Floor Statements

Mr. President, now, some of my staff can do their work from the relative peace and quiet of the office, but the last two folks I would like to thank today are dug in on the frontlines.

First, my deputy press secretary, Jerry Calengor. As some of our colleagues may recall, I have had good luck in the past hiring sharp communicators from the State of Minnesota. It must be something in one of those lakes.

Serious pride in his roots, along with a wicked sense of humor, helped him hit the ground running in the busy bullpen where much of this team spends their days. He wasted no time becoming an essential member of the research team, particularly when it came to carefully vetting nominations.

But it didn't take long to recognize Jerry's aptitude for dealing with the press more directly, and I am proud of the way Jerry has grown as a trusted adviser I turn to as I prepare for interviews, including our weekly stakeout. Appropriately, he still keeps an old hockey helmet at his desk for days when the incoming barrage from the press corps is especially thick.

Jerry is fortunate that his wife Grace tolerates this rough-and- tumble day job. As I understand it, she was willing to road-trip back from their wedding so he could be in the office for a busy Monday.

On top of it all, Jerry is responsible for taking a last careful look at just about every public statement and press release I make, and then making sure people actually see them. I am grateful to have his good judgment and eagle eye double-check our work.

So, Jerry, thank you.

Mr. President, finally, to folks around the Senate--or Twitter, as I understand--this last one needs no introduction: my trusted press secretary, Doug Andres. Doug is,

without a doubt, the most skilled navigator of the Capitol Hill press corps a Senator could hope for.

I hired him specifically for his reputation as an unmatched flack. Over his years in the Speaker's office, he had already tilted successfully with the House and executive branch press corps, and I had a feeling he would do the same here in the Senate. Boy, was I right. It may have something to do with his disarming, deadpan wit. It certainly helps that Doug is the kind of guy everyone wants to be friends with outside of work.

Whatever the reason, Doug has got an uncanny nose for news. He is consistently able to predict stories that are still miles off and around the bend. Frankly, I shudder to think how many headaches he could create for the rest of us if he wanted to switch sides.

For now, there is only one thing I ever worry could distract Doug from his duties as my early warning system with the press, and that is his growing role as ringleader of a group of prominent figures who actually share his name. We had a Doug running for President earlier this year, and another one is the Second Gentleman. But there is no doubt that the heart and soul of the ``Doug Caucus'' is right here in the Senate, and I know my entire team sleeps safer with Doug on the job.

So, Doug, thank you for everything.

Mr. President, I will need another few speeches to adequately thank the whole team around me in the leader's office for all of their outstanding work--work that is not nearly finished. It is a great problem to have, and I will have much more to say soon.

Mr. President, 23 years ago today, forces of evil brought their war on the United States to American soil. They filled a clear blue sky with smoke, fire, and the shattered lives of 2,977 innocent people.

Before the dust had settled, the world witnessed the extraordinary heroism of first responders, the compassion of neighbors and volunteers, and the will of a proud nation not to let this savagery go unanswered.

The terrorists had started this war, but America resolved to finish it. At times, that resolve has wavered. Over the years since September 11, 2001, I have counseled administrations of both parties not to shortchange, hamstring, or abandon our fight against the terrorists or let up on the adversaries who support them. I have urged colleagues in Congress not to make the job of the warfighter harder by taking essential counterterrorism authorities off the table, and I will continue to do so as our colleagues consider our recent vote on section 702 and the one we will take in less than 2 years to further extend this vital intelligence collection authority.

The Biden-Harris administration pretends the War on Terrorism is over. The Vice President herself claimed last night that ``there is not one member of the United States military who is in active duty in a combat zone . . . [for] the first time this century.''

Well, this, of course, would be news to U.S. servicemembers who conducted operations against ISIS in Iraq last week and to the sailors intercepting Houthi rockets in the Red Sea and to the families of servicemembers killed and injured in the attack on Tower 22 near Jordan's border with Syria earlier this year.

Our current Commander in Chief and the Biden-Harris administration are not the first to chase the tail of shutting down terrorist detention at Guantanamo Bay. They are not the first to indulge in the idea of a pivot away from a region full of important U.S. interests. They are not the first to suggest that America gets to decide unilaterally when threats from Afghanistan end, but they were the ones who

followed through with the disastrous retreat that torched American credibility and left 13 servicemembers dead.

