Floor Statements

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, yesterday, the Biden administration added the Houthis to the government's terrorist list in light of the group's sustained terrorist violence against U.S. military and commercial ships in the Red Sea. It might seem like the sensible response of a clear-eyed Commander in Chief, except that Iran-backed Houthi terror isn't new. For years, this group has made no secret of its aims. Here is their motto:

God is great. Death to America. Death to Israel. Curse on

the Jews. Victory for Islam.

Why on Earth did President Biden remove the Houthis from the Terror Watchlist in the first place? And why did it take so long to admit that denying a reality of Iran-backed Houthi terror was a mistake?

It is good that the President finally mustered the fortitude to authorize strikes against the terrorists who threaten America. But just like its response to Putin's war against Ukraine, the Biden administration's response to Iran-backed terrorism has been hesitant, half-measured, and openly conflicted over the risk of escalation.

It is Iran that should fear the cost of escalation, not the United States and our allies. Iran must fear that terror against America's interests will result in military responses against its interests; that its complicity in Houthi attacks on global shipping will produce devastating economic pressure from all across the free world; that continued terrorism, whether by proxies or by Iranian personnel themselves, will be met with swift and costly retribution.

It is all well and good for President Biden to authorize yet another round of strikes against Houthi missiles, but having to do so multiple times in the span of a week is a pretty good indication that his initial effort did not exactly send the desired message to Tehran or its proxies. The world's most active state sponsor of terrorism is actually stepping up its violence against U.S. personnel in the Middle East precisely because it doesn't believe we have the resolve to respond with strength and impose serious costs.

And the chronic, compulsive effort to tie our hands only validates this assumption. It only encourages our adversaries to lash out with impunity.

We know exactly what an undeterred Iran looks like. After 3 years of the Biden administration's desperate policy of conciliation, it is what we are experiencing right now.

Regardless of which corners of our politics are willing to acknowledge it, America cannot hope to deter aggression with weakness. We need to start investing seriously in the capabilities and capacity to meet the tasks at hand. We are facing an axis of connected threats that stretch from Moscow to Beijing and Tehran to Pyongyang. Our adversaries speak the language of strength. Americans can't afford not to be fluent.

Economic Recovery

Now on another matter, this year, like last year, President Biden is still taking to the road trying to sell the American people on the wonders of Bidenomics, but working families still see right through him. On average they are spending more than $11,000 more than they were when the President took office, just to maintain the same standard of living.

Less take-home pay means less spending, and small businesses are feeling the pinch. Out in Iowa, the owner of a one-of-a-kind manufacturing operation is closing its doors after 125 years in business, and the owner says lower discretionary spending is to blame.

A mother of three in Arizona recently lamented to reporters:

It has probably been one of the worst years. It's been very

difficult for us . . . It's been difficult just buying

groceries and paying bills.

And across the country, working families sympathize. One poll last month found that just 14 percent of Americans thought that Biden's economic policies were actually--actually--helping them.

So the President can moonlight as a traveling salesman all he wants, but pretty soon he will have to face facts: Bidenomics is a dud.

Nomination of Adeel A. Mangi

Mr. President, on one final matter: Today, the Senate Judiciary Committee will decide whether to recommend a lifetime appointment for Adeel Mangi on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. Mr. Mangi's nomination is just the latest example of the Biden administration's practice of rewarding bad behavior in the personnel business.

As I explained last month, this nominee served on the board of a law school organization with an international reputation for amplifying the voices of anti-Semites and terrorist sympathizers.

As a letter from the Coalition for Jewish Values recently noted, Mr. Mangi's affiliation ``raises genuine concerns about his judgment and his commitment to American principles.'' Unfortunately, the nominee's testimony before the Judiciary Committee last month did nothing to assuage these concerns. In fact, even after claiming ignorance of this disgusting and well-documented history of the organization with which he chose to affiliate, he declined repeatedly--repeatedly--to disavow it.

It would be hard to sum up Mr. Mangi's record more succinctly than the joint statement of several other American Jewish organizations:

[He] ``repeatedly donated to [an] extreme anti-Semitic,

anti-Israel, anti-American terrorist-affiliated organization;

evaded vital questions; made improbable claims of ignorance;

[and] has no judicial record.''

At some point, the Senate has to decide that this is unbecoming of a nominee to a lifetime tenure on the Federal Bench. I would urge my colleagues on the Judiciary Committee to reject this nomination.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, over the weekend, President Biden once again refused to describe the situation at the southern border as a crisis. Apparently, according to the Commander in Chief, 10,000 illegal border crossings in a day--and the busiest month and year on record at the border--is, somehow, not a crisis.

