Floor Statements

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for up to 6 minutes of debate prior to the rollcall vote.

Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 926 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, I want to say a few words in support of this bipartisan bill. This is a Cruz-Manchin-Ernst-Fetterman bill, which demonstrates the breadth of agreement we can have in this body.

This amendment would prevent the sale of our Nation's emergency crude oil stockpile, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, to four countries that are unequivocally U.S. adversaries.

We know that China has been amassing the largest stockpile of crude in the world. At the same time, our own reserves have fallen to only 347 million barrels--the lowest since 1983.

Last year, the United States sold off part of our reserves to China. One would think that existing law would prevent this, but that isn't yet the case.

For some time now, Senator Manchin and I have been working together to try to fix this issue. Our amendment prevents the Federal Government from selling oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to China, to Russia, to Iran, or to North Korea and their related entities, while giving the Department of Energy flexibility to waive these restrictions in the event doing so serves our national security interests.

I want to thank Senator Manchin for working closely with me on this amendment and also Senators Ernst and Fetterman.

I also want to note briefly--I know there are some Members of this body who believe we should ban all oil sales overseas. I would note that doing so would be spectacularly harmful not only to U.S. interests, but it would also hurt our friends and allies. It would hurt Ukraine, it would hurt Europe, and it would benefit our enemies, including Russia, to force our friends to have to purchase oil from Russia.

I urge adoption of the amendment.

I yield the floor.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, many Americans remember waking up on Saturday morning to watch their favorite cartoons, including shows like ``The Jetsons.'' As I look at the Senate pages who are here, I suspect none of them have any memory of ``The Jetsons.'' For those who are under 40 in the Chamber or who are watching at home, ``The Jetsons'' was a futuristic cartoon that was set in the year 2062, and it depicted a family from the future who had fun, imaginative technologies, like jet packs and holograms and video calls and robot vacuums and smartwatches and flying cars. While we are still waiting to see those flying cars in the air, we already have a lot of ``The Jetsons' '' technology available to us now--in many cases, even better than what was depicted in the cartoon show.

Today, internet-connected smart devices are commonly used in American households. Light bulbs, mirrors, air fryers, coffee makers, trash cans, kitchen faucets, refrigerators, and more are all becoming smart, and we are able to control them with our phones or voice commands. A lot of that is really cool. It is expected that, in a few years, nearly 70 percent of American households--more than 80 million households-- will own at least one smart home product. This is, by and large, a good thing, as smart devices can help us improve our quality of life and complete daily tasks more easily.

But, with any technological advancement, there can be tradeoffs, and for smart devices, one of the potential tradeoffs is our privacy. In Texas, we have become very aware of that cost. In the past few years, smart thermostats have allowed electric companies to control the temperature in your own home, from afar, in the name of conserving energy.

Furthermore, a lot of Americans don't realize or expect that the growing number of smart household devices and appliances have cameras on them and microphones that can surreptitiously record families and transmit data. In other words, when you are buying a new refrigerator, you don't expect your fridge to record you or listen to you or to spy on you without your knowledge. And, while some manufacturers have responsibly taken steps to more clearly label their products and to let consumers know they contain listening devices or cameras, others have not.

So I have introduced bipartisan legislation, which I authored alongside Senator Cantwell of Washington, a Democrat and the chairman of the Commerce Committee. I am the ranking member of the Commerce Committee. Our bipartisan legislation would simply ensure that this information is clearly communicated to consumers so that you are informed before you buy a product that is going to photograph you or film you or record you, so that it doesn't happen against your wishes and without your knowledge.

Now, I expect, in a minute, we are going to hear opposition to my bill--opposition focused on the proposition that any mandate put on a private company is somehow a burden. And it is a mandate to require your refrigerator manufacturer to tell you if your fridge is spying on you. Now, I am sympathetic to the problem that there are too many mandates from government and that many of the mandates are unnecessary and burdensome and costly, but requiring a manufacturer to tell you if they are spying on you does not fall into that category.

And I have to say, in assessing the minimal burden--the disclosure burden--against the harm, I fall down on the side of individual liberty. I fall down on the side of privacy. I don't think the American people want their air fryer spying on them, and, at a minimum, they have the right to know if their air fryer is spying on them.

Now, I would note that my colleagues on both sides of the aisle agree. The Presiding Officer today serves on the Commerce Committee. This legislation passed the Commerce Committee by voice vote, with bipartisan support from both sides of the aisle. This should be a simple, easy, pro-privacy step to protect consumers.

For that reason, as in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 538 and that the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; further, that the Cruz-Cantwell substitute amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. President, I have listened to the objections of my friend from Kentucky, and I use that word as many do on this floor, although he is not listening to my response, but that is his choice.

The first time I ever spoke on the floor was in support of Senator Paul's filibuster in 2013. Senator Paul is fond of telling his constituents that he is a libertarian, that he defends privacy. I am not quite a libertarian. I am a conservative, but I have strong libertarian leanings. And I want to note the irony that Senator Paul, who has devoted his entire public career to defending liberty and defending privacy, just objected to protecting the privacy of over 300 million Americans. He just objected to Americans knowing whether they are being spied on at home. I have to admit it is truly flabbergasting.

I would like to invite my colleague Senator Paul to join me in front of a gathering of libertarians, and let's discuss with libertarians which side of the aisle you want to be on. Do you want to be on the side of Big Business' surreptitiously tape-recording, photographing, and videotaping you in your home or in your bedroom without your knowing about it or is a mild and nominal disclosure requirement simply saying, ``If you are going to tape-record someone or videotape them in their house, you have got to tell them,'' a justifiable burden?

I hope that, in time, reason will prevail, because we ought to be protecting privacy. This is a bill whereby, if we vote on it on the Senate floor, I am confident the vote would be 99 to 1. I am confident that every Senator except the Senator who just objected would support this bill. Protecting people's privacy is a good idea, and I hope the Senate can get there as a body.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I rise today to honor an extraordinary Texan and

an incredibly dear friend. Karon Kaye Tinsley Goolsby passed away on Monday, June 19, 2023.

Kaye is someone who has been an incredible friend to me for two decades now. She lived in Katy, TX, and was married to the love of her life, Gary. Their son Greg was born in 1981. She loved her family. She loved her grandkids.

Kaye was a grassroots organizer unlike any other. Kaye was incredibly active in the Texas Federation of Republican Women and in the National Federation of Republican Women.

I still remember when I first met Kaye. It was 2004. It was at the Republican National Convention. I was a 33-year-old young lawyer. I was serving as the solicitor general in Texas, and I had hopes to run for office, but I didn't know a whole lot of people in politics. At that convention, I met Kaye.

She lit up any room she was in. She had a personality that was incandescent. As Kaye would later observe, for some reason, this kid-- that would be me--just followed her everywhere she went. And at the end of the day, it wasn't complicated. Kaye knew everybody.

When I followed Kaye from one grassroots activist to another to another, Kaye would turn around and introduce me to one after the other, after the other, after the other and say: Have you met Ted? Have you met Ted? Have you met Ted? She had the energy of an atom bomb. It was unstoppable.

Kaye became one of my very closest friends and most trusted advisers. When I first launched a campaign for attorney general of Texas, I remember sitting in Kaye's car for about 3 hours trying to convince her to come support our campaign, that I needed her. She, quite rightly, said: Are you out of your mind? You don't have the support. You don't have the money. You don't have the name ID. How on Earth can you possibly win?

My answer was: Kaye, with your support, we can do anything.

After about 3 hours, her husband Gary, who is also a dear friend, told her: Kaye, just say yes. He is going to keep asking you until you do.

She finally laughed and said yes.

That race for attorney general never ended up materializing. The vacancy we thought existed ended up not happening.

But 2 years later, I launched a campaign for U.S. Senate, and Kaye was my grassroots chairman. I will tell you, in that race, I was supposed to have no prayer. My opponent in that race was the incumbent Lieutenant Governor, who was personally worth $200 million, who had put $35 million of his own money in the race, and I had never been elected to anything. The last thing I was elected to was the student council. But we had a weapon unlike anything else: We had Kaye.

You have to understand, Kaye would be on three cell phones at once, calling people relentlessly. She would greet them all the same way. She would go: Hey, sugar. And ``sugar''--she could drag that second syllable out for three sentences. And she would be talking to people all over the State.