The administration pinned its hopes on the mistaken idea that because the U.S.-led coalition had made tremendous progress in keeping terrorist threats under control, we could continue to do so from over the horizon. So how is that going? Despite assurances from the Secretary of Defense that over-the-horizon operations would not suffer from a lack of human intelligence after the U.S. withdrawal, the administration hasn't conducted a single strike--not one--against ISIS- K, the terrorists responsible for the Abbey Gate bombing, among other atrocities, since 2001. Of course, that is not because the terrorists have been quiet. In fact, by one analysis this year, ISIS-K planned 21 external plots or attacks in 9 countries in the previous 12 months alone, compared to just 3 between 2018 and the spring of 2022.

The ODNI annual threat assessment was forced to acknowledge that ``terrorists will maintain an interest in conducting attacks . . . against U.S. persons, allies, and interests worldwide.'' Indeed, America's retreat from Afghanistan has invited violence elsewhere, from the resurgence of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, to the AQAP in Yemen, to al-Qaida affiliates across the Sahel. And then there is Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah and the Houthis and Iraqi terrorist groups, all of whom have been trained and equipped, aided and abetted, by the world's most active state sponsor of terror--Iran.

Hamas's attack on October 7 is described as Israel's September 11. Relative to population, it was actually September 11 15 times over. It was the deadliest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust, and it wouldn't have been possible without the involvement of Tehran.

The chaos stemming from this genocidal assault and the violent choreography by the IRGC of attacks on Israel and U.S. interests across the region are evidence of the failure of this administration's passive, accommodating approach to Iran and its terrorist proxies.

America's weakness and hesitation will not deter our adversaries. Withholding critical assistance from partners on the frontlines will not defeat them. This is true in Israel just as it is true in Ukraine.

There is no doubt that allies, partners, and adversaries in Asia and elsewhere are watching a tentative America pull its punches. They are questioning our resolve and our commitment to our friends.

If we are unwilling to change Iran's calculus and compel an end to attacks on American forces in Iraq and Syria or international vessels on the high seas and if we are unwilling to stand with partners like Israel or Ukraine, can we be trusted to stand up to the PRC?

Twenty-three years ago, a dangerous world struck America here at home. We must not wait for today's threats to do the same.

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

Mr. President, as students head back to school, college campuses across the country are hoping this academic year begins more calmly than the last one ended.

Back in May, the tantrums of campus radicals made some elite schools so inhospitable to learning, particularly for Jewish students, that administrators were driven to cancel commencement ceremonies. Since then, Columbia University's president has resigned, along with three deans who were put on notice for anti-Semitic comments made about a panel on Jewish life on campus back in May.

These are, of course, steps in the right direction for an Ivy League institution that professes--professes--a commitment to ``thoughtful, rigorous debate'' and a campus culture ``free of bigotry, intimidation, and harassment,'' but Columbia and other universities have a great deal of work still to do to earn back the trust of students, parents, and alumni alike.

Other recent personnel decisions actually inspire less confidence. Remember, for example, the Columbia doctoral student who served as the unofficial spokesperson of the violent Hamasnik mob that forcefully occupied a campus building? In between her studies of Marxist poetry, she demanded that campus officials provide the trespassers with food and water. Months later, she is now scheduled to teach a required course for undergraduates on nothing less than contemporary Western civilization.

So the decline in the Ivy League's academic rigor is well-documented, but it would seem that, at a bare minimum, its instructors ought to be able to distinguish between civilization and barbarism and to act accordingly. A survey conducted over the summer by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression found that 72 percent of college students agreed that, in at least rare circumstances, it could be acceptable for students to have an encampment as part of a campus protest, and more than one-third agree that it would be acceptable to deface school property.

I have to wonder whether a survey of the parents of college students or, for that matter, the campus staff who clean up their misbehavior, wouldn't paint a different picture.

Unfortunately, what used to be a reliable path to the middle class appears to have turned into a breeding ground for childish radicalism. Fortunately, this radicalism may begin to face limits to its own upward mobility.