Needless to say, I am glad that Senator Lankford and our colleagues working on meaningful border security policy don't share that view. I am glad that we may soon be able to address an urgent crisis with urgent action.

Negotiators are making headway toward the most significant border enhancements in almost 30 years. They are getting closer to delivering serious, lasting solutions to the unprecedented humanitarian and national security catastrophe that has unfolded on President Biden's watch. That is certainly good news.

Of course, our colleagues' work is also the linchpin of our broader efforts to address the national security challenges we face around the world, from Russian aggression in Europe to Iran-backed terror in Israel and the Middle East, to competition with China.

China

Mr. President, an increasingly aggressive China represents the greatest strategic challenge of the century, and recent events in the Indo-Pacific remind us exactly what is at stake. The PRC is an expansionist, revisionist, and repressive power all at the same time. It wants to impose its will on its neighbors, regardless of their views or values, just like it does at home.

Just consider the free, fair, and hotly contested elections that took place in Taiwan this past Saturday. The people of Taiwan have resisted Beijing's blatant efforts to interfere in their politics, and the PRC is clearly unhappy with the outcome of the election, which saw the DPP maintain its hold on the Presidency.

But it wasn't just the results of Taiwan's elections that the PRC views as a threat. It is also the basic process

itself. The idea of self-determination--of citizens actually getting a choice--terrifies the leaders in Beijing.

Of course, it is impossible to watch Taiwan's defiant self-expression without thinking how fragile this autonomy can be. Just remember how swiftly the PRC has acted to snuff out forces of democracy in Hong Kong.

Right now, my old friend Jimmy Lai, prolific publisher and a proud Hongkonger, is on trial. He is facing the possibility of life in prison simply for committing the crime of journalism, of seeking to publish the truth at variance with the party's definition of it.

See, the Chinese Communist Party doesn't just fear its own people. It fears the pursuit of truth. And, on both counts, Beijing finds common cause with fellow authoritarians in Moscow, Tehran, and Pyongyang. These regimes, and the would-be imperialists who lead them, understand that their most precious currency isn't truth or legitimacy, but control and fear.

The PRC subjects its citizens to extensive surveillance, censorship, and repression. And in the case of ethnic minorities like the Uighurs, Beijing has employed detention, sterilization, and outright genocide.

Beijing fears difference. It fears dissent, and not just at home. The PRC's interference in Taiwan's democracy is emblematic of the shadow of intimidation Beijing hopes to cast further across that region.

The PRC is building a military with the capacity to bend Beijing's neighbors to its will. It is putting U.S. allies like the Philippines directly in its crosshairs. It is aiming to impose direct, prohibitive cost on the United States, and it isn't pinching pennies to achieve those aims.

For more than two decades, its investments in new military equipment and capabilities have grown by an average of 10 percent per year. So it has become quite fashionable in Washington to talk about how we are not taking competition with China seriously enough.

But the resource this competition demands most urgently is not a stern lecture from a climate diplomat. What America and our allies need most in the race to outcompete our top strategic adversary and systemic rival is hard power.

At its essence, winning the competition means credibly deterring Beijing's worst impulses, which, for us, means investing in American strength. Outcompeting the PRC will require greater investment in our military capabilities and in our industrial capacity to produce them.

The West cannot be caught unprepared for this challenge. We cannot afford to neglect the lessons of history.

The Senate has opportunities ahead to demonstrate that we understand what is at stake. We will have chances to take hard power investments seriously. We need to be ready to take them.

Electric Vehicles

Mr. President, now on a related matter, the Biden administration is continuing to wage war on the affordable and reliable American energy that makes America competitive. The administration's climate policy isn't just weakening American workers and businesses; it is actually making China's economy stronger.

President Biden's EPA recently issued new emissions standards that, as several of my Republican colleagues pointed out last year, ``are so stringent they effectively mandate automakers to produce electric vehicles, even if Americans do not want them.''

The move is shockingly out of step with the needs of American consumers, the capacity of American industry, and our Nation's strategic interest. The whimsical desire for universal electric vehicles caters to the preferences of wealthy coastal liberals, but working families simply aren't buying it. The average EV on the market costs over $16,000 more than the average gas-powered car. As one automaker recently put it, the Biden administration has been ``far too focused on . . . the well-heeled one-to-two percenters . . . forgetting about the people where a car is not a luxury--it's a necessity.''

