Floor Statements

Mr. President, I know the Senate is running behind, and I wanted to jump in, but I do invite the pages to bring a podium for me when they are ready.

The pages so rarely get recognition, but without them, where would we be? I am grateful.

Mr. President, I am grateful to have this opportunity, and it really is about the fact that very soon, my colleague from California Adam Schiff will be bringing another War Powers Resolution to the floor.

This is the sixth time that a group of us has said every single week we are going to continue to bring these War Powers Resolutions to the floor. And why? Clearly, we know the outcome of the vote. Why are we doing this? Well, we are doing this because it has almost been a month now that this Nation has been at war. In fact, we are coming up to that very 60-day mark. And we are a nation that has now pledged tens of billions of dollars we have spent in an overseas war where 14 servicemembers have died, where hundreds more have been injured, where our President has given multiple different reasons for going into this war, and none of them have been achieved. In other words, there has been no regime change--the regime is more extreme; their incredible race towards highly enriched fissile material is still there in their country; and we are seeing a nation that is still showing military capabilities.

Yes, we have degraded their navy and their air force, but now, with low-cost drones, they are still able to inflict a lot of damage to their neighbors, to our allies. And they have closed the Strait of Hormuz--something that was not going on before but has caused a global oil shock that is hurting Americans at home. Tens of billions of taxpayer dollars--Americans spending hundreds, if not thousands of dollars--all to support President Trump's folly--costly, tragic folly.

And what do we do? We are bringing these War Powers Resolutions to the floor to force this body not to treat this like another normal day. American soldiers are in the line of fire. This is not normal that a President for almost 60 days has been able to conduct a war with this body being silent on it. In fact, today, we are having our first ever hearing with the Secretary of Defense, and he is saying that this war is going well. Well, by what account?

The American people are against this war. The American people are paying the price for this war. American soldiers are dying for this war. Hundreds more have been injured for this war. We see a crisis in the Middle East that is growing and not subsiding.

So this is yet another attempt of ours to force this body to confront an ill-gotten war, a war that has pulled us into further and deeper crisis, yet another quagmire in the Middle East.

I want to make a couple of points. The War Powers Act says that a President can act in defense of this Nation if it is an imminent threat. We have not seen that. But many people have been saying that the reason why he doesn't need to come to this body for a declaration of war is because of the War Powers Act.

So let's assume that he actually did have an imminent provocation-- which I say it was not there, but let's assume for argument's sake that there was an imminent threat to the United States of America that this President had to act upon. That would have triggered 60 days.

The Senate now should be either acting on a war declaration or the Senate should be waiting for the President to ask for 30 more days. That is one of the two choices according to the legislation, the law of the United States of America. But just moments ago, in an open hearing, we had the Secretary of Defense say: Well, no, no, no, that 60 days is paused because we are in a cease-fire.

That is illogical and not in alignment with the law of our land. We have an active military blockade going on. That is actually an act of war by our own laws and regulations. We have an area of this nation-- the Strait of Hormuz--under a blockade, an act of war. It is demanding aircraft carrier groups. It is demanding thousands of U.S. soldiers engaged and on the frontline.

The cease-fire does not somehow escape his necessity to come to Congress after 60 days. To use that as some kind of escape valve to further escape scrutiny, debate, oversight, accountability to this body is unacceptable.

I have heard some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle-- the Senator from Alaska, the Senator from North Carolina, the Senator from Maine, many of my colleagues, the Senator from Utah--say that the 60 days, to them, matters.

So here is a bipartisan conclusion. We are about to go out on a recess. The question is, What will we do as a body when the President has not come forward after 60 days of this military conflict to ask for any kind of authority?

This was not the constitutional demand of our Nation. This is not the law that we have sworn an oath to uphold. This is insanity that we--the most powerful deliberative body in the world that has a constitutional obligation where war powers sit with us--for us to do nothing, not to demand that the President come before us and make his case and let there be a vote of whether we declare war or not. We are at war. Sixty days have passed, and we are still doing nothing.

So I am going to do everything I can with my colleagues to continue to force this body to confront this failing war where we are losing American soldiers; where hundreds have been injured; where we are spending tens of billions of dollars; where the regime is more radical and more extreme; when they still have the highly enriched fissile material in their country; where they have new capabilities that have been exposed, like their ability to cause havoc with low-cost drones; and where they have now choked the Strait of Hormuz, causing shocks around the country. And we are doing nothing? That is unacceptable.

I want to make this last point. Donald Trump has engaged us in this war to stop them from getting a nuclear weapon. But remember that in 2015, we had the JCPOA. We had our NATO allies, European allies, Russia, China, and Iran all agreeing that Iran would, No. 1, ship out of country their highly enriched uranium, which they did; that all of their enrichment facilities, from Natanz to Fordow, would be open to snap inspections and constant surveillance, which it was; that their mining

facilities would be under surveillance and snap inspections as well, which it was. Iran's ability to enrich uranium over a certain amount was stopped.

President Trump criticized that deal and ripped it up, and at that moment, Iran raced to enrich uranium that put them closer and closer to breakout, and that was the pretext that Donald Trump said he invaded. It was one of the many pretexts of what he said is the reason why he started this war.

Well, he caused that problem, ripped up a deal, and now he is racing to negotiate some way to get back to many of the same aspects of that very deal. This is what the President has done. He created the crisis, declared war to stop the crisis he created, and still has not solved that crisis. This is the great dealmaker. This is the person that said they would keep us out of wars like this that has gotten us into those wars. And now we have no off-ramp, while Americans are suffering with higher prices, higher costs, and billions of dollars of taxpayer money that could be used to reduce the deficit, reduce prescription drug costs, reduce the cost of health insurance or other things that are high priorities for Americans.

So today, instead of ignoring this problem, we are going to force a vote. My colleague Adam Schiff will bring forward a War Powers Resolution.

This is a sad moment for this body. Sixty days is about to pass, and we are doing nothing to demand any kind of oversight, any kind of accountability, or even following the War Powers Act by the letter of the law. We are allowing the President to flaunt our Constitution, to flaunt our laws. The only thing necessary for the Constitution to be so trashed and broken is for the good people of this body to do nothing.

We are about to celebrate 250 years of our Nation's history. When the Constitution was created, this body was created, as Federalist Papers No. 47 says, to be a check on our President, to ensure that they don't overstep their powers, to assure that they don't abuse their office. That is the constitutional calling for this body.

There are soldiers in harm's way right now defending the Constitution with their lives. The least we could be doing here in this body is upholding the Constitution with the moral fiber of our being.

I thank the Presiding Officer for the recognition, and I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I want to thank my colleague Tammy Baldwin for bringing this War Powers Resolution to the floor and for forcing it onto the Senate. By its own prerogative, the leadership on the Republican side did not want to have a debate or a discussion about a war that is affecting every single American.

Remember, the problem we have right now, which I will talk about, is not just the actions of a President; it is the inaction of this body.

Today, what my colleague is doing is saying: No, we will not have business as usual. We will not just go about as if there is not a cataclysmic war going on. We will not go about as if we are not spending billions of dollars a week overseas that are desperately needed resources here at home.

My colleague is saying: No, we are not going to let the Senate operate as business as usual. We are going to force a debate and a discussion and a vote because the Senate is abdicating its responsibility--its constitutional responsibility--in that matters of war should be decided here and not unilaterally by one person, by the President of the United States. Explicitly stated in the Constitution is that those powers lie with us.

What we have seen in the U.S. Senate is one of the worst examples in the history of our country of a surrendering of our constitutional responsibility, a surrendering of our power to a President who is abusing it.

Now, those abuses are obvious. Those abuses are now seen forever for the historical record in that this President told us we were going to war because of multiple different reasons.

Regime change. That hasn't been accomplished. We now have a more extreme regime.

Because of nuclear concerns. Well, the ultra-enriched fissile material is still there in that country.

He said that we are going to war to protect civilians. He threatened them: If you continue to kill your civilians who are protesting for democracy, the

USA will jump in. Well, we now are seeing more civilian deaths, including a school full of children, and a more secure regime.

He said his goals and his end in this--he stated them clearly: We will attain unconditional surrender. Well, that is clearly not the case when you are rushing off to Pakistan to try to negotiate an end.

This is a President who has failed in everything he has said about this war that he wanted to achieve. If anything, he has shown the Iranians that they have more power, that this regime has more leverage against Americans.

First and foremost, they found out that--as we send multimillion- dollar weapons into that country to bomb and to achieve an erosion of their navy and their army, they have actually shown now that their low- cost, inexpensive drones can still inflict maximum damage; that when the President bragged about having control of the air, our planes were still being shot down.

This is a President who now has seen Iran realize: Wait a minute, we have tremendous leverage here; we can choke the Strait of Hormuz and cause a global economic shock--the likes of which we have never seen and an oil shock here at home that we have never had.

There is no way to look at this war as if there is any modicum of success, when you have the Iranians holding more cards than they did at the beginning of the war, still have their highly enriched uranium, have a more extreme, entrenched regime, and have us rushing to try to negotiate to get something out of this horrible ``excursion,'' as the President has called it.

And not only has this cost tens of billions of dollars, but it has cost American lives. We are seeing it already as, recently, a brave U.S. servicemember, who survived a deadly attack by Iran in Kuwait, spoke up. This attack killed 6 servicemembers and injured 20.

One of the injured soldiers stated that the story Secretary Hegseth was telling the public that the building was ``fortified,'' and that one of the drones just ``squeaked through'' is a falsehood, our military servicemember said.

The servicemember said:

I want people to know the unit was unprepared to provide

any defense for itself. It was not a fortified position.

