Floor Statements

Mr. President, my Democratic colleagues say wealthy Americans should pay their fair share. Yet they want to expand the electric vehicle tax credit for the rich once again.

In this bill, there are two separate EV tax credits: one for people who want to buy new $80,000 vehicles and one for those who want to buy used EVs.

Why two separate credits? The tax credit for new EVs is available to the wealthy, while the credit for the new EVs is limited to the folks with lower incomes. Why do my colleagues from the other side keep giving bigger tax breaks to their rich donors?

My change would at least prevent taxpayer dollars from subsidizing the wealthy.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, while we haven't yet seen any bill text for this reckless tax-and-spending bill, we have seen or we have heard an outline of it, some chatter about it, snippets about it--about what is in this reconciliation bill. So, Madam President, let me state the obvious: Billions of dollars in reckless spending and major tax hikes--they will not solve the economic crisis our Nation finds itself in. Yet, somehow, this concoction of truly terrible economic policies is exactly what my colleagues on the Democratic side are pursuing.

Let's start with the tax hikes. In the Schumer-Manchin bill, they have proposed imposing a corporate minimum tax on those big, bad corporations. Well, 50 percent of this change would be borne by the manufacturing industry--an industry that both Republicans and Democrats have been trying to grow. We have been trying to grow that, not harm it with bad policies.

Manufacturers are already struggling to navigate inflation and supply chain crisis, but this bill will punish manufacturers, and there is no question that this would hurt the middle class by raising prices and lowering wages. At a time of historic inflation, manufacturers will have no choice but to pass on higher prices to the consumer.

That is just one part of it. Democrats say the rich should pay their fair share. OK, let's look at that.

A nonpartisan analysis of the entire bill found that it would cause a $16.7 billion tax increase for American taxpayers earning less than $200,000 in 2023. President Biden is going back on his promise and raising taxes for those earning less than $400,000, and he is doing this during a recession.

What about the claim that this proposal will address inflation? The Penn-Wharton Budget Model, which Senator Manchin frequently cites for producing the best economic analysis, found the proposal produces no meaningful reduction in the deficit or with inflation. Any suggestion otherwise is insulting to the intelligence of the American people.

OK, now let's look at the spending. Why, during a time of significant economic hardship, should the American people be on the hook to fund $369 billion in incentives to the Green New Deal businesses to promote those energy policies? Can anyone in this Chamber argue with a straight face that subsidizing Tesla purchases will help to ease inflation? I can tell you it certainly will not help working families.

Then there is the $80 billion for the IRS, which is six times the Agency's current annual budget. Our folks on the other side of the aisle are once again trying to hire an armada of new IRS agents-- 87,000, to be exact. This would unleash a wave of new audits. Half of those new audits would hit Americans making $75,000 or less.

You know, we have been here before. The public does not want this deal. The bottom line: It is clear this economy is not working for the American people.

The Biden administration's policies have saddled this country with two consecutive months of negative economic growth--which is the definition of a recession--9.1 percent inflation, a negative 3.6 inflation-adjusted decline in pay for workers, and more Americans than ever before are now holding two full-time jobs.

In the face of all this hardship, we need real solutions, not more of the same backward spending policies.

The cute name that Senators Schumer and Manchin have come up with for their proposal should not hide these facts. And the facts are massive tax hikes and billions of dollars in reckless government spending. That is the last thing our country needs right now.

So why are we even debating such a terrible bill? A short history lesson may offer some answers. People may recall something called the Cornhusker Kickback--an agreement in 2009 between my predecessor and Senator Harry Reid. In exchange for a special carve-out only for Nebraska to reduce the costs of enacting ObamaCare in our State, my predecessor agreed to vote for ObamaCare. Well, the kickback, once public, it angered and it embarrassed Nebraskans.

History often repeats itself, and from what I am hearing, it seems as though we have a new kickback--the Mountaineer kickback, a deal only for West Virginia; tax hikes and reckless spending that all of us will have to bear in exchange for a pipeline.

I will close by saying again, this is not an inflation reduction bill. Like a bad Hollywood franchise that just won't die, this is simply the third installment in the ``Build Back Broke'' trilogy. I hope it does as poorly in the box office as the first two.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise today to voice my concern about attempts to undermine American institutions.

There is a difference between constructive efforts to ensure public institutions are accountable and trying to cut down these foundational institutions at their core.

Recently, our country commemorated National Police Week, and it was an opportunity to show our gratitude and appreciation to the men and women who put their lives on the line to keep our people and our communities safe. Yet we continue to see those on the left trying to villainize all law enforcement in this country.

President Biden and Speaker Pelosi, scared about their party's dropping poll numbers, can keep trying to muffle their colleagues' destructive comments, but what the Democrats have already said has harmed our Nation's law enforcement.

We heard ``defund the police'' from many--too many--Democratic elected officials.

During a CNN interview in June 2021, a Massachusetts Congresswoman said:

I support a radical re-imagining of community safety and

public safety, which means reallocating and not further

investing in a carceral state.

A New York Congresswoman has called for the Federal Government to apply pressure to disrupt the system in reference to police departments.

Others have said time and time again that we must ``completely re- imagine what policing looks like in our country.''

What affect is this antipolice rhetoric having on those who swear to serve and protect? Not surprisingly, we are seeing a drain on law enforcement agencies. Numbers of law enforcement officers rose from 2014 to 2020; however, over the past 2 years, retirements and resignations are climbing while recruitment numbers are down. Many of our law enforcement agencies are receiving far fewer applications.

This is something that I directly discussed with Sergeant Tony Conner, the president of the Omaha Police Officer's Association, when we met recently. Application numbers for some Nebraska law enforcement agencies are down 75

percent or more compared to just a few years ago.

Contributing to these challenges, police officers' jobs have also become increasingly dangerous. Last year, we saw surges in violence and aggression towards officers. Three hundred and forty-six police officers were shot in the line of duty, and 130 of them were targeted and shot in ambush-style attacks. In a recent CBS ``60 Minutes'' interview, FBI Director Christopher Wray said there had been a 59- percent increase in the murders of police officers, with 73--73-- officers killed in 2021. That is a rate of about one officer killed every 5 days.

Without a doubt, Democrats' antipolice rhetoric has diminished morale and eroded public trust in law enforcement. Maybe that was the goal.

But dwindling application numbers to join the force also are contributing to rising crime all across this country. A report by the Council on Criminal Justice found that the national violent crime rate increased 44 percent from 2019 to 2021.

A recent Wall Street Journal editorial discussed efforts to address rising crime in one of our Nation's cities--Seattle. According to the editorial, Seattle city attorney Ann Davison's office found that 118 individuals were responsible for more than 2,400 crimes in Seattle over the past 5 years. Yet, her efforts to hold repeat offenders accountable are being stymied by some.

Because of a 2019 agreement signed by Davison's predecessor, certain classes of misdemeanors in that community go to the community court, and this court releases the accused after referring them to certain support services.

The editorial states:

Seattle criminals get four tries in the Community Court

before they flunk out. Each can encompass multiple charges.

Repeat offenders see the lack of consequences as an

invitation to commit more crimes.