Early on in the Senate campaign, we rolled out a list of Republican women leaders in TFRW across the State who would endorse my campaign. We rolled out a list. It was like a cannon shot. It shocked everyone. That was 100 percent Kaye. That was Kaye on the phone with one after the other, after the other, saying: Trust me. This kid, he is going to do what he said.

After that, a few weeks later, we rolled out a second endorsement list with over 80 leaders of the Republican Women's Club all over the State.

In response to that release, my opponent in that race fired his campaign manager. That is how big a deal it was. He had assumed that all the Republican Women's Clubs across the State would be with him. But he did not understand that when you had Kaye working the phones, and working the phones, and working the phones--and I would travel around with Kaye from event to event to event, and she couldn't be stopped. She would take me to this person, to that person, to the next person. It was relentless.

In 2016, when I ran for President, Kaye was my national grassroots chairman. Kaye and I spent hundreds of hours on the bus together in Iowa and out on the ground in New Hampshire and South Carolina and all over the country. And, I will tell you, Kaye would talk to Republican women in every State.

Mr. President, you are from the great State of Hawaii. I guarantee you, Kaye was on the phone with Republican women in the State of Hawaii.

She had an energy that was fiery. And, boy, she could get mad. Kaye has chewed me out probably more than my wife Heidi has. She would get mad at this or that or whatever you did, and she would tell you exactly what she thought.

I remember, once, Kaye was really mad at me. I don't even remember for what. But I had to drive all the way out to her house in Katy, TX, and sit in her living room while she spent about an hour and a half explaining to me how I had screwed something up that she was mad at me for.

She also made me eat some of her homemade brownies. Kaye had a lot of wonderful gifts, but cooking was not one of them. And the brownies were pretty terrible, but I told Kaye they were delicious and I appreciated it and I took my medicine.

Kaye and I, as we were talking to Republican women's groups--I used to say all the time that ``Republican women are the heart and soul''-- and when I say that, Kaye, from the back of the room, would call out, ``and the brains,'' and everyone would laugh, and I would say, ``and the brains of the Republican Party.''

It started off as an ad-lib joke, but it became something we said all over the State and eventually all over the country.

Kaye had kidney disease and liver disease. She spent the last several months waiting on the list for a transplant. Kaye was a tiny lady. She needed a small liver. Several times it looked like they were going to find a liver, a kidney.

Just a few weeks ago, I got a text from Gary: It looks like we have got one. Surgery is tomorrow.

That next morning, I woke up praying for Kaye, until I got a text a couple of hours later that said the surgery fell through; the transplant wasn't a match.

I have never known someone like Kaye Goolsby. Kaye loved this country--loved it. She loved Texas. And she was so fierce and so full of life.

When Kaye passed, I texted her husband, and I later put out on Twitter--I said the angels were weeping and so am I. But I will tell you this: I have no doubt that, right now up in Heaven, Kaye Goolsby is organizing and reorganizing everything. She is going to the angels saying: This isn't right. You need to change this. You need to move this over here. We can do better.

After a long struggle with liver and kidney disease, Kaye has gone to be with the Lord. Those of us she left behind, we are hurting. We will miss her. I will still wonder, when my phone rings, if on the other end is going to be that lilting southern accent saying: ``Hey, sugar.'' But we are going to have to wait a little while to hear it again.

This is one of my favorite pictures. You can see the joy. She could laugh. She brought that joy to everyone else. Her grandkids called her Kaye-Kaye. My daughters called her Kaye-Kaye too.

To Kaye Goolsby, my dear, dear friend, the heart and soul and the brains, we love you, Kaye.

I yield the floor.

Reserving the right to object, I agree with the Senator from New Hampshire that this position at the State Department is important, and it should be filled by someone qualified and someone who will use the position to stand up to the terrorists who target Americans all across the world. Unfortunately, Ms. Richard--her record makes her singularly unqualified for this post.

The Biden administration has put forward many troubling and radical nominees during the past 2\1/2\ years. Indeed, the nominees who have been put forth by this President are more extreme, are more radical than any nominees I have ever seen in my lifetime.

I will say, unfortunately, our Democratic colleagues will rubberstamp whatever radical is put on this floor, and they have demonstrated an unwillingness to stand up and reject even the most extreme nominees submitted.

If you look at Ms. Richard's record, and in particular her time as Ambassador to Lebanon, her record, catastrophically, when it concerns terrorists, is to downplay the threat of terrorists, to appease the terrorists, and even, astonishingly, to fund the terrorists.

While in Lebanon, Ms. Richard established a clear record of effectively boosting the Iran-backed terrorist group Hezbollah. And for all practical matters, her tenure as Ambassador demonstrates that she aided and assisted Hezbollah rather than standing strong against them.

Let me give you three examples to demonstrate these points. Elizabeth Richard shielded Hezbollah while we were fighting for Amer Fakhoury's release. Ms. Richard consistently sought to downplay the threat posed by Hezbollah.

Take the case of Amer Fakhoury, an American citizen who was held hostage by the Hezbollah-controlled Lebanese Government while he was dying of cancer. The Senator from New Hampshire knows this case well because Mr. Fakhoury and his family are constituents of hers in the State of New Hampshire. She and I worked together closely, aggressively, fighting to secure his release from captivity. Amer Fakhoury was an American citizen, a beloved family man, and a small business owner who traveled to Lebanon in September of 2019. While he was there, he was abducted; he was illegally detained; he was beaten; and he was held hostage. He was suffering from stage IV cancer, and his symptoms were exacerbated by the beatings that he received at the hands of Lebanese security officials who were looking to extract a false confession.

The Senator from New Hampshire and I came together to pressure the Lebanese Government to free Mr. Fakhoury. Together, we introduced legislation to impose sanctions that would have brought down the Lebanese political class unless they immediately released him. When it became public that Senator Shaheen and I, together, were advancing our legislation toward passage in the Senate, Mr. Fakhoury was freed. Good news. Success--a bipartisan success, freeing an American hostage in captivity in Lebanon.

Unfortunately, Mr. Fakhoury passed away from cancer just 5 months after he came home to the United States, but at least, together, we were able to ensure that he did so surrounded by his family and not by the Hezbollah-controlled Lebanese Government thugs who had held him hostage.

Why did it take Senator Shaheen and me coming together on the floor of the Senate to target the Lebanese Government and force them to release an American hostage? Well, one of the significant reasons it took action at the Senate level is because the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and our Ambassador there were effectively running interference for the Lebanese Government, were fighting against us and effectively running interference for Hezbollah. And who was our Ambassador at the time? Elizabeth Richard.

I want to read you what Mr. Fakhoury's family says about that and what they say about President Biden's nomination of Ms. Richard. They said:

As the family of the late U.S. hostage, Amer Fakhoury, we

are shocked by the news that Ambassador Richard is being

confirmed as the next counterterrorism [czar] in the State

Department. Our father would still be here today if the U.S.

embassy under Ambassador [Richard] prioritized an American

citizen's life first instead of catering to the Hezbollah

backed Lebanese government.

These are the words of the family of Amer Fakhoury, whom you see here, constituents of the Senator from New Hampshire. And this is what they say about the Senate and about the nominee whom the Senate is being asked to confirm; that this is a nominee who is responsible for accelerating the death of their father because she refused to stand up to Hezbollah.

Second example. Ms. Richard did not just establish a record of downplaying Hezbollah's terrorism. She also consistently sought to appease the Iranian-controlled terror group. At the beginning of 2020, the U.S. Armed Forces killed Qasem Soleimani, an Iranian regime arch- terrorist with blood on his hands of hundreds of American service men and women whom he had murdered.

I will note that the Senate subsequently passed language that I authored specifically praising President Trump and our Armed Forces for the operation taking out Qasem Soleimani. The vote on the floor of the Senate was 64 to 34. One of the ``yea'' votes was my colleague from New Hampshire, Senator Shaheen. Meanwhile, the Trump administration sent a quick response force to our Embassy in Lebanon to protect it from retaliation by Iran and Hezbollah.

Yet again, American citizens' lives were in danger, and what did Ms. Richard do? She secretly sent them away in defiance of the political leadership of the State Department and behind the backs of Secretary Pompeo and the State Department's No. 2 officer, both of whom had been confirmed by this body. She secretly sent them away, directly endangering lives of the men and women in our Embassy.