Now, you would think, if a U.S. member of our armed services is shedding factual light on our unpreparedness for a war that our President rushed us into--unprepared, no plan, no strategy--that the one body that was responsible for providing check, balance, oversight, and accountability, the U.S. Senate, wouldn't just sit back and do nothing. But that is exactly what this body has done.

Republican leadership has done nothing to call for open hearings where we could ask questions, which we can show those U.S. servicemembers on the frontline that, while you are upholding your oath to the Constitution, we will uphold ours. But we are not. They are showing the ultimate fealty and loyalty to the Constitution, but we are not. They are brave enough to confront the enemy, but we are not brave enough to call questions to the President of the United States that must be called.

Were you prepared? Under what grounds did you go? How much is this costing the American taxpayer? And more.

We are not doing our job. We have abdicated our responsibility. We have betrayed the Constitution, and yet we do nothing.

So what my colleague is doing today is forcing this debate, forcing this vote. But dear God, this is a sad day, because the only thing that we need to do to check the power of the Presidency when it is being abused, when it is reckless, when the consequences of that recklessness are higher prices for every American, when the consequences of that recklessness is giving a dangerous Iran more power and more leverage, when the consequences of that recklessness is the death of our soldiers--what is this body doing? Nothing.

Republican leadership has called no open hearings, no sufficient accountability, no substantive oversight. They are kowtowing to a President and allowing him into a reckless war with grave consequences and a shredding of our constitutional intent by our Founders.

Woe be to us at this 250th anniversary, where people will rush out with flags, waving to celebrate our Constitution and our country. But here, they are betraying it.

We have a job to do. It is clear in the Constitution. We have three equal branches of government that function when they check each other. They function when there is oversight. They function when there is accountability. But when one branch fails to rise to the historic urgency of this moment, that is when our Constitution and the people on the frontlines--the people like this brave servicemember--are not only being ill-served, but they are at graver danger.

Our Nation is in crisis right now. Our precious, scant resources are not spent on healthcare, our children's education, science research, but on this President's war. We have servicemembers in danger. The least we should ask from this body is to do its job, uphold the Constitution, and provide a real check and balance, real accountability, and oversight to this President.

I thank my colleague for forcing this debate and forcing this vote. This is yet, unfortunately, another sad day in history for this body. This is the least we could do, but we should be--we must be--doing so much more.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, it has been 2 weeks since we last voted on a War Powers Resolution to responsibly end Trump's unauthorized, unconstitutional, reckless war with Iran. In just those 2 weeks, the war has continued to spiral out of control, and Americans are paying the price.

Here is where we are since we last voted and why we are calling up another War Powers Resolution for a vote, why we are forcing that debate onto this floor. Americans are facing soaring costs, and this war is making those costs explode and get worse. Prices are rising because of the decisions made by President Trump without congressional approval. Gas and essentials are surging as global energy markets react to the blockade, the destruction of energy infrastructure, and the unbelievable, immense uncertainty in the market. Inflation jumped sharply, driven overwhelming by energy costs tied to the conflict. Analysts say we spent $25 billion during the month of March on the war, and this month, it is expected to be similar.

Now, remember, the President launched this war without congressional consent. He has basically said that any President is entitled to commit tens of billions of dollars, to commit American lives--13 we have lost, hundreds of Americans injured--as he began this war without authorization, without transparency.

Observers note that this is a war the administration initiated not only without approval but with shifting reasons for the provocation of our going to war itself.

This President has said everything: We are going to stop this regime. We want regime change and then we don't. He has said that we are going to save civilians from being murdered by this regime, and now, he says that is not the priority.

He says: Oh, we are getting in for the nuclear crisis. Even though I had obliterated it just months ago, it is now a crisis again.

His shifting reasons and provocations are bad enough, but now the outcomes he says he seeks are outcomes that have shifted themselves. He has failed to tell the American people why we are in this. He has no endgame.

Just today, the administration deployed 10,000 more U.S. troops into harm's way into this region. Naval forces have expanded to now enforce a maritime blockade that takes the efforts of tens of thousands of American military professionals, and officials are preparing for potential additional strikes and ground operations.

So where does that leave us? Well, No. 1, if the war ended today-- which it won't. It seems to be expanding. But if it ended today, the oil shock, the economic crisis would go for months and months longer-- again, Americans paying the price. We still have our American troops in greater harm's way. We have an Iranian regime who--even though their near-term combat capabilities have been significantly degraded--now are flexing more power in that region and influence by choking the Strait of Hormuz, which we have not been able to stop.

The situation is worse. The regime is more extreme. The fissile material to make a nuclear weapon is still there in that theater. This President has made the situation worse, at the cost of tens of billions of dollars, American lives, and hundreds of troops injured.

The thing that makes this all worse is the enabling that Congress is doing of this war, their failure to ask for accountability, this failure to have even one open hearing on the biggest military engagement since the war in Afghanistan, not one open hearing where Congress has asked for accountability, for transparency, for facts and information.

On top of that, this body was designed just for that purpose--to provide a check and a balance, to provide oversight--and what we have done is nothing of any substance to play that critical role.

Our Founders warned us what an out-of-control Executive could do if not checked by Congress, and we are not doing it. The price we are paying--every American is feeling it. That is why this war is overwhelmingly unpopular with the American people of all political backgrounds, because they know. Not only are they feeling the pain of it economically, not only are they seeing the pain of it when American troops are killed in battle and the families live with that loss, not only knowing the pain of the hundreds injured, but they are also seeing with their own eyes how the situation is getting worse and not better.

We are bringing this War Powers Resolution back to the floor today because Congress cannot look away. Congress must do their job. Congress must stand with the American people, ask the tough questions that we deserve answers to, hold this President to account, really do our job of asking the hard yet urgent questions.

We need transparency. We need accountability. We need the Senate to do its job. So today, I again lead, with a handful of my colleagues, to bring these War Powers Resolutions, to demand a debate, to demand that this body show some account for its inaction on a war, for allowing an Executive to spend tens of billions of dollars, throw the world and our Nation into economic shock, not achieve any of its stated goals with the nation of Iran, and make more of that region more dangerous and unstable by the day.

We must do our job. We must defend the Constitution, which spells out the checks and balances that should be happening but are not. But we will continue this fight. We will continue to force debate on this floor. We will continue to call on my colleagues across the aisle not to just let Donald Trump do whatever he wants but to hold him to account, to hold public hearings, to ask the difficult questions, to demand accountability.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, there is something awful going on here in the U.S. Senate, and people should focus on it right now. The Senate is not doing their job. And we see a President unilaterally going off to fight a war--to declare war without any authority from the U.S. Senate or the U.S. Congress.

What does it mean when the body that is supposed to provide checks and balances checks out? What does it mean when the body that is supposed to provide oversight covers its eyes and refuses to see what is happening? What does it mean when the body that should be having hearings on this war will not hear, will not look, will not ask questions?

We are in a constitutional crisis, and Americans are paying the cost--the worst of all costs: the deaths of our men and women, with 13 dead and over 200 injured. And Congress is doing nothing--no checks, no balances, no oversight, no hearings.

What does it mean when Americans all over this country are paying the cost with the worst energy shock crisis in the history of our country? According to the International Energy Agency, as of yesterday, the crisis we are experiencing is larger than the two major oil shocks of the 1970s combined. And what does Congress do? Nothing. No oversight. No hearings. No checks. No balances.

Americans are feeling the pain already of this administration cutting healthcare for millions. They are feeling the pain already, seeing their energy prices go up. They are seeing the pain already from billions being cut from our Veterans' Administration and millions more being cut from student lunch programs and the services we provide for special needs. And Congress does nothing.

We are supposed to be the body that declares war. Well, we are at war. But we also have the power of the purse. And what is happening with the purse right now? We have just spent $25 billion in Donald Trump's war--that kind of expenditure with no oversight, no hearings, no checks and balances.

Twenty-five billion dollars is enough to provide health insurance for over 3 million Americans. Twenty-five billion dollars means 30 million children could have free school lunches. Twenty-five billion dollars could provide millions of Americans with affordable housing or housing assistance.

There are things going on right now that nobody on either side of the aisle thinks the President should be able to do without any kind of oversight, without any kind of hearings, like give Russia billions of dollars, relieving them of sanctions, the very adversary that continues to prosecute their war in Ukraine and undermine our democracy at home-- no hearings, no checks and balances, no oversight. This is not just a constitutional crisis. This is a shame upon this body.

I am grateful for the War Powers Resolution that Chris Murphy has brought forward. I am grateful for Tammy Duckworth, Tammy Baldwin, Tim Kaine for joining together to force these War Powers Resolutions so that the Congress is not silent, that at least people have to take a vote.

But think about what is happening right now. We see a President moving to move more American troops. It was reported that the Pentagon is considering deploying 3,000 soldiers from Fort Bragg's 82nd Airborne Division. That is 3,000 of our American courageous sons and daughters-- no oversight, no hearing, no checks and balances.

The biggest military engagement since the war in Afghanistan--tens of billions of dollars, American lives, the worst oil shock ever, prices going up--and what does this Senate do? Nothing. It is a shame upon this body. It is a surrendering of our duties. It is the submission before Donald Trump and his authoritarian-like inclinations to declare war and not come to Congress as the Constitution dictates.

We swore an oath in this body to defend the Constitution. Our fealty should be to the Constitution and not what this President is doing.

So we bring War Powers Resolutions, and we will bring more. My fear is that this body, amidst this shame, will be dismissed for a recess. How many soldiers will die during that recess? How many billions of dollars will be spent during that recess? How far will they go with this war?

I call this what it is: one of the more shameful stretches of this body--no hearings, no oversight, no checks and balances.

It is time that we stand up for the Constitution and stand up to Donald Trump's unconstitutional war.

