Fathers warned us against over 200 years ago. There is no need for this to be partisan. We hope we can come together on the issue.

I yield the floor.

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

Madam President, last night, President Donald Trump, in an interview with ABC News, said that if he were offered information about an opponent from a foreign source in the next election, he would take a look at it and might not go to the FBI.

I think you might want to listen. There isn't anything

wrong with listening. If someone called from a country . . .

[and said] ``we have information on your opponent''--oh, I

think I'd want to hear it.

That is shocking, shocking--yet, sadly, is par for the course for this President.

My predecessor, Senator Moynihan, said, ``We are defining deviancy down.'' No President has defined deviancy down more than Donald Trump, and his remarks last night defined deviancy down to a new low.

To say that it is OK for foreign countries to interfere in our elections, with their motives not being what are in the interests of the American people, is disgraceful, shocking. It is as if the President has learned absolutely nothing from the past 2 years of investigations into Russia's interference of the 2016 elections. This is precisely how the whole thing started. A foreign power reached out to establish connections with a Presidential campaign by dangling the promise of information about an opponent, and President Trump said he would welcome it. He asked Russia to interfere.

When he wonders why people think there might be collusion, well, this is why. This is a President who says: Russia, come help. That doesn't prove collusion, but it sure proves that he doesn't mind foreign powers interfering with an election.

Again, the President's comments are undemocratic, un-American, and disgraceful. The President's comments suggest he believes winning an election is more important than the integrity of an election. That idea is flat-out wrong. The President's idea that winning an election is everything and the integrity of an election is nothing is one small step away from dictators and autocrats, who manipulate the results of an election because they care more about staying in power than they care about democratic principles. Donald Trump seems to fall into that category in which winning is everything and integrity is nothing.

It is simple. When a foreign power tries to give a campaign information on an opponent, that is foreign interference in our elections. It is exactly what the Framers worried about at the very founding of our Republic.

It is up to us in Congress to protect that legacy, the wellspring of democracy--free and fair elections. It is up to all of us in Congress-- Democrats and Republicans. When a foreign power interferes in our elections, the Democrats shouldn't say ``If it helps our side, we are OK with it,'' and the Republicans shouldn't say ``If it helps our side, we are OK with it.''

Where are the Republicans going to be with this latest step over the line by Donald Trump? Are they going to sit and cower and do nothing?

We have multiple bipartisan elections security bills that are just languishing here in the Senate. We even

have a bill that has been introduced by the ranking member of the Intelligence Committee that would make it a campaign's legal duty to report to the FBI when a foreign power offers its assistance.

It is very simple. If a foreign power comes to your campaign and offers assistance, you tell the FBI. This would say you are required to by law. It is Senator Warner's bill. Are our Republican colleagues going to be with us on that? We will find out shortly because later this afternoon, my friend Senator Warner will ask our colleagues for the unanimous consent to pass his bill that says: If Russia, Iran, North Korea, or anyone else offers campaign help, you must report it to the FBI ASAP.

My Republican friends should take a few hours to decide if they really want to block that bill, because if they do, it would be a disgrace and another step in defining deviancy down in this grand democracy that is becoming more and more at risk.

The Republican blockade of elections security thus far, led by Leader McConnell, has to come to an end. Bipartisan elections security bills are languishing because Leader McConnell will not bring them to the floor. One of his own colleagues, the chairman of the Rules and Administration Committee, said we are not bringing them to the floor because Leader McConnell doesn't want to. He stands in the way, with his graveyard, on an issue that is vital to American integrity, American democracy. Leader McConnell needs to bring these bills to the floor.

Again, I ask our Republicans to think hard as Senator Warner asks for his unanimous consent request later this morning or this afternoon. Are you going to say it is OK when a foreign power goes to you or to any other candidate or a sitting President and says, ``We will help you win the election--shhh--and we will help you to be quiet about it and not to tell law enforcement''? I hope not.

The embrace of our Republican colleagues of everything Donald Trump does, including things they know are wrong, has become stunning and appalling. Let's see, in this instance, if it gets even worse.

Madam President, on taxes, a year and a half ago, as the Senate debated the Republican tax bill, the Democrats predicted that giving enormous tax breaks to big corporations and the superrich would not trickle down to working Americans. We predicted then, as usual, that corporations would find a way to direct those newfound profits to themselves, not to their workers, not to their communities, and not for the good of the country.

Our Republican colleagues protested. They said trickle-down works. They talked about tax cuts. They tried to deliberately avoid who they were designing the tax cuts to benefit, but it was largely the very wealthy and the very powerful corporations. They said it was going to benefit everybody.

Well, here we go. The analyses keep pouring in of what a sham--a disgrace--this tax bill was, especially for middle-class, average Americans.

An analysis by JUST Capital showed yesterday that 56 percent of the tax savings from the Trump tax bill have gone to shareholders in the form of stock buybacks and direct distributions--56 percent, a majority. Do you know how much workers got? While the shareholders-- most of them wealthy--got 56 percent, workers got 6 percent of the whole benefit of the tax bill. This was by JUST Capital, which is not a leftwing group; it is a group that is composed of people who know all about and participate in corporations and finance.

If you don't believe that one, this morning, the Business Roundtable, which is made up of the 200 largest CEOs in America--hardly a leftwing, radical group--reported that America's CEOs expect to spend less on capital investments now than before the tax bill was passed.

So this idea of giving these companies big tax breaks so they will reinvest them is not happening. They are going to buybacks. This is not dealing with the No. 1 problem that America faces--the maldistribution of wealth and income as it agglomerates to the top and the middle class and those trying to get into the middle class being left out.