Sure enough, a $16,000 premium is more than most sensible Americans are willing to pay. Electric vehicles account for less than 8 percent of new vehicle sales in the United States. Less than 8 percent of Americans shopping for a new car are buying an EV. That, however, hasn't stopped the Biden administration from powering ahead for an absurd goal for electric vehicles to make up two-thirds of the car sales by 2032.

American businesses are not buying this nonsense either. In fact, auto dealers in Kentucky and across the Nation recently sounded alarm bells in a letter to the President. Here is what they said:

This attempted electric vehicle mandate is unrealistic

based on current and forecasted customer demand. Already,

electric vehicles are stacking up on our lots.

And just earlier this month, Hertz announced plans to sell off a third of its electric vehicle rental fleet due to sparse demand and heavy repair costs.

Meanwhile, State utilities are becoming concerned that a massive uptick of EV use could overload power grids that are already on the edge of blackouts.

Talk about a lose-lose proposition. But there is one party that stands to benefit from Washington Democrats' climate scheme, and that is the Chinese Communist Party. As I mentioned before, China controls nearly 70 percent of the supply chain for the batteries required to manufacture EVs. A Chinese automaker just became the world's top seller of electric cars.

And thanks to Washington Democrats' so-called Inflation Reduction Act, leased cars from China qualify for a major tax credit. This means hard-working Americans like the Kentuckians I represent are directly subsidizing California millionaires and the CCP all at the same time.

So it is one thing for the Biden administration's outgoing climate czar to spend his time begging China to voluntarily engage in unenforceable green diplomacy, but it is quite another for Washington Democrats to forcibly create a pipeline that pumps working Americans' tax dollars into the pockets of our biggest strategic adversary.

It is time for President Biden to choose between the American people and a leftwing dream that communist China can't wait for us to realize.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, yesterday, our Nation honored one of the most consequential lives in American history. The America in which Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., labored for change was the same America in which I grew up.

I was fortunate to be raised by parents who believed deeply in equal rights, but the scourge of segregation was not unfamiliar in the places I spent my formative years.

As I have shared with some of our colleagues before, I was especially lucky to witness one of the most climatic moments of the civil rights movement as I was a congressional intern here in Washington. I remember stepping outside my office on August 28, 1963, and taking in the enormous crowds that had flocked to participate in the March on Washington. I remember looking down toward the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial beyond.

I was too far away to hear Dr. King's immortal words with my own ears, but I was proud to be a witness to that remarkable history he wrote that day and throughout his extraordinary life.

Government Funding

Mr. President, now an entirely different matter, House and Senate negotiators worked hard and reached an agreement on top-line government funding levels for the current fiscal year, and work continues to deliver full-year appropriations through regular order. Shutting down the government, even part of it, would interrupt this important progress. That is why, today, the Senate will begin the process of passing a short-term extension of government funding to allow this work to continue.

I am grateful that the Speaker of the House was able to secure serious rollbacks on reckless spending, but it remains to be seen whether the Biden administration can get serious on its responsibility to provide for the common defense. For 3 straight years, the President has turned in budget requests with real dollar cuts to funding America's Armed Forces. Even a quick glance around the world shows how little we can afford to shortchange the men and women defending the United States and our interests. We need to take this responsibility seriously.

Iran

Mr. President, now, on another matter, 3 years ago, I warned the Biden administration that it needed to take a tougher approach to growing threats from Iran and its terrorist proxies. I warned against removing the Houthis from the Terrorist Watchlist, and I called attention to how, even then, Iran was increasing its shipments of ever deadlier and longer range weapons to the terrorists in Yemen.

But from the beginning, the administration chose to meet Iranian aggression with accommodation. The President's team operated on a profoundly naive assessment of the threat that we face. They abandoned pressure and squandered leverage in an attempt to revive a failed nuclear deal.

They hectored regional partners under attack, as if their defensive actions against Houthi terrorists had provoked these Iranian proxies in the first place. And then they trumpeted the utterly fictional successes of their approach.

Remember how the President's National Security Advisor described the state of the world last September--just last September--in an incredibly timed essay in Foreign Affairs. Just weeks before Iran- backed terrorists would slaughter 1,200 Israelis on October 7, he claimed the United States had an ``enhanced deterrence'' to deter ``further [Iranian] aggression'' and that the Middle East was ``quieter than it has been for decades.''

And 3 years in, the price of these delusions has become inescapably obvious. To the extent that President Biden sought detente with the world's most active state sponsor of terrorism, he was woefully ill- advised about the nature of the Iranian regime. To the extent that this administration ever seriously sought to deter Iran and its proxies, their efforts have demonstrably failed.