Davison is currently trying to renegotiate that deeply flawed 2019 agreement, but despite the rise in crime in Seattle, these negotiations are at an impasse.

Problems like these aren't confined to the Emerald City. In L.A., Minneapolis, Chicago, Washington, DC, and other cities, liberal prosecutors often fail to hold violent criminals accountable.

The impact on public safety is clear. CNN reports the following about the increase in carjackings: In New York City, the number of carjackings has quadrupled in the last 4 years. In Chicago, more than 1,800 carjackings were reported in 2021. Here in the Nation's Capitol, Metropolitan Police confirmed that carjackings have tripled since 2019.

The administration's efforts to address the rise in this violent crime are weak. I am supporting a resolution led by the senior Senator from Louisiana that actually gets at what we should be doing. It demands that the President work with Congress on a comprehensive strategy that encourages the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security, as well as State and local law enforcement officers to counter the rise in violent crime by reinforcing strong criminal justice policies. The Senate should pass this.

Our law enforcement officers who wear the badge deserve our gratitude and our support. The sacrifices they make and the sacrifices their families make, keep us safe. We stand with our men and women in blue.

I yield the floor.

Vote on Leaf Nomination

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

Madam President, I would like to tell you a story about North Platte, NE.

During World War II, this small, West Central Nebraska town was one of the most famous cities in America, and it was the epitome of homefront patriotism. From Christmas Day 1941 to April 1946, North Platte was the site of one of the many community-based canteens that offered hospitality to soldiers on their way to join the fight or on their way back home.

There were nearly 120 of these canteens across the United States, mostly along railways, like the Union Pacific line that still runs through Nebraska. Of these 120 canteens, North Platte was by far the biggest. It served more than 6 million servicemembers over the 4\1/2\ years it was open. The country's second busiest canteen in Ohio served well under half that many soldiers over its lifetime.

As many as 24 different troop trains, carrying up to 8,000 uniformed personnel overall, rolled through North Platte on any given day.

Here is a quote from a local newspaper about what the residents of just two Nebraska towns, Merna and Anselmo, donated to the North Platte Canteen on a single day in 1944: 53 birthdays cakes, 127 fried chickens, 58 dozen homemade cookies, 32 dozen cupcakes, 73 pounds of coffee, 163 dozen eggs, 68 dozen doughnuts, 41 quarts of pickles, 3 crates of oranges, 9 pounds of ham, 160 loaves of bread, 40 popcorn balls, and 50 pounds of sandwich meat.

It took 22 cars and 3 pickup trucks to drive all those donations 70 miles west to the train station in North Platte.

Members of the community organized regular benefit dances, scrap metal drives, and other events to support the canteen's operations. In all, volunteers raised more than $137,000--worth more than $2 million today--to support the canteen, and they did it all on their own.

As you might imagine, the soldiers who were fortunate enough to stop at the North Platte Canteen didn't soon forget the hospitality that they received.

Russ Fay, a Wisconsinite who was barely old enough to be drafted when he was shipped off to basic training in California, was one of those lucky soldiers. More than 60 years after his 10-minute stop in North Platte, he told journalist Bob Greene, who wrote a book about the North Platte Canteen called ``Once Upon a Tow'':

I can still taste it. I would say that a majority of the

men on the battlefield know exactly what North Platte was. .

. . They would talk about it like it was a dream. Out of

nowhere, [other soldiers would say]: How'd you like to have

some of that food from the North Platte Canteen right about

now?

The thought of the North Platte Canteen kept our soldiers going during one of the darkest periods in world history. And more than 55,000 people, nearly all of them women from 125 different communities, chipped in to help run it at one point or another. Most were Nebraskans, but many were from our neighboring States of Colorado and Kansas.

One of those Nebraska women was my mother, Florence Strobel. She moved from Lincoln to teach kindergarten in North Platte in the fall of 1944, and she was proud to be among the volunteers at the canteen.

To honor everyone who helped give our soldiers a good memory to hold onto while they were away from home, I recently introduced the North Platte Canteen Congressional Gold Medal Act.

This bill would award a collective Congressional Gold Medal to all of the individuals and communities that volunteered or donated food and other items to the North Platte Canteen. This is the highest honor Congress can give civilians, and the tens of thousands of people who made America's busiest World War II canteen a success are certainly deserving of it.

Under my bill, after the Treasury Department strikes this Congressional Gold Medal, it would be on display at the Lincoln County Historical Museum in North Platte, which has an outstanding exhibit about the canteen.

This wouldn't be the first time that Congress has given the volunteers at the North Platte Canteen the recognition they deserve. Almost 20 years ago, the 108th Congress acknowledged their efforts with a resolution introduced by Nebraska Representative Tom Osborne. I hope the 117th Congress will do so, as well, by passing this bill.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, earlier this month, the commanders of the U.S. Strategic Command and the U.S. Space Command, ADM Charles Richard and GEN James Dickinson, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee for their annual posture hearing.

The backdrop for their testimony was two twin challenges facing the United States and our allies: Putin's desire to recreate the Russian Empire, demonstrated most recently in his unprovoked and unjustified invasion of Ukraine, and China's plan to massively expand their power, rolling back U.S. influence in the process.

Both of these American adversaries are expanding their nuclear arsenals to back up their ambitions.

As ranking member of the Subcommittee on Strategic Forces and with STRATCOM's headquarters in my State of Nebraska, I appreciated this chance to engage with Admiral Richard on such an important issue.

As the commander of STRATCOM, Admiral Richard has one of the highest pressure jobs in the world--overseeing America's nuclear forces. He knows

better than anyone how important our nuclear deterrent is to preventing war around the world, and he understands the threat posed by our adversaries' growing arsenals.

Admiral Richard told the Armed Services Committee that Putin's war in Ukraine is giving us ``a very vivid real-world example of the importance of extended deterrence.'' What he meant by that is that, even though Putin has brought a major war back to Europe for the first time since the end of World War II and heartbreaking destruction to the people of Ukraine, nuclear deterrence, including the extended deterrence commitments that we provide our allies, has shielded NATO countries and discouraged the conflict's spread. More specifically, without our nuclear deterrent, our plans to protect American citizens and our allies would fall apart.

Take it straight from Admiral Richard. He said:

Every operational plan in the Department of Defense, and

every other capability we have, rests on the assumption that

strategic deterrence is holding, and in particular that

nuclear deterrence is holding.

If strategic or nuclear deterrence fails, no other plan and

no other capability in the Department of Defense is going to

work as designed.

When people who care about a safe and secure America say that strategic deterrence, especially nuclear deterrence, is the bedrock of our national security, that is exactly what we mean because, at the end of the day, American strength is the only thing that tyrants like Putin actually respect.

Just as we need to reassess our approach to Putin in light of his invasion of Ukraine, we also need to rethink our approach to our nuclear deterrent. Barely 2 months ago, on January 3, the five members of the U.N. Security Council released a joint declaration on ``Preventing Nuclear War and Avoiding Arms Races.'' Russia, of course, is one of those five members.