I know my colleagues and I, we have been calling these War Powers Resolutions. We will continue to do so until this body does its job and lifts the shame off of this body and checks a President, who is clearly running us into a war with no off-ramp in sight, putting more of our men and women in danger as Americans suffer from skyrocketing costs.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, it is with a heavy heart that I rise today to honor the life and service of a great advocate for justice and nonviolence, Rev. Dr. Bernard Lafayette, Jr.

Dr. Lafayette was a Freedom Rider who risked his life challenging segregation across the South. He helped organize the Selma voting rights movement, laying the groundwork for the march from Selma to Montgomery and the eventual passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

As a young activist in Nashville, Dr. Lafayette worked closely with John Lewis, who later became my mentor and a moral compass for so many of us who serve today. Together, they believed deeply in the power of nonviolence and the courage it takes to stand up for justice, even in the face of violence and hatred.

The late Rev. Dr. Bernard Lafayette helped shape a generation of leaders

who carried forward the spirit of the movement. Today, I rise to honor his life and legacy. May we continue the work he devoted his life to building a nation that lives up to its highest ideals of justice, equality, and dignity for all.

Dr. Lafayette and his family are in my prayers.

Mr. President, I am grateful for the recognition.

I think we should set the scene very clearly. During the last 2 weeks since we voted on the War Powers Resolution, led in a bipartisan manner by Senators Kaine and Paul, the Trump administration's unconstitutional war with Iran has evolved tremendously.

In the span of just 2 weeks, 13 U.S. servicemembers have been killed and at least 200 of our American men and women have been injured. U.S. diplomatic posts and military facilities in the Middle East are under constant attack. The war has expanded, now impacting at least 15 different countries, from the bases of our European allies to our allies in the region.

American citizens are still, 2 weeks in, stranded in the region trying to get home. Civilian casualties are increasing, and here at home, we are seeing the skyrocketing costs of basic goods, the skyrocketing costs of energy, and the skyrocketing costs we are seeing at the pumps at our gas stations.

We now know the Trump administration is spending over a billion dollars a day on this unauthorized war, while Americans are struggling to make ends meet here at home, and this President is throwing millions of people off of their healthcare.

And this administration, amidst all of this, has failed to come before the U.S. Senate and the American people for public hearings to make its case on the biggest military war engagement since the war in Afghanistan.

Now, all of us--all 100--swore an oath to the Constitution of the United States of America. Well, fealty to that oath is clear because the Constitution is clear. Congress has the authority to declare war and authorize the use of military force. But in this case, Congress and the U.S. Senate, in particular, has done nothing.

The Senate has a solemn responsibility to assert itself along the constitutional mandate in matters of war and peace. This is why I urge my colleagues soon to support the motion to discharge S.J. Res. 118. I ask for that because of what is at stake: billions of American taxpayer dollars, hundreds of American lives.

What is at stake is the Constitution of the United States of America. We swore an oath. We have an obligation. This is the moment now. This is not left or right; this is a moral moment and a solemn, sacred patriotic duty to uphold the Constitution, especially when the President of the United

States of America is so willfully violating it.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I am grateful for the recognition of the Presiding Officer.

I have listened carefully to my colleagues who have come down to oppose this War Powers Resolution that I am bringing up right now. I have listened with an open heart because many of them I have worked with on Middle East issues assiduously to bring about peace in that region.

I share many of the beliefs that were expressed of the danger of Iran and their proxies, of the chaos and the harm and the lives they have taken, the instability in that region. We have worked side by side on bipartisan delegations, bipartisan work--as the Senate should function--to deal with the challenges in the threat matrix that affect the United States as well as our allies.

But here is the issue: We are bringing a War Powers Resolution to the floor to bring this to a vote and to a debate. My colleagues do not want a debate on this issue. Nothing has been scheduled--no floor debates, no hearings, no oversight, no checks and balances.

This resolution seems to almost offend my friend and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; that how dare we bring this to the floor. Well, we have the power to bring such resolutions to the floor because of incredible sensitivity to the idea of war powers.

The idea that the power to go to war--unlike in times of despots and Presidents--in the United States of America, the power to go to war does not lie with one person, the President of the United States.

Now, at first, there were some people trying to deny--on the other side--that this was a war, but tonight they showed it clear. Multiple people talked about us being at war. We, as a nation, are at war, the largest military engagement we have had since the war in Iraq.

And in this war, in barely over 2 weeks, thousands of people have died. In this war, in barely 2 weeks, 200 Americans have been injured. In this war, 13 Americans have paid the ultimate price for a war that we have gone into on the decision made by one man.

And the American people at large are paying costs in the billions of dollars a week. They are seeing prices at the pump--energy, consumer goods--skyrocketing on top of already this President cutting their healthcare, cutting their food programs, cutting their veteran services. We are at war, and Americans are paying the price and our servicemen--too many--have paid the ultimate price.

And what is our constitutional obligation when the Nation is making billions of dollars of expense? What is our constitutional obligation when lives are being lost every single day? What are our obligations when our brave military men and women, carrying out their missions, some of them not coming home?

Well, the Constitution is clear on this. There is no debate even possible. The Constitution says that the war power belongs to Congress. And so I know the noble issues and ambitions of my colleagues that they mentioned--noble ideals like not letting Iran have a nuclear weapon, noble statements that they are making about trying to stop evil--those are important. That is a debate we should be having, but we are not having it.

It seems that my Republican colleagues, all they want to do is to try to pretend that this is business as usual, to try to ignore or even cover up all that is going on because as my colleague who just spoke on the floor said to a bunch of us today: I do not want open hearings. I do not want executive people of the administration, like the Secretary of State or the Secretary of Defense, to have to answer questions in open hearings.

They want to circumvent the Constitution. They want to go around public oversight. They want to avoid the glare, the questions of the American people.

Woe to a nation--our Founding Fathers believed--woe to a nation that makes it so easy to go to war. They developed this government with a check and a balance. They developed this government oversight. They developed this government with the dispersal of powers so that we could have an enduring democratic Republic.

But what the Republicans are saying is they want none of that--none of our constitutional obligations, no checks and balances, no oversight, no hearings, no accountability. We want to

rush to war, spending billions of taxpayer dollars, costing American lives and costing our constitutional fidelity.

It has been 2 weeks since we had a War Powers Resolution brought up by my colleague Tim Kaine. In 2 weeks, this war has expanded. In 2 weeks, more Americans have died. In 2 weeks, more countries have been attacked.

This is not just Iran being hit. It is now 11 countries have been attacked, and even some of our European allies have had their bases in the region attacked.

It has been 2 weeks, and we have seen the mistakes of war, like a school of girls being targeted and attacked, and the administration not feeling that they have to stand before Congress and be accountable for that; 2 weeks, and we have seen more soldiers perish; 2 weeks, and we now have a report that it is over 200 that have visible injuries and perhaps even more invisible injuries.

Today, in the Capitol, we had veterans come, veterans of foreign wars, veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq, veterans who came to this building today to remind people in the Capitol the true costs of war.

We cannot question their bravery. We cannot question their sacrifice. And they stood with us today to make the simple point: When will Congress do its job?

There is something inexcusable about people who will stand in this Chamber and swear an oath not to a President, swear an oath not to an authoritarian leader, swear an oath not to a political party; they swore an oath, all 100 of us, to the Constitution of the United States of America.

And if there is anything that is plain in that Constitution, it is that a President does not have the power to unilaterally bring a nation and its treasure--to bring a nation and its men and women into conflict without a say of Congress.

This is not a partisan issue. This is not a left or right issue. It is a right or wrong. Do you stand with the Constitution of the United States of America or do you stand with what our Founders rejected; that we should be a nation where all power, especially the power that sends our soldiers into making the ultimate sacrifice--do we stand with the ideal that that lies with the President and not with this body?

And so I am telling you right now, those who feel that this vote is an inconvenience to them, those that feel offended that we are having an hour--an hour--debate of what we are entitled to when we bring up a War Powers Resolution, I say to those who feel angry--how dare we try to force the Senate to try to focus on this war--I say to you: I don't care about your objection.

We have privileges as Senators, and I refuse to let business as usual go on in this body. I and my colleagues will bring up these resolutions again and again and again as more and more Americans on both sides of the aisle see this war for what it is: one President's decision costing all Americans, costing us at our homes, around our kitchen tables, costing our budgets, and then costing the greatest cost of all, the lives of our men and women in service.

In a few moments, we will take a vote. I know what the outcome of that vote will be. But my dear friend Tim Kaine, who has brought these War Powers Resolutions--not just about this war, not just about our war that we declared with Venezuela or bombing ships in the Atlantic--he has called this question before, and he quoted a great faith leader. The outcome of this vote, I know what it will be, but he quoted that faith leader in saying simply: I was not called to be successful. I was called to be faithful.

That is the real issue before us right now. Are we faithful to the oath that we swore to uphold the Constitution? Are we faithful to the most sacrosanct ideals of this Republic? Are we faithful to the service men and women who also swore an oath to this Constitution and make greater sacrifices than any of the hundred of us are making today? Are we faithful to the ideals that this is not a monarchy, that we do not have a King, that we are a democratic Republic with a Constitution and no one is above the law.

This President cannot take us to war without coming through this body. He is not able to do that unless this body supplicates itself before that man and surrenders its responsibilities.

Today, I say no.

Today, we will vote, and whatever the outcome of that vote, we will come back here, again and again, with a simple demand that the world's most deliberative body must deliberate; that the branch of government that was supposed to hold the Executive to account demands some accountability; that the checks and balances designed by our Founders should operate, and we should check and balance his power; that what the American people want and what the American people deserve is to have a Congress that functions, and a President that seems so cocky and confident and is taking us to war should have to come before this body; that the members of his Cabinet sit here and justify both the provocation of why we went to war and what is the endgame--because it is clear to me now that we have seen this from Libya to Afghanistan, President after President taking us to war in the Middle East and leaving chaos, instability, and terrorism and subjugation behind.