So let's be absolutely clear. The United States is capable of destroying those who threaten our allies, our interests, and American lives. A global superpower is equipped to bring enormous force to bear against its enemies. But deterrence isn't just about capabilities. It is not enough for Iran to know that America has the means to demolish its military and its network of terrorists. No. Deterrence requires that our adversaries actually believe we are willing to use these capabilities. It requires credibility. And when credibility is eroded, it is not easily restored.

It will be difficult for the Biden administration to convince Tehran and its agents that after 3 years spent scolding our partners for wanting to defend themselves from Houthi terrorist attacks, America now intends to do the same thing.

It will be difficult for the administration to convince our adversaries that, after years of bending over backwards to accommodate Iran and wringing our hands over the use of military force against its proxies, we are now prepared to respond directly against Iranian targets.

Restoring credible deterrence means identifying what our adversaries hold dear and proving we are willing to hold it at risk.

Now, I am certain, Mr. President, that there are things Tehran considers more precious than empty terrorist warehouses in Syria or Houthi radar systems in Yemen. Iran uses proxies precisely because they consider them expendable. Taking pains to avoid killing these proxies or targeting Iranian forces and interests themselves tells Tehran that its strategy is actually working.

President Biden owes it to the American people to explain how, exactly, he intends to compel Iran and its proxies to actually change their behavior.

He owes it to the Nation to start explaining how the stakes of conflict in the Middle East ripple across the world; how the challenges we face in the Red Sea, Ukraine, and the Indo-Pacific are all connected; and how the cost of failing to meet them compounds.

Unfortunately, the Biden administration is not alone in its failure to take its responsibility seriously. This afternoon, the Senate must take it upon ourselves to reject an attempt to degrade our Nation's credibility even further.

The resolution brought forward by Senator Sanders is little more than performative leftwing politics. It is not, as our colleague would suggest, about authorizing a report on aid to Israel. It is not even about human rights. It is about tying the hands of a close ally locked in a necessary battle against savage terrorists.

It is a gift to the leftwing anti-Israel activists.

So colleagues who share a concern about the plight of innocent people in Gaza should set their attention on the Hamas terrorists who orchestrate their suffering--the terrorists who take hostages, steal humanitarian aid, and use their own citizens as human shields; the terrorists who go to loathsome extremes to imperil innocent human life.

America's ally Israel takes extraordinary risks to minimize civilian casualties. Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and Iran's other proxies across the region go to extraordinary lengths to maximize senseless death. We must not confuse one for the other. The distinction here is clear and boldfaced.

Any colleague considering a vote for the Sanders resolution ought to consider what message they would like to send to America's allies and partners facing shared threats around the world and what message they would like to send our adversaries who doubt our resolve.

Israel deserves America's firm support as it roots out terrorist killers and restores its security.

Soon, the Senate will have an opportunity to make necessary investments in our capacity to support Israel and other threatened partners from Ukraine to Taiwan or the Philippines. As the threats to our interests grow, so do the costs of defending them.

In just the time the Senate has been working on the national security supplemental, operational costs for U.S. forces in the Middle East have risen. As I have warned for weeks, using million-dollar missiles to defend against thousand-dollar drones strains an already insufficient inventory of long-range capabilities.

The supplemental is our chance to expand our capacity to meet the national security challenges we face. The American people deserve leaders who are willing to take these challenges seriously.

I suggest the absence of a quorum

Mr. President, as I noted earlier this week, the Senate's first major business of the year is addressing a historic array of national security challenges. For the first time since 1945, there is a land war in Europe. A Russian imperialist is deploying North Korean and Iranian weapons in his assault on Ukraine, with additional support from the People's Republic of China.

After the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust, there is a land war in the Middle East. Iran, the world's most active state sponsor of terror, is living up to its title, underwriting multiprong aggression against Israel, brazen attacks on U.S. personnel in Iraq and Syria, and a growing war on the global commerce in the Red Sea.

And just today--just today--Iran itself has reportedly hijacked an international oil shipment on the high seas, a further reminder that the Biden administration's failure to impose serious costs and restore credible deterrence is emboldening Tehran.

Our single greatest strategic adversary is supporting this worldwide challenge to the West, interfering more aggressively with peaceful neighbors and investing relentlessly in the capabilities to outcompete us.

Meanwhile, record-setting illegal arrivals have rendered America's own southwest border functionally nonexistent.

This is the most serious crisis of America's credibility in decades, and I don't use the word ``crisis'' lightly. It implies that a situation requires urgent action.

Of course, that is exactly why the Biden administration spent years twisting itself in knots to avoid acknowledging the record-shattering humanitarian and security crisis that unfolded on their watch and because of their policies at the southern border. Remember how the White House engaged in damage control back in 2021 when the President himself slipped up and called the situation facing CBP and ICE a crisis. It was a big deal because a crisis is something that requires action.