People who want our deterrence to continue aging while Russia and China modernize their own forces, including many members of the media, rushed to hail the joint statement as a long-awaited and revolutionary breakthrough. They seemed certain that we had turned a corner and that by signing this statement, we were ushering in a new and enduring era of world peace.

I was skeptical. I wrote an op-ed in National Review Online that responded to what I called the ``delusional'' parts of that statement and the wishful thinking that led the United States to sign our name next to those of Russia and China.

More than a month before Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine, I wrote:

This would be a historic moment for international unity--or

rather, it would be if it were true. China and Russia may

have signed this document, but they do not intend to honor

it.

They clearly did not.

Since then, Russia has put their deterrent on high alert, essentially threatening to use their nukes against the other countries that signed that statement. I believe it was clear to anyone who had been paying attention that signing our names to a feel-good piece of paper wasn't actually going to change anything about Putin's behavior or the behavior of China.

While our deterrent remains effective, we are asking it to protect against a growing range of threats. Russia is continuing the deadliest war in Europe in nearly a century, and the Chinese Communist Party-- well, they are hard at work expanding their own nuclear arsenal. And they are doing it at a pace we have never seen in world history.

I asked Admiral Richard about the U.S. intelligence community's estimate that China plans to potentially quadruple their nuclear arsenal by the year 2030. He told the committee:

Last fall, I formally reported to the Secretary of Defense

the PRC's strategic breakout. Their expansion and

modernization in 2021 alone is breathtaking. And the concern

I expressed in my testimony last April has now become a

reality.

China is attempting a rapid buildup of unprecedented scope and scale, and we have no reason to think they will stop once they reach the Pentagon's estimate. We have even less reason to think it will take China 8 more years to grow their stockpile to 1,000 deliverable warheads.

Admiral Richard agreed. In response to my questioning, he said:

Whatever the time estimate that the intelligence community

gives you on anything from China, divide it by two and maybe

by four and you will get closer to the right answer.

So, no, I don't know that we have any idea of [China's]

endpoint and/or speed.

And as Admiral Richard pointed out at another point in the hearing, many observers have gotten too caught up on the ``1,000 by 2030'' figure.

Since the Pentagon released their report in November of last year, an unspoken assumption has developed that China will simply stop building nukes once they reach that point, whether that is in 2025 or 2030. But let me point out, the Chinese Communist Party has given us no reason to think that that might be the case.

In fact, given their ambitions to take Taiwan and develop a Chinese sphere of influence beyond Asia, I think it is very likely they will continue building far beyond that number.

And even as China works to expand its nuclear arsenal, ours is rapidly aging. The United States has not designed or built a new nuclear warhead since the end of the Cold War. We don't even have the ability to produce a new warhead right now, and we are the only nuclear power unable to do so. China and Russia can. The United Kingdom can. France can. And India and Pakistan can. Even North Korea can.

But here in the United States, we cannot. Instead, we have focused on extending the life of our current systems. This has pushed our deterrent far beyond its designed lifetime and made the need for modernization even more acute.

Admiral Richard went out of his way to stress this point during his testimony. He told the Senate Armed Services Committee:

Right now, I am executing my strategic deterrence mission

under historic stress, crisis levels of deterrence, crisis

deterrence dynamics that we've only seen a couple of times in

our nation's history.

And I'm doing it with submarines built in the '80s and

'90s, an air-launched cruise missile built in the '80s,

intercontinental ballistic missiles built in the '70s, a

bomber built in the '60s, part of our nuclear command and

control that predates the internet, and a nuclear weapons

complex that dates back to the Manhattan era.

We have ignored the need to modernize our deterrence for far too long. As Admiral Richard said at another point during his testimony: The nuclear force we have today is the absolute minimum we need to guarantee our security.

The world has only gotten more dangerous over the past decade, and the last few weeks in Ukraine are the latest evidence of that.

But Washington--well, Washington has spent that time procrastinating.

Our failure to make tough decisions has left Admiral Richard with a deterrent that simply hasn't kept up with those of our adversaries. The final piece of Admiral Richard's testimony I will read is this:

We have reached a point where we can no longer deter with

the leftovers of the Cold War. We have life extended them to

the maximum extent possible.

We must now start to recapitalize, remanufacture those that

require a very robust infrastructure . . . We're 10 years

behind the point where we needed to start recapitalizing the

infrastructure . . . And the consequence is we simply won't

have the capabilities that we are going to have to have to

deter the threat environment we're in.

We cannot keep kicking the can down the road. We are not in the 1990s or the 2000s anymore. The threat environment is changing, and we have no choice but to keep up. But our nuclear deterrent is sized based on the 2010 New START Treaty, written in a very different world, before Putin decided to behave like a war criminal and before China's unprecedented nuclear breakout.

To wrap up, I would like to draw my colleagues' attention to an exchange from the Foreign Relations Committee's hearings during the ratification process for the New START Treaty.

Responding to a question about whether the posture set by the treaty left the United States with nuclear forces beyond what we needed, the STRATCOM commander at the time, GEN Kevin Chilton, completely rejected that idea. He said instead:

I think the arsenal that we have is exactly what is needed

today to provide the deterrent.

We need to think long and hard about if a deterrent designed around the

threats of 2010 is still what is needed for the very different and much more dangerous world we live in now.

I hope the administration will address that question in its upcoming Nuclear Posture Review. In fact, the upcoming fiscal year budget and various strategy documents we expect to be released soon, including the NPR, are a chance for the administration to show that they do understand the challenges that we face. Most fundamentally, that is the erosion of global stability and the increasingly challenging threat environment facing our country.

These documents are an opportunity for President Biden to propose a realistic plan to meet these threats. I hope that he will. The hard truth is that every day that we refuse to commit to the modernization schedule today's world needs is a day that Russia and China become greater threats. They get further ahead.

If we wait too long, we are going to wake up 5, 10, 20 years from now with no way to deter adversaries who did commit to modernization. That is not a position anyone wants to wind up in.

We need to act like adults and make difficult choices to prioritize our nuclear deterrent, the most fundamental part of our defense strategy. And we have to keep modernization on schedule in the FY2023

Mr. President, the Ukrainian people have captured the hearts of freedom-loving men and women around the world since Putin launched his unprovoked invasion of their homeland last week.

Even as we speak, they are still under attack, not just in the capital of Kyiv but in cities all across Ukraine. The images coming out of Ukraine are truly heartbreaking: newborn babies in need of intensive care, kindergarten buildings and apartment complexes being shelled indiscriminately, and tearful goodbyes between loved ones.

Putin's invasion has caused Europe's largest refugee crisis this century. According to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, nearly 900,000 Ukrainians have fled to neighboring countries so far, but many of the other images we have seen show inspiring courage. Citizens of EU countries have welcomed their Ukrainian neighbors with open arms. Regular, everyday men and women--teachers and software engineers and moms and dads--have taken up arms to defend their country and their loved ones. President Zelenskyy has chosen to remain in Ukraine when he could have fled, refusing to desert his people in their darkest hour.

The English writer G.K. Chesterton once said:

The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in

front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.

I can't think of a better way to describe this conflict.