Now, why did she do that? Well, this deeply troubling incident was first reported by Politico, and Politico explained her reasoning. First and foremost, she said, she didn't want to antagonize Hezbollah. Despite threats to the Embassy and despite an obligation to protect the lives of the Americans who worked there, Ms. Richard left them exposed and vulnerable because her policy over and over again was to appease and avoid confronting Hezbollah.

Finally, Ms. Richard did not just downplay and appease terrorists; in several cases during her tenure in Lebanon, she actively funded Hezbollah allies.

One of the many corrupt branches of the Lebanese Government is the Internal Security Forces or ISF. According to one Lebanon expert who recently wrote about the group, they are ``the Hezbollah auxiliary forces who run counterintelligence for the terror group.'' They do Hezbollah's ``counterintelligence dirty work.''

What does that mean in plain language? It means that they break up the Israeli spy networks and espionage rings that our allies use to track Hezbollah's threats and Iran's threats. That is what they do. It is what they have always done. Just recently, they announced that they had broken up 17 Israeli networks. The damage was incalculable to the safety and security of our friend and ally, the State of Israel, and also to the safety and security of America. And in 2022, Hezbollah publicly heaped praise on the ISF for all the work they do.

What did Ms. Richard do when she was in Lebanon? She pushed for policies to fund and boost the ISF with American taxpayer dollars. She even oversaw the building of the ISF academy, funded by American tax dollars.

I wish we had a nominee for this post whom I could enthusiastically support. I wish I were not obliged to come down and object to an extreme nominee whose record demonstrates she is unfit and unqualified to serve in this post, but unfortunately President Biden has not given me that choice.

Having examined Ms. Richard's record, the only conclusion is that her approach to counterterrorism consistently is to downplay terrorism, to appease the terrorists, and even to fund terrorist groups and their enablers. That approach is utterly disqualifying for a nominee for Coordinator of Counterterrorism. It is a policy that has had terrible consequences when she pursued it in the Middle East, and it would have terrible consequences if she took it from Lebanon and applied it globally, appeasing not just Hezbollah but every other terrorist on Earth.

The Iranian regime right now--the Ayatollah right now--is pursuing murderous terrorism, including against Americans, right now. The Ayatollah right now has hired a hit team with the intention of murdering the former Secretary of State of the United States, Mike Pompeo. Secretary Blinken confirmed at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, on my questioning, that the State Department is spending $2 million a month providing security to Secretary Pompeo because Iran is actively trying to murder him.

We need a Coordinator of Counterterrorism who will stand up to Iran, who will stand up to Hezbollah, who will stand up to Hamas, who will stand up

to al-Qaida, who will stand up to al-Nusra, who will stand up to ISIS, who will stand up to every terrorist in the world who seeks to murder American citizens.

We need a Coordinator for Counterterrorism whose record is not so extreme that the grieving family of a hostage is telling the Senate:

Our father would still be here today if the U.S. embassy

under Ambassador [Richard] prioritized an American citizen's

life first instead of catering to the Hezbollah backed

Lebanese government.

For these reasons, I object.

Mr. President, this week the Senate unanimously passed my bipartisan legislation to rename the street in front of the Cuban Embassy in Washington, DC, ``Oswaldo Paya Way.''

Oswaldo Paya was a dissident and a fighter for freedom in Cuba of unrelenting passion and dedication. He was someone who stood up against the Castro regime. He had incredible courage. He spoke up for human rights. He spoke up for free speech. He spoke up for democracy. And 11 years ago, Oswaldo Paya was murdered by the Cuban communist government.

On July 22, 2012, Paya left his house with three other people, including Harold Cepero, to go visit friends. From the start of the journey, their car was followed. On the way, the Cuban security services drove Paya's car off the road, killing both him and Cepero.

There has never been any doubt about who was responsible for these murders. Indeed, just this week, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights released its long-awaited report on the case. The determination was clear and conclusive in confirming what we have known all along.

Paya had long been a thorn in the side of the Castros and the regime, even from a young age. He was the only person at school who refused to join the Communist Youth. As a teenager, he publicly opposed the communist crackdown on protesters in Czechoslovakia who were fighting for freedom, and he was punished with 3 years in prison.

Paya went on to found the Varela Project, which sought a referendum on Cuba's communist system. Their demands were simple: democratic government, religious liberty, freedom of expression, and the economic freedom to start businesses. Paya managed to get 11,000 signatures to support the Valera Project to petition the regime to hold a referendum. And, eventually, over 20,000 people supported the cause, but the Cuban regime refused to hold it.

Paya's fight for freedom made him a target of the Communist Party in Cuba. They harassed him. They tried to intimidate him. They arrested him numerous times and, ultimately, they murdered him.

Paya's friend and the driver of the car said that when he awoke after the crash, he was confronted at the hospital by a regime operative, and the hospital was flooded with uniformed military personnel. Under extreme duress, drugged, and threatened with death by regime officials, he signed a document falsely exonerating the regime.

That is how important it was to the communists to immediately try to hide their crimes and avoid accountability. It is imperative that they fail in this task.

I am heartened that, yesterday, the Senate unanimously passed this bipartisan legislation that I led to rename the street in front of the Cuban Embassy here in Washington, DC, after Paya.

I want to thank Senator Durbin, who led this effort with me, along with Senator Rubio, Senator Menendez, Senator Rick Scott, and Senator Cardin--all who joined with me in this bipartisan effort. This week the Senate spoke in one unanimous voice, and it was a voice speaking out for freedom.

I also want to acknowledge the tireless work of Paya's daughter, Rosa Maria, who has fought tenaciously and never wavered in pursuing and advocating her father's legacy. She is an incredible, courageous, powerful leader in her own right, and together we have sat down and discussed ways of advancing the cause of justice in Cuba. We will continue doing so.

This is the second time that the Senate has passed this bipartisan legislation. In the previous Congress, the House of Representatives declined to take it up. But I urge our colleagues in the House to take it up and pass it this year, and I have a high level of confidence that the House will do that. We need to make this a law, to put it on Joe Biden's desk, and to rename the street outside of the Cuban Embassy.

Now, when we change the street name, we are not merely changing signs. It can be a reminder--indeed, a forceful one--that shines a light of truth on the regime. Changing the name of the street means that anyone who wants to write to the Cuban Embassy will have to write Oswaldo Paya's name, or, if you need to go there, you will have to look up the address and see his name. Members of the Cuban regime who deal with the embassy will have to acknowledge that Paya existed. Their efforts to erase his existence and his legacy failed.

I have told this story before, but it is worth retelling because it illustrates just how much of an impact renaming a street in front of an embassy can be.

A few years ago, I introduced legislation to rename the street in front of the Chinese Embassy ``Liu Xiaobo Plaza,'' after the famed Nobel peace laureate and democracy activist in China who was wrongfully imprisoned in China.

After multiple iterations on the Senate floor, my bill ended up passing the Senate--a Democrat Senate with a Democrat majority. My bill passed the Senate unanimously. Unfortunately, the House of Representatives failed to take that bill up as well. It was infuriating.

However, at the beginning of the Trump administration, in 2017, I was having breakfast with Rex Tillerson, then the new Secretary of State, at his office at Foggy Bottom. We were talking about the challenges facing America, and he had recently just met with his counterpart, the Chinese Foreign Minister.

Secretary Tillerson said that the Foreign Minister from China told him that China had three critical foreign policies, at which point Rex shook his head and said: Ted, it was the damndest thing. One of their top three priorities was stopping you from renaming the street in front of their Embassy in DC.

That is how concerned--that is how terrified--Xi and his communist cronies were of the world being reminded on a daily basis about Liu Xiaobo.

Ultimately, I told Secretary Tillerson the following, which is that Liu Xiaobo had passed away at that point but that his widow, Liu Xia, was

still in China. China would not let her leave. She had never gone to collect the over $1 million that she was due for her husband winning the Nobel Peace Prize.

So I told Secretary Tillerson: You tell the Chinese Government, if they release Liu Xia--if they allow her to leave and escape to freedom--I will stop pushing this particular bill, but if they don't, I will keep pushing it, and we will pass it into law. You can let him know it is not a bluff, because I have already passed it unanimously through the Senate once and will do it again, and this time the House will pass it as well.

Within a matter of weeks, the communist government in China released Liu Xia and let her escape. That is how powerful shining a light of truth on a despotic regime can be.

Renaming the street outside of the Cuban Embassy sends a powerful message to the Cuban people that their struggle for freedom will not go unnoticed or be forgotten; that the world is watching, and their heroic efforts are not in vain. Their fight for freedom resonates deeply with people across the globe.