Well, right now, the Senate is very close to an opportunity to finally do something meaningful to address the Biden administration's border crisis. Thanks to our colleague Senator Lankford, we are inching closer to a chance to restore sanity, commonsense enforcement mechanisms, and the rule of law. Our colleague's efforts are the foundation of supplemental legislation to address each of the glaring national security challenges that we face: securing America's sovereign borders, investing heavily in American leadership and strength, and equipping America's military with critical capabilities and expanding our defense industrial capacity to deter threats from major adversaries like China. These requirements go hand in hand, and the world is watching to see whether we are willing to meet them.

With an arsenal stocked by North Korea and Iran, Russia, literally, mocks Western hesitation. With brazen terrorist aggression, Iran defies American strength. With intense focus, China bets against America's resolve.

So none of the challenges we face from our southern border to the Red Sea get any easier the longer we wait to address them. Unfortunately, our own allies and adversaries alike have every reason to doubt us. Three years of this administration's hesitation, self-deterrence, and half measures have exacted a steep price. So our work this month is the clearest possible test of America's credibility as a global superpower, as the leader of allies, and as the nation capable of upholding our own sovereignty. The Senate simply must not fail this test.

Mr. President, here on the floor yesterday, I warned that the administration's efforts to deter Iranian-backed Houthi threats to international shipping and American credibility were grossly insufficient. Just hours later, the Houthis proved my point with a significant escalation in the Red Sea.

Tehran's proxies fired more than 18 suicide drones, along with anti- ship cruise missiles and ballistic missiles, into one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. At great cost, American and British Navy vessels launched expensive interceptors to defend against these relatively inexpensive Houthi weapons.

On January 3, America and coalition partners warned that ``the Houthis will bear responsibility for the consequences should they continue to threaten lives, the global economy, or the free flow of commerce in the region's critical waterways.'' Well, the Houthis crossed that redline. The question is now whether President Biden will finally impose sufficient consequences on the Houthis and their patrons in Tehran. The world is watching.

But American credibility and security isn't just on the line in the Red Sea; our Nation is facing the most serious array of national security challenges since the fall of the Soviet Union. The Senate's responsibility to address them remains unfilled.

Take the first major land war in Europe since 1945. On one side of the war in Ukraine is a free world that recognizes sovereignty; on the other is an autocrat with imperial ambitions that extend beyond Ukraine's sovereign borders.

With assistance from a nuclear-armed, rogue state--the most active state sponsor of terrorism--and a friendship without limits with America's top strategic adversary, Russia has spent a decade trying to subjugate Ukraine militarily.

Putin is waging a war of torture and brutality. In some cases, his forces' crimes--like those of the Hamas terrorists responsible for October 7--are documented proudly by the perpetrators themselves. And Moscow has mobilized a war economy, ramping up military production while also tapping into the industrial capacity of its axis partners in Beijing, Tehran, and Pyongyang.

The war has clearly jolted our European allies out of a holiday from history. Producers in Norway are racing a

streamline production of critical air defense systems. Governments like Poland and Germany have announced major increases in defense spending. Denmark, for example, has resurrected an entire dormant industry to contribute ammunition. But even these historic, overdue investments have not yet turned the tide. This conflict has also exposed the glaring shortcomings of America's own arsenal and supply chains for critical capabilities.

As I have explained repeatedly and in great detail here on the floor, our supplemental appropriations to support Ukraine included heavy investments in expanding our defense industrial base and purchasing the cutting-edge weapons that our own forces need to deter our biggest adversaries.

The legislation we are considering this month would do even more to help meet urgent requirements of our own Armed Forces. It will increase procurement of critical munitions, long-range fires, and air defenses, and invest in our own defense industrial capacity.

This is essential for long-term competition with China and Russia. America and our allies still face serious shortcomings, and they extend well beyond the war in Ukraine. By one recent tally, Russia and China's arsenal of land-based air defense systems far exceeds the combined stockpile of the United States, Europe, and Japan combined. The West is outgunned in critical capabilities.

So let's not waste time indulging the misconception that standing by our European allies is an obstacle to competition with China. Let's give no credence to the idea that America should cut and run from our own allies and partners--precisely as our adversaries work closer and closer together.

With continued American leadership, European allies are shouldering more and more of the burden of collective security on the continent. There is just no question that our NATO allies are building military capacity and taking on more responsibility for restoring and maintaining the sovereignty of America's closest trading partners.