This is a moral test for this body. It is not just a vote. This is a moral moment. Where do you stand? It is not whether you stand left or stand right, stand Republican or stand Democrat. The question is, Do you stand with the Constitution that you swore an oath to uphold?

This vote may fail, but this failure is not final because even after this vote, there are many in this body that will continue to fight to uphold the Constitution and make the U.S. Senate do its job.

Business as usual is unacceptable. This fight will continue.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, in an effort to uphold the Constitution and

pursuant to section 601(b) of the International Security Assistance and Arms Export Control Act, I move to discharge the Committee on Foreign Relations from further consideration of S.J. Res. 118, to direct the removal of United States Armed Forces from hostilities against the Islamic Republic of Iran that have not been authorized, as is by the Constitution necessary, by Congress.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Madam President, your mic wasn't on. What did you call me? What was the name that you used?

Madam President, thank you. I truly appreciate the Presiding Officer.

I hope that was recorded by the stenographer that the Presiding Officer called me a gentleman.

Madam President, to my colleagues in the Senate, to the Senate President, to all those assembled here, I am rising to give this speech, and I feel such privilege because I get to recognize someone whose work most Americans never see but whose contribution is woven into the very history of this institution.

When a Senator comes to the floor to speak, whether it is daily routine address or a moment that will echo through generations, there is always someone standing just off camera, often unnoticed, a stenograph machine hanging from their neck, capturing every word we say. They record our arguments and our aspirations, our disagreements and our dreams, our long

speeches, and sometimes our longer ones.

The dozens of people who are watching C-SPAN may not realize it, but the words spoken in this Chamber simply don't float away into the air. They are preserved--faithfully, meticulously--by extraordinary professionals who ensure that the Congressional Record becomes the living memory of the U.S. Senate and our Nation.

For those of you who do not know about these extraordinary stenographers, their work is not easy. It requires years of training, immense focus and concentration, and a remarkable command of language and speed and accents that range from a southern Texas accent to a Jersey one. And it requires a hell of a lot of patience because, as everyone in this Chamber knows, brevity is not always the defining virtue of the U.S. Senate. Yet, through late nights, historic votes, moments of celebration, and moments of national grief, Senate stenographers have stood quietly at their posts ensuring that what happens here is captured for the American people and preserved in American history for generations yet to come.

Today, I want to recognize one of the very best of them. Today, I want to recognize Carole Darche. Carole has spent more than 45 years as a court reporter, bringing her extraordinary skill to the Senate floor to record some of the most consequential moments in our Nation's history.

Through long sessions, overnight debates, and pivotal moments in our country, Carole has been there--steadfast, precise, and deeply committed to this institution. It would not be an exaggeration to say that the lights of this Chamber have shone a little bit brighter because of her presence.

What has always struck me about Carole is not just her professionalism but the spirit she brings to her work. Day after day, she arrives with warmth and enthusiasm and a quiet pride in serving something larger than herself.

And the dedication required is extraordinary. Each session week, Carole boards the Amtrak from New Jersey to Washington, listening to her audiobooks along the way, traveling hundreds of miles that would make even Joe Biden a little bit jealous, to stand on this floor and serve the American people. This kind of commitment to public service, to this institution of the U.S. Senate, and to the preservation of our democratic record is something we should all aspire to.

While we will deeply miss Carole--I am sure I speak for my 99 colleagues; we will miss her in the Senate--I must admit that I am delighted that her retirement will take her back home to the great State of ``New Joisey''--I mean New Jersey; forgive me--where she plans to enjoy the Jersey Shore with her husband Fred, her three stepchildren, and her five grandchildren. She also plans to travel to Paris, to Portugal, and beyond. I have no doubt that the same spirit of curiosity and joy she brought to this building will accompany her on those adventures.

Carole, the Senate will miss you. We will miss your warmth. We will miss your enthusiasm for this institution. And, yes, we will miss hearing about you, witnessing your humanity, seeing every day the truth that it is leaders in the Senate--often who don't stand in the spotlight, who don't face the camera--it is leaders in the Senate like you that make this institution functional for the American people.

Carole, that is what patriotism is. It is not seen often in one flash or one flourish. Patriotism is steadfast dedication to serving this Nation day in and day out.

What does your service render? I have come to learn that the Congressional Record is more than ink on paper; it is the story of our democracy. And for decades, you have helped ensure that story was captured with precision, care, and integrity. For that, the U.S. Senate and the Nation and every one of the Members of this body owe you gratitude.

Carole, thank you for your extraordinary years of service. May your retirement be filled with family, with travel, with laughter, with yoga, and many beautiful sunsets along the incredible Jersey Shore. The truth is, you will be leaving this Chamber, but the history you helped preserve here--your contributions--will endure for generations.

I yield the floor as I give tribute to another great member of this body who herself is yielding this floor and saying her farewell.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I had a sleepless night last night as I put together in my mind where I think we are as a nation right now. We are a nation that, looking across our great land, showed unequivocally that we are in crisis. We are in a constitutional crisis.

From people in our communities to people in this body, we are seeing grotesque--grotesque--attacks on our most sacred constitutional principles.

As I sat last night, I found myself scrolling through words of our Founding Fathers, and something Madison said really stuck out to me: that power needs to be checked; power needs to be balanced; power derives its right from the consent of the governed, but power itself does not self-correct.

I look at what is happening from the executive branch and see over and over again grotesque violations of our Constitution, and this body is doing nothing. The list of what is happening is clear. It is actually making headlines. It is not something that can be ignored.

When you see the President of the United States taking power from the people, taking power from the executive, resisting the power of the judiciary, breaking the rule of law and nothing happens, it reminds me of Frederick Douglass: Find out just what a people will submit to, and that is the exact amount of injustice that will be heaped upon them.

Well, what are the constitutional ruptures we are seeing so clearly right now? Well, we have seen them with the President's grift, graft, and corruption.

I said this to some of my colleagues earlier: If a headline had appeared a few decades ago of a President of the United States and a sheik coming together days before he ascends to the Presidency, where that sheik is giving him tens of millions of dollars in what amounts to a direct payout, enriching him and his family in a trumped-up crypto scheme--that is clearly seen by our Founders as a breach of the Constitution in a clause called the emoluments clause.

This President is using his position to profit off of as he oversees foreign policy, and we are seeing leaders come to him and give him millions of dollars, as they have foreign policy considerations before them. That is a rupture of the Constitution.

What is another example? We are literally seeing people in the streets in Minnesota, exercising their constitutional right to protest, their constitutional right of speech, their constitutional right to hold law enforcement accountable, for doing nothing wrong but filming law enforcement--how many of us have seen the videos of people filming law enforcement and getting beaten, getting literally kicked, getting handcuffed, being put in jail, or the worst of all constitutional violations is when you attack someone's life, as we saw with Alex Pretti being murdered.

We see more ruptures to our Constitution--not just the oppression of the basic rights of our people but that other sacrosanct right that our Founders saw when it comes to the right to vote.

We have a President saying literally that the Constitution should not apply, that we should federalize elections. You see the President sending his Justice Department not to investigate the last election or the election before that--not the election he won but going back to 2020's election and seizing private voting records that belong to the State, in a claim that has been proven wrong over and over again that there was some kind of election fraud--the Big Lie, as it is called. That, too, is a rupture of our Constitution.

He is violating voting rights. He is violating speech rights. He is violating the freedom to protest your government. He is violating the emoluments clause. He is violating the powers of the legislative branch as he stops funding that was approved in a bipartisan way in this body, like he just did in my State with the biggest infrastructure project there is.

Again and again and again, this President is violating our Constitution.

From, literally, agents masked jumping out of unmarked cars, going into our churches, going into our schools, this President violates our Constitution over and over and over again.

But here is a truth spoken when constitutional rights were violated against an activist named Angela Davis--that this body is now seeing clearly what James Baldwin wrote. You see, the truth of our land has always been ``injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere,'' as Martin Luther King says. As the great Langston Hughes wrote in poetry, ``There's a dream in the land, with its back against the wall . . . To save the dream for one,'' you must save the dream ``for all.''

Well, here are the rights. Here is the sacrosanct document that we swear oaths to--the Constitution. Here is the truth that the injustices you are seeing and the violations will be visited upon this body, because, as James Baldwin wrote so clearly, if they come for you in the morning, they are going to come for me at night.

Well, we have now seen, last night, that they are coming for Members of this body, and no, I am not talking about House Members like LaMonica McIver, who has been thrown out, handcuffed, and is on trial right now. No, I am not talking about Adam Schiff, who was investigated for trumped-up charges. No, I am not talking about Alex Padilla, who was thrown to the ground and handcuffed in a Federal building. No, I am talking about my colleagues Elissa Slotkin and Mark Kelly, who literally quoted military manuals that say it is illegal to follow unjust and illegal laws--that they have a right to not follow unjust, illegal orders--literally quoting what is the law of the land.

And what did this out-of-control Executive do? What did this out-of- control Executive do--an Executive that has already reached and taken away the power of the purse; an Executive that has already violated court orders that we have seen come from the highest office in the land, the Supreme Court; an Executive who has violated the emoluments clause; a President who brags about taking away States' rights to control their own elections; a President that has violated the law, time and time again? What did he do with his Justice Department? He called together a grand jury, used officials from our Justice Department that should be keeping us safe--used them to go after two Members of this body in an attempt to criminally charge them for their constitutional rights, protected in the Constitution, the speech and debate clause.