Earlier this year, over a dozen Federal judges described Columbia as an ``incubator of bigotry''; declared that they had ``lost confidence in Columbia as an institution of higher education''; and announced that they will not hire law clerks from Columbia Law School until it undertakes serious reforms.

Predictably, this news is met with howling from liberal busybodies. In fact--get this--a State prisoner even filed an ethics complaint against a number of judges.

Apparently, the left would have the signs outside America's courthouses read: ``Hate must have a home here.''

Fortunately, Chief Judge Richman of the Fifth Circuit wasn't having it. She observed in her opinion dismissing a complaint that ``judges . . . have discretion to refuse to hire law clerks who graduated from a university that does not foster what the judges believe to be important aspects of higher education, such as viewpoint diversity and tolerance and differing viewpoints.'' Indeed.

Columbia would do well to heed these judges' warning, and their colleagues on the bench would do well to heed their example.

Meanwhile, the Biden-Harris administration hasn't skipped a beat in ensuring that taxpayer dollars go toward subsidizing the post-modern indoctrination on display in so many American towns.

Over the summer, the Supreme Court upheld a stay on the administration's SAVE plan. But the administration still won't take no for an answer, pushing forward with yet another version of student loan socialism.

Last week, the scheme hit another roadblock in Federal court.

Remember, the Penn-Wharton model has estimated that previous iterations of this scheme would have cost taxpayers tens of billions of dollars. Even left-leaning think tanks have criticized student loan socialism for the regressive nature of its beneficiaries. But the Biden-Harris administration, like the Marxists of Morningside Heights, keep coming back for more.

Madam President, on an entirely different matter, I would like to welcome everyone back from the August State work period. Hearing from the people we represent is what allows us to be effective here. So I know our colleagues will agree that the time we spent back home last month was particularly valuable.

Unsurprisingly, the issues I heard about across Kentucky are familiar to millions of American families. In Daviess County, I heard about how small family farms are struggling to stay afloat amid rising costs.

Of course, historic inflation hasn't just hit our Nation's growers and producers. From Pikeville to Hopkinsville, job creators and working families are bearing the brunt of the Biden-Harris administration's reckless spending.

I also heard from Kentucky farmers who are waiting for Congress to act on the farm bill--legislation for which the Democratic majority has yet to secure a single minute of floor time.

In my hometown of Louisville, I spoke with legislators about the regulatory costs that are crippling State leaders and Main Street alike. Today, navigating the maze of redtape from Washington nearly requires a black belt in bureaucratic politics.

And, finally, I heard from Kentucky's brave servicemembers as we celebrated the first newly renovated barracks facility to open at Fort Campbell.

I was proud to work with Army leaders to modernize 11 barracks that have stood untouched for nearly half a century. In just one year, we accomplished what would have taken close to a decade to finish.

As I have said time and time again, rebuilding American hard power starts here at home in projects just like this, modernizing our capabilities, rebuilding the arsenal of democracy, and equipping America's servicemembers to keep us safe.

Madam President, I need to begin today by addressing a shooting that took place along I-75 in southeastern Kentucky this past weekend. My office is in close contact with local law enforcement as their search for the perpetrator continues.

Elaine and I are grateful for their swift efforts to protect the surrounding communities, and we are holding those who were injured in this senseless violence in our prayers.

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

I ask unanimous consent I be permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes prior to the scheduled rollcall vote.

Mr. President, today, as the Senate prepares to leave town for the August State work period, the Democratic leader has decided to squeeze in one more vote that isn't ready for prime time. To our colleagues on the Finance Committee--and to anyone paying attention in recent months--it has been clear that the Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act that Chairman Wyden wrote with the House needed some serious revisions in order to earn 60 votes here in the Senate.

We don't need a vote today to tell us that is still the case. Colleagues on this side of the aisle have serious unresolved concerns. They don't like how more than 90 percent of the supposed benefits of the bill, as written, come as a $30 billion expansion of cash welfare, instead of relief for working taxpayers.

They are concerned about how it would weaken the work requirements tied to those benefits under current law. For a bill with the potential to so seriously impact working Americans, one might expect its proponents to engage seriously on resolving obstacles to bipartisan support.

