Floor Statements

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, later today, the Senate will vote to begin consideration of this year's National Defense Authorization Act. The NDAA is our most significant opportunity to set priorities for competition with adversaries like China and Russia.

It is our chance to keep the Biden administration focused on critical missions, like rebuilding America's defense industrial base, instead of the woke partisan agenda of political appointees. It is our time to lay the groundwork of robust investments in hard power.

For 62 straight years, from the thick of the Cold War through the Global War on Terror, the Senate has used the NDAA to match tailored solutions to evolving national security challenges.

This year is no different. Ranking Member Wicker, Chairman Reed, and our colleagues on the Armed Services Committee considered 445 amendments

and adopted 286 of them. Here on the floor, the full Senate should do the same. Senate Republicans are committed to exceeding the President's woefully inadequate defense budget request and delivering the resources our Armed Forces actually require. So I expect the Democratic leader to allow thorough consideration for a range of important amendments as we begin that work with the NDAA.

First and foremost, I would like to remind all of our colleagues that the No. 1 piece of business on the Senate's agenda is actually already overdue. So it is especially important that we begin this process without further delay.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, across the country, surges in violent crime and deadly drugs have forced businesses to board up and working Americans to think twice about the cities where they have chosen to raise their families.

While repeat offenders are increasingly turned loose to run up longer rap sheets, victims of senseless violence are usually guilty of nothing more than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. For example, just days ago, I was reminded of this when a 6-year-old girl in my hometown of Louisville was shot by a group of motorcycle thugs while riding in the back seat of her car. While she remains in critical but stable condition, I join the entire Louisville community in wishing her a full recovery.

Tragedies like this are unfortunately not unique to Kentucky. In our Nation's Capital, crime has surged to startling levels. Compared to last year, car thefts have shot up 117 percent, robberies are up 53 percent, and homicides are up 17 percent.

Just last week, a social studies teacher from Kentucky who was visiting Washington for a conference was fatally shot on a university campus. The assailant had a previous firearm charge and repeatedly violated the terms of his release. This young man from my home State was one of 10 people who were shot and killed in Washington during the first 5 days of this month, including a college student and an Afghan immigrant who had risked his life as an interpreter for the U.S. military.

Too many Americans are mourning loved ones, and in cities across their country, when they look for answers to this senseless violence, they find radical prosecutors refusing to do their jobs. Liberal district attorneys are watering down criminal codes and outright refusing to prosecute repeat offenders who ought to be behind bars.

Earlier this year, the liberal DC Council tried to pass a new criminal code that would make it easier for repeat offenders to get back on the street. Thankfully, Republicans used

Congress's jurisdiction over our Nation's Capital and blocked this nonsense. But at every level of government, Democrats continue to turn a blind eye.

Keeping our communities safe is a fundamental governing responsibility. The American people deserve to feel safe in their own streets.

Madam President, earlier this year, I had the opportunity to deliver an important message directed to our European allies in Munich. I told our friends that leading Republicans are as committed as ever to American leadership and a robust transatlantic alliance.

I emphasized our resolve for helping Ukraine to defeat Russian aggression, not because of some vague moral obligation but because of what it means for America's own core national interests.

Letting Putin's brutality succeed would mean putting some of America's closest trading partners one border closer to a violent and revanchist authoritarian regime. It would mean emboldening Putin's ``friend without limits'' President Xi in Beijing to assert even more aggressive influence over on the other side of the world.

I spoke yesterday about how our allies recognized what is at stake in Ukraine and about how Europe's biggest economies have woken up from holidays from history and made serious commitments to helping Ukraine actually win.

For some perspective on this important progress, more than half of the Javelin anti-tank weapons Ukraine has received have come from countries other than the United States. In fact, we now rank 13th in terms of assistance as a percentage of GDP.

Even as America continues to provide critical assistance to Ukraine, some nations are digging even deeper into their own arsenals and making a much greater relative investment of support. Russian aggression has spurred our European allies to heightened vigilance and greater resolve. Here at home, the American people overwhelmingly share that resolve.