But America is a global superpower, and retreating from our leadership of NATO before seeing the job through won't make competition with China any easier. Handing Russia a victory in Ukraine on account of a waning attention span will only shred America's credibility, weaken critical alliances, and force us to contend even more directly with two major adversaries at once. I honestly can't think of a more shortsighted strategic gamble.

Only time will offer a full accounting of the missed opportunities of the past 3 years, but it is already clear that hesitation and self- deterrence on the part of our Commander in Chief cost Ukrainian lives and chances at swift victory over Russian aggression.

Of course, the brazen violence of Iran's terror network reminds us that this weakness and timidity is contagious. We cannot let them spread. We cannot let shortsightedness govern our approach to the strategic competition that will define the next century of American history. We cannot give China any more reasons than this administration already has to doubt America's resolve to stand with sovereign democracies and to vigorously defend our interests.

In the very near future, it will be time for the Senate to demonstrate that we understand what time it is.

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

Mr. President, 3 months after the massacre of October 7, Israel's Defense Minister observed that his country was fighting ``an axis, not a single enemy.'' He was talking about Iran's terrorist proxies, arrayed to attack Israel on multiple fronts.

But the reality of facing interconnected threats isn't unique to Israel. Around the world, our adversaries are colluding in new and aggressive ways. Authoritarians who disdain the West are arming and underwriting one another's aggression. And, as the Senate continues our work on supplemental national security legislation, we would do well to keep this in mind.

Israel reports that it has succeeded in significantly degrading Hamas's military capacity in northern Gaza. But while the pace of operations may have slowed, Israel continues to face a dug-in Hamas threat in southern Gaza. And their terrorist enemies continue to exploit innocent civilians in their bid for survival. Hamas fighters brazenly steal international aid shipments, use Gazans as human shields, and hold more than 130 hostages, including Americans.

So Israel's operations will continue because the threats to Israel remain. As I have said before, Israel needs the time, space, and support to restore its security.

Unfortunately, that is not what the Biden administration has been providing. In fact, as the left wing of the Democratic Party grows more loudly and stridently anti-Israel, its leaders are second-guessing America's closest ally in the Middle East.

Administration officials have taken to anonymously and shamefully accusing Prime Minister Netanyahu of seeking conflict with Hezbollah for domestic political reasons. Of course, reality is quite the opposite. For decades, it has been Hezbollah that seeks conflict with Israel and the West. It is the terrorists with Israeli and American blood on their hands who have chosen violence regardless of the current governments in Israel or the United States.

And Hezbollah's attacks against Israel have only grown since October 7. It is not Prime Minister Netanyahu who forced tens of thousands of Israelis to evacuate their homes in northern Israel. It was Hezbollah threats.

By now, we all know about Hamas's terror tunnels. Well, Hezbollah has built them too. I led a delegation to Israel, and we saw them with our own eyes--efforts to infiltrate northern Israel for the same purpose that Hamas struck in Israel's south. And it is not a myth conjured by the Prime Minister. It is a real and growing threat that even his leading political opponent and fellow member of Israel's war cabinet Benny Gantz also warns about.

Rather than sniping at Israel's war cabinet for taking Hezbollah seriously, the administration should tell Congress and our ally how it proposes to change the murderous calculus of Iran and its proxy.

So the best way we can help our friends is to restore our own credibility in the region and take bolder steps to respond to our common aggressor Iran.

The Biden administration has work to do to repair the damage done by 3 years of retreat. The first thing they could do is admit they have a problem. Instead, they are busy patting themselves on the back. Last week, an administration spokesperson declared with pride that the President was taking a proactive approach to threats from Iran-backed terrorists. Honestly, nothing could be further from the truth.

Instead of aggressively targeting the launch facilities and Houthi terrorists responsible for harassing global shipping and U.S. naval assets or sinking the Iranian spy vessel reportedly facilitating Houthi strikes, President Biden's passive policy means the Navy is expending million-dollar missiles to swat away thousand-dollar drones--million- dollar missiles to take out

thousand-dollar drones because, apparently, we don't have the nerve to target launch facilities. Rather than imposing costs on our enemy, we are allowing the enemy to impose costs on us.

In response to more than 100 attacks on U.S. personnel in Iraq and Syria, the President has authorized isolated jabs at low-consequence, peripheral targets.

No wonder. No wonder Iran isn't deterred. Tehran's strategy is actually working.

If Hamas's capacity for violence is not destroyed, Palestinians and Israelis alike--including the hostages still in captivity--are going to continue to suffer.

If the Houthis' capacity for violence is left intact, they will continue to attack civilian ships and disrupt the global economy.