By passing this legislation, the U.S. Senate has made a powerful statement of solidarity with the people of Cuba and is a resolute condemnation of the oppressive regime that silenced a brave voice for freedom. The Senate has spoken with one voice, and that voice has demanded ``Cuba libre''--a free Cuba--an end to the totalitarian and despotic state.

I urge our colleagues in the House to take up this bill and pass this bipartisan legislation swiftly.

Let us come together as one, as the U.S. Congress, and force the communist regime to do what utterly terrifies them--to say Oswaldo Paya's name--to say his name.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, a few months ago, I spoke on this floor about Mark Swidan, who has been unjustly imprisoned by the Chinese Communist Party for over a decade. Mark is from Luling, a small city in my home State of Texas. His mother, Miss Katherine Swidan, still lives in Luling. And for the last 11 years, Mark has endured a living hell, trapped in a Chinese prison. He is exposed to extreme heat and extreme cold. He is deprived of sleep. He is subjected to physical abuse. Mark has also been denied access to his family and to American diplomats.

And in 2019, a Chinese court sentenced Mark to death. Mark is being unjustly held by the Chinese Communist Party as a hostage. The CCP tells us that China is a great power, but this is how Third World thugs and dictators act.

I called for Mark's immediate release and called on the Biden administration to use any and every available means to secure Mark's freedom.

I am deeply distressed that since my speech on the floor a few months ago, Mark's plight has deepened. Recently, a Chinese court reaffirmed the death sentence imposed on him with a suspension for 2 years.

That is wrong, and it is outrageous. We need Mark to come home.

It is worth revealing how breathtakingly, infuriatingly unjust all of this is. How did it happen? On November 13, 2012, Mark was abducted by China's Public Security Bureau while he was in China on a business trip. A witness to the abduction said that Mark was detained because Chinese officials wanted to view the contents of his cell phone.

The Chinese officials accused Mark of being part of a criminal conspiracy to

manufacture and traffic drugs with 11 other individuals--charges that Mark has denied and which have been debunked over and over again.

Chinese officials tried to coerce Mark into confessing. Mark refused and pleaded not guilty in a trial in November 2013. During the trial, the prosecution didn't produce any forensic evidence to back up their allegations, and no drugs--zero--were ever found on Mark or in his hotel room. Mark's passport and other records show that he wasn't even in China at the time of the alleged offenses, and the 11 other individuals indicted in relation to this alleged drug conspiracy--none of them could identify Mark. The charges against Mark were completely bogus and false.

Meanwhile, Mark's mom Katherine is aching to see her son again. Her heart is breaking. This is a mom who wants to hold and hug and care for the son she loves.

I have been working with the Biden administration, and I have been pushing Chinese officials at a senior level to release Mark, but more needs to be done, and it needs to be done much more quickly.

Now, Secretary of State Blinken was planning to travel to China in February, and we had been pressing the State Department to make Mark's case a major priority for the Biden administration on the trip. Then what happened? A Chinese spy balloon came over the United States, and Secretary Blinken canceled his trip.

It is time to apply more pressure on the Chinese Communist Party to let Mark go and let him come home to Texas.

Madam President, the Chinese Communist Government is a tyrannical government. They don't like it when you turn up the heat. They don't like it when you shine a light on their atrocities. There is power in shining a light, and there is power in unity.

We need to bring Mark home. In a moment, I am going to propound a live UC request on a resolution I have introduced with my colleague from Texas, Senator John Cornyn. When it passes, the Senate will, with one unanimous bipartisan voice, reiterate these declarations.

The resolution calls on the CCP to immediately release Mark. It condemns China from withholding from Mark access to his family, to diplomats, and to proper and independent medical care. And it calls on the Biden administration to prioritize efforts to secure Mark's release, both in their conversations with Chinese diplomats and in international forums.

No opportunity should be lost in urging Chinese officials, at every level of engagement, to release Mark. The Biden administration must use the voice and the vote of American diplomats to highlight his case.

This resolution has already passed the House. It will now pass the Senate. The United States Congress is with a united and unanimous voice condemning and calling to end the unjust imprisonment of Mark Swidan by the Chinese Communist Party. Enough is enough.

Madam President, as in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 53, S. Res. 23.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I rise today to give tribute to a great American, a great Texan, a great friend, and a 24-year veteran of this institution who has dedicated his career to serving the needs of his fellow citizens. His name is Jason Fuller, and he has served as my regional director in the southeastern part of Texas, including my home city of Houston, for the last 5 years. He is now retiring and moving on to the private sector.

Jason is a native Texan. Born in Corpus Christi, he graduated from the University of Houston, where he served as student body president. He is a proud Houston Cougar.

Jason started working in the Senate in late 1994, after working on my predecessor Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison's 1994 campaign for a full term in the Senate. At the time, Jason said he was only going to come to DC for 2 years, work for Senator Hutchison, and move on. He ended up working in the Senate for 19 years. During that time, he served as Senator Hutchison's personal aide, until 1997, when he moved back home to Texas and worked for her regional office in Houston. He eventually became regional director and served in that role until Senator Hutchison left office in 2013.

In 2018, Jason heard the call to once again serve his fellow Texans, so he came on board as my regional director of southeastern Texas. His region stretches from the Texas-Louisiana border down south towards Victoria and all the way to the upper Texas gulf coast.

Jason hates to be on the sidelines, and he is always eager to help others in a crisis. When Hurricane Katrina happened and everything was chaos, Jason had 12 people, 6 dogs, and 3 cats squeezed into his downtown residence. He helped out in the shelters in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey. When the Santa Fe shooting horrifically happened in May of 2018, Jason was there to lend a helping hand to the victims and their families, as well as to law enforcement. Many of those people became his personal friends.

When Jason is not helping his fellow Texans, he likes to travel to some of the most exotic and hard-to-get-to places on the planet. When Jason is getting ready for a trip, he spins the globe and sees where his finger lands. He has been to Iraq, China, Russia--anywhere that is going to give my State director and national security advisor heartburn.

He has often helped people in stressful situations, navigating the leviathan of Big Government on behalf of fellow Texans in their time of need. He has taken the time to connect with them personally and to listen as a friend listens.

In the coming days, Jason will start his new job in the private sector. We will miss him greatly, but we wish him well. The Senate, the people of Texas, and the thousands of people and families he has helped over the course of 24 years of service will miss him too.

Thank you, Jason, for your hard work, your determination, your passion, and your patriotism. God bless you.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I wish we were not here facing these issues yet again. In recent days, our Nation has seen yet another horrific school shooting. In September of last year, I stood on the Senate floor and tried to pass legislation to stop these school shootings. There have been too damn many. I have been there on the ground at too damn many of them.

Sante Fe High School in Texas, about 45 minutes away from my house-- the morning of that shooting, I got the call within minutes of the shooting. I was down on campus just over an hour after it occurred. I saw the tragedy, the tears, the grieving parents, the children in shock.

Uvalde, I was there shortly after that shooting as well--the horror, the mayhem.

Too many of our children have been murdered by deranged lunatics.

Mr. President, when you and I were kids, this wasn't a thing. When you went to school, when I went to school, there wasn't a single day that I woke up going to school worried that some idiot, some sociopath, was going to shoot up the school. You might worry about getting punched at recess, but this didn't happen 30, 40, 50 years ago. Now it is a brutal reality over and over again.

There are lots of causes that we could debate for a long time: causes in our culture; causes of disconnected, emotionally disturbed young men who want to become famous. I think Columbine may have started this whole tragic cycle where an angry young person seeks to lash out by murdering little kids.

With respect to becoming famous, one rule I try to follow is that I will never say the names of these mass murderers. If they want to be well-known, I hope everyone in elected office--I would like everyone in the news media to follow that rule as well. They deserve to be forgotten in utter obscurity.

But we also have an obligation to stop this. Every time there is a mass murder, there is a pattern that plays out. No. 1, there is an expression of grief, of love for the community. There are millions of us who lift the community up in prayer. Inevitably, that produces a response from the political left where they scream in unison: Thoughts and prayers aren't enough.

I will tell you, Mr. President, I believe in the power of prayer, and I will continue praying for communities that are hurting, whether from a natural disaster or a horrific crime or anything else. But I agree with the sentiment ``thoughts and prayers are not enough.'' That is exactly right. We need action.

