Floor Statements

Mr. President, I think, with Christmas right around the corner, I can't think of a more appropriate time to deliver a short message here.

I have spoken several times about the situation in Ethiopia this year. It is a nation that is close to my heart for a lot of good reasons. It is close to other hearts around here. And if you are trying to understand the politics behind what is happening on the ground, it is very complicated.

But what is not complicated is that human suffering happens, and it is heartbreaking. We are talking about women and children and the elderly people. And they are dying every day. And it is totally unnecessary. I pray the violence stops very quickly and call on those who feel the same way to join me if they agree with this.

One of my big criticisms of our State Department is that they tend to go around the world telling other countries what they need to do instead of focusing on building lasting friendships and alliances.

This pushes countries away from us instead of bringing them toward us. And we can't afford to do that anymore with the rising problems that we are having right now--we have been talking on the floor--with both China and Russia. And those countries are all too eager to pick up the pieces that we leave behind. And this is happening right now. We are faced with a situation where we have countries that are out there that have actually better resources than we do in many areas.

Unfortunately, this is exactly what the Biden administration is doing in Ethiopia. Because Ethiopia has been unable to resolve its internal challenges quick enough for the administration, they are punishing Ethiopia. They are really punishing their own people here.

Most recently, this has been in the form of announcing that they plan to remove Ethiopia from the African Growth and Opportunity Act. The African Growth and Opportunity Act is known as AGOA. And it is something that is very significant. It is one that all of those in Africa and other countries are trying to get behind them.

And I think it is particularly significant right now that Christmas is upon us. It means Ethiopia would no longer have preferential trade capabilities with the United States for both import and export.

Now, this is devastating to a nation that has been such a great partner over the years. Ethiopia has always--ever since it came back during the Meles administration, and we kicked communists out with the help of that administration, it has been our friend ever since then. Ethiopia has long been one of our last trading partners in Africa, in part, because its airline has a majority Boeing fleet. And because of that, many planes across the continent are being maintained in Ethiopia.

This flippant action makes our other partners doubt our commitment and pulls the rug out from many American business that have decided to make investments in Ethiopia instead of other countries in places around the world like Southeast Asia.

If we are willing to arbitrarily kick countries out of the agreement, other countries and American companies might not see participation in AGOA as worth the hassle you have to go through to get that. Every time we do something like this, we leave a vacuum that China is only too eager to fill.

Just after the Biden administration announced their plan to punish Ethiopia, the Chinese Government announced their own plan to purchase $300 billion worth of goods from Africa over the next 3 years and to invest nearly $10 billion.

The Chinese Foreign Minister promptly visited the principals in Ethiopia to support Prime Minister Abiy. Prime Minister Abiy, whom you might remember, has been a Prime Minister in Ethiopia for a long period of time. I can remember standing many years ago on this floor and lauding the virtues of him and what he has done for this country and the fact that he probably could be arguably the best educated Prime Minister in that country at any time. He didn't mention a word about the international challenges that he faces. They were there to support him, the democratically--we are talking about the Chinese now-- democratically elected leader in Ethiopia. That is exactly what we should be doing. But we aren't--and China is.

We know that China and Russia are encroaching throughout Africa. They want nothing more than to create a division between the United States and Ethiopia and in countries across the continent.

And the good news is--if you can call it that--there is time before the Biden administration cancels AGOA benefits, and that would be for Ethiopia on January 1. But the door is closing. And January 1 is on us now.

So the Biden administration should take real steps to undoing the sanctions against the democratically elected government of Ethiopia and roll back the termination of AGOA benefits. And that would make a much happier Christmas for us and for Ethiopia.

With that, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, let me, first of all, say that I would have a hard time finding a better friend than the Member who just spoke. We have been good friends for a long period of time, and we have not been apart on very many votes; yet we are not of the same party. Nonetheless, we are going to have to do something that is the same thing we had to do 5 years ago, and really for kind of the same reason.

Every year, when the Senate turns to the NDAA, we call it our must- pass bill. It is a must-pass bill, and it is a bill that will pass. It is a must-pass because it gives our troops the pay that they have earned and the tools and the training that they need to fight and to win against our enemies.

That is why we have passed the NDAA every year for 60 straight years. This year will be 61. This is pretty much the only authorization bill that gets done the way it should year after year. In fact, it is pretty much the only bill--period--that Congress does every single year without fail.

However, no matter how important it is, that doesn't mean that we will accept the fact that Senator Schumer wants to jam it through the Senate without adequate consideration.

Let me be clear. Senator Schumer has put us in this position today. He waited more than 2 months after we filed the NDAA to bring it to the floor. For 2 months, we could have been discussing this and having it and treating it like we should.

He tried to tack it onto his unrelated legislation just as many of us, including my Democrat colleague in the House, Adam Smith, guessed that he would, and now he wants a floor vote on this bill--the most important bill that we do all year--to be enough, despite the fact that he isn't giving us ample time to debate the bill, and he certainly hasn't been willing to entertain an open amendment process.

We have been trying to get this for a long period of time, and we haven't gotten it--the most important bill of the year.

I think Americans back home are smart enough to understand that our servicemembers deserve more. They deserve to be our priority in the Senate, and we need to show them, by providing a robust and open debate on the annual Defense bill, that that is how we will do it.

We are in this place right now because Senator Schumer won't prioritize national defense and fund our troops because the majority leader mismanaged the Senate's schedule. He won't allow votes on bipartisan amendments that make our country more secure. We heard that argument the last time we were in session.

These include an amendment that would inflict sanctions against Russia to stop its power grab over European energy supplies, which simply builds on our previous bipartisan NDAAs and aligns with the House's version of the NDAA.

Another amendment on which Senator Schumer would not give a vote would tighten import restrictions on China to ensure goods sold in the United States aren't made by Uighur forced labor. This already passed the Senate by voice vote.

Good amendments like these shouldn't fall victim to the majority leader's failed leadership.

We all understand how important this bill is. It shouldn't be a partisan thing. This is the most important bill we do every year. In fact, we have said this every year. In fact, I have said this more times than any other Member has stated it. It is even more important now because we are in the most threatened position of our lifetimes. I can't tell you how many times I have demonstrated that fact on the floor of the Senate.

I echo the minority leader's frustration. I understand the frustration from my colleagues who wanted, in realtime, to debate this bill. I think they pled their case very effectively. We wouldn't be in this position if the majority leader had brought this bill up earlier, which we kept insisting that he do, over and over again, on a bipartisan plea.

While I want to be clear that we are in this position because Senator Schumer is forcing this unfortunate action, I also want to be equally clear that I am still very supportive of this bill, and I hope we will pass it soon, but I stand with my colleagues who are voting against the majority leader's irresponsible management of the bills. We have got to get it done, but we can't rush it, and that is why I will be voting no on cloture. That is not an easy thing for me to do, but I believe we can get this bill in better shape. My vote against the process is not against the bill; it is against the process.

We are not delaying national security, no. This is just the opposite. We are demanding that we show, through open and robust debate, that our men and women in uniform are our priority.

I have heard this from many of our people that I have talked to over the weekend and over this past week who are really wondering why we didn't have this on the table earlier so we could get the debate. I hope that a lot of the American people heard the six different Republicans who were demanding to have their votes and amendment process. This is the first time, in my memory, that we have not had this kind of a process take place, and for that reason I will be voting no.

I do want to hear, of course--and let me say something because this might be an area of disagreement between my partner and myself.

Senator Reed, we have worked on these bills together for a long period of time. We have been successful, and we are going to be successful this time.

I yield the floor.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

I yield the floor.

Would the Senator yield?

Let me thank my partner there for all the hard work that we have done together.

Not many people understand the process that we go through every year. It is an exhaustive process to get just to where we are today.

First of all, I would say that, out of all the amendments that were discussed, I support all of them. We didn't get a chance to really see who did and who didn't support them, but I support them all.