You might have expected the chairman of the Finance Committee or the Democratic leader to provide regular order, to schedule a markup, to give this bill a shot at actually passing the Senate, but, alas, you would be wrong. Of course, months without progress on

this front aren't for lack of effort from Ranking Member Crapo, and I am grateful for his dedication to addressing Republican concerns.

Today's vote doesn't seem to be intended to produce a legislative outcome. In fact, the Democratic leader himself admitted this week that even losing the vote would still be a political benefit for vulnerable Senate Democrats running for reelection. Well, I am not so certain the American people are impressed by message votes, and I don't think they give out points for incomplete work.

Mr. President, on a different matter, today, the Appropriations Committee is considering defense funding for the coming year. From the outset, colleagues who take seriously our obligation to provide for the common defense knew that they had their work cut out for them.

This spring, the President sent down a fourth straight defense request that would cut funding for the national defense after inflation. The request was grossly insufficient when it went to print; it is even more so today.

Then, this summer brought our closest allies and partners here to Washington, underscoring the importance of American leadership by example.

Just a few days ago, a final report of the Commission on the National Defense Strategy put an even finer point on the stakes of the growing and interconnected threats to our national security. As I discussed earlier this week, the bipartisan expert panel behind the report delivered a grave warning. Here is more of what they said:

The U.S. military lacks both the capabilities and the

capacity required to be competent it can deter and prevail in

combat.

The American public have been--again, according to the report-- ``inadequately informed by government leaders of the threats to U.S. interests--including to people's everyday lives--and what will be required to restore American global power and leadership.''

They went on further:

Very little progress will be possible without Congress,

where a relatively small number of elected officials have

imposed continual political gamesmanship over a thoughtful

and responsible legislating and oversight.

Goodness.

It is past time to prioritize our national security. It is totally obvious to all of us that this needs to begin. Just take the pacing threat from China, for example. Plenty of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle like to talk about outcompeting the PRC, but not as many seem to recognize that winning this competition, preserving American primacy, and protecting America's interest are first and foremost about investing in hard power.

As the Commission put it, China has ``largely negated the U.S. military advantage in the Western Pacific through two decades of focused military investment. Without significant change by the United States, the balance of power will continue to shift in China's favor.''

But the vast majority of supposed counter-China policies that folks in Washington like to talk about won't do much to arrest this shift, and neither will pretending that the pacing threat is the only threat we face. It is naive to believe we can ignore or assume away threats in other regions.

Anyone who believes our security and prosperity don't require urgent investments in hard power, in alliances and partnerships, and in our defense industrial base clearly doesn't know what they are talking about.

So I am grateful to my friend Vice Chair Collins and to colleagues on the Appropriations Committee, who recognize the urgency of the task in front of us, for fighting hard to negate as much of the President's real-dollar cut to national defense as they could. The bill in committee right now exceeds the President's request by nearly $19 billion. This is less than the additional $25 billion authorized by the Armed Services Committee.

Senate Democrats refused to spend more on defense without adding funding for nondefense discretionary programs. However, thanks to our colleagues' efforts, this bill secures crucial steps forward on a number of urgent priorities.

The bill includes the largest ever appropriation for shipbuilding, with hundreds of millions in new resources for growing and retaining the critical shipbuilding industrial base.

It tackles maintenance backlogs head-on and invests in enough spare components to bring 500 more aircraft to full readiness than the President's request accounts for. It goes $3 billion beyond his request for overdue investments in expanding the defense industrial base and provides for modernizing ammunition and vehicle production facilities, from Iowa and Missouri to Ohio and Tennessee.

It delivers important downpayments on critical munitions, from the long-range and precision strike capabilities needed in the Indo-Pacific to the naval interceptors required to defend U.S. personnel and global commerce from terrorist attacks in the Red Sea.

But let's be absolutely clear. When it comes to rebuilding our stockpiles and preparing our Armed Forces to deter and defeat threats, there is much, much more work to be done. There is no serious reading of post-World War II history that doesn't trace the preservation of Western peace or the growth of American prosperity to an order underpinned by American strength.