There are books that have been written--from ``On Tyranny'' to ``How Democracies Die''--long before this administration, that predicted that this country's real threat will not be from some foreign enemy; it will be from internal corruption that goes unchecked--that this Nation's real threat is not from any adversary that cannot beat this Nation, this mighty country. The real threat to this Nation is when the Constitution we swear an oath to is eroded and the people with the power to stop it do nothing.

That is how great nations have fallen in the past, not from those who violate the Constitution, who violate the rule of law, who violate the freedom of the people. Nations fall when the people that have the power to do something about it remain silent, sit on the sidelines, remain quiet, or submit to the will of an out-of-control Executive.

The road to hell is paved with people who have the power to stop bad things from happening but say nothing. Our constitutional norms, the laws of our land, and the principles upon which we stand are being violated every week in our Nation. Americans are being swept up off of our streets. Americans' freedom of speech, Americans' privacy, the lives of American citizens are being taken--

Even people in the Senate being arrested, and so now I say unequivocally--

I ask unanimous consent for 2 more minutes. Is there an objection?

In this body, I see cowardice now. I see people afraid that the President will retaliate against them if they stand up and say something.

Well, Thomas Jefferson said clearly: When the people are afraid of government, there is tyranny. When the government is afraid of the people, there is liberty.

We have a President that calls people up and threatens to run primaries against my colleagues. We have billionaires that say: I will put $21 million in opposition if you don't submit to the unconstitutional actions of the Executive.

Two of our colleagues, arrested for their free speech--a grand jury summoned to try to arrest them for their free speech, and I hear silence.

We are in a constitutional crisis. The silence is complicity. The failure to stand up and speak up is an insult to our ancestry. We are in a moment of crisis. I fear for this body. I fear for this institution. I fear for our Constitution.

But I still have faith in the people. We can stop this erosion of our constitutional norms. We can stop this democratic backsliding. We can protect our rights and our values. But more people need to speak up. And it is a shame upon this body that those who have power and position now do nothing.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, there is something extraordinary that happens when we are here in the Senate. Every cycle, we see numerous young people who come here to--one might call them indentured servants. They are the pages.

I have come to have a lot of respect for Katie Britt, but my work with her every year in getting to know the pages--we have a little lunch--it is something I really treasure.

Senator Britt could not be here now. The schedule--we were supposed to do this earlier in the afternoon. But I want the pages to know that I think she is pretty broken-hearted that she can't be on the floor right now.

She and I together worked to judge the poetry competition. She was very disappointed that she could not be here to read the successful poems. But even more so, I think what she really wanted to do was to express her gratitude to this extraordinary group of young people who are assembled on the Senate floor before us.

So what I want to do is in two parts, with the latitude of the Chair, I am going to talk about the poetry competition and then share some parting words with the pages.

First, they are already annoying me--as they often do--because I cannot see you guys, all. So the pages who are sitting down and cannot eyeball me, please join the other pages who are standing so we can have a better look. I want to look into your eyes just in case my harsh words make any of you cry.

That is much better. That is much better.

Mr. President, we had a poetry competition. I want you to know this poetry competition was different than all the other poetry competitions we have had with pages. First of all, they were recalcitrant. Very few of them even participated, to begin.

So we did something we never, ever did before. We extended the deadline, and then I bullied and badgered--I admit this on the Senate floor. I bullied and badgered some high school students into complying with the poetry competition, and we got a large number of poems, a large number of participation from the pages.

I am proud, proud of your page participation that has lasted until today.

Now, what I did not expect is for their poems to be so good. I was actually literally shocked. I look at you all, and I just don't expect greatness. But your poems were exceptional. I literally texted Senator Britt in agony.

I was like, how do we decide on which poems to choose, because in past page classes--I hope they are listening out there in the world. They are just so top class. So it was very difficult.

Katie and I went back and forth. We did a lot of consternation, and we came up with the winners.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that all the page poems be--I have never done this before--but all the page poems that were written this time--all of you that wrote poems should be printed in the Congressional Record with their names because I did not see names. They were all anonymous to me. I don't know which pages they were. I don't know if they were Republican or Democrat. I don't know if they were the pages that told me bad jokes or the pages that told me really bad jokes because there were really just two categories in this class.

Mr. President, you will enter all the page poems because they are so good. So for the rest of time, it will be noted in the Congressional Record, in the Record of this august body. These poems will be in the Record with my comments that they are great poetry, even though you tell very bad jokes. That is now in the Record forever.

But we had to choose. There must be winners. I am very happy that we--Katie and I--through much grueling work, chose some winners. So there are three categories I am going to give you.

There is one honorable mention. There is another one that I chose myself, taking the privilege of being here and present on the floor. Please don't tell Senator Britt. And then the two that garnered in this body the bipartisan support--these are the two ultimate winners that got both Katie and me.

So here is the first honorable mention, then the one that really truly moved me, and then the one the two of us agreed on.

First, the honorable mention.

Where is Lilliana Grinberg?

Lilliana, you have been, in so many ways, so kind. I did not know this was your poem until moments ago.

Now that I know it is yours, I am not going to read it. No, I am joking. Here we go. Let's see if you impress the good Senator from Ohio.

It's a new day, here in the Capitol:

Prayer and pledge and now hear the gavel.

Under these gilded ceilings, then and now interweave;

It's where we see what is, and what ought to be.

Joking through the tired and laughing through the stress;

Praying that each scramble will turn into success;

Voting and speeches and printing amendments,

Debates and objections and unanimous consensus.

We leave this world made of marble and to Webster Hall we

return;

Where our bodies may rest, but our minds will still churn.

We all have no clue what tomorrow will bring;

Best and brightest, to this place we will cling.

We will cling to the chamber, and the flag and its staff.

We will cling to this group, every lesson and laugh.

Thank you very much. Snapping in the Chamber is against the rules, but you guys are leaving tomorrow anyway. So break some rules.

All right. This next poem I read, and more than one person who read this poem agreed with me. We got very emotional. It was brave and courageous, like some of the other poems I read. So this is a poem unlike any I have ever read from the pages. I am going to read it now. Then I will get to the two Britt-Booker wins.

But this poem is by Lucas Hogan.

Where is Lucas?

Lucas, all I have to say is wow. I am going to read it.

The poem is entitled ``Moments of Silence''

A gunman enters the school planning to cause violence

Students try to pretend they aren't there; they pack up

their things

They hold their breath; the school is in a moment of

silence

As hard as they tried, new angels still gained untimely

wings

At the funerals, they send thoughts and prayers to victims

of the violence

Shell-shocked survivors embrace one another and try to move

on

The next day at school, the victims are honored with a

moment of silence

It is impossible for anyone to keep going--their friends

are gone

Politicians give stentorian remarks on stage denouncing the

violence

Afterwards, they hand off the microphone and scurry off to

the next speech

There are no votes on any policies; nothing but moments of

silence

Children still march into the place where survival is a

reach

There's been enough inaction. There's been enough waiting.

There's been enough sorrow.

Only moments of silence leaves more children who yearn for

tomorrow

Very, very powerful.

Now, the Britt-Booker choices for the highest senatorial honor given to a teenager anywhere ever. I guess I am exaggerating--but what the heck. Who knows.

Two that I shall read, and first is by Addison Norris--oh, my gosh.

Addison, you are like a Senator. You are very long-winded in your poetry writing. But it is beautiful, nonetheless.

In the beginning,

God created the heavens and the earth.

He looked upon His work and said, It is good.

But is it really good

when we're facing wars,

when families are waiting

for unopened doors?

Is it really good

when it doesn't go my way,

when I've lost my job,

had a horrible day?

Is it good

when I can't see the light

when there's no clear way out--

is it good, is it right?

Is He good?

Is God really there

when there's no food on the table?

Does God truly care?

Yes--He is good,

though the night feels long,

though prayers fall heavy

and the silence feels strong.

Because goodness was never

the absence of pain;

it was God stepping into it,

bearing the weight, wearing the stain.

Good looked like a manger,

not a throne dressed in gold.

Good looked like mercy

when the world had grown cold.

Good had dirt on His hands,

tears in His eyes,

a cross on His shoulders,

love choosing sacrifice.

He is good not because

life bends to our will,

but because He stays close

when everything is still.

When the job is gone,

when the cupboard is bare,

when all we have left

is a whispered prayer--

He is there.

Good is the Shepherd

who walks through the valley,

not shouting directions

but walking it with me.

Good is the promise

that night doesn't win,

that Sunday still comes

after Friday's grim.

So yes, He is good--

not loud, not rushed, not proved in a day--

but faithful, and near,

and already making a way.

Fantastic.

The last page poem--prodigiously, purposefully, powerfully plain--I said less alliteration. I lied. Here is the last page poem. I do want to say, there was another poem--I didn't even ask whose name it was-- that heralded Katie Britt and me. I admired the obsequious nature of that poem. The sycophantic excellence was powerful. I mean, to drop my name into the poem, I was weak. I wanted to choose the person who praised me, but I felt like I wouldn't get away with it before the Presiding Officer. He might rule XIX me or something like that.

So here is the final bipartisan poem that gets our most highest honor here in the Senate, and it comes from Emma Ross.

Emma.

You can snap for Emma before the poem, but shouldn't you wait to hear what she wrote first? Gosh, premature ``snap-ation'' is a bad thing.

Here we go. From Emma Ross.

I came from quiet roads and open air,

Where every sunset felt like it knew me.

But here, the marble glitters cold and bare,

And I feel lost in all this history.

These crowded halls move faster than my breath,

Each rushing step reminding me I'm new;

Some days my confidence feels close to death,

And I miss skies my hometown once let through

I smile, I learn, I try to stand up tall,

But still my heart aches for familiar ground.

A porchlight glow, a voice I knew to call

A place where I was seen, not just around

Yet though I ache, I stay, because I know

Great dreams are born from seeds we bravely sow.