The Russians are fighting to fulfill Putin's imperial ambitions. The Ukrainians are fighting to protect their families, their democracy, and everything that they hold dear. That may be their greatest advantage as they, God willing, continue to hold out in the coming days.

Responsibility for this horrific invasion lies squarely with Putin. Leading up to this crisis, President Biden and our allies offered Russia every opportunity to choose deescalation and peace. Instead, Putin chose to use diplomacy as a smokescreen, buying time while he prepared for war.

In a deliberate message of contempt for the international community, Putin ordered the attack to begin

while the U.N. Security Council was meeting to discuss Russia's buildup on the Ukrainian border. Here is a glimpse into how little power organizations like the U.N. have in moments of crisis like this: During this meeting on what to do about Russia's coming invasion, the Russian Ambassador was presiding.

Innocent Ukrainians as young as 6 years old are being killed because one man fancies himself the next Joseph Stalin. Because of one man's desire to restore the borders of the Soviet Union, the fundamental principles of security in Europe are in peril.

In response to this invasion, President Biden has announced new sanctions against Russia. These measures will affect 2 of Russia's largest banks--Sberbank and VTB--as well as 45 of their subsidiaries. The administration is also imposing sanctions against several other Russian financial institutions and a number of state-owned enterprises.

The United States, with our allies and partners, not just in Europe but also in Asia, have agreed to pursue even more aggressive sanctions against Russia. That includes beginning to remove certain Russian banks from the global SWIFT financial messaging network. It includes freezing the currency reserves of Russia's central bank. All of this will make Putin and his inner circle feel the pain. It will hurt Russia's ability to wage war now and in the future. Many companies are joining this effort on their own, and they are withdrawing from the Russian market.

Putin's unprecedented aggression demands an unprecedented response. Beyond economic sanctions, this invasion has only made the NATO alliance stronger and more resolved to stand firm against unlawful aggression. This includes Germany, which has traditionally taken a more positive view of Russia than many of our other European allies.

Germany's Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has rightly committed to increasing Germany's military investment after decades of putting defense spending on the back burner. Scholz also said Germany would seriously pursue options to reduce their reliance on Russia for natural gas. If he follows through on increasing Germany's military spending, that will bring German defense investment above the 2 percent target NATO has set for its members by 2024--a target that most NATO countries still aren't meeting.

While historically neutral Sweden and Finland are considering joining NATO, they aren't members yet, but they are still sending much needed military aid to Ukraine. Even Switzerland has broken its tradition of neutrality in order to freeze billions in Russian assets being held in Swiss banks, and our other allies and partners around the world, like Japan and Australia, are helping fund the Ukrainian resistance as well.

After this near universal condemnation from the world's democracies, Putin hasn't backed down. No. He has turned to nuclear blackmail. He put Russia's nuclear forces into special combat readiness on Sunday, explicitly using Russia's nuclear deterrent to discourage Western nations from supporting Ukraine.

This kind of escalation is unthinkable to Americans but not to Putin. This is why the men and women of the U.S. Strategic Command, which is based at Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska, work day and night to deter threats like these. There is a reason that their motto is ``Peace is Our Profession.'' Separately, at least five Offutt-based jets from the Air Force's 55th Wing are flying reconnaissance missions in Europe. Together, these planes have flown 10 of the 86 missions the United States and our NATO allies carried out in the days leading up to the Russian attack. I was told of these missions during a visit to Offutt last Friday.

In addition to what we have done so far, I believe the Ukraine crisis demands that we fundamentally reevaluate our approach to dealing with Putin. We can no longer pretend that he might, one day, play by the same rules as the rest of us.

Since he came to power, Presidents of both parties have sought to improve relations with him. Too often, they have overlooked decades of bad behavior to try to achieve that goal, hoping that American restraint might lead Moscow to take that same approach.

If it wasn't clear even before this attack, the events of the past week have proven that idea to be a fantasy.

Putin thought Russia would get a quick win when he invaded Ukraine. He never expected this kind of resistance from the outmatched and the outnumbered Ukrainians. But he didn't account for their bravery. He didn't account for the fact that while Russia is fighting to gobble up more land in Eastern Europe, the Ukrainians are fighting to protect their children, spouses, parents, and their very way of life.

After the events of the past week, Putin's naked aggression, his imperial ambitions, and his contempt for the international order are undeniable.

Global norms and treaty obligations mean nothing--they mean nothing to him. Russia had explicitly sworn to uphold Ukraine's territorial integrity in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, one more agreement added to the long list of those Russia has violated under Putin.

After his completely unprovoked invasion, this would-be 21st-century czar has lost whatever credibility he had left. The United States and our allies must keep this in mind as we think about where we go from here.

We have to accept that as long as Putin is in power, a cooperative relationship with Russia will not be possible. We have to do what we can to push back against Putin's warmongering and continue to support the brave people of Ukraine.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, like many Americans, Nebraskans were rooting for the Bengals on Sunday. Everyone loves a good underdog story. The Bengals hadn't won a playoff game in more than 30 years until this season, and they were effectively the visiting team in a Super Bowl that was played in Los Angeles against the L.A. Rams.

Outside of Ohio, Nebraska may have more connection to the Bengals than any other State. To start, Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow has deep roots in Nebraska. Both of his brothers, Jamie and Dan, played for the Huskers in the early 2000s. His mom Robin grew up in Tecumseh, NE, and Burrow has uncles and other relatives scattered around southeast Nebraska.

His grandfather Wayne is a farmer in Johnson County. Wayne has watched every Super Bowl for 56 years, going back to Super Bowl I in 1967. This year was the first time he has attended the big game in person to cheer on his grandson and the Bengals.

Maybe best of all, Joe Burrow's dad played for the Nebraska Huskers in the seventies before going on to a career in the NFL and the Canadian Football League. Later, as an assistant coach, he was part of the Husker team that took on No. 1 Miami in the 2002 Rose Bowl. Husker football fans remember that game as the last time Nebraska has played for a national championship--not good. Five-year-old Joe Burrow was there in Pasadena to support his dad, making Sunday's Super Bowl the second time he has traveled to L.A. for a national title game.

Even by themselves, Joe Burrow's Nebraska connections would have been enough to make Husker Nation pull for the Bengals, but Bengals Coach Zac Taylor is another reason that Nebraskans were with Cincinnati on Sunday. He was the Huskers' starting quarterback for the 2005 and 2006 seasons, throwing for nearly 6,000 yards and 45 touchdowns. He was also the last Cornhusker to win the Big 12 Offensive Player of the Year Award.

He credits his success as a player to Nebraska's coach at the time, Bill Callahan. Now, he has Brian Callahan, Bill's son, on his staff as his offensive coordinator. Troy Walters, the Bengals' wide receivers coach, was Nebraska's offensive coordinator from 2017 to 2019.

Another Bengals player with Nebraska ties is Stanley Morgan. He signed with the Bengals in 2019 after a stellar college career with the Huskers, and he is easily one of the best receivers in Husker football history. Morgan rewrote Nebraska's wide receiver record books from 2015 to 2018. He holds the record for career receptions and receiving yards and also for single-season receiving yards. With that last record, he eclipsed the previous total Nebraska football legend Johnny Rodgers set on his way to winning the Heisman Trophy in 1972. Now Morgan has a bright future ahead of him in the NFL.