According to a recent survey, three in four Americans--three in four Americans--including big majorities in each party, think it is important to us, to the United States, that Ukraine win the war. A clear majority also supports sending U.S. military aid to Ukraine. And more generally, 85 percent of Americans say a strong U.S. military is essential to maintain peace and prosperity.

So the American people's view of our national security is really quite clear, but here in Washington, providing for the common defense remains our biggest and most pressing piece of unfinished business. President Biden's defense budget request is woefully inadequate, especially as we look at the growing military requirements to deter or defend against Chinese aggression.

Folks in Washington are using the threat of China to justify all sorts of other policies and initiatives, but the reality is, the primary area of geopolitical competition is part power.

This growing threat makes our work on funding America's Armed Forces especially important, but the process of setting the Senate's national security priorities begins with a long-overdue annual Defense authorization.

I am hopeful that the Democratic leader is taking the necessary steps to bringing the NDAA to the Senate floor next week. I am hopeful this legislation will receive the thorough amendment process that it deserves.

The sooner we deliver on the NDAA, the sooner we can deliver the robust hard-power investments our Armed Forces need to replenish stocks, support our allies and partners, and deter growing threats to American security all around the world.

Madam President, on another matter, last month, the Supreme Court included in its most consequential rulings of the term a major blow to the Biden administration's sprawling conception of executive branch power.

For years, the administration grasped for a way to deliver a big dose of catnip to Washington Democrats' wealthy blue-State base in the form of student loan socialism. They had dreamed up a reverse Robin Hood system of taking from working families to pay off the student loans of highly educated professionals, moving hundreds of billions of dollars in outstanding debt from high-earning doctors and lawyers onto the taxpayers' tab.

The median college graduate earns 55 percent more than the median worker who holds a high school diploma. And the wealthiest households in the country owe a disproportionate share of America's student debt.

But Democrats are hellbent on forgiving that debt at the expense of folks who carefully saved, paid off their debt, or avoided it altogether.

Of all the ways Washington Democrats have dreamed up to waste taxpayer dollars and betray the trust of working Americans, this one may well have taken the cake. But when the Biden administration picked an especially outlandish deal for enacting this particular scheme, the Supreme Court ended up being involved.

Just a couple of weeks ago, the Court ruled that 20-year-old emergency authorities designed during the War on Terror did not permit the President to ignore Congress and unilaterally cancel debt from his party's most reliable supporters.

As Chief Justice Roberts put it in the opinion of the Court, the administration's plan `` `modified' the cited provisions'' of existing authorities ``only in the same sense that the French Revolution `modified' the status of the French nobility.''

Washington Democrats tried to serve working families a raw deal. And by all accounts, they will probably try it again. But Senate Republicans continue to stand against radical student loan socialism-- in whatever form it may take.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

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

Mr. President, right now, President Biden and other NATO leaders are convening in Lithuania. The way I see it, there are four key objectives for this important summit: securing more Western support for Ukraine; improving NATO's own military capabilities; strengthening collective resolve against the primary threats posed by China, Russia, and terrorists; and welcoming Sweden to the alliance. I am encouraged by the progress NATO is making towards each of these objectives, but there is more work to be done.

As transatlantic leaders confer about how to help Ukraine defeat Russian aggression, it is significant they are doing so in a Baltic country--itself once a ``captive nation'' subjected to decades-long Soviet occupation. The Baltics' proud history of resistance drives their active contributions to NATO and extensive contributions from their own arsenals to Ukraine's fight.

Decades after the fall of the Soviet Union, brutal Russian occupation has now found a new target, and the fate of Ukraine's resistance continues to depend on Western support. Western allies should use this week's summit to commit even more critical capabilities to tip the balance of forces in Ukraine's favor.

Time is of the essence for allies to increase production of critical munitions and to send longer range, more sophisticated, and more lethal systems to the frontlines. In this regard, I welcome President Biden's decision to provide Ukraine cluster munitions to improve its defense against Russian invaders.

However overdue, these munitions will both improve Ukraine's capability to strike Russian forces and compensate for shortfalls in standard artillery rounds. Despite vocal opposition from his own party, the President ultimately made the right call.

