Floor Statements

Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask that it stand adjourned under the previous order.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, in his inaugural address yesterday, President Trump spoke of his confidence in America. He spoke of the country's future: prosperity, security, strength. And I share the President's confidence and his optimism about what we can accomplish in the coming years.

President Trump has brought a new direction to Washington, and yesterday marked the beginning of a new era.

Here in the Senate, we have begun the process of confirming the President's Cabinet. Within hours of President Trump taking office, we confirmed the first of his Cabinet nominees--Marco Rubio to be Secretary of State--in a unanimous vote.

Secretary Rubio demonstrated his command of foreign policy last week at his confirmation hearing. He made it clear that under his leadership, the State Department will be focused on its core mission.

In his own words, that mission is ``to promote peace abroad, and security and prosperity here at home.''

Gone are the days of a foreign policy exporting progressive ideologies, appeasing our adversaries, and demonstrating weakness on the world stage. The State Department is back in the business of advancing America's interests.

This is a welcome change in direction to our foreign policy, and Secretary Rubio is ready to hit the ground running. During his time in the Senate, he was a leading voice, articulating America's role in the world, and he has a clear command of the issues facing the world today.

As a Senator, he was vocal about the threat the Chinese Communist Party poses and the stakes of the competition between the United States and China. He recognizes the need for American leadership in Latin America to promote democracy and justice.

And he is clear-eyed about the threats that America faces from other countries as well as from nonstate actors.

I look forward to working with Secretary Rubio and the Trump administration to restore American strength abroad and promote peace and prosperity here at home.

In the coming days, the Senate will hold additional votes on the President's national security team. We expect a vote on the nomination of John Ratcliffe to be Director of the CIA later today. Mr. Ratcliffe, like Secretary Rubio, earned bipartisan support after his confirmation hearing last week.

He was reported out of the Intelligence Committee with a bipartisan vote yesterday, and he will bring valuable knowledge and experience to his new post, including from his time on the House Intelligence Committee and as Director of National Intelligence in the first Trump administration.

Under the Biden administration, the intelligence community made some notable misses. In 2021, the intelligence community failed to anticipate the swift collapse of Afghanistan in response to President Biden's decision to go ahead with the withdrawal, a withdrawal that cost the lives of 13 American servicemembers.

In 2022, the intelligence community warned that Ukraine would fall in days in the face of a Russian attack. Yet Kyiv is still firmly in Ukrainian hands almost 3 years later.

And in 2023, Hamas's October 7 attack on Israel took place with little or no warning from the intelligence community. And unfortunately, the list goes on. We need a return to fundamentals.

Last week, in his confirmation hearing, Mr. Ratcliffe promised to return to the CIA's core mission. That means recruiting spies to collect intelligence and providing objective intelligence analysis without bias.

Mr. Ratcliffe brings the right experience and the right approach to the CIA, and I look forward to working with him in this position.

Republican Senators-Elect

Mr. President, before I close, I want to say a word about two new Senators who will take office later today. I am very pleased to welcome Ashley Moody of Florida and John Husted of Ohio to the U.S. Senate. Ashley Moody began her career as a lawyer in private practice, and in all the spare time that a young lawyer has, she volunteered to help domestic violence victims seeking protection in court.

At the age of 31, after already practicing at a law firm and as a Federal prosecutor, she became the youngest judge in the State of Florida. During her time as a judge, she recruited volunteer attorneys to stand with children whose parents did not appear in court with them and developed a mentoring program for at-risk youth.

In 2018, she was elected attorney general in Florida, a post from which she held the Biden administration accountable and defended Florida law. And now, she is bringing her energy and experience here to the U.S. Senate.

Being sworn in alongside Ashley Moody today will be Jon Husted, Ohio's new Senator. ``Senator'' is just the latest title that Ohioans have called Jon Husted. He has been a State representative, speaker of the statehouse, a State senator, secretary of state for Ohio, Lieutenant Governor, and now U.S. Senator.

No matter his title, Ohioans know that they can depend on Jon Husted to fight for a smaller and more efficient government that genuinely serves its citizens. And I am very pleased to welcome him here to the Senate.

Both our new Senators bring valuable experience, expertise, and perspective to the Senate Republican majority. And the whole Senate will benefit from their joining our ranks. I look forward to working with them.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I was listening to the chair of the Intelligence Committee just a moment ago talking about this nominee, and I was curious.

I ask the Senator from Arkansas, the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, what was the vote coming out of committee for Mr. Ratcliffe?

OK. So 14 to 3 coming out of committee, and we have now wasted a whole day where we could have been acting on that nomination.

So, really, I think the question before the Senate is, Do we want to vote on these folks on Tuesday or vote on them on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday? Because that is what we are going to do. This can be easy or this can be hard.

This is a nominee that came out of the Intelligence Committee 14 to 3. It is a bipartisan nomination to the Central Intelligence Agency. This is about America's national security interests, and we are stalling.

So that is not going to happen. We are going to file cloture on him. You can force us to hang around here, and we can vote on these things Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. But we are going to vote on him.

This one shouldn't be hard, folks. I understand there are some that are going to draw some opposition from the other side of the aisle. But Democrats and Republicans, in a very big bipartisan fashion, agree that he is very qualified for this job that is an important job to America's national security interests. And, frankly, I believe, we ought to fill it as soon as we possibly can. So it is going to be a big vote here on the floor.

Everything we are doing right now is just stalling. I don't know what that accomplishes for you, but we are going to be here voting on it.

Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 1.

Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. President, I move to proceed to legislative session.

Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 3.

Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. President, I move to proceed to legislative session.

Mr. President, I move to proceed to executive session to consider Calendar No. 4.

Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to resume legislative session.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. President, I further ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 11 a.m. on Wednesday, January 22; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and the Senate resume consideration of the motion to proceed to Calendar No. 4, S. 6; finally, that the Senate vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to Calendar No. 4, S. 6 at 2:30 p.m.

Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask that it stand adjourned under the previous order.