I am impressed with this class. I have to say, as much as I tried to diss you and disrespect you, you guys showed such specialness, I will never forget this page class.

So I am going to do two things. One, as the Presiding Officer knows that you lead by example, so, of course, I wrote you a poem, and I am going to share it.

Then I will say some final words, and I will let the Presiding Officer close the Senate for the recess.

So, first, a poem before my final words. This is a Booker original, written hastily over the last 24 hours. You can do things at the last minute and still make it in life. I think I am a testimony to that. You can procrastinate. But I actually wrote this after reading through your poems a second time.

You inspired me, so here is the Senate page poem dedicated to you all.

One hundred Senators--confident, accomplished, successful

Elected leaders projecting excellence in times so

stressful.

They may seem like giants and you may feel a bit small.

But, dear God, don't buy it--don't believe that at all.

For every Senator you hear roar on this hallowed floor,

There are shadows, stumbles, wounds--times they collapsed

and wept before.

You witness speeches, polished, practiced, refined,

What you don't see are the staffs who write drafts, fix

flaws, and make sure we arrive on time.

And if we sound wise--sagacious on camera or TV shows--

The true heft we carry wasn't born from our highs,

But was forged through our lows.

So dear Pages, a truth not often shared in this place,

To the young people who carried our water and opened our

doors with such grace:

Greatness isn't achieved when you reach the highest ground.

Greatness is forged when you get knocked down and despite

it all, rise, and rebound.

You may have become curious how someone climbed so far,

they must be better than we are. But if you want to know the

real story, perhaps the best question to ask us is: Tell me

about your scars?

But maybe this is a story you already know so well . . .

Because these last months of your life here in the Senate .

. .

You all went through hell.

You worked humbling, demanding jobs full-time,

Then carried a full course load--every class, so much work

assigned.

And what moved me most--what I admire in you--is that

somehow, still, you became one of the kindest Page classes I

have ever known or knew.

Maybe that's the lesson you offer us today:

That despite the world's pressure, its chaos and fray,

You met stress, struggle, exhaustion, and so much, too much

labor--

Yet you still lived the most sacred refrain of all:

To love your neighbor.

I say this because you've impressed me, you really have,

every single day.

Look, your jokes really sucked, but your kindness was your

way . . .

So I leave you now with this final reminder: God, this

world needs to become a lot kinder.

So, when angry, when joyful, when weary or mad.

When soaring with hope, or aching and sad.

When lost, when certain, or when unsure of your way--

When life makes no sense at the end of the day--

Choose again. Decide again.

Make it your very spine:

Resolve, in all moments, to always be more kind.

Because in my life the best people I've ever met--without

question, what has been and is their principle?

It is that they center their lives

on cultivating a kindness, that is invincible.

Very true. You guys disappointed me time and time again. From the day you arrived, I asked for jokes. I haven't asked much. I asked you guys just to be funny, and you are not. You are really going to have to work on that in life. I mean, you have got to have a sense of humor.

But what you lacked in humor, I was blown away by just how good people you are, and this world is yearning for more good people.

You have seen this place split along the aisle. You have seen the tribalism grow in our country. You are going to return to your phones very soon, which I think this is probably going to be looked back upon as one of your better periods when you weren't scrolling and weren't doing social media. In many ways, you were liberated from that toxin, which feeds in our society so much hate and so much disagreement.

These are corporations actually that feed us through their algorithms things that make us more enraged on each other. If there is any great threat to America, it is no other country. They can't beat us tank for tank or warship for warship. The greatest threat to our country isn't from without, it is from within. In fact, you will study history, and if you look at the decline of nations, it has not necessarily been from external threats. From the Roman Empire to the Soviet Union, they fall because of internal corruption and failing to live up to their virtues.

If there is any virtue that you all have been amidst every single day for America to make us successful, it is the one over the Presiding Officer's head. It is ``E pluribus unum.''

But I was blown away in this session. You heard the speech. One of my colleagues researched where that speech came from. I never thought of the origins of ``E pluribus unum.'' I have been saying that phrase from a dead language. And he found the origins of it from a great philosopher that is actually the end of a sentence. The sentence talks about that value that you all showed me through your kindness. Whether it was in the train or passing in the hallway, you all seem to always have a smile, a generous word. Even on the days you were haggard and weary, ``E pluribus unum''--the beginning of that sentence is, if we are to be a great people, we must love one another, we must love our neighbors and become one out of many. That is the secret.

So if there is any parting word I can give you on behalf of Katie and myself, who have forged a friendship in this place--I have come to love and respect her deeper because I see her struggle in the most important way. The greatest struggles in our lives are not necessarily the next career ladder we are going to grab; the greatest struggle in life is often just to manifest every day, to show up every day and evidence the most important virtues in our lives. And I think of no greater virtue than to love one another.

So I will end by telling you a short story about my scars, about times I have failed, because the truth of the matter is, the best lessons I have been gifted have been through the most difficult times. You guys just went through difficult times, and I hope you look back and say that there was something about the hardship and the challenge that forged something with you that you will take with you for the rest of your life, that you look back at this page experience and value and remember two things: One is the friends you made, and the other is the grit that you gained to be the best version of yourself to show up.

Whatever you do, whatever you do, I hope you do like I have seen you do in this place, is just litter this world with small acts of kindness, decency, and love.

So the embarrassing story, which I hesitate to tell before the Presiding Officer--it might show up in my campaign this year in ads used against me. So I hope I can have a public promise that you won't use this story against me, sir. Is that without objection?

Thank you very much, sir.

So three blocks from my home in Newark, NJ, is this place--you guys are from all over the country. I don't know if you have this place, but three blocks

from my home is this place called McDonald's.

Now, I have a guy who has driven me since I was a mayor. He was on my protective detail. He was a detective in the Newark Police Department. His name is Kevin Batts. From 2006 until now, he has been driving me around. And we have such a great friendship. We know each other so well that when I jump in the back of the car, I am often doing work, pounding away on texts, on the phone, so we don't even have to talk. He has learned to read my mind. Telepathic powers have emerged between us.

So as we are driving past that McDonald's, he looks in the rearview mirror and immediately turns into the drive-through. He looked at me and read my mind. Maybe he didn't read my mind; he just saw weakness in my soul. I needed to have some McDonald's french fries.

Now, at this point in my life when this story takes place, I was not a plant-based man. I did not know that McDonald's to this day--this is not libelous--they soak their french fries in some kind of beef product. I don't know what it is. But still I love McDonald's french fries. I get two large french fries.

Now we are driving out of the drive-through, and I see a guy in a trash can rooting around, and I don't say a word. Kevin knows me. I look in the rearview mirror, our eyes meet, and he immediately stops the car. I roll down the window. He knows that I am going to want to try to see what is going on here three blocks from my home. I am trying to live my values.

I say, ``Hey man, you all right?'' and he sort of waves me off. But, immediately, I realized my tone wasn't right. This is a man with equal dignity, God's creation made in God's image, and I said--my words weren't respectful enough.

So I lowered my tone, and I said: Excuse me, sir. I am sorry to bother you, but do you need anything?

He turns around and looks at me, and he goes: I am hungry.

Now, I have talked to a lot of you. A lot of different faiths. We have a lot of different faiths for Senators here. It is more diverse than it has ever been. But in my faith, I think Jesus said something like, if you have two McDonald's french fries and your neighbor has no McDonald's french fries--I think it was the sermon on the McMount. Yes. The Parliamentarian can fact-check that. I think that is what the Bible said. But if I have two McDonald's french fries and my neighbor has none, I think Jesus said: Give one of your McDonald's french fries.

So I reach into my bag, and I hand the man one of my treasures. I mean, before that, I was holding them like that movie, ``The Lord of the Rings.'' My precious. My precious. But now I go into my bag, and I hand him one of my fries. He takes the fries. He seems happy. I feel satisfied that I showed up in that moment. And he looks at me, grateful, steps away from the car, and then steps back to the car, and he goes: Excuse me. One more thing. Do you have any socks?

Now, all of us who have done any voluntary work in homeless shelters or worked with folks who are experiencing homelessness, you know if he is asking, there must be an urgent need for him. So I felt bad. I sort of vainly looked in my car left and right. I don't carry extra socks in my car.

I said: No, sir. I am sorry, I don't have socks.

He shook his head and stepped back and raised the fries to me like saying: Cheers. Thanks for the fries.

I whipped my head around, looked in the rearview mirror, giving him all the telepathy I could. I need to get home. I need to turn on the British baking show--I should say the American baking show, American baking shows. And there is nothing worse than cold McDonald's french fries. But Kevin doesn't move the car. I stare harder--more telepathy. Move the car. He doesn't move the car.

Suddenly, what he does is he puts the car in park, and he reaches between the steering wheel and his legs, kicks off his shoes, and takes off the socks he is wearing. He folds them as neat as he can and offers them up to the man, who then takes the socks like he just received a bar of gold and steps away from the car and says: Thank you.

I am a U.S. Senator, and I talk about kindness all the time, but in that moment, I failed to use my moral imagination to see how I could show up. I am three blocks from my house. I have socks in my drawer. Some of them, I don't even wear anymore. But I didn't think about taking off my socks.

Pages, you all are special. I tell you, I really have come to have a lot of affection for you. I am going to miss you. This place is going to miss you. I hope if I see you out and about, you don't pretend like you don't know me and I can tell you what an honor it was that we served together in the U.S. Senate.

I think I speak for 99 other people in telling you how grateful we are.

If there is one request I have, it is to just remind you that our Founders knew about this country, that we needed improvement. They wanted this in every generation of us to make this a more perfect Union. If I could prescribe one great need our country has, it is you. This country needs your heart and your spirit; it needs your brilliance and ideas; it needs your grit and hard work; but most of all, it needs you to be kind. Those seeds are in you. I see it.