If Iran does not pay a price for its insidious support of terror from Israel and across the Middle East to Ukraine, it will continue to underwrite violence and claim innocent lives.

America owes our ally Israel our continued support, and we owe Iran's web of terror the firm deterrence and swift justice it has always deserved.

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

Madam President, I would like to begin by wishing our colleagues a very happy new year and welcoming everyone back to begin a new session.

There is a tremendous amount on the Senate's plate, beginning with the unfinished business of the year that just ended.

Yesterday, negotiators announced they had agreed on a path to completing full year appropriations for the fiscal year that began 3 months ago. Delivering on this basic governing responsibility in a timely manner has proven a tough row to hoe, and building broad recognition of the most urgent priorities facing our Nation remains difficult.

Here is the truth. Threats to U.S. national security are growing, and the Biden administration's habit of proposing real-dollar cuts to defense funding is a streak that must end at three. With its forthcoming budget request for fiscal year 2025, the administration needs to finally start taking the long-term needs of America's national security seriously.

But Congress's most immediate opportunity to address urgent national security priorities will be supplemental legislation in the coming weeks. I was encouraged to see that Senator Lankford and our Democratic colleagues made progress toward an agreement to put meaningful border security policy at the heart of this supplemental.

As negotiations continued over the holiday break, Customs and Border Protection reported that December set a new, alltime monthly tally for southern border apprehensions. The Biden administration's border crisis is not going to fix itself, and the status quo is unacceptable. The answer, as Republicans have been saying, literally for years, is to restore meaningful border enforcement and fix the broken policies that the cartels are exploiting to devastating effect. And I am grateful to Senator Lankford for continuing to insist on such commonsense steps at the negotiating table.

The stakes here are quite high. We have an opportunity to make the most comprehensive headway on border security in a generation.

But our national security challenges don't end at our own borders. The threats we face are intertwined, and the coming days will show the world whether America is willing to treat them accordingly. Allies and adversaries alike will be curious what we do with news that Russia is now attacking targets in Ukraine with ballistic missiles supplied by the rogue Kim regime in North Korea, following the suicide drones provided by Iran. Yet again, it is abundantly clear that authoritarians support authoritarians--as if our clear-eyed Pacific partners like Japan, South Korea, and Australia needed more evidence that what happens in Ukraine matters in their own neighborhood; as if we needed yet another reminder that facing down an expanded industrial base in Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea will require America and our allies and partners to invest more seriously in our own defense production capacity.

Meanwhile, terrorists in Yemen are spelling out in painful detail just how wide the ripples of Iran's war machine extend. The world's most active state sponsor of terror isn't just a destabilizing force in the Middle East. Tehran isn't just sowing chaos for American-minded partners in the region. Tehran's bloody influence isn't even limited to helping to train the Hamas and PIJ terrorists who conducted the horrific massacre of Israeli Jews on October 7, or to building Hezbollah into a top-tier international terrorist organization, or to the repeated attacks its proxies have carried out against U.S. personnel in Iraq and Syria.

The Houthis' campaign against civilian ships in the Red Sea is an assault on the global economy that the world has no choice but to address. Once more, an adversary's initiative has forced a reluctant administration to act.

With fawning conciliation and half measures, the Biden administration has squandered deterrence against Iran. Russia is openly mocking the fickleness of Western support for Ukraine. And China, our single greatest strategic adversary, is watching closely to see if America can still manage to lead or sustain credible resistance to authoritarian violence.

So these are the stakes after 3 years of the administration's foreign policy. The world is asking not when or how but whether the world's greatest superpower will start acting like one, which makes our work on the supplemental national security legislation even more urgent. Beginning at the southern border, we must demonstrate that America is up for the challenges we face. The Senate cannot afford to get this wrong.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, negotiations on border security continue to make headway. I am grateful to Senator Lankford for his uninterrupted focus on the task at hand, which is meaningful policy changes.

Our colleagues at the negotiating table are under no illusions about how difficult it is to fix our Nation's broken asylum and parole system. They are working on what would be the first serious repair in more than 30 years.

But there is no longer any disagreement that the situation at the southern border is unsustainable and requires the Senate to act. This is the core of America's national security. It will be an essential part of supplemental legislation to address pressing security challenges, and negotiations will continue in earnest until we get there.

The Senate cannot afford to get this wrong. From South Texas to Southeast Asia and from the Black Sea to the Red Sea, it is a historically challenging and consequential time to protect America's interests, our allies, and our own people.

Mr. President, the world is witnessing the first land war in Europe since 1945. Ukraine's citizen soldiers are in the trenches right now, resisting Russian aggression with Western assistance.