Nebraska's connections to this Bengals team is strong. The team came up just short on Sunday, but Nebraskans are proud of what they accomplished this season. Joe Burrow and Zac Taylor led this team of underdogs to a game no one expected to see them in, and they ended the longest active playoffs drought in the NFL while they were at it.

Things are looking up for this Nebraska-led team. I look forward to seeing them in the playoffs again next year.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, I rise today to celebrate the distinguished career of a Nebraska public servant, U.S. District Court Judge John Gerrard.

After just over 10 years on the Federal bench in the District of Nebraska,

he announced Monday that he will move to senior status starting next year. Judge Gerrard's impressive career has spanned more than four decades, and it is not over yet. After his successor is confirmed, he will remain on the bench with a reduced caseload.

Judge Gerrard is a native Nebraskan. He grew up in Schuyler and attended Nebraska Wesleyan University in Lincoln. He left the good life, temporarily, to pursue an MPA at the University of Arizona and a JD at the University of the Pacific in California.

I am grateful that he came home to Nebraska after law school. In 1981, Judge Gerrard began his career in private practice in Norfolk. A year later, he also began serving as a part-time city attorney for the neighboring community of Battle Creek. That was the start of 40 years and counting of selfless public service.

In 1995, he was appointed to the Nebraska Supreme Court by then- Governor Ben Nelson. He was just 41 years old at the time, making him the youngest-ever Nebraska Supreme Court Justice.

After more than 15 years on our State's highest court, he was nominated by President Obama to the Federal judgeship he holds now in 2011, serving as chief judge for 3 of those years.

At every turn, Judge Gerrard has used his respect for the law to advance the greater good of Nebraskans and all Americans. During his time on the bench, I have appreciated hearing his views about many pressing judicial matters. His perspective as a sentencing judge has also been crucial in helping me to unpack how proposed legislation in Congress would affect Federal judges.

It has been an honor to know Judge Gerrard and to work with him for over a decade. He is an accomplished, skilled, and respected jurist, and I am glad that he has chosen to continue his service after moving to senior status.

Everyone who knows Judge Gerrard can attest that his wisdom extends far beyond the law. He has never failed to impress me with his keen observations about life. He is a good man with a servant's heart, and I am proud to call him a friend.

On behalf of all Nebraskans, I would like to thank him for his four decades of dedicated public service. I look forward to working with President Biden to confirm a district court judge who will live up to Judge Gerrard's legacy of ruling fairly in accordance with the Constitution.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, it goes without saying that each of the American athletes competing in the Olympics this year is the best in their event. Many of them have dedicated their entire lives to their sports in the hope that they might have this opportunity to represent the United States at the Olympic Games. They have earned their spots on Team USA, and I wish them the best as they compete against other athletes from around the world.

But make no mistake, Beijing 2022 is no ordinary Olympics. Just a 4- hour flight from where the Games are being held, China has imprisoned more than a million Uighur Muslims in concentration camps. These Chinese citizens are prisoners--political prisoners--in their own country. Their crime? Maintaining a vibrant Muslim culture that doesn't fit the mold that Beijing wants to impose on China's more than 1.4 billion people. The very same government that is hosting the Olympics this week is putting these innocent people in labor camps and subjecting them to forced sterilization, forced labor, and physical and psychological torture.

One of the few things that President Trump and President Biden agree on is that what China is doing to its Uighur population amounts to genocide.

Last November, one of the most famous athletes in China, Peng Shuai, posted on social media that a high-ranking politician in the Chinese Communist Party had sexually assaulted her. This wasn't just any politician; he was a member of the Politburo Standing Committee and the face of China's successful effort to land the 2022 Olympics. He even met with the president of the International Olympic Committee at least once.

Speaking out about someone like this is dangerous in a country like China. Peng Shuai knew that, but I don't think she expected what came next. Less than 20 minutes after she

posted her accusation, her existence had been scrubbed from the internet. Any mention of her name was restricted. For a while, the Communist Party banned discussion of hundreds of other key words, even words as general as ``tennis.'' She disappeared from the public eye for months, and the only appearances that she has been allowed to make since have been scripted and supervised by the CCP.

If this is how China treats its own people, I think it is fair to ask: What kind of risks are our athletes facing as they participate in the Olympic Games?

To protest China's miserable human rights record, the United States instituted a diplomatic boycott, and American officials will not be present for these Games; neither will officials representing many of our allies, like Canada or the United Kingdom. That is the right decision. We shouldn't pretend that everything is fine in China just because the IOC chose them to host the Olympics.

As far as the committee is concerned, they have made it very clear that China's money is worth more to them than the rights of the world's athletes. They had years to plan for these Olympics, but they still chose not to adopt any rules to protect the human rights of Olympians while they are in China. Instead, competitors are required to follow local laws limiting free expression, privacy, and other basic freedoms.

Before they ever set foot in China, athletes and journalists were required to download an intrusive smartphone app, supposedly to track COVID-19 infections. Experts say that China and other malicious actors could exploit flaws in the app's design to go beyond that and spy on athletes in many other ways, both during the Olympics and long after they are over.

The CCP's app also contains a list of more than 400 illegal words that they could use to censor athletes' conversations.

The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee has gone as far as to tell American athletes to ``assume that every device and every communication, transaction, and online activity will be monitored.'' Many other nations have issued similar warnings.

This all could have been avoided. We didn't have to host a unifying event like the Olympics in a country that thinks the book ``1984'' is an instruction manual. The IOC chose to have China host the Olympics anyway. They chose to ignore these and many other shameless human rights abuses Beijing engages in every single day. They could have required China to respect the basic liberties athletes enjoy in the United States and other Western countries, but they didn't. The next time a host country is chosen, it is important that the IOC pick any of the dozens of democracies around the world.

The more than 200 athletes on Team USA earned their places at the Olympics with years of hard work and sacrifice. I do wish them the best, and I pray that they stay safe while they are away from home.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, something I have been hearing a lot lately from members of the media, from many of my Democratic colleagues here in the Senate, and even from the President of the United States is that democracy is at stake, that democracy will die if we don't make drastic changes to our election system, that we are just one election away from the end of the experiment our Founders began in 1776.

If my colleagues really believe that our democracy is teetering on the edge of the cliff, that it is going to fall over the edge unless we transform the way we run elections across the entire country, then they need to be able to tell the American people why. But, instead, all I am hearing from Democrats--even from the President, himself--is that democracy is on its deathbed; that Americans are no better than George Wallace or Jefferson Davis if they dare to question that; and that the only solution is for one party to rewrite the rules of the U.S. Senate to pass a completely partisan Federal takeover of State and local elections. Those are truly some wild claims.

If you take these assertions at face value, I can see why some Americans might be concerned about the State of voting rights in this country, but not a word of what they are saying is true.

The good news is that most people live in the real world, where America shattered records for voter turnout in the 2020 election and 66 percent of eligible voters cast a ballot, the highest level in 120 years. That translates to 156 million Americans, the most in history.