When we start one of these processes each year--we do this every year--the first thing we do is that we send a notice out. We send a notice out to each Member and ask each Member: What types of things are you interested in?

And we send this out to all--to each Member of the House and the Senate, and they send their notices in as to what they want, when they want it, and how they want it. Then we put them and marry them in with other Democrats and Republicans who want the same thing and try to get these lists shaved down a little bit. And we have been successful in doing it. Right now, there are 60 cleared amendments. That is 60. That is about the same number we had last year and the same number we had before.

I was disappointed that we had to waste a lot of time. My fellow Senator from Oklahoma, James Lankford, made the comment that we should have been on this bill for 2 weeks or longer. I agree; we should have. We couldn't do it. We didn't have it.

I have to say that the leader--the Democratic leader--didn't allow this to come up so that we could do this. We didn't have a choice. As Republicans, we didn't have a choice, and we were united in wanting to get started earlier. As a result of that, a lot of Democrats and Republicans have lost their opportunity to get heard and to have amendments considered.

The system is good. It is one that has worked for a long time. This is going to work. When we stop to think about the number of hours that are spent wading through all of these amendments, this does take place.

I would compliment our chairman of the committee. We have worked very well together. We have gotten to this point. We will have to get this thing finished, and we will. But, nonetheless, we have an exhaustive policy that we have considered year after year after year. That is where we are today.

With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, over the past--first of all, let me just agree with the Senator from Nebraska. She is exactly on target here. This is a problem that we are in a--I have said several times, I cannot remember a time that we have not been--that we have been in a greater threat than we are today.

Over the past 2 weeks, just to kind of let you know where we are now, the Armed Services Committee held two classified sessions and two open hearings on Afghanistan. That is the committee that actually had these in their schedule. These are really eye-openers, and I think we have a lot of time to uncover what happened and where we go from here.

First, we heard from General Milley, the commander on the ground in Afghanistan through July. He went up to the July period of time. Then we heard from the Pentagon's top policy official, Colin Kahl. In open testimony, we heard from Secretary of Defense Austin, the President's top military adviser; General Milley; and General McKenzie, who is in charge of the combatant command that oversees the Middle East. We also heard from two outside experts with decades of experience following Afghanistan and the region. Here is what we learned. Now, I am going to list these things. There are actually seven things we learned, and it is very significant.

No. 1, we learned that top military leaders advised President Biden to keep at least 2,500 troops. Now, the President came out and said that wasn't true. Yet every military person who offered testimony has said, yes, that is exactly true. They all recommended to President Biden to keep at least 2,500 troops in Afghanistan. If not, then, you know the results that are coming from that. You know what we are living with today.

This advice goes counter to what President Biden told the American people back in August. He said his generals did not advise him to leave troops there. Now we know that is not true, and we know that he said that and he misled the American people. This is a very significant point.

The second thing: As I said, we learned that al-Qaida was never gone from Afghanistan. As Biden says, they were there all along, and they were a big part of the Taliban's victory. Now they are focused on external operations. Al-Qaida and ISIS could be able to strike America's soil as soon as a year from now; that is, striking us on our soil here in America. Even worse, the withdrawal from Afghanistan was a shot of adrenaline in the arm of the radical Islamic terrorists everywhere. They now have a victory to point to.

The third thing: We learned that by completely withdrawing from Afghanistan, we nearly zeroed out our capabilities to strike those same terrorist organizations. We understand this. Not many people would disagree with this. General McKenzie said he was not confident that the United States would be able to prevent al-Qaida or ISIS from using Afghanistan as a launching pad for terrorist activity, and here is why--and this is important. The administration isn't talking about this. Afghanistan poses a unique set of challenges. It is landlocked. We don't have any bases nearby. This was driven home by our Senator--a few minutes ago--from Nebraska. Our generals confirmed that it is extremely difficult and costly to get the intelligence and conduct the types of operations the President said he would do. This came from all of the military leaders.

Let's not forget--we still have not killed the terrorists directly responsible for the attack that killed 13 U.S. servicemembers. Just imagine--they are still out there.

President Biden decided to put the Taliban in charge, hoping they changed. The first thing they did was broadcast a video on Afghan national TV saying the United States deserved the 9/11 attack. It turns out that the Taliban is the old Taliban. They haven't really changed a bit. What this means is that Afghanistan is now the safest place in the world for radical Islamic terrorism. We are at greater risk, and we are less safe.

The fourth thing out of seven: We learned--and I quote General McKenzie directly--``The war on terror is not over, and the war in Afghanistan is not over either.'' But President Biden told the American people and told the whole world that the war is over. We know better than that. Evidently, the terrorists didn't get the memo. As General Milley put it, ``Al-Qaida is still at war with us, and never has not been.''

No. 5: We learned without a shadow of a doubt that our allies and partners and our adversaries, too, are questioning our credibility and resolve. In fact, General Milley said that our credibility has been ``damaged.'' At last week's hearing, our experts confirmed that President Biden's botched withdrawal has caused our allies to question our ability to stick to our strategies and policies.

No. 6: We learned that our military leaders would not call President Biden's evacuation operation an ``extraordinary success'' like he did. General Milley called it a ``strategic failure.''

Now, I want to be clear. This wasn't a failure on the part of our troops. Our troops served admirably. They rescued 120,000 people. They did what they were told to do. Their Commander in Chief led them astray.

As Dr. Vali Nasr said just the other day--he told our committee last Thursday that the end game in Afghanistan was not our ``finest moment.'' That is an understatement, and that is someone trying to figure out some way to justify what went on.

The last thing, No. 7: We learned that President Biden simply ignored the conditions-based approach.

Now, one thing I will say about the previous approach. People are confused sometimes about what our previous President said. He had a conditions-based approach, and the hallmark of it or the center of that conditions-based approach was that we would leave troops there to protect our Americans. We don't even know right now how many Americans are there.

So we learned that President Biden simply ignored the conditions- based approach. President Biden could have easily said: The Taliban has not met our conditions. We are going to stay in Afghanistan and ensure that no terrorists are able to hit us.

That is what his military advisers recommended that he say, and he didn't do that. In fact, President Biden ignored the conditions on the ground and instead decided to accept a significant amount of strategic risk. That means the United States is less safe today, and our credibility for the future is shot through, and that is what his decision means.

We lost credibility because we left Americans and our Afghan allies behind. No one will believe what America says after this, and I am not sure why they should. I can't think of a time in history that this has happened. This is simply just something that is brand new.

One thing we didn't get clear answers on despite the repeated bipartisan requests is exactly how many Americans and Afghan partners did we leave behind and what is going to happen to them. DOD pointed to the State Department and vice versa. That is just unacceptable.

We don't know how many people we left behind. You know, we heard the Secretary actually made a statement approximating at one time between 3- and 4- and 500, and the next approximation was closer to 10,000. So we don't really know that. It is bad enough that we leave them behind, but we don't even know how many people we left.

This is why I am going to continue calling for more hearings until we get--we have to get the answers. This isn't going to go away.

Why does all this matter? America is less safe than we were before because of President Biden's decisions. Six years ago, former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said:

I think [President Biden] has been wrong on . . . every

major foreign policy and national security issue over the

past four decades.

America is now more vulnerable to terrorist attacks. We all understand that, and the whole world understands that. We have no plan to meet that threat.

We also have to think about what this means for our biggest challenge, and that is, of course, our challengers of China, Russia, North Korea, Iran. They are all celebrating now. China is engaged in a historic nuclear buildup--one that we have never seen anything like before. Russia just conducted its largest military exercise in four decades. They are watching this debacle and thinking how weak America looks. Now, if President Biden can't get counterterrorism right, how can his administration put together a strategy to confront China and Russia?

Unfortunately, this strategic failure of our Afghanistan exit is encouraging our adversaries to test us--the exact opposite of deterrence. That is what I am worried about now. I am more worried about it after last week. That is why I am going to keep fighting for more open hearings so the American people and our adversaries and our enemies and our friends will understand what it is all about. And this will be the real America, not what they experienced recently.