I remember when President Trump promised his tax bill would be a ``middle class miracle''--his words--and that the average American family would see a $4,000 raise. I remember when many of my Republican friends came to the floor to tout workers' bonuses in the wake of their tax bill even though many of them were merely your typical annual bonuses. It turns out, as to yesterday's report, that 2 percent--just 2 percent--of the tax bill's overall windfall went to workers' bonuses, which is an average of a measly $28 per worker, while their corporate parents and their larger shareholders got hundreds of thousands and millions.

Several of my Republican colleagues still laud the tax bill. They try to link it to positive economic news, but you will never hear them mention that most of the bill's benefits flowed to multinational corporations and to the top 1 percent of America. You won't hear them mention that it did very little to raise wages for average Americans. Alas, the Republicans are giving themselves credit for building a theme park for everyone when all they have done is renovate the exclusive country club.

As many Democrats predicted, a year and a half after its passage, the Republican tax bill has overwhelmingly benefited shareholders and corporate executives but not workers and their families.

Madam President, now, on a very important topic that affects New York and America, there is the renaming of a ship.

The men and women who wear this Nation's uniform are some of the most inspiring people you will ever meet. There is no shortage of stories of their valor, of their courage under fire, or of their sacrifices made voluntarily on behalf of a grateful nation. Yet I have the responsibility and the honor this morning of sharing the story of a particularly exceptional servicemember from my State of New York, SCPO Shannon Kent.

Shannon Kent was from Upstate New York. She was born in Oswego and was raised in Pine Plains. She graduated from Stissing Mountain High School and left college to join the Navy, following in the footsteps of her father and her uncle--a police commander and a firefighter--both of whom were first responders on September 11. Duty ran in the veins of the Kent family.

Shannon was a pioneer in the special operations community. She was one of the first, if not the first woman to pass the course required to join Navy SEALs on missions. That is amazing in itself. Shannon was an outstanding linguist and a seasoned cryptologist, whose work ``contributed directly to the capture of hundreds of enemy insurgents and severely degraded enemy combat capability,'' which earned her a slew of accolades, including multiple commendation medals--the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star.

What an amazing woman--brave, strong, brilliant, and with a large body of knowledge. Amazing. Her courageous efforts and groundbreaking achievements have inspired numerous programs for integrating women into the special operations forces, with there being combat jobs and special operations training now open to female servicemembers. Senior Chief Kent was living proof that women could not only keep up with but lead our Nation's most highly trained and capable servicemembers.

Of course, Shannon was more than just a sailor; she was a loving wife to her husband, Joe, a caring mother to her two children, a cancer survivor, a scholar, and an unstoppable athlete who stayed true to her New York roots, often going out for runs in her faded New York Yankees cap.

On January 16 of this year, SCPO Shannon Kent was among four Americans and more than a dozen others who were killed in a suicide bombing in northern Syria.

Senior Chief Kent was on her fifth combat deployment, once again conducting some of the Nation's most classified and dangerous missions. After her tragic death, one of her commanding officers said: ``Senior Chief

Petty Officer Shannon Kent deserves to be honored in a manner befitting of her noble service to our country and enduring contributions to the United States Navy.''

I could not agree more. So, today, I am proud to introduce an amendment to the annual Defense authorization bill urging the U.S. Navy to name a ship after New York native and American hero, SCPO Shannon Kent.

Of the 289 Active-Duty ships in the Navy, only five--only five--are named in honor of women. Of the 53 named vessels currently under construction, only one--just one--is named in honor of a woman. And no Navy ship has ever been named for a woman who fought and died in combat as Shannon Kent did.

It is time to address this disparity, recognizing the integral role that female servicemembers play in protecting our great Nation. RADM Grace Hopper, the namesake of the USS Hopper, once said:

A ship in port is safe; but that is not what ships are

built for. Sail out to sea and do new things.

That is what RADM Grace Hopper said.

Well, SCPO Shannon Kent was built to set out to sea to do good things. So should we. I urge my colleagues to support my amendment to name the first naval vessel after a woman who has fought and died in combat, the brave, patriotic, wonderful Shannon Kent.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, will my colleague kindly yield the floor before I leave?

I agree with the first half of his sentence.

Joint Resolution of Disapproval

Mr. President, first, I thank my friend from Virginia for offering this unanimous consent request. I express my severe, severe disappointment in our friends on the Republican side blocking it.

The bottom line is very simple. When a President feels it is more important to win an election than conduct a fair election, we are a step further away from democracy and towards autocracy. That is what dictators believe--winning at all costs. That seems to be what President Trump said yesterday.

The shame of this is that our Republican colleagues can't even bring themselves to say that when a foreign nation tries to interfere in our election, it ought to be reported to the FBI. How minimal. How minimal.

How disgraceful it is that our Republican friends cower before this President when they know that the things he does severely damage democracy. This one is a new low. It is OK for foreign powers to interfere, and we don't have to report it to law enforcement? That is welcoming foreign powers to interfere, and, as my friend from Virginia said, the President's own FBI Director said it is going to get worse in 2020. But our Republican friends say: Let's cover it up because it might have an effect that we like.

Today is a new low for this Senate, for this Republican Party here in the Senate, and for this democracy.

I would urge my friends, when they go home over the weekend--my friends on the other side of the aisle--to rethink this. We will offer this unanimous consent request again. To say that it is OK to interfere, that we shouldn't have any law enforcement, that we should have no knowledge, is to encourage Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran to interfere in our elections with no recourse. Shame. Shame.

It is truly outrageous that this unanimous consent request, which should bring all of us together, is being blocked by our Republican friends.

I thank my colleague for his wise, wise unanimous consent request.

I yield the floor.