In my State of Nebraska, 76 percent of voters cast a ballot in the last election. We have been proud to be a no-excuse State for absentee voting for years since long before the pandemic. We have that law because we want to make it easier for Nebraskans to vote. And there are many other States that don't require voters to provide a reason before voting by mail, not just Nebraska.

Across the country, turnout was up in the last election, regardless of race, class, or any other demographic. And according to Pew Research, 94 percent of 2020 voters said voting was easy. Yet Democrats still say voter suppression is rampant in the United States. The logical response to that is to ask: OK, where?

In Georgia, Democrats say.

After Georgia passed a new law last year, things have apparently gotten so bad that the President picked Atlanta to give a recent speech on the issue. But if you listened to President Biden's speech, you might have noticed that he barely talked about the Georgia law at all. And when he did, he twisted the law into an unrecognizable caricature, into Jim Crow in the 21st century. He has shamelessly and intentionally misrepresented the Georgia law for months, and his speech last week was no different.

But something he didn't say in his speech is that the Georgia law extends early voting to 2\1/2\ weeks. That is longer than blue States like California and New York, and it is longer than the President's home State of Delaware, which currently allows for zero early-voting days. Maybe he should have given that speech at his house in Delaware instead of in Georgia. And he didn't say the language in the Georgia bill that requires voter ID for absentee ballots is very similar to a bill that passed the Senate almost unanimously in 2002, the Help America Vote Act, with President Biden voting in favor.

So if the Georgia law is the best Democrats can do, then there is simply no evidence for the idea that Republican State legislatures around the country are trying to restrict voting rights.

With that in mind, here is a friendly suggestion for the President. If he truly believes, in spite of all that, that democracy itself is at stake in a way it has never been before, the last thing he should want is for the voting laws of all 50 States to be overseen by the Department of Justice and a partisan Attorney General. That power should remain with State-level secretaries of state, State legislatures, nonpartisan local officials--anyone but one official at one Department in one branch of the Federal Government. In other words, he should want exactly the election system we have now. Our decentralized system, with buy-in from a diverse group of voices, is what allowed States to adapt to the pandemic and achieve voter turnout, a record turnout in 2020.

But the Democrats' Federal election takeover would give the U.S. Attorney General the power to oversee every State's electoral process, and it would turn the Federal Government into a piggy bank for our House candidates. Everyone running for election in the House of Representatives would have access to Federal money through a new program designed to help them fund their campaigns. The Federal Government would match contributions 6 to 1, meaning money that belongs to taxpayers would go to politicians with views that many of those taxpayers may oppose.

This partisan takeover would require States to allow felons to vote once they are out of prison, overruling the States that already have laws in place preventing this. And if Democrats have their way, they will mandate that every single State offer same-day registration at every polling place in the Nation. If you live in a State that has decided that that is not a good idea, well, too bad.

Mr. President, it is clear that the majority leader wants to get rid of the filibuster to accomplish all of this, but what Democrats are trying to do in Congress right now is the best argument I could ever imagine for keeping the filibuster. Think about it this way. Let's say we are talking about before the 2020 election and I told you that Republicans would retain the Presidency and the Senate and we would win back the House, but the Senate would be split 50-50 and we would barely have a majority in the House.

In fact, Republicans are going to have the slimmest majority in Congress in more than a century. But guess what: Republicans are going to try to pass bills that most Americans don't fully support anyway, and we are going to dismantle a rule that has promoted bipartisanship and compromise in this body for nearly 200 years to accomplish it.

And be honest, you would say that is outrageous, and you would be right. It is outrageous. You would be begging those of us on the other side of the aisle to leave the filibuster untouched. And if you think way, way back into the past--all the way back to 2017 and 2018-- Republicans were in the same situation that Democrats are in now. We had a Republican President and majorities in both Chambers of Congress. We had bigger majorities than the Democrats have today.

The former President even outright asked us to abolish the filibuster, and that brought many, many Democrats to the floor praising the filibuster, saying it should never be abolished.

But we didn't abolish it for the simple reason that burning down 200 years of bipartisan history for a few temporary victories is shortsighted, at best, and institutional arson, at worst.

And don't think that by presenting this talking filibuster Americans won't see the Democrats' efforts for what they really are--a ploy to abolish the 60-vote threshold for legislation, to abolish the need for bipartisanship, because, in reality, it will only take a majority vote to pass controversial bills.

Nebraskans can certainly see through this. In Nebraska, State senators have to speak on the floor to filibuster a bill before our legislature, but to overcome the filibuster in Nebraska, you need two- thirds of senators to vote to end debate, not the simple majority that Leader Schumer has proposed before this body today.

Nebraskans have benefited from the consensus-building and the moderation in developing good legislation that this rule promotes for nearly 100 years. We know that it works. The 60-vote threshold in the U.S. Senate does exactly the same thing for all Americans. So I urge my Democratic colleagues: Don't abolish the filibuster.

And if Democrats won't listen to reason from Republicans, they should listen to the President himself.

When he was a Senator, he said: ``At its core, the filibuster is not about stopping a nominee or a bill, it's . . . about compromise and moderation.''

He has forgotten that now, but that doesn't mean his colleagues who are still here have to forget it. Senate Democrats were happy to use the legislative filibuster hundreds of times under President Trump.

Not so long ago, it was ``the most important distinction between the House and the Senate,'' and without it, the Senate would become ``much more subject to the winds of short-term electoral change.'' That was the now-majority leader, and he was 100 percent correct.

But now the Democrats are in power, and they have changed their minds. Today, the filibuster is not only no longer essential, but anyone who supports keeping it is called a racist. That is truly incredible, and it is offensive.

The Democrats who supported the filibuster a few years ago clearly weren't being truthful, and they aren't being truthful now about the state of voting rights in this country.

The problem they are responding to simply doesn't exist, and the solution they have for this imaginary problem would do lasting harm to our democracy. I will be voting against this partisan takeover of our elections.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, President Biden wants to pass a new New Deal. In fact, in some ways, the reckless spending the President is pushing for actually dwarfs the New Deal. But Joe Biden is not FDR, and we are not living in the Great Depression. The New Deal passed the House and the Senate on the back of huge Democratic supermajorities.

Today, Americans have elected a 50-50 Senate and a razor-thin Democratic majority in the House. The American people voted for bipartisanship and compromise in the U.S. Congress, not a blanket mandate for progressives to reorganize American life as they see fit. But some Democrats in Congress seem to think they did.

Because they haven't reached out to Republicans to work together on important issues, they haven't been able to pass their Build Back Better plan, so they have turned their attention to another kind of Federal Government overreach: overhauling the way our country runs elections. Their argument is that lawmakers in red States are trying to make it harder for people to vote, and so it is necessary for Washington Democrats to take over election administration in all 50 States.

One important point: The first part of that is simply not true. The right to vote is not under assault. According to Pew Research, 94 percent of Americans believe that voting is easy. In my home State of Nebraska, we achieved a record 76 percent voter turnout in the 2020 election, in the middle of a pandemic, because of all the different ways that my State made it easier for Nebraskans to vote, including expanded early voting and no-excuse absentee voting. But Democrats still want to pass a Federal takeover of elections.