That is why I continue to push for adequate defense funding, to make sure that we prioritize nuclear modernization, and to pass this year's NDAA as soon as we can get it to the floor.

By the way, this is the one bill that I have every expectation we will get. The NDAA, the National Defense Authorization Act, is one that we have passed for 61 consecutive years. I have every expectation that we will do it now. I don't like the idea that the Democrats are putting this off as if there is no threat out there. I don't think that is going to happen.

That is why we have to keep getting to the bottom of this. We have taken some big hits--big hits--out there, and we have got to recover.

Mr. President, it is my honor to pay tribute to Stephanie Barna, who is retiring October 15 after more than 30 years of Federal service. A dedicated public servant, a fierce advocate for our Nation's men and women in uniform, and an astute legal mind, the Senate Committee on Armed Services has been extremely fortunate to have Ms. Barna as Republican General Counsel for the past 3 years.

Ms. Barna joined the Committee on Armed Services in November 2018, after decades of working within the Department of Defense both as a uniformed officer and as a civilian. As a career Senior Executive at the Pentagon, Ms. Barna held critical positions that focused on Total Force management, personnel matters, and improving the lives of our servicemembers and their families. Most recently, she performed the duties of the Under Secretary of Defense for Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis. Before that, she served as senior policy adviser to then-Under Secretary of Defense Robert Wilkie; Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Manpower and Reserve Affairs; performed the duties of Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness; and Deputy General Counsel for Operations and Personnel in the Office of the Army General Counsel.

Ms. Barna began her public service career in 1989 as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army Judge Advocate General's Corps. Ultimately, she retired from the U.S. Army Reserve in 2011 in the grade of colonel. She is also qualified as an Army Jumpmaster, and if she is willing to jump out of a perfectly safe plane, she is definitely able to work in Congress.

As a member of my staff on the Senate Committee on Armed Services, Ms. Barna played a critical role in the drafting and enactment of the fiscal year 2020 and 2021 National Defense Authorization Acts, NDAA. Because of her work and commitment to bipartisan solutions, we successfully enacted the 59th and 60th consecutive NDAAs when many speculated it couldn't be done. I am grateful for her work this year to help usher the fiscal year 2022 NDAA toward the finish line as well. With creativity and tenacity, Ms. Barna shepherded important policy reforms that strengthened national security, improved the management of the Pentagon, and bettered the lives of our servicemembers.

Over her career, Ms. Barna received numerous, well-deserved accolades, including the Legion of Merit, the Meritorious Executive Presidential Rank Award, the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Civilian Service, and the Department of the Army Exceptional Civilian Service Award--twice.

Most telling to her leadership, Ms. Barna has never asked for recognition. She is a tireless worker, wholly dedicated to serving her Nation. If you were to look up the definitions of ``competent,'' ``capable,'' and ``grace under fire'' in the dictionary, I am sure you would see her picture.

Ms. Barna leaves behind a legacy of getting things done, of doing what is good and right, and fulfilling the law to the best of her understanding. Because of her, the Department of Defense operates better, our troops are better cared for, and long-standing institution of the U.S. Senate live on. While she will leave big shoes to fill on the Senate Committee on Armed Services, I wish her very well in her well-earned retirement. For her service, she has my thanks and the thanks of a grateful nation.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I be recognized as if in morning business for such time as I shall consume.

Madam President, first of all, I am going to do something that is a little bit unusual. I will start off by saying thank you. We have got a lot of people to thank. Yet we never seem to do that.

When we look at what happened in Afghanistan over the past 20 years-- I can't approximate how many times I was over there--that was tough duty for those guys and the gals there; it was not easy. This is not the place you want to go take a vacation--and to their families. Then, of course, on August 26, we were reminded so painfully of what we ask our troops and their families to do. They lay it all on the line for this country. Our servicemembers represent the very best of us. Over the past 20 years, they did everything that they could in Afghanistan to root out evil and to champion American values. I couldn't be more grateful to or have more respect for them than I have today.

I say this not only because we should say it more often but because it is important to remember that what we saw in Afghanistan over the past few months was not a failure of our military; it was a failure of the Commander in Chief--the President of the United States--and the people who advised him on his policy in Afghanistan.

I still don't know who those people are, and, you know, I have chaired the Senate Armed Services Committee and other committees. People ask me, when I go back to my State of Oklahoma--they will say: Hey, who is advising the President to do all these things? I have to tell them I don't know, and I have been around for a long time. I don't remember any administration where I just honestly didn't know who was making the decisions and who was advising--in this case, advising the President.

But what we did witness, though, was a failure of the Commander in Chief and whoever was advising him. No one can look at what happened over the past few months and claim that it was a success like President Biden did. It was a disaster. Leaving Americans behind, and allies-- don't forget our allies who are still left behind. It was un-American.

The administration keeps saying: ``We didn't inherit a plan.'' That is false. They inherited a condition-based agreement and made their own policy decisions. It was condition-based; it wasn't open-ended. It was something that was out there, and they had the reins.

Let's keep in mind, this administration has a majority in the House and the Senate and the White House, and they make their own decisions. And they say: We didn't have a plan. They had a plan, and we had a plan, but everything we did and the previous administration did was condition-based.

So according to the condition-based approach, President Trump agreed to withdraw our troops from Afghanistan if and only if the Taliban acted against al-Qaida. Now, that is one of the things. There were many other conditions, and one condition was to leave some of our troops there, not just to walk away, to vacate. And those conditions were in line when this administration came in, and that didn't happen. President Biden knows it. Secretary Blinken admitted it.

When President Biden announced his decision to withdraw back in April, a senior administration official told the Washington Post: ``The President has judged that a condition-based approach is a recipe for staying in Afghanistan forever.'' That is a quote.

Just last week, in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, when asked if the Taliban had severed its relationship with al-Qaida, Secretary Blinken said the relationship has not been severed.

Let's keep that in mind. We keep hearing that, yes, they are taking action against that administration, but the relationship has not been severed.

Now President Biden says that he will hold the Taliban accountable, but he didn't hold the Taliban accountable while our troops were still in Afghanistan. I mean, that is when we had the leverage to do it, but we didn't do it, and he has presented no plan for holding the terrorists accountable now.

This decision--this rushed withdrawal that has left the Taliban stronger than it was in 9/11 was President Biden's alone. He is responsible for the chaos that followed. He is going to be held accountable and should--everyone who advised him to make such a horrible decision.

Now, what is more outrageous to me is that President Biden left Americans behind. That is not something we do. He said that we were going to get everyone out, and that didn't happen.

You know, when historians look back at this--this may be decades from now, centuries from now--this is what they will remember: The Biden administration knowingly left Americans behind.

The administration has tried to downplay this. Early in the evacuation, Secretary of State Blinken said that there were perhaps 10,000 or 15,000 American citizens in Afghanistan. Our men and women in uniform, working tirelessly and effectively with our diplomats under incredibly difficult circumstances, managed to evacuate about 6,000 of our citizens. Now, according to my math, that means that between 4,000 and 9,000 Americans were left behind. Secretary Blinken says that there were only 100 and that the rest of them preferred to stay in Afghanistan.

By the way, some legitimately did prefer to stay in Afghanistan because they were married people, they had families, and they made it very clear that--when something like this normally happens, families are moved as a family unit. Not there. That is not what happened.

So that is more than bad math; it is a lie. We know and every congressional office that tried to get people out of Afghanistan knows--and I know this because our Senate office was very busy at that time helping people to get out--that there were many U.S. citizens who wanted to leave Afghanistan, but they couldn't leave because the Taliban would not let their families go with them. Well, that is exactly what I would expect from the terrorists who were there at that time.

So Secretary Blinken wants you to think that these people made a choice. He wants to hide the fact that the administration in which he serves created its own hostage crisis and gave the Taliban the upper hand.

Keep in mind when we talk about this, it is the Taliban. They were the terrorists.