I hope that as you go out into the world and encounter challenges and stresses, that you can always show up with your heart and your kindness and your love. And that perhaps you remember better than I do that sometimes in life, you got to take off your socks.

Mr. President, I want to thank Senator Mark Kelly for bringing people to the floor to talk about that which is, unequivocally, the greatest threat to American democracy right now. It is the cancer that is metastasizing more and more and more.

Since the Citizens United decision, I have watched as to how this body has seen clearly corrupt forces beginning to overrun the common sense and the will of the people in policy. More and more are being bent to the whim and the will of the wealthiest of the wealthy in our country and the world, as well as to corporations--many of them, multinational corporations.

We are in crisis--our Nation is in crisis--as more and more Americans lose trust and lose faith in our country, in our democracy, in the people who serve--the 535 Members: the 100 Members of the Senate and the 435 Members of the House of Representatives. They feel more and more that they are in it for themselves and for the corporations and not to do the hard work of the people.

Trust is vital for a democracy to thrive, and there has been nothing more powerful in the undermining of that trust, in the years that I have been in the Senate, than what I have seen in the destructive force of money in our politics. We know that the decision that was made by a conservative majority of five Justices--three of whom are still on the Court--permitted those billionaires and corporations to pour unlimited, unchecked money into our elections, drowning out the collective voices of the people.

Let me give you an example, a sobering fact. In 2024, about 44 percent of all of the money raised to support Donald Trump came from 10 individual donors.

Think about that for a second. Of the billions of dollars that were spent on this election for the President of the United States right now, 44 percent of that money was contributed by 10 people. This is not just a purview of any party, though; this is something that is infecting our entire system.

People ask the question rightfully: What does all that influence and money buy? Well, right now, we are seeing it. Individuals like Elon Musk and other billionaires are exercising an outsized influence on our party, threatening people in this body and other bodies to drop millions and millions of dollars against them. And to say that doesn't have an influence is wrong. Unlimited corporate cash literally buys policies that put even more money in the pockets of the wealthiest, allows them to rig the system to benefit them, while working-class Americans more and more get a raw deal.

We are seeing a virtual welfare state for the wealthiest of the wealthy in our policies that benefits and protects the wealthiest, that serves the largest corporations, that is designed to line the pockets further and further of the wealthy. It is a tax cut for corporations that we have seen in policies, while Americans and their most important issues--whether it is their healthcare, whether it is their ability to make a living--are further and further undermined.

Citizens United has created a system where Presidential pardons are pay-to-play, where environmental regulations that keep us safe and healthy are slashed, where corporate mergers are rubberstamped by Federal regulators.

For 16 years now, we have seen the slow, cancerous corruption of American democracy. We have seen how folks who pay the price get outsized influence, that a small group of billionaires and corporations wield enormous power over elections and, in turn, over the policies that all Americans have to live under. And this has fueled what is growing to be a growing discontent.

Ending Citizens United is wildly popular on both sides of the aisle. The majority of Americans want to see an end to this cancerous decision. Americans are sick and tired, and they are demanding that we act.

I believe this body should come together in a bipartisan way to end the nightmare that has been unleashed on America by Citizens United. I know from private conversations with people on both sides of the aisle that it would be a relief not to have this outsized influence of money and power on this body. It would allow us to focus in an undeterred way on the business of the people.

I am proud to cosponsor bills that would end this nightmare like Democracy for All, the amendment to overturn this misguided decision. I am proud to champion commonsense reforms like the Freedom to Vote Act

and--God--the DISCLOSE Act, which would ensure that the dark money pouring into our elections, the cancerous resources unleashed by the wealthiest of the wealthy--that at least they could not pour that money in and then hide their identity. It would shine light on what is a dark, dark process.

I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle but particularly my Republican colleagues to listen to the overwhelming majority of Americans who just not only want to avoid the dark, cancerous reality that Citizens United brought to us but are hoping and yearning for our democracy to get back to the ideals that we all share, that we pledge allegiance to, that could make this 250th anniversary of our country something truly to celebrate: that we are a nation free from this cancer, free from the dark money that is flooding our politics; that, indeed, we are free at last to see what can happen in America that focuses on the people and the power of the people and not just the power of the wealthiest.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, before my colleague leaves the floor, I just want to commend him for his leadership and for that of some of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle, like Lindsey Graham and Mike Lee, who were extraordinary in getting this done.

When I got to the Senate about 12 years ago, one of the best experiences I have had as a Senator was to have the senior Senator, who in many ways, to me, was a legend, put me under his wing and say: Join me in this effort, in this fight. It gave me one of the best, most gratifying legislative experiences I have had as a U.S. Senator.

On this the seventh anniversary, I just want to herald the leadership of Dick Durbin for never giving up, for his indomitable will, and for his invincible spirit in getting this major piece of legislation done.

I am grateful to be able to stand here today, 7 years later, to thank him for that kind of leadership as well as my colleagues in the Republican Party who stood strong, who stood with us, and helped us get over this line. This is the kind of thing that is a real example of setting political differences aside and doing what is right. There were people in the White House, not just President Trump but many of his team members, who enabled us to work together to get something done.

It shows what we can do when we let evidence, facts, fairness, and compassion be the guide to getting legislation done. This is not only a reflection of what we have done; to me, it should inspire us to what we can do. For 7 years, this landmark legislation has represented the crowning achievement in this body.

First, I want to remind everybody that, in the years leading up to this, our prison population in America ballooned by 800 percent. America became the incarceration capital of planet Earth, with 5 percent of the world's population but 25 percent of the world's prison population. Even today, close to one out of every three adult Americans has a criminal record. That is stunning, and it should stun everybody here, but we know we were able to make some changes and not by accident. This system--this corrupt system--is a result of decades of failed Federal policies that we challenged; that we showed did not work.

My friend Bryan Stevenson put it perfectly. He said that you get treated better in this country if you are rich and guilty rather than if you are poor and innocent. That is why so many of us worked together to get something done.

As of January 31, 2024, over 17,000 individuals were released from residential reentry centers, home confinements, and secure facilities because they participated in the programming to help them reenter society and earn credits. The great thing about it is their recidivism rate is so much lower than it would have been from comparable populations that maxed out their time. We have, actually, through the programs we have put in place, made people safer; have lowered recidivism rates; have created safer communities and stronger, more intact families through this program. Over 400,000 people now have completed programs that were put together in our legislation. In fiscal year 2023, over 4,000 people completed occupational training, and over 8,000 earned industry-recognized credentials.

So much good has come from this, but as Senator Durbin said, our work is not done. We know that the Bureau of Prisons has a staffing crisis that jeopardizes the safety of correctional officers and those in custody, and that undermines the programs we have put in place, which are not being fully implemented.

When we named the law, we also were very deliberate. We called it the First Step Act because we knew there was so much more work that we could be doing in a bipartisan way to empower our criminal justice system to be about justice and fairness and public safety, not just the routine warehousing of human beings and human potential at great cost to taxpayers.

Perhaps one of the great public safety things we can do is to continue this work. We must not succumb to the dangerous rhetoric that spreads fear for political gain and does not look at the commonsense, evidence-based ways to lower crime, to lower prison rates, to empower communities, and to reunite families. We must not brand every person who commits an offense as someone who is irredeemable. Indeed, the very nature of our country is the ideal of redemption.

I am so grateful to have participated in the First Step Act. I see my friend Mike Lee, who just came in, who is another one of those champions whom I mentioned earlier by name. Now that he is on the floor, I want to thank him for his courage, for his telling the stories of people over and over again until the consciousness of the country was raised to the point at which we could get this legislation done.

Again, it is one of the best experiences I have had as a legislator. I want to thank him, Senator Durbin, Senator Chuck Grassley, as well as my friend Lindsey Graham, and many of our colleagues on this side of the aisle.

I know the hour is late, and a lot of my friends are waiting here, but I am hoping that, in the spirit of this anniversary, we can commit ourselves to doubling our efforts and doing more good work in this spirit.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, as my colleagues are understandably greeting my colleague, I just wanted to take a moment and take the floor to express my deep admiration for a man that I have known for decades.

I first met Andy Kim when he was a college student and I was interviewing him for a Rhodes Scholarship. I was part of this panel of people who had to interview some of the best people from the State of New Jersey for this vaunted scholarship. I will tell you right now, when Andy Kim walked in that room, he blew away every one of the interviewers.

I like to brag around New Jersey now that while now hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people have voted for Andy Kim, I was perhaps the first person to do so.

What I saw in a young college student decades ago has only blossomed so much more as he has gone from a young man to a U.S. Senator.

We throw around the word ``patriotism'' a lot, and it is often used in a way to brandish pride or, at its worst, as a way to condemn others. But the truth of patriotism was in the language we heard today; it is in the language of love, the fact that you cannot love your country unless you love your fellow country men and women.

I am excited that New Jersey has a Senator of unassailable brilliance, but what makes him special is not simply his extraordinary head but the profound depths of his heart.

New Jersey is a State that often I call the Rodney Dangerfield State where we get no respect, but the truth of the matter is, New Jersey has a representative that in this body that is known for partisanship, he is a person that is seen by colleagues on both sides of the aisle as someone that has a soul force, someone who has a heart, someone who is determined to be the kind of patriot this Nation needs.

I would be remiss in not mentioning this: I love the fact that we have this body that represents so many American traditions, so many streams of lived experiences that make this a great representation of our Nation. But the truth is, we are still seeing so many firsts in this body.