The fact of the matter is, Russia has been using cluster munitions for months in Ukraine. American cluster munitions have a substantially lower failure rate than the Russian munitions. And while the risk of unexploded ordnance is not zero, it is fantasy to believe that wars can be fought without risk.

Here is the bottom line: It should be up to Ukraine whether to employ these effective weapons on its own soil.

Plenty of liberals have criticized President Biden for this decision. The New York Times editorial board suggested that helping Ukraine match capabilities its aggressors are already using amounts to ``a clear escalation of the conflict.'' The senior Senator from Vermont suggested yesterday that the President should be concerned about what ``the rest of the world feels'' about these weapons. Never mind that providing these capabilities to Ukraine will save lives by facilitating a counteroffensive designed to stop Russia's conscious efforts to kill civilians.

If liberals are truly concerned about civilian casualties in Ukraine, they should support giving our friends the capabilities they need to end Russia's brutal war.

The stakes are simply too high for leaders in Washington to let their own naivete and virtue signaling get in the way of reality. Ukraine's war will not be won with yard signs or hollow promises to hold Putin accountable; it will be won with weapons.

The same rules apply to future conflicts we hope to deter. Unity is important, but hard power will be decisive. On this front, NATO is making progress toward rebuilding the hard power many allies allowed to atrophy. Every member of the alliance now spends at least 20 percent of its defense budget on actual capabilities. Our allies are making progress toward spending 2 percent of GDP on defense, and more than half of the alliance should hit that goal by the end of next year. But we should agree that 2 percent is a floor, not a ceiling, for our commitments to collective defense. Our allies should invest in critical capabilities and modern systems that add to NATO's combat power, and they should revive defense industrial bases that have languished since the Cold War.

Certainly, another clear way to strengthen NATO is to welcome Sweden to the alliance. Like Finland, Sweden is a high-tech economy with a strong industrial base. Its leaders are committed to contributing to the alliance and are investing even more significantly in an already capable military.

I am encouraged that President Erdogan and Prime Minister Orban have agreed to support Sweden's accession, and I look forward to rapid action by the Turkish and Hungarian Parliaments.

For America's part, it is past time for the Senate to consider the National Defense Authorization Act. We have an obligation to ensure the U.S. military remains the world's preeminent fighting force, capable of deterring and defeating enemy aggression.

The Senate will have an opportunity to lead our allies by example as soon as the Democratic leader brings the NDAA to the floor.

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

Madam President, over 25 years ago, America made a noble and necessary commitment--never again to deploy or produce chemical weapons and to destroy our remaining stockpiles.

The Blue Grass Army Depot in my home State of Kentucky has been home to the bulk of our Nation's legacy chemical weapons for decades. On Friday, the depot safely destroyed the last nerve-agent rocket in the U.S. arsenal.

Last week marks a major milestone in an effort that dates back to President Reagan's call for a global prohibition on chemical weaponry altogether. After a decade of bilateral negotiations, the United States made an international commitment to ban their use, production, and stockpile for good.

At that time, Blue Grass Army Depot stored over 500 tons of lethal chemical agents. The Army's initial plan for eliminating the depot's stockpile was incineration--literally burning the rockets. Understandably, local residents were concerned about the potential for poisonous leaks into the community, with schools and family homes literally in spitting distance.

When I joined the Senate in 1985, our first victory was putting a stop to new munitions entering the Commonwealth. The second came when I passed legislation forcing the Army to explore more advanced disposal options that ensured the safety of local residents. Over the years, I have been proud to call greater national attention to this important local issue. I fought to bring home nearly $7 billion in Federal funding to support the responsible destruction of these munitions, and I will continue to fight for Kentuckians until the mission is complete.

It has been the honor of a lifetime to lead this charge in the Senate and to push for the safety of Madison County families each step of the way. We wouldn't be here today without the singular focus and determination of community leaders like Craig Williams, an extremely effective local advocate who devoted much of his career to seeing this project through. And, of course, we owe a debt of gratitude to the operators, technicians, construction workers, and other staff for their work on the ground.