He also wants you to think it was the fault of those families they didn't get out before August, repeating that they had been telling Americans to leave for months. There is a kernel of truth to that, but it is clouded by the fact that they repeatedly stated that it would be a year, probably more, before Kabul was at risk of falling to the Taliban. Instead of 36 months, the fall of Kabul only took 36 hours.

In addition to American citizens, President Biden left behind our Afghan partners who risked everything to support our shared security goals. I was out there many times in the past, talking about that very thing, about the problems they had and the dangers they were in.

Now, these are not our American citizens; they were some of our allies who were left over there. In addition to American citizens, President Biden left behind our Afghan partners who risked everything to support our shared security goals. As a result of the President's decision, Afghan women and children have been thrown back to the stone age. We all know that. We know what they are doing right now. We don't have to guess.

Our allies and partners around the world are questioning our credibility, our leadership, and our commitment. These are our allies. They are not used to having the rug pulled out from under them. This is the first time.

Our enemies are bolstered by President Biden's policy, which puts Taliban terrorists in charge of Afghanistan--a policy that spread the perception that we not only abandoned our allies and partners, but we also abandoned our own citizens.

Seeing all these failures, Americans are demanding accountability, and they deserve it.

But let's make this crystal clear: None of this is the fault of our military. Our military leaders, the ones with real experience on the ground, advised the same thing that I did, and that is, leave a small force in Afghanistan. Now, this would have supported the Afghan military, prevented the Taliban's takeover, kept the pressure on the terrorists, reassured our regional partners, and kept our homeland safe.

President Biden pretends that none of this was possible. He claims that he had two options: a massive deployment or zero troops, which is not true. In fact, I publicly supported a third option: maintain a small force to preserve our air power. We can't do the air power without some troops on the ground. We needed to have some troops on the ground--we did--counterterrorism operations and military options.

Many of us here supported a small, tailored deployment to protect our core interests, and so did his own military advisers. Yet, when he was asked, ``Did your top military advisers warn against withdrawing on this timeline? Did they ask you to keep 2,500 troops?'' President Biden said, ``No, they didn't. That wasn't true.''

But it was true. We talked to the--in fact, you are going to find something out this coming Tuesday when we have a hearing. We are going to have many of the principals whom we really haven't heard from, principals who were involved in advising the administration as to what the military wanted and didn't want.

Except it was. We know that now. The former commander of U.S. Forces- Afghanistan, General Miller, told the Senate Armed Services Committee just this last week--this is our committee, the committee I chaired for some period of time--he said no. Now, he didn't tell President Biden directly because President Biden didn't even bother calling his top commander on the ground before making his decision, but General Miller did report it to the chain of command.

Now, we are talking about General Miller. At that time, he was the top commander on the ground. So the President didn't even consult him as to whether or not we should--he made it very clear he advised him not to go, not to close everything up.

He also tried to say that al-Qaida is ``gone'' from Afghanistan and that ``terrorism is not emanating from that part of the world.'' Well, we know that is not true. General McKenzie said al-Qaida remains the main focus in the region.

Last week, the Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency--that is LTG Scott Berrier--said that the projected timeline for al-Qaida to have the capability to threaten our homeland is 1 to 2 years at most, if not sooner, and that is it.

So President Biden was not telling the truth in that area about having only two choices. He didn't tell the truth about getting American families out of Afghanistan. He failed to tell the truth about the advice that he got from his military commanders, saying that his military commanders did not advise him. We know better than that, and if you don't know it, stick around for next Tuesday, and you will find out. He didn't tell the truth about al-Qaida not being a threat.

So I have to wonder, if he is not telling the truth about this, what else is he not telling the truth about? If we can't trust the President on this, if we can't trust him to tell the truth and we can't trust him to put together a good strategy in Afghanistan, how can we trust him to protect the Nation from our strategic competitors?

After watching President Biden stumble badly in Afghanistan, I am worried that he won't pursue a strong strategy to push back on China, and China is our top threat right now. We all know that. We don't like to talk about it, but it is true.

As former Secretary Gates famously wrote in his memoir, President Biden has ``been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades.'' That was Secretary Gates, former Secretary of Defense.

I am also worried about the administration desperately trying again to return to the Obama administration's failed Iran deal and offering Iran massive sanctions relief, sanctions that were put on in the previous administration to get their--of course, we know Iran would just use the sanctions relief to ramp up terrorism.

You know, I don't know how the American people--maybe it is the people in Oklahoma. They are the ones I have talked to more than any other groups. You know, what else would they do? What would Iran, with their background, do with sanction relief or with funds? They would use it on terrorism. That brings us back to Afghanistan, which is only one of many, many examples in the Middle East and North Africa where the administration has no plan for countering terrorists and keeping us safe.

President Biden and his administration have broadly talked about a new over-the-horizon strategy to counterterrorism. ``Over the horizon'' means that we don't have boots on the ground. We send airplanes in from afar--something our military leaders have told us is way more difficult than most people believe, far more expensive, and almost impossible without partners on the ground.

We can't do it. You can't just lead with military airpower. Even if it is possible, experts are telling us it won't be effective. We haven't even seen a plan for how this will be enough to keep American families safe.

This is a failure of leadership. Along the way, President Biden has tried to blame everyone else--the Afghan Security Forces, the Afghan Government, and the previous administration. But the blame lands squarely on him, and he owns this.

We should expect his failures in Afghanistan to bleed into other issues. China and Russia see a weak America now. Terrorists see safe havens and use Afghanistan as a rallying cry.

I still have a lot more questions and expect President Biden and his administration to have more answers. Thirteen brave Americans died in the chaos created by President Biden's policies. We need explanations and we need accountability.

We are going to hear from Secretary Austin, General Milley, and General McKenzie next week. This is going to be on Tuesday. I have reminded people of that for a long time because we need to have a clear understanding, and we will get that understanding. We are going to start to understand this--just what went wrong, who is to blame, and what we need to do to protect ourselves. This is going to be an open meeting. This is not a classified meeting. This is an open meeting that is going to take place this coming Tuesday. We are going to be doing this as transparently and openly as possible because the American people deserve the truth. Our servicemembers and their families who sacrificed so much over the last 20 years deserve that, too, and we are going to give them the truth. That is going to happen next week.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, on Friday, September 17, 2021, Vance Air Force Base celebrated its 80th anniversary. On this day, we honored the community, leadership, cadre of instructors, and over 35,000 pilots Vance has trained since 1941. Vance AFB is the top pilot-producing base for 2 years running and enables our Nation to provide and defend global power projection.

Vance Air Force Base's history dates back to 1941, originally founded as Air Corps Basic Flying School in Enid, OK. After World War II, the base reopened as a permanent facility on August 26, 1948, and became Vance AFB on July 9, 1949. The base is named in honor of Lt Col Leon Robert Vance, Jr., a native of Enid, who posthumously received the Medal of Honor for gallantry in action over France on June 5, 1944.

For 80 years, Vance has served as the model for empowering the future of the U.S. Air Force through innovation and focuses on supporting flight operations everyday. The 71st Flying Training Wing operates over 200 aircraft, conducting more than 50,000 sorties annually, and logging more than 74,000 flight hours in the T-1A Jayhawk, T-6A Texan II, and T-38C Talon. Soon, Vance will add the T-7 Red Hawk to its training aircraft fleet. The base graduates 370 exceptional U.S. Air Force and allied student pilots from pilot training each year.

Vance is lucky because it benefits from outstanding community support and partnerships. The base supports more than 1,400 civilian employees and 1,400 military members and their families in the local area. Vance has a remarkable $381.2 million impact on the local community. On September 17, thousands of friends and families who make the Vance mission a success gathered to celebrate the history and future of the base.

Vance strives to accomplish its mission every day to deliver the world's best pilots, develop resilient airmen and families, deploy combat ready warriors, and demonstrate Vance culture. I am proud that Vance will continue to train the finest airmen for the finest Air Force in the world. On behalf of my colleagues and the entire U.S. Senate, I want to congratulate the Vance AFB community on 80 years of excellence in service to our Nation. ``Vance Proud!''

Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 3331 and ask that it be reported by number.

My friends, the amendment--my amendment--is designed to protect a very small population but a very significant population: the babies with Down syndrome.

Over two-thirds of the unborn babies diagnosed with Down syndrome in the United States are aborted. Some countries, like Iceland, are eradicating their entire population of individuals with Down syndrome through abortion.

Now, I think we agree that an individual should not be discriminated against due to his or her chromosome count.

This is not partisan. It is not extreme. Seventy percent of Americans, including 56 percent of pro-choice Americans, oppose abortion on the basis of a Down syndrome diagnosis.

This amendment uses the budget mechanism to help protect the most vulnerable among us and who are being systematically targeted through abortion.

I urge my colleagues to lay aside their party differences and think about the lives and the lives--

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Madam President, I know we have all been talking about what is going to happen in the next 2 days, and it is very significant, the things that have to take place.

But I want to remind some people out there that it doesn't mean that everything else stops. We have a couple of issues that are major issues but not to really large numbers of people. But they are issues that are meaningful--very meaningful--to a few, and it happens that there has been progress in both of these.

Now, one of them is an issue that has to do with Western Sahara. And I know that a lot of people are not really familiar with that or what the issue is, but it is an old issue. It has been around since 1966. It is a very significant issue. It is one that you have heard me talk about for quite some time, but we have made some great progress.

First of all, it bears repeating because--they are called the Sahrawis. The Sahrawis are the people from Western Sahara, and they are kind of a voiceless people. That is why I am here--because nobody else is here on that.

So how we got here: As West Africa was being decolonized, Western Sahara was clear and declared an independent nation, despite Morocco attempting to claim it as a territory.

In 1966, the U.N. General Assembly resolution agreed that the referendum of self-determination should be held. That is the U.N. General Assembly. There was no disagreement at that time except from Morocco. Everyone was in agreement. In fact, at that time, Morocco was even in agreement. This is 1966. And we were going to have a determination in the form of a referendum that would be taking place in 1975. So it was 1966, planning for 1975.

Self-determination is just merely letting the Sahrawi people decide for themselves the imperative principle of action, the right to judge for themselves to be independent or to be a part of Morocco. Now, this was just the first promise of a referendum. To date, none has been kept.

The International Court of Justice opinion from 1975 also agreed that Morocco did not have any sovereignty over the land and that the referendum of self-determination should be held. So you have the International Court of

Justice agreeing with this, the U.N. General Assembly--all in agreement.

Morocco maintained its unlawful claim to Western Sahara and, after decolonization, attempted to annex the country with force. Western Sahara--officially the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic--through the Polisario, defended their rights to the land.

And after more than a decade of violence from Morocco, the United Nations finally intervened in 1991, and both sides agreed to a cease- fire and a path forward. That was 1991. It was called at that time the Settlement Plan. It solidified that Morocco and Western Sahara agreed to hold a referendum and a date for that referendum and created the United Nations Mission for the Referendum to solidify this.

If you are keeping track, that was the third promise. And it is worth noting that the U.N. regularly reaffirms the 1991 commitment to a referendum for self-determination.

Now, self-determination is something that people assume there is not opposition to. Self-determination is something that is very meaningful to us and our history in this country, and this is something that at that time was accepted.

I can remember talking several times in previous administrations, going back to the Reagan administration, and people were, at that time, knowing that this was going to happen but just didn't know for sure how it was going to happen or when it was going to happen. And here it is now decades later, and it hasn't happened yet.

The referendum for 1992 never took place, and the process stalled. The process stalled, although the cease-fire held. Morocco just wouldn't hold up its end of the bargain.

Former Secretary of State James Baker--I remember when the previous administration came in, James Baker had read someplace that I was concerned about this issue. This old issue had never been resolved, and he called me up, and he said: Well, I want you to know that I spent a lot of years with three different Presidents trying to get this done. We were unable to do it, but let me work with you.

This is one of these rare things where everyone agrees.

So, anyway, they had a special envoy to Western Sahara. Baker worked on multiple plans with Morocco and Western Sahara and came close many times, but it never happened.

Most notable is the Houston agreement was signed by Morocco and Western Sahara and recommitted to a referendum of self-determination plan for 1998. That would have been the fourth time. Morocco recognized they would likely lose a vote quickly and tanked all negotiations. The next year, by declaration, they would never accept a referendum that included independence as an outcome despite years of promise otherwise.

The conflict stalled then, leaving us in what is called a frozen conflict for more than two decades. At the end of last year--November, to be precise--Morocco tried to violently crush a peaceful protest in the Gujarat area. The Western Saharans were peacefully protesting Morocco's direct violation of the United Nations' cease-fire agreement by using the road in this direction.

The international community did nothing. Then truly the worst thing happened. There was a change in policy of the United States that had been a policy for some three decades where they actually were recognizing Morocco's sovereignty. That decision was wrong. It reversed decades of U.S. policy. But the policy held until 1966. It was a shocking announcement and deeply disturbing to all who valued individual rights and self-determination.

That is why earlier this year Senator Leahy and I led 25 of our colleagues in a bipartisan letter to President Biden urging him to reverse the harmful policy and to recommit to a policy of self- determination. This is something that I know that he recognizes. I actually personally talked to him about this in his first week in office. It hasn't been done yet, and it should be done. Many of our colleagues and I are not alone in our push for Western Sahara to have the right for self-determination. So does the African Union, which is comprised of 55 member states. We have most of the European community who supports the U.N. efforts on our side. The European Court of Justice also ruled that Western Sahara is not a part of Morocco, and the EU and the economic agreements can cover Western Sahara.

So, anyway, this has happened over and over again for a long period of time. Just fairly recently, Sultana Khaya had a CNN--I am actually going to wind this up with an agreement with my friend from Maryland-- this is the statement that she made. She said:

Morocco's repression of the Sahrawi people, and Sahrawi

human rights defenders in particular, is well documented. The

Sahrawis have struggled under Moroccan occupation since 1975,

and this repression will continue until the occupation is

ended. And while the United Nations Security Council supports

giving the people of Western Sahara the chance to determine

their own future through a referendum, Morocco has refused to

allow the referendum to take place, depriving us of the

chance . . . [for] self-determination.

She concluded by saying:

I cannot find the words to describe the endless suffering

that I personally, and the Sahrawi people more generally,

have endured under this violent occupation.

They are resolute, and we should be too

With this, I would like to offer my friend, since he has been waiting for a long period of time, to use the remainder of my time if he will then yield the floor to me at the conclusion.

I thank my friend. We worked on a lot of bills-- infrastructure--together since we were both elected the same year many years ago and we accomplished a lot together.

What I want to do is complete my remarks that I began a few minutes ago.

Before I do, Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that during the course of the remarks I made concerning Western Sahara, that the speech that was made by Sultana Khaya, that was published in CNN, be printed in the Record during the course of my presentation

Ligado

Madam President, let me repeat what I said in the beginning of my previous remarks, and that is we are all talking about the same thing right now. We are now getting down to the last--conceivably, the last two votes that we are going to be having, so all of the concentration has been on those.

But I want to mention two of the other issues that were made very popular issues and they are making great progress right now. Let me go ahead and do that for a short while, and that is to provide an update on the Ligado issue--the Ligado issue.

Friday was inauguration day of a thing called the Space Beat Memo. It is a new weekly newsletter from POLITICO designed to focus on space and satellites. This is their inaugural, first-ever newsletter with a great rundown on--they chose the Ligado issue.

Just to remind everyone what we are talking about--Ligado, L-I-G-A-D- O--the Ligado Order was a spectrum sale approved back in April of 2020, that would let Ligado use the L-band or the spectrum--that is the spectrum close to the GPS for commercial use.

Why is that a problem?