And what is so infuriating is, every time there is a mass shooting, Democrats in this Chamber stand up, and they don't actually want to do something to stop the murderers. Instead, they want another gun control bill to disarm law-abiding citizens that won't actually stop the murders, that won't actually protect our kids.

In September of last year, I introduced legislation that would be the most far-reaching school safety legislation ever enacted. It would double the number of police officers on campuses, devoting $15 billion to putting armed police officers on campus to protect our kids, the single most important step we can do. It would also devote $10 billion for mental health professionals on campuses because so many of these troubled murderers had warning signs leaping off the page. It also devotes $2.56 billion for physical security at schools to help enhance the security of schools.

When I introduced this bill, it first came up as an amendment on the much-touted bipartisan gun control bill last year that did nothing to stop violent crime but satisfied the leftwing donors of the Democratic Party. When my amendment was voted on, on the Senate floor, I am sorry to say every single Democrat in this Chamber voted no--all of them, every one.

Afterwards, I went to this floor, I stood on this floor, and I tried to pass the bill by unanimous consent. And when that happened, the Senator from Connecticut stood up and objected.

Now, I have to say, leading up to that unanimous consent request, numerous reporters had asked me in the hallway: Why are the Democrats objecting to this?

And I was forced to say ``I do not know,'' because, to date, they have not articulated any reason. They have not explained why they oppose more police officers in schools. They have not explained why they oppose more mental health counselors in schools. They have not explained why they oppose more funding for enhanced physical security in schools.

So I was quite interested to hear the Senator from Connecticut give his reasons. I was disappointed that day. The Senator from Connecticut stood up and uttered two words: ``I object.'' Then he sat down. That was it. His answer was just no.

Mr. President, I stood on this floor then, and I said something that--I said: God forbid there is going to be another school shooting-- I pray to God there isn't--but we are going to find a day when another one of these happens, another deranged lunatic commits this kind of mass murder. And if there is not a police officer at the front door, I said, remember this moment, remember this moment. Because if the Senator from Connecticut had not stood up and said ``I object,'' this bill would have passed the Senate unanimously.

If this bill had passed into law, $15 billion to double the number of police officers on campus--and that was available at public schools, at private schools, at parochial schools--what that would have meant is that there is a very real possibility an armed police officer would have been at the front door of the Covenant School in Nashville.

As we look at what happened, every one of us--every one of us--who is a parent or a grandparent is beyond horrified at what sort of deranged person murders little children, but we also know that that shooter came to the front door and shot the front door open. If this bill had passed, funding for school security, that front door could have been made more secure so the shooter couldn't have blasted in.

But even more importantly, what many of us have watched in the body cam footage is horrific. It is deeply disturbing. But, I will tell you, it is also awe-inspiring. You saw the Nashville police officers arrive on campus about 15 minutes after the shooting began. They enter the campus. They are scared. They don't know what is going on, but they are looking for the shooter. They are wearing bulletproof vests. They are searching for the shooter. They are going up the stairs, and they hear the sound of gunshots. The police officers do what police officers should do: They head toward the shots. They risk their lives. And they encounter the shooter and shoot the shooter dead.

The heroism of those officers saved lives that day. If this bill had passed, those officers might not have been 15 minutes away; they might have been standing at the front door. The purpose of this bill was to have those officers at the front door so that when the deranged shooter showed up and tried to shoot in the door, the officers could stop the shooter right there and then, which would have meant that not a single child needed to die.

I told this body that if we didn't act, the consequences would be horrific. Yet the sad reality--I do not understand why our Democrat colleagues in this body do not support having police officers keep our kids safe; why, when it comes to this issue, the only thing that interests them is disarming the people at home who pose no threat rather than protecting our kids.

As I said, I wish I wasn't back here today. I wish this had passed last year. I wish Democrats were willing to work together on really solving this problem. But, sadly, this pattern replays over and over again.

I have two different bills that I am going to put before this body, but I am going to start with the first one, the one I have just described--$15 billion for police officers to double the number of police officers on campus to protect our kids.

You know, when you go to the bank and you deposit money in the bank, there are armed police officers in the bank. Why? Because we want to protect the money we save. Why on Earth do we protect a stupid deposit more than our children? If there are parents who don't want police officers protecting their kids, I don't know those parents.

We have the opportunity right now to double the police officers on campus and keep kids safe. Therefore, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 1082, which is at the desk; further, that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

So history has repeated. We still don't have an explanation as to why police officers on campus is not a good thing. Maybe we will get it. We were told we will get a speech, so we will see what that is. That is what happened last time.

All right. The Democrats don't like that.

Unanimous Consent Request--S. 1081

Let me give you a simpler bill--a simpler bill that would spend unused COVID education funds. There is over $100 billion in funds that Congress has appropriated to the schools. Under the restrictions put in place from the Democrats, that money cannot be used for school safety. That money cannot be used to make our kids safer.

In September, I introduced this bill as well. It is a one-page bill. It is a very simple bill. It says schools can choose to use that money to enhance school safety. It says if a school wants to use some of that money to hire a police officer, the school can do so. It says if the school wants to use some of that money to enhance their physical security, the school can do so. It gives flexibility to the schools.

In September when I attempted to pass this, I asked: Why would anyone possibly oppose this?

I don't know how a Democratic Senator goes home to your State--I don't know how you go home to Connecticut or New Jersey or Michigan and look in the eyes of a superintendent, look in the eyes of a teacher, and say: No, I will not let you spend the money on school security. It doesn't matter if your kids are afraid. It doesn't matter if your teachers are afraid. We the Democrats in Congress know better than you, and you may not spend a dollar of this on school security.

Let me be clear. This would have passed in September except for two magic words uttered by the Senator from Connecticut: ``I object.''

Now, last time, he went on a discourse about how this was not the full legislative process, that we hadn't negotiated with him, and, goodness, that must be comfort to the parents who are scared at home, that we hadn't sat there in a detailed negotiation.

Every year, this body passes bill after bill after bill by unanimous consent. Every Senator here knows how to do that.

The reason it doesn't go through the committee process, by the way, is because the Democrats control the committees, and they don't want to debate this.

So if you hear a bunch of process arguments from the Senator from Connecticut--``Gosh''--what he said last time--``this isn't real,'' it is only not real because the Democrats are objecting. That is what makes it not real, because they are blocking it. But to say it is not passing because I am objecting is like the arsonist complaining there is a fire.

I ask you in all seriousness, Mr. President, how do you explain to a parent back home, how do you explain to a superintendent, how do you explain to a teacher that there is something wrong with your having the ability to spend this money on school safety? I don't know how to articulate that. I am looking forward to hearing it. We will see if we do.

Therefore, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 1081, which is at the desk; further, that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

As the Senator from Connecticut walks away because he is unwilling to debate the topic, I will note several things he said not a word about.

But let's focus on--he said: Oh, this bill is very hard to figure out; it is very complicated. Well, the second bill, the one he just objected to, is all of one-page long. I am going to read you the statutory text. The Senator from New Jersey is here. He is a learned Senator. It says:

The unobligated balance of funds made available in the

COVID funding--

I won't read the actual citation, but the COVID funding:

The unobligated balance of funds made available . . . shall

be made available to local educational agencies to keep

elementary schools and secondary schools served by such

agencies physically secure.

That is the entirety of the bill. You can use the $100 billion that Congress has appropriated to make schools safer.

Now, not a word from the Senator from Connecticut addressed that bill. He just said: ``I object.'' And as for his caterwauling that the first bill--gosh, he can't figure out what is in it; you don't do it this way. I will point out the first time I introduced it, it was Cruz- Barrasso, and every Senator voted on it because I introduced it as an amendment to the bill the Senator from Connecticut introduced.

Mind you, in the wake of Uvalde, with great fanfare, the Senator from Connecticut passed a meaningless gun control bill that did nothing to prevent what happened in Nashville. That is not going to prevent the next mass murder. Why? Because it doesn't target criminals. It doesn't go after the bad guys. It doesn't put police officers in a position to protect our kids. I find some rich irony that the Senator from Connecticut suggested: Gosh, the purpose of this is to get on cable news. I don't know if the Senator from Connecticut has difficulty getting on the news, but I can assure you that I don't.