One first we should recognize is the one that Andy Kim exemplifies. He is the first Korean American to serve in this body at a time that Korean Americans have made contributions--from the academics, to the sciences, innovators, businesspeople, farmers. But this is the first time the United States of America has seen a Korean American, the son of immigrants, stand in this body. I will tell you this--not just because of his heritage, not just because of the uniqueness of his presence on this floor, but because of the depth of his humanity, his demonstration today of the urgency that we stand up and allow people to see our vulnerability, see our frailty. In fact, in many ways, Andy Kim has shown that often the greatest courage is found in the depths of our frailty, our vulnerability, and our candor and honesty with our own struggles.

I am a man of great physical stature relative to my smaller Senator, but I hope everybody in America knows this: I may have greater physical stature, but since I met him as a college student, I have looked up to my friend and my brother, a giant of a human, Andy Kim.

I appreciate it. I appreciate my colleague pausing for a question.

I just want to first say, as I present my question to him, how grateful I am for his stamina and for his strength but, more importantly, for his insightful truths that he has been telling now for well over 14 hours.

In many ways, we see a tradition in this body of being a deliberative body, but it seems now, more and more, that deliberation is giving way to what the Founders never imagined, which is that of simply conceding to anything that the President of the United States wants. We were born to check and balance the Presidency. We are the article I branch of government.

As my colleague rings the alarm bell, it is clear to me that the alarm bell he is ringing is not a partisan alarm bell; it is not left or right. It is right or wrong. It is about asserting the article I branch of the Constitution's strength, its purpose, its constitutional intent. That is to provide oversight. That is to provide advice and consent. That is to provide the checks and balance that we need.

For hours now, what I have been seeing is that my colleague Jeff Merkley has, time and time again, been laying plain facts that would not play no matter what party a person is from. The President is encroaching again and again and again on the constitutional prerogatives of the article I branch of government, and the result of this is that people are hurting.

I really want to get my colleague's response to this. The fact is, right now, you have a President not going through Congress, not working with Congress but undermining congressional intent by gutting and cutting programs; by gutting and cutting Agencies; by gutting and cutting bipartisan-approved resources for our States in ways that threaten and undermine the well-being of Americans.

We see him approve a tariff policy, not one that has gone through this

body--in fact, I would say not one that people in this body would even agree on that is hurting American farmers, that is driving them to their knees. They want trade, not aid. As a result of that tariff policy, it is not only hurting the bedrock people who put food on the table for Americans and people throughout this world, but it is hurting consumers by driving up grocery prices.

What my colleague continues to point out is how these violations of our constitutional norms and traditions--the insult and injury done to our Constitution--have real-life impacts on the lives of Americans. It is making us poorer, and it is making us sicker in our lack of access to healthcare. We are seeing a time now when, if we do not ring the alarm bells, more and more Americans will be hurt by a President who is acting more like an authoritarian leader than a democratically elected Executive in the article II branch.

This is not a left or a right moment. It is a right or a wrong moment. This is a moral moment in America.

I love what Martin Luther King said. He said: The problem today is not the vitriolic words and violent actions of the bad people. It is the appalling silence and inaction of the good people.

This is the time that my colleague, in doing this extraordinary step here for more than 14 hours--all through the night--is standing up and saying: Look, democracy has never been a spectator sport. If you love this country--if you love with deep devotion the ideals of patriotism more than a party--now is the time for all good people to stand up and call it out.

So I want to know this from my colleague: With the urgency that we have in this moment with Americans seeing their energy costs go up; with Americans seeing their grocery costs going up; with Americans now seeing the reality of their healthcare costs going up by thousands and thousands of dollars for marginalized people; for folks who are struggling to provide for their children; for children with disabilities struggling to get the resources they need; with parents not knowing how they are going to meet the rent and pay for medical expenses or how they are going to be able to pay for the basic needs of their families, this is a time that if you believe in the cherished principles of our Nation, from patriotism to devotion to our national ideals, if you believe in the ideals of our Nation of love thy neighbor, and if you believe that we are one nation under God, this must be the time when more people stand up and speak out because the only thing necessary--the only thing necessary--for the triumph of tyranny is for a free people to remain silent.

So I ask my colleague right now because there are people saying: What does it matter that a Senator is standing up? I ask my colleague right now to maybe say directly to the American people why you are taking this courageous stand tonight and what you hope they will take away because it is not about you or me; it is not about the 100 people here. We have seen this President back down before when the American people, in a chorus of conviction, stand up and say: No, no more.

As Frederick Douglass said, the limits of tyranny are prescribed by the people who face the oppression.

I ask my colleague: What is the message that you are trying to send with this courageous stand, with this incredible endurance, with this strong speech you are giving today?

And of my colleague I would ask another question because you are making such a great point, and I really hope America hears this--that these policies, these constitutional principles that we are defending here, are not just arcane, idealistic things; they have a direct impact on our Nation.

My colleague is making it plain. This is what should be animating everybody; it is that when you attack the healthcare of millions of Americans, it doesn't mean you are curing disease, and they are not going to have a demand for healthcare. The demand is still going to be there. And if they are not getting their healthcare reimbursed, if they are not getting preventive care, if they are not getting regular checkups, they are going to put more demand on our hospitals, which are going to make our hospitals have longer wait times in the emergency rooms, that are going to have our hospitals have less reimbursed care, and our hospitals are going to strain and buckle under that, thus, driving up the costs for everyone. You make it plain, and people should hear this.

When the President lies to the American people and says he is about all-of-the-above energy costs, he is not. He is about advantaging certain energy over other energy, and it is actually the lower cost energy that he is attacking. Those projects are actually going to lower people's bills.

So here he is raising the healthcare costs for everyone, hurting the hospitals that we all rely on, and driving up energy costs for everyone and giving an advantage to our competitors, like the Chinese, who are racing to energy projects in the renewable energy space.

But it is even more than that, as my colleague knows. When you have boneheaded attacks on our Constitution, as opposed to going through Congress, where there is deliberation and debate, you are actually raising costs in other ways too.

As my colleagues knows, Americans, right now, are seeing investments that we make that return for the taxpayer significant returns in science and research. We are a nation that has exploited industries, where the rest of the world is trying to catch up to us. We are the Nation that invented so many great things by funding research, basic research and technology.

So when you attack universities, where they are now reporting less postdoc programs, less Ph.D. programs, less research going on in America, you are ceding the pathway to human endeavor. You are closing it off.

As my colleague was saying, with attacks on universities, making them come and bend a knee, those universities are saying: No, I will not bow to you. You are not my King.

And then that King--want-to-be King--cuts funding to our greatest research institutions--not in America but the greatest research institutions on the planet Earth, which have spawned new innovations from quantum computing to fission and fusion, to robotics, to medical sciences. When you cut off the resources to those things, you are starving the goose that has been laying the golden egg for human endeavor, for industries, and more.

It has a cost when a President goes rogue and does what he wants to do. It has a cost not just to our liberty, when you make universities, when you make businesses, when you make law firms bow before you or be punished by you.

It has a cost to our liberty, but it also has--as you were saying so plainly what most Americans are saying over and over again--it has a cost financially to American families who are right now struggling.

As you have said, time and time again, over these last dozen-plus hours, Americans are hurting. Americans are afraid. Americans are worried that they are going to get a diagnosis from a doctor that is going to drive them to bankruptcy.

Americans don't know how they can take care of a sick child and pay the rent, and this is directly being attacked by a President who is doing things that are driving up their energy costs, that are driving up their medical costs, that are driving up their grocery costs, and who is failing to make the investments that keep America ahead of the competition we are seeing in places like China.

It is boneheaded. It is financially imprudent. It is hurting America, as well as our constitutional framework.

The genius of our Founders in this great experiment that is now 250 years old, which has put us at the top of all of humanity and innovation and human success, is now being jeopardized, after 250 years, by a President who is claiming authorities that the Constitution and our Framers never intended to be in the executive.

So God bless America. My colleague from Oregon is giving a master's class today--a master's class now for 14-plus hours, closing in on 15; a master's class in helping people understand not just constitutional principles but how all of us are invested in this Constitution, how all of us are invested in making sure that nobody steps outside of those constitutional authorities because when it does, we have seen what has happened when McCarthyism arose; we have seen what has happened when demagoguery trumps common sense, common cause, common purposes, and a shared devotion to that flag.

So I ask my colleague right now, we haven't even had a year of this President, and we have watched things happen where this body has not even called an oversight hearing when our very national security was in jeopardy.

When you have Americans at the highest level of our Defense Department using a commercial app with reporters on it to release classified information, we didn't hold one oversight hearing.

When we took the extrajudicial step to blow up speed boats, there has been no oversight into that claimed attack on people who were allegedly smuggling drugs.

We are constantly not doing our job, which is not a partisan one. It is to hold this President in check, that no one operates without accountability and without transparency because power is corrupting.

When you let someone do what they want to do, when they want to do it, without a check or a balance, it is corrupting. We know that because we have the most corrupt President, dollar for dollar of any President we have ever seen, through his crypto schemes, from him exchanging his authorities for compensation that makes him a richer man.

Unchecked power leads to corruption. Our Founders knew it and designed this system thusly.

So I ask my colleague now, that sense of urgency of a President who has been in office nearly 10 months, if my colleagues in this body do not start standing up and doing their jobs, holding hearings on his tariff policies, holding hearings on his agricultural policy, holding hearings on his healthcare policies--and I say that generously because they are not policies; they are not thoughtful; they don't reflect the wisdom on both sides of the aisle; they are hurting people. If we continue to let this President proceed unchecked, if we continue to let him flaunt the rules of our Constitution, if we continue with open eyes to let him do things that he is doing right now by ripping apart the White House, not going through any of the process whatsoever that is literally contrary to the laws of the people's House--not Donald Trump's House, the people's House--if we continue to let him go in this way without checks or balances, I ask my colleague, what are the consequences that you fear might happen in the next 10 months with this President, who wants to be an autocrat and is in the White House?