It is a problem because Ligado's signals are about 2 billion times as powerful as GPS signals, so they would cause interference, according to all unbiased sources, to the GPS.

Here is one way to put the interference into perspective: Because GPS signals travel from satellites in space, by the time those signals get to the Earth's surface, they are low power. Because the FCC order allowed Ligado to repurpose spectrum to operate in a terrestrial-based network, Ligado signals on Earth's surface will be much more powerful than GPS, causing substantial harm and interference.

Now, we know that basically everyone in government opposes this. We talked about this now since the last time--just June 23, down here on the floor. Shortly after the Ligado Order was announced in April of 2020, the NTIA filed a petition to reconsider--basically, a petition asking them to reconsider their decision again, given the negative impact it would have. This was signed on behalf of some 15 governmental Agencies.

The NTIA is the National Telecommunications Information Administration. They are an Agency within the Department of Commerce that serves as the President's primary adviser on telecom policies.

As I announced on June 23, I recently received a letter from Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo confirming that--and I'm quoting now--``there has been no change to the Department of Commerce's or NTIA's opposition to the FCC's Ligado Order.''

That is a direct quote. That is the new administration. We know the last administration believed the same thing, and this administration is following on this cause. It is a very significant one.

She also pledged that NTIA will continue to pursue the petition for reconsideration. The petition represents the Departments of Commerce, Defense, Interior, Justice, Homeland Security, Energy, Transportation,

Mr. President, it is my understanding that prior to my remarks on the floor, we were going to recognize the Senator from Minnesota for 10 minutes or so. So if that is still desired by the Senator from Minnesota, I would be glad to yield.

And since the Senator from Minnesota is not present, I will go ahead and make my remarks.

I do ask unanimous consent that I be recognized as if in morning business for such time as I shall consume.

Mr. President, first of all, I am here today to share some news about a key subject we have been talking about for quite some time, and that is Ligado. It is a complicated thing. It is something where one company was able to get rushed over a weekend in April of 2020 and get recognized and get an agreement from the FCC to have an operation that deals with the individuals that are wanting to be involved in this group.

The 15 government Departments and Agencies signed a petition for reconsideration of a flawed decision. Keep in mind that this is a decision by the FCC with the NTIA, the National Telecommunications and Infrastructure Administration, because they manage Federal spectrum.

Now, when the new administration was sworn in this January, the petitions were still pending. The NTIA, which I just now used the initials of, is very well-known. This is the one that has the responsibility to take care of the Department of Commerce, some of their instructions, some of their activities. So I spoke with Secretary Gina Raimondo, who is the Secretary of Commerce for the new administration, about the importance of continuing the petition for reconsideration. I also followed up with a letter.

What is a petition of reconsideration? What we are talking about here is that a decision was made by the FCC, and they have been petitioned by almost every bureaucracy and many, many individuals--over 100--to have a reconsideration. And this has not happened yet.

And so we changed administrations, and, of course, the new administration came in and Secretary Gina Raimondo did a great job with the importance of continuing the petition for reconsideration.

I wanted to make sure that even with the change in administration, the government Departments and Agencies still wanted to see the harmful order repealed. And here is the breaking news. I just got a letter from Secretary Raimondo, confirming now that ``there has been no change to the Department of Commerce's or [the] NTIA's opposition to the FCC's Ligado Order.''

And that says it all. It says this administration is in full agreement with the previous administration, and they will be acting accordingly.

She also pledges that the NTIA will continue to pursue the petition for reconsideration--the petition that represents the Departments of Commerce, Defense, Interior, Justice, Homeland Security, Energy, Transportation, NASA, FAA, and more--virtually, the entire government.

Now, this is huge. This shows, once again, that there is bipartisan concern about the Ligado order and that it is continuing into the Biden administration.

It is not an exaggeration when I say that the Ligado order would be devastating to public safety, our national defense, and even our way of life. And everybody knows that.

The reliability of GPS and satellite communications is necessary for the safety of life operations, national security, and economic activity.

Here are some of the day-to-day things people might not think of as being a part of the users of GPS and how it affects our daily lives. A big one is using your credit card or debit card when you are making a purchase or anything in terms of making transactions.

Another one is making a phone call--even making a phone call. Cell phone networks rely on GPS to synchronize the cell towers so calls can be passed seamlessly. Otherwise, they could get bogged up, and if they experience interference, your call could be dropped when moving from tower to tower.

Here is one that most people don't expect, and that is energy. Why would energy be dependent upon an accurate and reliable GPS system? Well, whether that is filling up your tank at the pump or managing electrical grids to light our homes, we rely on GPS timing to safely operate underground pipelines and our electricity grid.

Farmers and ranchers depend on GPS and satellite communications when planting crops, applying fertilizer, and during our harvest operations, to move large critical machinery from place to place.

I was back in my State of Oklahoma last week and met with a bunch of farmers, and I learned myself how farmers are using GPS now. This is a thing that wasn't true just a few years ago, but it is true now.

Working out. A lot of healthy people are out there doing what they ought to be doing with their bodies, and that is working out. A study last year found that one-fifth--that is 20 percent--of all Americans use a fitness tracker or smart watch, the majority of which use the GPS to count steps and track distances.

Taking a flight. Commercial and civilian aviation relies on GPS navigation and satellite communications to operate safely.

Driving around. Each day, countless Americans rely on Google Maps, Waze, Apple Maps, and other forms of navigation systems to get them from point A to point B. And they rely on GPS to do that.

And while no one hopes that they ever need a firetruck, an ambulance, or other emergency services, 9-1-1 operators and EMS use GPS and satellite communications to locate a caller and navigate as quickly as possible.

We had a hearing just a few weeks ago, and we had the Helicopter Operators Association talk about their emergency runs and what would happen to them if they lost the reliability of GPS.

And there is more: weather forecasting, the movement of goods on our highways, surveying maritime harbors and channels, operation with construction and mining equipment. The list goes on and on.

I had a personal experience about 20 years ago with one of the uses; that is, I had occasion with three individuals and participants to fly an airplane around the world.

I am from Oklahoma. Of course, we are all familiar with Will Rogers. Some people are not quite as familiar with Wiley Post. Wiley Post flew around with Will Rogers. They flew around the world. So what I was doing was replicating that flight in my plane around the world. I was using a Trimble--that is the manufacturer--a Trimble TNL 2000. That was the first time, I think--I haven't checked since then--that it has been used for private use for flying around the world. Nonetheless, that is a GPS system.

Because the FCC order allows Ligado to repurpose spectrum to operate a terrestrial-based network, Ligado signals on Earth's surface will be much more powerful than GPS, causing substantial and harmful interference.

How do we know Ligado will cause interference?

The FCC told us when they approved the Ligado order. They said--you should listen to the FCC statement:

Ligado shall expeditiously repair or replace as needed any

U.S. Government GPS devices that experience or are likely to

experience harmful interference from Ligado's operations.

That is a quote. Remember that quote. I will tell you about a bill we will introduce to correct this problem that is serious to so many people.

Last year, we also held a hearing on the Armed Services Committee to hear how the Ligado order would impact the military and warfighter. All of the witnesses--Dana Deasy, Michael Griffin, General Raymond--they are all united.

Dana Deasy, the former Chief Information Officer at the DOD, said it best when asked if he thought the Ligado order would have an impact on DOD or the Federal spectrum. He said:

Yes, the fact that we're sitting here today, and you have

General Raymond here representing our military, would clearly

suggest that . . .

We wouldn't be sitting here today if it didn't have a heavy impact on our military operations.

There has been multiple testimony about that. The NTIA petition filed in April of 2020--and, again, signed by the Departments of Commerce, Defense, Interior, Justice, Homeland Security, Energy and Transportation, as well as agencies like NASA and the FAA--is also clear and united. There is no division of opinion on this.

That alone should be enough to overturn the order. If not, we need to make sure Federal agencies, State governments, and all others negatively impacted by the actions of Ligado are not left holding the bag when it comes to costs and, worse, aren't put in the position where they have to push the costs onto the American consumers.