What I do know is this is about stopping these damn murders. The Senator from Connecticut suggests this is about conflict with him. I can assure him, very few people outside of Connecticut have any awareness of what he says. Why is that? Well, for one thing, when we did this last time, there were zero reporters in the Gallery; now there are two. The corporate media doesn't report on this. If you turn on cable news, they won't tell you that the reason there wasn't a police officer at the Covenant School is because every Democrat in the Senate voted against it. Corporate media won't tell you the reason the Covenant School couldn't spend these funds on hiring a police officer and hardening that front door so you couldn't shoot through it is because the Senator from Connecticut objected. He knows--he knows, to an absolute certainty, that a dishonest press corps will not tell anybody.

By the way, he made great fanfare of saying: Well, the legislative text has a bracket. What he didn't tell you is his staff gave him an old version of the bill, not the one that is filed. And he was focused, in particular, on the one edit that was made, which was to change the fiscal year because we are now 1 year later, so it was to alter the date from the appropriate date last year to the appropriate date this year. That was the amendment.

He reported: Gosh, no one knows what is in this. You all voted on it. You know what he didn't say once? Why having police officers--more police officers in schools--is a bad thing. He didn't talk at all about $10 billion for mental health program counselors.

I am tired of these games. I told you that he would give you process arguments and, oh, boy, did he. He said: Gosh, Cruz didn't call me. I guess his feelings were hurt.

I have also done this a long time. I have seen the political posturing that too many Democrats do on this issue. The Senator from Connecticut suggests that this is a newfound interest. I served 11 years on the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. I have fought for 11 years. I have introduced legislation after legislation after legislation to lock up gun criminals. If you commit a crime with a gun, you should be prosecuted and go to jail. If you are a felon or fugitive or someone with serious mental illness and you try to illegally buy guns, you should be prosecuted and sent to jail, and, repeatedly, Democrats block those bills.

The sad reality of this body is, if you are a mom at home who wants to be able to protect your kids, the Democrats are really eager to disarm you. But if you are a gangbanger in Chicago, they are not interested in a gun task force to lock you up and take the murderers off the street.

Why is it an unreasonable question to ask what is wrong with having more police officers to protect our kids?

I want to show you how little interest the Democrats have. The Senator from Connecticut is gone. He gave his little speech and ran away. This is supposed to be the world's greatest deliberative body. But as long as the press doesn't do its job, the Senator from Connecticut can send out a fundraising email tonight to all the gun control groups saying: Guess what. We are coming after the Second Amendment. Please click here.

That is cold comfort to the parents who are scared at home right now, to the kids who are scared at home right now.

The solutions put forth by the Democrats in this body are not designed to stop crime; this bill is. You know, for a long time, in the weeks and months following Uvalde, there has been a talking point raised by the left on Twitter and echoed just moments ago by the Senator from Connecticut that says: Well, we don't want more police because the police don't stop these crimes, and they point to Uvalde. I will say, having been in Uvalde right after

that shooting, what the police officers did there was tragic. Hundreds of officers showed up at that school, and for an hour and 14 minutes, they did nothing. They didn't go in and take out the shooter. That was true even as shots rang out repeatedly. That was true even as little children were calling 9-1-1 begging for help. For over an hour, they didn't go in. I agree the conduct of law enforcement that day was inexplicable and indefensible.

I will say, when I went to Uvalde immediately after the shooting, senior law enforcement there in Uvalde sat in the room and lied to me and lied to John Cornyn and lied to Greg Abbott, the Governor, about what happened. The story they described was utterly false, as would come out in the days to follow. One of the things they claimed that day was to say: Oh, an officer was there when the shooter arrived. That was not true.

You want to know why having an officer there matters? Watch the body cam footage. In Nashville, those heroic officers who heard the sounds of gunshots ran toward them, risking their lives. There are children who are, thank God, alive because of the heroism of those officers. Is it too much to ask how things would have been different if the officer could have been at the front door to begin with? They could have been, if not for Senate Democrats.

The Senator from Connecticut said, gosh, he hasn't had time to read this bill that he voted on before; that he has objected to before. But, you know, it really did make his head hurt to have to read this legislative language. I tell you what. We are ready to go on a 2-week recess. When we come back, we can do this again. Senator from Connecticut, take 2 weeks to read the bill. It is not complicated. And then I look forward to the Senator from Connecticut telling me why, on behalf of the Democratic Party, he thinks having police officers on school campuses is a bad idea.

By the way, I would note, even though it is just the Senator from Connecticut objecting, every Democrat in this body voted against this bill, and not a single Democrat has come to the floor to say they disagree with what the Senator from Connecticut is doing. When he stands up and does this objection, he is doing it on behalf of the whole Democratic Party. I will make an invitation to any one of you. If there is a Democratic Member in this body who actually believes that having police officers protecting our kids would be a good thing; that actually believes having mental health program counselors in our schools would be a good thing; that actually believes that providing funding to enhance physical security in schools would be a good thing, then come join me. I don't have a whole lot of optimism that is going to happen. But if it doesn't, this is all going to happen again.

The bill passed last fall. Nobody--nobody, nobody, nobody--thinks it is going to do anything to stop mass murders. It wasn't designed to do that. It was designed to assuage gun control activists. If you want to stop mass murders, go after the murderers. If you want to stop mass murders, protect our kids.

We can do this. But to do it, we have to have someone from the Democratic Party willing to stand up and say: Let's actually get it done. Right now, today, the answer from Democrats is thoughts and prayers. I agree, thoughts and prayers are not enough. How about action? By the way, they do want action. They would be happy to confiscate all the law-abiding citizens' firearms, which doesn't work and wouldn't have kept anybody safe. How about action to keep our kids safe?

If the Democrats had that objective in September of 2022, this horrific murder in Nashville could have been prevented. It should have been prevented. And we have a responsibility to do everything we can to prevent the next one.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I call up my amendment No. 9, and I ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, there is no responsibility we have as Members of Congress more serious than protecting the men and women who defend this Nation. We are facing a national security crisis due to Joe Biden and his administration, which have repeatedly been unwilling to act against repeated hostilities from the nation of Iran. They have looked repeatedly for excuses to justify that inaction.

Now, I want to be clear. I am not where some Members of this body are who want to maintain this authorization for use of military force. I want to vote to repeal this authorization for use of military force. The Iraq war was a long time ago, and I believe the Iraq war was a mistake at the time it was fought. I would be enthusiastic about Congress reasserting its war-making and war-declaring power by repealing the AUMF.

But, at the same time, I don't want the repeal of the AUMF to be used as an excuse by the Biden administration to roll over and do nothing if and when Iran attacks and murders American soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines in the Middle East. And this is not hypothetical.

Just last week, General Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, testified before the House that from January 2021 until last week, there were 78 attacks against American forces in the Middle East by Iranian-linked fighters--78. The Biden administration responded 3 times; 75 of them went unresponded. Tragically, but predictably, appeasement doesn't work.

On Thursday morning, the CENTCOM Commander was testifying in front of the House. Here on the floor of the Senate, we were debating this very issue of the AUMF and Iranian aggression. We now know that, at 6:30 in the morning eastern time on Thursday, Iran attacked U.S. forces, murdered a U.S. citizen--a U.S. contractor--and wounded six other Americans. That happened at 6:30 in the morning eastern time on Thursday.

The Presiding Officer didn't know that on Thursday. I didn't know that on Thursday. None of us knew that on Thursday. Why? Because the Biden administration kept it a secret for 12 hours because they didn't want to tell the Senate, while we were debating this issue, that an American had just been murdered by Iran. That is disgraceful. The Presiding Officer should be angry about it; I should be angry about it.

My amendment is very simple. My amendment restates that under article II of the Constitution, the President has the authority to defend U.S. troops and to respond to Iranian aggression.

The opponent of this bill, my friend Senator Kaine, will speak shortly. What he said to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was that the amendment is unnecessary; that article II already does that. Well, good. If it is unnecessary, then the Democrats ought to support my amendment and add it. Because I will tell you what it will get: If we add this amendment, I will vote yes on the AUMF repeal. If we don't add this amendment, I am a no.

Here is why: I don't want to give an excuse for the Biden administration, the next time Iran attacks, to do nothing. If it is unnecessary legally, it ought to be an easy give to say, ``Let's add it, to be clear, that if you attack U.S. forces, the President has the authority to respond,'' because I don't

want the Biden administration using the repeal of the AUMF as an excuse for their weakness or as an excuse for their appeasement.

There are some in the political world who are in favor of unending wars. I am not one of them, but I am in favor of the United States defending our soldiers and sailors and airmen and marines.