Because the rules don't allow them to pass every single law they would like to in a 50-50 Senate, many of my Democrat colleagues are flip-flopping to oppose the filibuster. President Biden, who defended the filibuster during his nearly 40 years in the Senate, now wants a special carve-out for Democrats' election takeover. But who says it is going to stop there? The majority leader said in 2005, when Democrats were in the minority, that doing away with the filibuster would ``wash away 200 years of history'' and mean ``doomsday for democracy.'' Today, no one is pushing harder to end it than he is. And Democrats were perfectly happy to use the filibuster hundreds of times during the 4 years of the Trump Presidency, when the majority leader was the minority leader and Republicans had even larger majorities in Congress.

This isn't some debate about some arcane Senate rule. This is about protecting the rights of the minority in our democracy. This is about providing stability and certainty to our people. If the majority is able to constantly push through their views and policy every few years, drastic swings in policy will take place. Tax policy, social policy, health policy, foreign policy, defense policy--the laws of the United States will start just to whip back and forth, following where the power lies in this Chamber, and those shifts will weaken our Nation both here at home and abroad.

In 2017, the senior Senator from Maine and the junior Senator from Delaware led a bipartisan letter urging Senate leadership to preserve the 60-vote threshold for legislation.

While I appreciate their efforts, I did not sign that letter. I was concerned that many Democrats only signed it because they were afraid the GOP--that Republicans were going to end the filibuster. I believed that many of my Democratic colleagues would soon turn against the letter's own arguments and they would go back on their word. I believed that because a few years earlier, I had listened to reasons they gave for changing the executive filibuster for Presidential nominations when they

were in the majority, and I had then watched them reverse those positions when they were back in the minority. I felt they would flip again for political reasons as soon as they returned to the majority.

Of the 61 Senators who did sign that letter, 30 were Democrats, 28 are still in office, and I am sorry to say that they have proved me right. But when Republicans were in the majority, we said we wouldn't abolish the legislative filibuster, and we have kept our word.

The truth is that some of my Democratic colleagues want to remake the American system only in their own image, not considering the views of about half of our citizens. To do that, they have to take an ax to the filibuster. But I urge them to think about the consequences their actions may have.

Without the filibuster, any Senate majority would be free to ignore the other side to pass their own agenda. Bipartisanship? Well, it would become a relic of the past. I know that Democrats don't want that to happen. I don't want it to happen, either, and that is why I have consistently supported the Senate filibuster no matter who is in power.

I urge my colleagues to think beyond the passions of the moment and to do what is best for this country in the long term: Leave the filibuster in place. Democrats may want to use it again as soon as next year.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, 8 months after President Biden asked them to study Supreme Court reform, the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States has finally released its report.

I want to begin my comments by recalling the backstory behind this group.

The President created this Commission to appease some Members of the Democratic Party. These progressives want to pack the Supreme Court with Justices who will put their agenda before the Constitution.

Not all Democrats belong to that group. I see the Court packers as more of a radical fringe who can't stand the thought that the Court may make decisions that they don't like.

But instead of lending this fringe element the legitimacy they hoped for, the Commission's nearly 300-page report simply lays out the arguments for and against Court packing, and then makes no recommendation.

In fact, the lawyers, professors, and former judges the President appointed were deeply divided on the issue of adding more Justices to our Nation's highest Court.

Twenty-nine of the Commission's 34 members were liberals. But even with this supermajority of left-leaning scholars, the Commissioners still expressed their ``profound disagreement over whether Court expansion at this moment in time would be wise.''

If you can believe it, many Democrats in Congress are fond of saying that expanding the Supreme Court for political reasons is actually unpacking it.

Representative Jerry Nadler, the Democrat from New York who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, has claimed that unpacking the Court by expanding it would ``restore balance'' and that Senate Democrats ``should immediately move to expand the Supreme Court.''

I want to be as clear as I can about this. Adding Justices to the Supreme Court of the United States simply because you don't like some of the decisions they make--that is Court packing.

President Franklin Roosevelt explored this idea in the 1930s, after the Supreme Court struck down key parts of the New Deal.

President Biden's Commission's own report called FDR's attempt to pack the Court a ``needless, futile, and utterly dangerous abandonment of constitutional principle.''

No President has been reckless enough or shortsighted enough to push for it since FDR. President Biden said

he was not a fan of Court packing during his campaign, but then he backtracked and said he was open to the idea.

Giving in to pressure from the far-left wing of his party, he created this Commission instead, leaving the problem of taking a position on this issue for another more politically convenient day.

As the Commission's report details, Court packing is often used as a political weapon in authoritarian regimes, not in the United States of America.

Take Venezuela, where Hugo Chavez cemented support for his socialist policies by expanding the country's Supreme Tribunal of Justice from 20 members to 32 members back in 2004. Look at all the good that did for what was once the wealthiest country in South America.

We need to leave this practice to dictatorships, where it belongs. Republics, like the United States, simply don't engage in this kind of behavior.

As the Commission's report says, stable democracies ``have retained a strong commitment to judicial independence.'' Packing the Supreme Court would take an ax to that tradition of judicial independence.

The United States is the greatest country on Earth because of our respect for the rule of law, not in spite of it.

And in light of this report, a resolution I cosponsored earlier this year that would fix the number of Supreme Court Justices at nine is even more important, and I would like to thank Florida's senior Senator for leading the way on this.

In the American system of separation of powers and checks and balances, our role here in Congress is to make laws, not to interpret them. That is the job of our courts, and their independence in doing that job is absolutely vital.

As the Commissioners write in their report courts ``cannot serve as effective checks on government officials if their personnel can be altered by those same government officials.'' That is a bipartisan group writing that--a bipartisan group where liberals outnumbered conservatives nearly 6 to 1.

We cannot pack the Supreme Court. President Biden needs to put an end to this dangerous idea once and for all.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, after months of delay with NDAA, it has finally made its way to the Senate floor. The Senate Armed Services Committee passed its version by a strong, bipartisan vote of 23 to 3, and that was back in July.

As a member of the Armed Services Committee since my first day here in the Senate, I have been proud to help draft this bill each year since 2013, and I was honored to play a part in drafting the bill this year.

First and foremost, the 2022 NDAA takes care of the greatest asset America has--our men and women in uniform. It supports a well-deserved pay raise for members of the military, and it reauthorizes important special pays and bonuses.

Keeping faith with our All-Volunteer Forces is essential so that our military men and women are able to focus on combating the threats that our Nation faces abroad. You don't have to look far to see the threats I am talking about.

Vladimir Putin has placed nearly 100,000 Russian troops right on Russia's border with Ukraine, essentially posturing to invade a sovereign country. China continues to make shocking progress in developing new types of weapons. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said that China's recent test of a fractional orbital bombardment system was very close to a ``Sputnik moment.'' This new missile could potentially carry a nuclear warhead anywhere in the world, and it was specifically designed to evade U.S. defenses. Our adversaries are making huge strides forward. The NDAA recognizes that and addresses it.