Everyone is on our side with this. The whole of government and over 100 private-sector groups all agree, and they all agree no one else is on the side of Ligado except paid lobbyists.

Ligado said this order is about winning the race to 5G and beating China. Those who claim Ligado's proposal is necessary to beat China's 5G push are deliberately mixing up two different and important spectrum issues in order to sell their product: the sharing of mid-band 5G spectrum by DOD with industry and harmful interference of Ligado's signal with the low-band GPS

signals used in nearly every aspect of daily life.

Ligado's spectrum they are repurposing is not in prime mid-band spectrum being considered for 5G, and Ligado's low-band spectrum was not a part of the FCC's own plan to accelerate 5G development released in September 2018, called the 5G FAST Plan.

Reliable GPS and satellite communications are important to everyone in America and drives much of our Nation's economy. We should not sacrifice GPS reliability. In the event the petitions for reconsideration are not successful--I can't imagine they would not be because almost every bureaucracy in most of the private sector are behind these. This is happening all over the country. But in the event that the petitions for reconsideration are not successful, I have introduced legislation, and I won't give you the name of that because it is one of these things where there are too many words involved. We refer to it as the RETAIN Act to protect the users of GPS when, by approving the Ligado order, the FCC did not.

Just last week, companion legislation was passed by the House of Representatives, by Jim Cooper, Mike Turner, Frank Lucas, GT Thompson, Ken Calvert, Nydia Velazquez, Abigail Spanberger, and Don Beyer. They introduced companion legislation to that legislation that we are currently introducing.

As of last week, we had more than 100 organizations who have signed a letter supporting the RETAIN GPS Act to hold Ligado accountable for the interference that they cause.

Clearly, the momentum is with us and the letter from Secretary Raimondo I announced earlier is a great example of that. Clearly, today's announcement is a big step for the good guys

Let me make sure people understand what we are talking about. We are talking about those who are responsible--that is Ligado--for the use of that spectrum, if and when, as most people are predicting, it does something that damages the GPS system. We are talking about the system that every user in America uses--that if they do that, then they have to pay for it. That is all. They have to pay for it rather than have the public pay for it.

Now, that is really the end of what I am trying to get across to people how serious this is.

I want to put down in the Record all the agencies that are strongly supporting this. We have the Department of the Army, Department of Defense, Department of the Air Force, Department of the Navy, Department of Commerce, NASA, Department of Interior, Department of Justice, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Energy, National Science Foundation, Department of Transportation, U.S. Coast Guard, and the Federal Aviation Administration.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that, at the conclusion of my remarks, these organizations be printed in the Record.

I would add to that group the NTIA, which represents a lot of government in addition to what I just read. I would like to add the names--I have a list here of well over 100--talking about Aerospace Association, Agricultural interests, the American Farm Bureau, all of these--virtually every recognizable organization in America is among the 105 organizations that are supporting this.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this letter also be printed in the Record

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, let me thank my friend for recognizing me for something that I consider to be and that he considers to be and the rest of the Senate considers to be very significant.

Our hearts are very heavy today because, like so many of my colleagues, I am mourning the death of my dearest friend, Senator Mike Enzi of Wyoming. I say ``dearest friend'' because he is.

Mike Enzi was the quiet leader in the Senate. There aren't too many quiet leaders in the Senate. And when he talked, everyone listened, and that is a rare quality in a Senator. He was humble.

Now, other than his humility, we had a lot in common. We were both businessmen before getting into politics, and we had that in common. We were both mayors of major cities. We had that in common. We were elected to the Senate within just about the same time. Just a very short time after the first, the second came along. So we had a lot in common.

Something people might not know about Mike is that he had a heart for the downtrodden. He helped people that no one else helped. I mean, that is unusual. And the thing is, nobody knew that, just a handful of people who were with him.

One of the places where I spent a lot of time with him, as a couple of other Members, John Boozman from Arkansas and Mike Rounds from South Dakota, and others--we were with him in some of these places where no one else really knew what he was doing. Some people might not know about Mike that he had a heart for the downtrodden, to help people that no one else would help.

And I spent this morning reminiscing with friends of mine from all over the world who were calling up. Most of them are in different time zones, and they found out about Mike's death later on. And that put us in a position where we were talking to old friends that Mike and we had in common, and that happened most of the night. And the stories came from all over the world.

I think, over the coming days and weeks, America is going to learn a lot more about Mike Enzi. The only reason they never knew it before was because he was humble, but you will see that he had a hidden impact on people. He had an impact on people that resonated for long periods of time, for years. He deserved enormous credit for his lifetime of service but accepted none.

We both have a heart for Africa and traveled there often, whether to promote our work that we were doing officially or the great partnerships, or for Mike to see the implementation of PEPFAR.

And I say this because, if you were to single out one bill that helped more people than any other bill, likely, arguably, in the U.S. Senate, it would be PEPFAR. You know, Mike was the leading architect of PEPFAR when AIDS was running rage across the globe.

We all remember that. Everywhere we looked, the people were contracted with AIDS, especially in underserved places like Africa, and it was time for the United States to step up. President George W. Bush was committed to whatever funds it might require.

Keep in mind that this, arguably, was the most significant, heartwarming thing that had ever happened in the Senate. So George W. Bush said: We will come with any funds that might be required.

The job of the Senate was to structure the way the money was to be spent, but we needed someone to lead it. And that was what the President at that time said.

Well, the majority leader at that time--at that time, the Republicans were in the majority. So we had the majority leader in the Senate at that time, who was Dr. Bill Frist of Tennessee. We remember him, the fine job that he did.

I remember him looking over at the assembled Members of our caucus and thinking--because he told me this afterwards--he was thinking: Millions of lives are at stake. Who do I entrust with this job? Millions of lives are at stake. Who do I entrust with this job? His answer was: Mike Enzi, the shoe salesman from Gillette.

That bill, PEPFAR, is one of the greatest, most generous, most effective bills passed in my lifetime and the most significant piece of legislation ever for the continent of Africa. It was Mike Enzi's skill, toughness, compassion, and determination that got it done and kept it on track for a decade.

Millions of lives have been saved. Millions of lives have been saved as a result of that one mission of Mike Enzi.

Mike had a story he would tell about his approach to tough problems. I have heard this probably 50 times over the years, but I still wish I could hear it and hear him tell it one more time. I will try to do it justice.

Mike was in South Africa. By the way, this thing that happened to him down there was something that changed his whole mission of prayer. He was with Paul. I can't tell you what Paul's last name was. Mike couldn't tell us what Paul's last name was. But he was a leader in South Africa. On one of his first visits, Mike asked Paul what he could do for him. Paul asked Mike to pray, and Mike said he would pray for solutions.

The way Mike told it, Paul leapt up and slammed his fist on the table and exclaimed: No. He said: We pray for people, and then the issues will solve themselves. Pray for the people.

See, this is what changed his whole prayer behavior until his death. Mike took that to heart and truly lived it. He kept the people as his focus, knowing that by doing so, the solutions would follow. Throughout his trips, he was always there. He was always there. When we couldn't find Mike, he would be with the kids, with kids who had problems.

In Tanzania, one of the--the first call I got this morning was from Lazaro. He is from Tanzania. He was first to express his condolences about Mike.

Then the second call that I got--the first call was from the Congo. They started a prayer breakfast there, where he brought together political enemies, and that is still going on. So Mike had started a prayer breakfast in the Republic of the Congo, in a place where it is still going on today.

Uganda--another one. He went up to northern Uganda. We were together at that time. We went with him to see the devastation of Joseph Kony and the LRA. The people in this Chamber know about the LRA, the Lord's Resistance Army. And it was Joseph Kony. Remember Joseph Kony? He would be the guy who would go and take the kids out of the villages and teach them to shoot and kill people. I am talking about 10-year-old kids, 11- year-old kids. If they didn't learn, they had to go back to their village and murder their parents. It was something that went on for a long period of time.