The U.S. military is the reason our neighbors back home sleep in peace. It is the reason our communities reap the benefits of global trade. It is the weight behind our leader's words. We cannot afford to shortchange it, and I cannot make the stakes of the task before us any more clear.

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

Madam President, it has been less than 2 weeks since

President Biden's name was removed from the Democratic Party's ticket. I have already spoken about how the effort to sideline Democrats' de facto nominee robbed primary voters of their role in the electoral process.

Now, as the dust settles, more and more Americans are realizing this wasn't just a process foul, it was also a massive promotion for someone with a failing record in her current job.

Remember, just 2 months into their term, the President asked the Vice President--gave her the task of getting to the bottom of the surging illegal immigration at the United States-Mexico border. He called her ``the most qualified person'' to lead on this issue.

So why don't we take a look at how she did. In the past 3\1/2\ years, the crisis at our southern border has made history. Border Patrol agents have recorded over 9.9 million illegal encounters. We know that nearly 2 million more have literally gotten away, and the administration's catch-and-release policies have let in over 3 million without any credible means of enforcing immigration law.

What rapidly became a humanitarian crisis on Vice President Harris's watch is also a national security vulnerability of alarming proportions. Since October 2021, CBP have encountered 539 individuals on the Terror Watchlist along the southern border.

The failure is vast. The facts are shocking. The numbers are staggering. But for too many American families, there is only one number that matters: the one empty chair at the dinner table.

For some families, that chair is empty because an illegal immigrant killed their loved one. For many more, it is empty because Chinese manufacturers and Mexican cartels have exploited the chaos at the border and made fentanyl the leading cause of death for American adults.

And yet--yet--in the face of pain and suffering, the administration's point person on the border has approached this crisis with profound unseriousness. It took the Vice President months to get around to visiting the border. When asked why she hadn't made time to see the effects of the administration's open border policies firsthand, she quipped that she had not been to Europe either.

Sometimes, instead of deflection, she has employed outright denial. For example, she said:

We have a secure border.

Another example:

[E]verything . . . is going rather smoothly.

Of course, years earlier, under an administration that took border security seriously, then-Senator Harris found plenty of time to elaborate on her aversion to that commonsense policy.

In 2017, when a Federal judge blocked the previous administration's effort to deny Federal funding to sanctuary cities, she reacted as follows:

It's fantastic, I'm jumping up and down. Put five

exclamation points after what I just said.

Democrats are poised to nominate someone with a long record of being dead wrong on securing American borders. So perhaps it is not surprising that their immediate allies are working overtime to absolve the Vice President of responsibility for the undeniable crisis that has unfolded on her watch.

Last week, we read headlines like: ``No, Kamala Harris Is Not The `Border Czar.'''

And claims that ``the Vice President's role was more limited.''

After the short hiatus of asking tough questions about President Biden's fitness for office, the legacy media are back in the business of papering over Democratic vulnerabilities, even in this case if it means blatantly gaslighting the public.

But at the end of the day, the American people know what neglect looks like. Families missing loved ones know what this sort of catastrophic failure feels like, and in November, I expect they will have plenty to say about it.

Madam President, now on another matter, the Senate is about to leave Washington for the August State work period.

When we come back, Senate Democrats will face a daunting list of judges that the Biden-Harris administration will want them to confirm.

There is Adeel Mangi and his record of bumping elbows with terrorist apologists and advocates for cop killers.

There is Kevin Ritz and Karla Campbell, both the nepotistic beneficiaries of corrupt bargains between the Biden-Harris administration and the judges they would replace.

There is Julia Lipez, another nepotism hire, who has distinguished herself in her leniency toward a parent who killed their baby with fentanyl.

There is Embry Kidd, who went soft on sex abusers and then misled the Judiciary Committee about it.

There is Ryan Park, the self-described ``tip of the spear'' of progressive activism, who fought hard to let colleges discriminate illegally against Asian applicants.

There is Sparkle Sooknanan, whose nomination Congressman Velazquez called ``an insult to the people of Puerto Rico.''

And then there is Mustafa Kasubhai who has advocated incorporating-- listen to this--Marxist theory into property law.

So as our Democratic colleagues head out of town, I would suggest that they consider whether the radical goals of the Biden-Harris judicial project are really worth it.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.