This bill will keep the modernization of our strategic nuclear deterrent on schedule. This is crucial because even though our nuclear forces are still effective, we have pushed our weapons far beyond their designed lifetimes--in some cases, by decades. This bill authorizes the resources necessary to keep modernization on track, and it will help make sure the next generation of systems is available before our current nuclear triad ages out.

Perhaps most importantly, the NDAA tries to keep defense spending on pace with rising inflation. Inflation is at its highest level in decades, and it doesn't look like it is slowing down anytime soon.

The Biden administration originally proposed a top-line defense spending increase of just 1.6 percent. That would not have kept pace with inflation even in a normal year, but in a year when it is threatening to spiral out of control, it would have meant an unacceptable cut in resources for our military. The NDAA takes this year's runaway inflation into account. It offers an increase of $25 billion on top of President Biden's proposal, and we came together across party lines to agree to that because it is what our military needs.

At the risk of stating the obvious, the NDAA is about investing in our national defense. It is in the name, the ``National Defense Authorization Act.'' But every State contributes in its own way to that national goal, and I am proud to say that this bill will bring some major wins to Nebraska, which has a long and rich military history.

It includes $100 million for the National Disaster Recovery Fund, which will help rebuild Offutt Air Force Base, the home of the Air Force's 55th Wing and U.S. Strategic Command, after the devastating flooding that Nebraska experienced in 2019. It recognizes how critical the 55th Wing is to our Nation's intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities. Their missions take them all over the world, but they are proudly based in my State of Nebraska.

The men and women who wear American military uniforms are part of the best fighting force the world has ever known. Our job here in Congress is to give them what they need, and this year's NDAA does just that.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I rise this evening to discuss President Biden's divisive and unprecedented vaccine mandate on private businesses.

I would like to make one thing clear at the start: I have encouraged Nebraskans to consider getting vaccinated since the day these vaccines were approved, and I hope more Americans will join me in choosing to get one, but that is their choice.

Through OSHA, the administration has issued an ``emergency rule'' to require, roughly, 84 million employees of private companies to get vaccinated or be subjected to weekly testing. If business owners fail to enforce this rule for their employees, they could be fined tens of thousands of dollars per violation.

The Biden administration is on entirely new ground here. There is simply no precedent for this kind of intrusion into Americans' private lives. Courts agree. The Fifth Circuit blocked the OSHA mandate almost immediately, citing ``grave statutory and constitutional issues.''

We in Congress have the power to push back too. In October, I joined nine of my Senate colleagues in sending a letter to President Biden that outlined our concerns about this abuse of Federal power. Under the Congressional Review Act, the House and Senate can vote to overturn executive Agency actions like this OSHA mandate, and I hope the Senate will do that when we vote on this later today. All 50 Senate Republicans signed on to this challenge. If our resolution passes both Chambers--and it looks like it may do that on a bipartisan basis-- President Biden will have to decide if he wants to keep defending this deeply unpopular policy.

The administration's decision to force private employees to get vaccinated is not just unprecedented; it is also counterproductive. It would apply to nearly 300,000 workers in my State of Nebraska alone-- more than 28 percent of our entire workforce. Businesses across Nebraska, from grocery chains to irrigation companies and family farms, have reached out to me about the damage this mandate will do to their companies. They come from very different industries, but their message is the same: We support the vaccines, and we have taken this pandemic seriously, but if the President goes through with this mandate, we could lose many of our employees.

At a time when millions of jobs need to be filled and we are seeing massive supply chain issues, Americans simply cannot afford this kind of Federal overreach. We need to stop this mandate in its tracks here in Congress because this could be the first step on the road to even stricter rules.

Let's just look at New York City. It has recently announced one vaccine requirement that will affect private employees and another that will affect children as young as 5 years old. Bill de Blasio's parting gift to New Yorkers is this: Get at least one shot by December 27, or you are going to lose your job.

Starting later this month, kindergartners are going to have to show vaccine cards to get into restaurants, movie theaters, and other public places.

I do not want to see policies like this even come close to being enacted at the Federal level, but I wouldn't put it past this President to try. The Senate must pass this resolution and prevent these kinds of mandates from being issued again in the future.

Madam President, I rise today to honor a devoted American patriot on her retirement from Federal civil service. Mrs. Robin Squatrito has served as the Director of Legislative Affairs for North American Aerospace Defense Command and United States Northern Command in Colorado Springs, CO, for over 15 years. During that time, she has provided expert legislative advice to nine NORAD and USNORTHCOM commanders, served as the principal liaison between the commands and the congressional defense committee staffs, and facilitated a tremendous collaborative relationship between NORAD, USNORTHCOM, and Congress--including my staff and me--as the commands have stood constant watch over the United States and Canadian homelands.

In fact, Robin was a member of USNORTHCOM from the day the command was established in October 2002. At that time, she was serving our Nation as a colonel in the U.S. Air Force and was hand-selected by the first commander of USNORTHCOM, Gen. Ralph Eberhart, to be the Director of his Commander's Action Group. USNORTHCOM was established in the aftermath of the attacks of September 11, 2001, and Colonel Squatrito played an instrumental role in ensuring the command was organized and ready to safeguard our homeland from further attacks. When she retired after 26 years in uniform, it was only a matter of time before she answered the call to serve once more.

From the day Robin returned to NORAD and USNORTHCOM as a civil servant, she has been a tireless advocate for our national defense. She is

well known inside and outside the headquarters as a passionate advocate for NORAD and USNORTHCOM, as well as for the men and women responsible for executing their critical missions. She is also recognized for her knowledge, remarkable attention to detail, and dedication, spending whatever time is necessary to make certain that every product that passes across her desk is as close to perfect as possible. Robin has repeatedly demonstrated her passion for doing the right thing and her commitment to high standards as she has guided nine NORAD and USNORTHCOM commanders through countless posture hearings, briefings, CODEL visits, office calls, phone calls, and numerous other engagements with Members of Congress and our staffs.

Robin's colleagues and her family will tell you that she has always been one of the first leaders at work in the morning, and can often be found at her desk well after standard duty hours. And for Robin, time away from the office has never meant she was off duty. She is never far from her phone or her email in order to ensure commanders and Members of Congress always receive a prompt and professional response to any question, request, or concern. That is one of the reasons why Gen. Glen VanHerck, the current commander of NORAD and USNORTHCOM, has said Robin is ``one of the most diligent and dedicated professionals I've had the privilege of serving with over my more than 34 years in uniform. Robin's devotion to our country, homeland defense, and our commands is boundless. She embodies the true meaning of selfless service for a noble cause.''

And it is certainly fitting to offer our Nation's sincere thanks to Robin's family for their decades of service and sacrifice. That includes her husband, retired Col. Joe Squatrito, who also served our Nation with honor as an Air Force officer. It also includes their children, Michael and Stacey. As the entire Squatrito family looks forward to the coming new year with limitless opportunities and adventures ahead of them, Robin and Joe are also preparing to take on important new titles and responsibilities as first-time grandparents.

It is my honor to thank Robin Squatrito for her lifetime of devoted service to our Nation. I wish her and her family all the very best in her extraordinarily well-deserved retirement.