This is Mike. Both of them were here in both of these pictures. The top one is that area in northern Uganda where all that was taking place, where Joseph Kony was going through these horrible things

Diana was there. Diana is with one of the nuns who was there at that time.

The next picture down there--where is that one? That is also Uganda. Yes, that was also Uganda. Those little kids were nearing the age where they would be captured and sent, and he was able to stop that.

Ethiopia, Yetabon. Yetabon was a place where we had a loved one, someone we really cared a lot for. She did so much for poor people. Yetabon was a place where they would go up and teach people, this very charitable group did.

We used to call Mike the socks and shoes man. He was a shoe salesman. That is how he started out, as a shoe salesman. He somehow got a hold of more shoes and soccer balls to take to places in needy areas, primarily in Africa. So that is where we spent time with him.

Rwanda. The next picture you have--this has the President of Rwanda and his wife Jeannette, and here is Jeannette down here with his wife. It was something that we all loved. In fact, we had the wives there, four Members of the Senate, who were there with us at that time. This is more of the things we just did together.

In Kenya, a very similar thing happened.

This is another thing that is taking place today. In Kenya, we went to the National Prayer Breakfast. That was 6 or 7 years ago. We were there, and we had played a part in that National Prayer Breakfast. But at the time, there had been a guy named Kenyatta, who was President of Kenya, and Odinga. Odinga and Kenyatta were bitter enemies, and they talked about killing each other. They actually tried several times. But Mike made a statement there, with 4,000 witnesses in Kenya, and told a story about love and how these people had loved these two members when their Parliaments were together many years ago, that they loved each other, and invited them to come up and to embrace, and they did that. That was between two groups of people headed up by Kenyatta and Odinga, and they became, right at that point, friends for life. Today, they are still friends. Kenyatta is retiring, and Odinga most likely will be elected to be his successor. Now, that was years ago when that happened.

Western Sahara. Right now, we are fighting this thing. We are very much on the side of the Western Sahara in the fight.

The picture you are looking at, I think, is a picture of President Ghali. President Ghali, yes. Wherever we went, we would also see--Mike would disappear. These are the only two he could find in that area who were from his State. But nonetheless, there he is with the leader, the President of that country.

John Kufuor--the same thing happened. John Kufuor--it is kind of funny because if you go to Ghana--and not to be confused with Uganda-- but in Ghana, it is funny because there are more people there, more Jesus people there than anywhere else. So he named a stand--to help some people there, he called it Jesus for Jesus. That was Mike Enzi.

Malawi. He started a prayer group in Malawi. The young parliamentarians on this early visit--Lazarus was one of the original members and is now President of Malawi. Now, we are getting a bit old now, but this happened a long time ago. He was close with him, and that is another call that we got early this morning.

There are probably half a dozen other countries in Africa we visited together and a dozen or so outside of the continent. No matter how difficult the trip was, whether he was getting left in Kosovo, which actually happened--he was with a bunch of kids in Kosovo, and we miscounted our passengers and left him in Kosovo and had to go back and get him. But no matter how difficult the trip was by the codel, leading to a new term called ``getting Enzi'd''--so that is a new term that we use here in the U.S. Senate. If you are late someplace and you get left alone, you are ``getting Enzi'd''; or in Uganda when the ceiling in his hotel room fell on him when he was sleeping. He was always there no matter how tough things were.

It was more than the policy for Mike; he also loved people--I mean all people. We couldn't go anywhere without him packing hundreds of soccer balls and shoes to give away to kids.

Now, how it happened, soccer balls and shoes--I don't know how many thousands of soccer balls and shoes that he had distributed to these kids, but one thing they all had in common: They were all barefoot when they started.

One of the things that we attributed to him because it was one of his favorite proverbs, Proverbs 31:8-9--this actually is not by Solomon; this is by someone a lot of people haven't heard of. It was King Lemuel. ``Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy.'' That was the impact that Mike had on everyone.

He and Diana also regularly hosted parties for Capitol staff. This is kind of interesting because we are used to parties around here. There are lots of parties to go to. Every night, there are parties and all that, but not Mike's parties. Mike's parties were for the people, for the staff. They were for the people you didn't see every day. You would see them every day, but you would never give appreciation to them: the cleaning staff, food service, electricians, and others. These are the people he invited, and he and his wife would do together, would hold these parties for them. Diana enjoyed it just as much as Mike did. He loved those parties.

He also loved talking about how, during one of them, he was talking to an electrician in the Capitol, some guy who was working as an electrician in the Capitol, who kept the place going every day--we understand that--and then the man turned to him after they had talked for a long period of time. Mike had asked him what an electrician does around the Capitol and all

that. When he got all through, he looked at Mike and said: Well, Mike, what do you do? So that was Mike. He never wanted attention from anyone. He always laughed about that story. That was good

Now, we are talking today about how much of a team Mike and Diana were and how well they complemented each other. She was saying how much fun they were to be with because they truly enjoyed everything that they did. As Kay put it--my wife--she said: They both looked for ways to help people. While Mike was steadfast and intentional, Diana was a whirlwind of energy that brought the vision to life.

You know, Kay and Mike were also both members of the Zipper Club--I bet you guys don't know what the Zipper Club was--because they both had their heart valves replaced about the same time. My wife used a cow valve, and Mike used a mechanical valve. Diana would always tell Kay that she could hear Mike's valve rattling at night. So Kay always told him that he should have had it done with a cow valve.

You know, these are very important subjects we are talking about here. But they are things that make memories. That is really who he is and who he was.

Mike never missed our weekly Senate Prayer Breakfasts, where he was a leader for many years. He even had a card with all 100 Senators--that is all the Senators who are here in this room right now--all 100 Senators, and he divided 100 Senators up into 5 groups. So he would pray for 20 Senators each day.

One time when he was leading the Prayer Breakfast, he invited King Abdullah from Jordan to join us. In fact, King Abdullah was here last week, and I shared this story with him because he was always a little nervous about what he was going to say. The Lord gave him a verse, and it was an excellent example of prayer uniting those different faiths. We are talking about the Muslims and Mike Enzi. So King Abdullah paid homage to him, saying he should have been there again.

Even after he retired from the Senate, he joined us every week and virtually for prayer and discussion and fellowship. Tomorrow's breakfast will not be the same because he retired from the Senate just a few months ago, but he attended every one of our Prayer Breakfasts virtually. So, as Mike Rounds said, I got to know Mike on a deeper level each week. But more than anything else, bigger than any other accomplishment, was Mike's love for his family.

Mike was utterly devoted to his family for more than 50 years: Diana; the three children, Amy, Emily, and Brad; and their grandchildren. Come to think of it, Mike's favorite topics were Jesus, the family, and fishing.

Now, you might think that trout fishing wouldn't be anyone's favorite thing to do if they are a Member of the Senate. But he would travel around. There is not a lot of people but a lot of land in Wyoming. One of the problems he would have, his staff would tell me, was that they would line up something he was supposed to be doing in another part of the State, but he would go across the creek someplace, and he would get out and, if he was catching fish, he would completely forget about where he was going to go. And the staffs don't enjoy that type of thing.

Nonetheless, that is what he did. He knew how to fly-fish. In fact, one of the things we were anticipating from Mike and Diana was that Kay and I spent a lot of time--people don't realize that in the State of Oklahoma we have more miles of freshwater shoreline than in any of the 50 States. Do you believe that? Yes, it is true. Nonetheless, he loved to fish.

One of the things they were going to do when they retired, Mike and Diana, was that they were planning to travel Route 66 and go all the way across. Well, the cabin we have in Lake Texoma, OK, is right on Route 66. So they were planning to come and join us.

Kay and I join the entire Enzi family together in their grief and in celebrating the remarkable life of a true servant leader, Mike Enzi. And all we say is: Mike, we will see you soon.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I complete my remarks before the vote is called.