Today is as much a story of local success as it is a reminder of worldwide significance. The United States is firmly planted in a wide international coalition that recognizes the moral imperative to reject chemical weapons, and unfortunately, that coalition is more important today than ever.

The authoritarian regime in Moscow that escalated a brutal war in Europe last year is the same one that repeatedly and brazenly ignores the Chemical Weapons Convention that governs our efforts. Vladimir Putin has repeatedly used deadly nerve agents on foreign soil and supported the Assad regime's use of devastating sarin and chlorine against Syrian civilians.

As we condemn this horror, the American people can be proud that our Nation stands squarely on the right side of history. Families in my home State of Kentucky can rest a little easier.

Thanks to the dedication of so many, the United States has shown the world that our commitment to the global prohibition on chemical weapons is ironclad as ever.

Now on another matter, last month, the Supreme Court wrapped up its productive term by deciding some especially consequential decisions in favor of equal protection and Executive restraint. In response, Washington Democrats offered a fresh example of just how profoundly they misunderstand the Court and its role in our government.

The President, who has flirted with calls for Court packing, warned ominously that a coequal branch was ``not a normal court.'' The Democratic leader who threatened Justices by name from the steps of the Court branded it as ``MAGA.'' And this month, the Judiciary Committee will attempt to force the Court to restructure itself in the name of ``ethics.''

But for all the Democrats' breathless fearmongering, the record of the Supreme Court's latest term tells a very different story. By the numbers, the Court remains as ideologically diverse and unpredictable as even passing students of our Constitution know it was designed to be.

Nearly half the cases the Court heard this term produced a unanimous outcome. It ruled overwhelmingly in both directions--striking down union thuggery and declining to stop the Biden administration's open border policy.

By contrast, just 9 percent of cases were decided 6 to 3, with each of the Republican-appointed Justices in the majority. The exact margin liberal commentators use to claim that the Supreme Court is irredeemably polarized actually decided fewer than 1 in 10 cases this term. This is the institution our colleague from New York likes to call a MAGA Court. Really.

Here is the reality: In case after case, the exceptionally qualified Justices Washington Democrats have spent years vilifying continue to prove their strength and independent jurisprudence.

Justice Barrett was just as likely this term to vote with Justice Kagan as with Justice Thomas. Let me say that again. Justice Barrett was just as likely this term to vote with Justice Kagan as with Justice Thomas. Justice Kavanaugh was more likely to vote with Justice Kagan. And the Court's two most conservative Justices, Thomas and Alito, voted together less frequently than liberal Justices Sotomayor and Jackson.

The Supreme Court is not in crisis when it refuses to reliably and predictably advance Democrats' priorities. The Court is not in crisis when it puts the text of our law above politics. The Supreme Court is a coequal branch of government, and it should continue to do its job.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, this month, the Supreme Court will issue some of the term's most consequential decisions. And if past is prologue, Washington Democrats will let the topline outcome of the cases determine their view of the Court's institutional legitimacy.

A year ago this week, the Court corrected a half-century of badly reasoned precedent under Roe v. Wade that cost our Nation millions of innocent lives. The Democratic leader responded by accusing an ``extremist MAGA court'' of bringing on ``one of the darkest days our country has ever seen.'' But almost a year later, when the same exact Court issued a ruling he agreed with, the Democratic leader celebrated that ``democracy held firm.''

Democracy held firm--but only because the Court's opinion aligned with our colleague's political preferences. Unfortunately, this has been Washington Democrats' playbook for years. They have taught their base that, when they can't accomplish their political ends from within our institutions, it is the institutions that need to go.

Last year, intimidation at the Supreme Court took an especially vivid turn. Activists threatened members of the Court and their families. One individual even plotted to assassinate a Justice. Here in Congress, Democrats have responded by trying to take hostage funding for the Justices' security unless a coequal branch of government restructured itself.

The nine Justices of the Supreme Court are empowered by the Constitution to function above the political winds. And they should continue to do exactly that, no matter how many Washington Democrats demand otherwise.