American leadership has strengthened the NATO alliance, prompted our closest allies and trading partners to share more of the burden of collective defense, and driven historic investments in the military strength and industrial capacity we need here at home to compete with our biggest adversaries. Finishing the job will require more of that leadership.

Meanwhile, Israel is responding to the deadliest day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust. Our ally needs the time, the space, and the support required to eliminate the terrorist savages responsible for the horrors of October 7, and the entire region needs American leadership to restore deterrence against Iran and its terrorist proxies who attack U.S. personnel with impunity.

From the other side of the world, our friends in the Indo-Pacific are watching closely what goes on in Europe and the Middle East and investing seriously in their own military strength because they know that China is doing the same.

Our single greatest strategic adversary is growing increasingly aggressive, increasingly advanced, and increasingly keen to seize an edge over a global superpower that has failed to act like one.

So the stakes are high this holiday season for our allies and partners on the frontlines of authoritarian aggression. The challenges are real for brave American servicemembers who are spending this time of the year far from home and loved ones to keep us safe.

It is a dangerous world, one that doesn't reward weakness. America needs to show that we haven't forgotten how to lead and that we are committed to restoring the hard power that leadership requires.

So I am encouraged by our colleagues' commitment to keep working toward an agreement on national security, beginning with security here at home. The Senate will not let the challenges we face go unanswered.

Mr. President, I ask consent that the Senate recess until 1:45 p.m.

Mr. President, as the Senate convened this week, our colleagues negotiating on border security were still at the table making slow and steady progress. They are chipping away at years of failure to enact basic commonsense border security policy. Reaching an agreement that can pass Congress and become law is easier said than done.

But I am very grateful to Senator Lankford for sticking with it. Our colleagues' effort to address the glaring national security challenge here at home is the foundation of our broader responsibility to meet the linked threats we are facing around the world, from the Indo- Pacific to Europe, to the Middle East.

Needless to say, it is a particularly dangerous time for nations that care about protecting their sovereignty from totalitarian thugs and savage terrorists. The headlines are filled with evidence that America's most dangerous adversaries are demonstrably not deterred, and it might have something to do with the Biden administration's penchant for deterring itself instead.

America is a global superpower, but far too often, our Commander in Chief has conducted our foreign affairs with hesitation and weakness. Remember his administration's overwrought fears of ``escalation'' that kept essential capabilities out of Ukrainian hands or the feeble half measures in response to an ongoing surge in attacks on U.S. personnel in Iraq and Syria.

Reports that the Biden administration now wants to constrain Israel's efforts to destroy Hamas are disappointing but not surprising. Two months ago, the administration was encouraging Israel to slow down its response before entering Gaza. Now, it is telling Israel to hasten its operations and wind them down to a close.

America cannot afford to lose sight of reality. We must not blur the boldface line between a sovereign democracy that takes great pains to avoid civilian casualties and a terrorist organization that steals humanitarian aid from vulnerable Gazans to fuel its war of hate.

Israel did not choose this conflict. It ended the occupation of Gaza nearly two decades ago, but its policy of seeking to lower tensions was rewarded on October 7 when Hamas unilaterally shattered the cease-fire with rape, torture, terror, and murder: Hamas, the terrorists who diverted mountains of foreign assistance intended for civilian infrastructure to build miles of elaborate terror tunnels instead; Hamas, the cowards who intentionally hide their fighters and weapons in schools and hospitals.

Hamas has repeatedly faced the choice between improving the lives of Palestinians and killing Israelis. Every time, to date, it has chosen violence. And if Hamas survives with its military capabilities and leadership intact, it will make that choice again and again.

This is the reality Israel faces. Its war cabinet knows they must see this fight through. It is the same reality that recent American Presidents have confronted in the fight against al-Qaida and Isis. But for Israel, the determined terrorist threat is on its very borders and its own citizen soldiers are on the line.

So I will repeat what I have said so many times before. Our responsibility as an ally is to provide the time, space, and support Israel needs to finish the job, to condemn shameful attempts at moral equivalence to excuse the genocidal violence of Hamas terrorists and apply double standards to Israel and to offer counsel to our ally in private, not in front page genuflections to the President's leftwing base.

Administration officials and world leaders who care about the Palestinians would do well to focus less on constraining Israel in the short term and more on the challenge of ensuring Palestinian leaders and organizations in Gaza and the West Bank actually care about improving the lives of their fellow citizens in the long term.

Palestinians deserve better than Hamas's cult of death in Gaza. They deserve better than a corrupt and sclerotic Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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