Let me say this: I don't know if the amendment is going to get the votes or not to pass. I think we will get most of the Republicans, and I don't know if any Democrats will vote for it or not. But if this amendment is defeated and the Congress goes on to repeal the AUMF and Iran takes that as encouragement that the Biden administration will not retaliate, I believe the consequences will be lives lost. I believe we will be back on this floor with American soldiers and sailors and airmen and marines having lost their lives due to Iranian aggression because the Ayatollah believed the Biden administration would not respond. The Presiding Officer doesn't want to see that. I don't want to see that. I believe no Member of this body wants to see that.

If it is legally redundant, all the better to say: Let's send a message to the Ayatollah that if you attack American forces, the President--the Commander in Chief--has the authority to respond and defend American forces.

That is the No. 1 responsibility of every Member of this body.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I respect my friend from Virginia, but he is mistaken. This amendment is not a new authorization for military force. It restates current law. The language in the finding is, word for word, the finding that President Trump put in place when he authorized the strike that took out General Soleimani.

After that strike against General Soleimani, I introduced an amendment on this floor to commend President Trump and the Armed Forces for taking out General Soleimani; and we voted on this, commending President Trump and our Armed Forces for taking out Soleimani. This is not breaking new ground. This is reiterating the proposition that the Commander in Chief has the authority to defend U.S. Armed Forces.

To my friend from Virginia, I would note, by the way, earlier last week, we voted on Senator Graham's amendment that would have been a new authorization for use of military force. Many Senators voted against it. This is a much narrower amendment. This says if Iran attacks U.S. troops, the Commander in Chief can defend those troops. That is current law, but it is important for Iran to hear. It is important for our troops to hear. It is important for the Biden administration to hear.

Nowhere in my friend from Virginia's remarks did he dispute that Iran has attacked the United States 78 times in the last 2\1/2\ years and that the Biden administration has responded only three times. We owe our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines to have their backs.

I urge support of this amendment.

Vote on Amendment No. 9

I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Mr. President, I rise today to discuss Phil Washington, President Biden's nominee to serve as the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration, the top job at the FAA.

The FAA has been in the news far too often lately, from the software meltdown of a critical safety system in January that resulted in the first U.S. ground stop of aircraft since September 11 to recent, numerous near-misses of airliners on runways. These incidents are a stark reminder of why it is essential to have an FAA Administrator with decades of deep and real aviation experience, especially experience in aviation safety. After all, the FAA's primary mission is to keep the flying public safe.

This mission is so important that Congress has explicitly mandated, by statute, that the FAA Administrator must ``have experience in a field directly related to aviation.'' This is not a patronage job; this is an aviation safety job. And it is, frankly, irresponsible to entrust the role of protecting the lives of millions of Americans who fly in the hands of a person who needs on-the-job training. Unfortunately, that is exactly what we have with President Biden's FAA nominee, Phil Washington.

I am deeply disappointed that the Biden White House decided to treat a critical safety position as a political spoil system, to reward a political ally rather than to ensure an experienced safety professional to keep us all safe. And as a result of the Biden White House playing politics with this critically important position, the FAA has lacked a Senate-confirmed leader for a year now.

Phil Washington is objectively, indisputably unqualified to lead the FAA. For two decades, he worked at mass transit agencies, where he was in charge of buses and trains, not planes. That experience might qualify him to serve at the Federal Transit Administration or on the board of Amtrak. Those would be reasonable nominations given Mr. Washington's experience. But buses and trains have nothing to do with airplanes.

The indisputable fact is that Mr. Washington has zero aviation experience and, in particular, zero aviation safety experience. Mr. Washington has never flown an airplane. He has never been a military pilot. He has never been a commercial airline pilot. He has never worked at an airline. He has never worked at an airline manufacturer. He has never served as an air traffic controller. He has never worked for a company that repairs airplanes.

The only aviation experience that Mr. Washington has is limited, for the last 20 months, to working at the Denver airport as the CEO. However, in that job, his primary responsibility is the physical plant there. It is the airport's shopping. It is its dining. It is its parking. It is its buildings. He doesn't have responsibility for aviation and aviation safety. In particular, as Mr. Washington admitted at his confirmation hearing, the pilots don't work for him, the mechanics don't work for him, and the air traffic controllers don't work for him. His job is not in aviation safety.

Aviation is a field involving highly technical issues. To understand these issues, to lead the FAA, the head of the Federal Aviation Administration needs to have extensive knowledge, experience, and expertise in aviation. This shouldn't be a controversial statement, and, historically, the head of the FAA has had decades of real, serious experience in aviation safety.

The FAA Administrator is supposed to be a nonpartisan position for an aviation expert. I don't want a Democrat FAA Administrator or a Republican FAA Administrator. I want someone who has some idea how to keep the damn planes in the sky. That is why the term of office is 5 years for this position--because it is not a position that is suitable to partisan patronage, but rather you need nonpartisan experts.

FAA Administrators typically stay on the job even when the White House changes hands. This is a job for someone with specialized knowledge needed to ensure the safety of the flying public.

I will readily admit, I am wildly unqualified to be FAA Administrator. No one in their right mind would put me in charge of this Agency because I don't have any idea how to fly a plane. I certainly don't know what needs to be done to ensure that they are flying safely. The sad thing is, Mr. Washington doesn't know any more than I do when it comes to this critical, specialized role.

Mr. Washington's nomination hearing confirmed what is abundantly clear in his resume: that he lacks any aviation experience. At his hearing, he was unable to answer basic aviation questions, including safety questions about aircraft certification, about pilot licensing, about airports.

I asked Mr. Washington about what caused the two tragic accidents with the 737 MAX. He was forced to answer to say he didn't know. Sadly, I believe him. But that is an enormous problem, given that 346 souls were lost in those two horrific crashes. An FAA Administrator who doesn't know what happened is not qualified to do the job.

One of the newest members of the committee, Senator Ted Budd, is a pilot. I would commend the Presiding Officer, I would commend anyone, go watch Senator Budd's questioning of Phil Washington. Senator Budd asked him basic questions a pilot should know, basic questions such as how close airplanes are allowed to get on runways. I will be honest. I have no idea. I am not a pilot; I am not an air traffic controller; and I am not running the FAA. But it is pretty stunning that the person nominated to run the FAA has no idea either. That person should know how to do his job.

And I will point out it wasn't just Republicans who raised these questions. At the confirmation hearing, multiple Democrats raised serious questions about Mr. Washington's lack of qualifications to lead the FAA.

As a result, State and local aviation groups from all across the country, including pilot groups from Arizona, from Montana, from New Mexico, from Minnesota, from New Hampshire--all are opposed to this nomination. One of them, the Montana Pilots Association, has said that Mr. Washington is ``singularly unqualified to serve as FAA administrator.''

And, unfortunately, the problems with Mr. Washington's nomination don't end with his lack of aviation experience. There are also serious concerns regarding outstanding allegations that Mr. Washington engaged in misconduct during his time as the head of the Los Angeles Metro. He has been named in multiple search warrants in an ongoing criminal public corruption investigation, and he has been the subject of multiple whistleblower complaints.

One search warrant was executed just last September, not very long ago. It contained allegations that Mr. Washington pushed forward lucrative no-bid contracts to a politically connected nonprofit to run a sexual harassment hotline that was hardly ever used and that he did so in order to stay in the good graces of a powerful politician on L.A. Metro's board.

The allegations are the kind of local corruption, sadly, we see far too often across this country in both parties. But a whistleblower who exposed the details of this alleged pay-to-play contracting scheme claims to have been retaliated against by Mr. Washington. After Mr. Washington left the L.A. Metro, the agency settled these claims with the whistleblower for $625,000. I practiced law for a long time. You did as well. A $625,000 check is not a nuisance check. It is not a go- away check. It is indicative that there is real there, there. Whistleblowers don't get settlements for more than a half million dollars if their claim is baseless.

During my 11 years in the Senate, I have seen lots of nominees. I cannot recall seeing even a single other nominee who was currently entangled in an ongoing public corruption criminal investigation while his nomination was pending.

The week before his confirmation hearing, my staff contacted the California attorney general's office about the status of this investigation. Despite Mr. Washington's insistence that he has done nothing wrong, the attorney general's office stated, No. 1, that there is an ongoing criminal investigation into this public corruption scheme; No. 2, that Mr. Washington has a ``material involvement in the case''; and, No. 3, that the investigation is months from being completed.

It is important to note that the law enforcement officers involved in this investigation--from the L.A. County sheriff to the California attorney general--are all Democrats. There is no issue of partisan targeting. There is no Republican who has it out for Phil Washington. This is a Democrat sheriff and a Democrat attorney general in California who are investigating Mr. Washington right now for public corruption.

Even more amazingly, when my staff spoke with the California attorney general's office, the AG's office told us that at the time they spoke, they were not aware of anybody from the White House, from the FBI, or from the Senate who had even contacted them to ask about Mr. Washington's ongoing involvement in the investigation.

That is truly stunning. That is, frankly, just not caring. It is inexplicable to me that a President, that a White House, would choose to nominate someone who is materially involved in a current ongoing public corruption investigation. Just imagine how damaging it would be to the FAA if Mr. Washington were confirmed and then months later he were to find himself indicted for public corruption. That would do real damage to an Agency that needs serious trust and leadership.

The FAA's mission to keep the flying public safe is far too important to have anyone other than a highly experienced aviation expert at the helm.

Fortunately, the FAA right now is being run by Acting Administrator Billy Nolen, who unlike Mr. Washington has decades of aviation experience. Mr. Nolen has worked as a pilot; he is a seasoned aviation safety executive; and he has been in senior leadership roles at the

Madam President, crime is surging across this Nation. Murder rates have risen over the last 3 years, carjackings are rising, robberies are rising.

Today, I want to discuss the resolution disapproving of the DC City Council's decision to eliminate mandatory minimums and to reduce maximum sentences for violent crimes, including robbery, carjacking, and burglary.

The DC City Council made this decision to lower penalties late last year, despite the fact that crime has been skyrocketing in this city. In the past 12 months, overall crime is up 25 percent in DC. Car theft has increased 110 percent in DC. And homicides have increased 30 percent.

Who, in their right mind, looks to those rising crime rates and says the answer is to lower the penalties for violent crime?

DC's spike in crime is hardly confined to the last 12 months. In 2021, the number of murders in DC was the highest it has been since 2003. The Mayor of DC, a Democrat, vetoed the city council's decision to rewrite the Criminal Code, saying:

Any time there is a policy that reduces penalties, I think

it sends the wrong message.

Unfortunately, the Democrats on the city council in DC overrode her veto.

Time and time again, we have seen Democrats in major cities reducing penalties for crime; and we have seen, as a result, crime spiking. We have seen this in San Francisco. We have seen this in Los Angeles. We have seen this in Portland. We have seen this in Boston. We have seen this in Philadelphia. We have seen this in New York. We have seen this in St. Louis. We have seen this in Chicago.

Crime is spiking in DC, and it is incredibly harmful to the men and women and children who live in DC to be lowering the penalties for violent crime. That is why I am proud to support the resolution to disapprove of the DC City Council's decision. And I thank my friend from Tennessee for his leadership in bringing this resolution.

This has already passed the House. And I believe it will pass the Senate as well. And, despite being soft on crime his entire Presidency, President Biden has said he will sign it if it passes the Senate. Now that is remarkable given Biden's record on crime. That is remarkable given that Biden has nominated not one, not two, but three of the leading advocates of abolishing the police to senior positions in the Department of Justice.

I am sorry to say that every Democrat in this Chamber voted to confirm not one, not two, but all three of those advocates of abolishing the police to senior positions in the Department of Justice. One of those was a George Soros-backed prosecutor in Massachusetts who, like the DC City Council, put out a list of crimes that she would not allow her prosecutors to prosecute, endangering the citizens she was charged to protect.

What was her reward for refusing to prosecute violent criminals? President Biden nominated her to be U.S. Attorney for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and every Senate Democrat voted to confirm her as the U.S. Attorney, the chief Federal prosecutor, in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

Now, once President Biden said he would sign this bill, the political pressure it has put on the DC City Council has had enormous impact. This week, the council tried to withdraw the legislation. ``Never mind,'' was their response. But simply withdrawing a bill doesn't permanently get rid of it under the Home Rule Act, which allows Congress to review legislation that comes out of the DC City Council.

To permanently stop the DC Council's harmful bill, Congress should proceed and pass the Resolution of Disapproval and President Biden should follow through on his commitment to sign it.

A recent poll found that 77 percent of Americans believe that violent crime is a major problem. Democrats, tragically, have been soft on crime for years; and crime has surged as a result.

At the end of the day, it is not complicated: If you let violent criminals go, they commit more and more violent crimes. We have seen patterns all over the country of mass murders carried out by violent criminals who Democrat DA's have let out of jail, only to see them turn around and commit more violent crimes.

Congress, right now, has an opportunity to come together and to speak in a bipartisan way and to say: Enough is enough is enough. Stop letting violent criminals out of jail. Let's protect our citizens. Let's do our job.

I urge every Senator, Republican and Democrat, to support this resolution.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, tomorrow is Texas Independence Day. On that day 187 years ago, the Texians declared our independence from Mexico and fired a shot for liberty.

In the fight for independence from Mexico, many would go on to give their lives for liberty at the Alamo, including William Barret Travis, Jim Bowie, and Davy Crockett. But shortly afterwards, after losing battle after battle after battle, the Texians won a decisive victory at the Battle of San Jacinto and formed the Republic of Texas. The rest is history.

After 9 years as a republic, our own nation, Texas officially became part of the United States in February of 1846.

Sam Houston, the founding father of the Lone Star State, was also born 230 years ago tomorrow. Tomorrow is Sam Houston's birthday.

Happy birthday.

Sam Houston was an extraordinary American. He was born in Virginia, spent many years in Tennessee, where he served in the U.S. House of Representatives and then became Governor of Tennessee. In Texas, he served as commander in chief of the Texian Army. He led the Texas Army to victory in the war for Texas independence. When Texas became an independent nation, Sam Houston served in the Texas House of Representatives and then as President of the Republic of Texas. When Texas joined the United States, he served in the U.S. Senate and finally as Governor of Texas.

I have always been a bit jealous that my colleague Senator Cornyn happens to occupy the seat that once was held by Sam Houston.

Sam Houston was a tireless, talented leader and a great statesman who believed passionately in freedom. His words, ``Govern wisely and as little as possible,'' remain true today, and the Lone Star State still follows that principle.

These great heroes, these great Texians, risked everything for freedom to make freedom a reality for generations of Texans. And tomorrow, we celebrate and honor their sacrifices.

Many years in the past, I have stood on the floor of the Senate and read Travis's letter from the Alamo to honor Texas Independence Day. This year, my colleague Senator Cornyn will read it since I read it last year.

Mr. President, I also want to take time today to thank another group of Texans for the incredible sacrifices they have made to the Lone Star State over the span of 200 years--the Texas Rangers. This year, 2023, marks 200 years since Stephen F. Austin formed the Texas Rangers to protect people who had settled in Texas--to protect them from outlaws and hostile attacks.

Over the years, the duties of the Texas Rangers expanded, and they played a key role in keeping Texas safe, from stopping an assassination attempt on President Taft, to tracking down the infamous outlaws Bonnie and Clyde, to doing the hard, painstaking work to arrest the cult leader Warren Jeffs. The Rangers are critical to law and order in Texas, where rural counties often don't have the resources they need to investigate crime. The Rangers are always ready to step in and serve.

There is an old line in the State of Texas: ``One Riot, One Ranger.'' That is who the Texas Rangers are.

I have been to the Texas Rangers Hall of Fame in Waco, TX, where the Rangers have done a wonderful job of preserving artifacts and telling the story of the Rangers. Anyone stopping through Waco should visit. The story of the Rangers is the story of Texas and, in many ways, the American West. It is a story about seeking freedom, and it is a story about courage.

That is why I am proud to introduce a resolution honoring the bicentennial of the Texas Rangers and in just a moment will propound a unanimous consent request in this body.

Mr. President, I am also proud to welcome here Major James Thomas to the Capitol. Major Thomas has served as a Ranger for 8 years, and he is the first Ranger to have a doctorate.

Major Thomas, thank you for being here today, and thank you for your years of distinguished service to the great State of Texas.

To all of the Rangers, as we celebrate with you your 200th anniversary, congratulations, and thank you for your incredible service to Texas.

And to every Texan, all 30 million, I wish you a very happy Texas Independence Day.

Mr. President, as if in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of S. Res. 86, which is at the desk.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.