We use analytics tools to understand how people use the site. They're optional: if you decline, the site works the same, no analytics cookies are set and Google gets only a cookieless, anonymous count signal. Your votes are saved either way; the details are in the privacy policy.
22Senate Resolution 31: Calling on the Government of Panama to Expel Officials and Interests of the People's Republic of China and Terminate Chinese Management of Key Panamanian Ports
24Senate Resolution 33: Expressing Support for the Recognition of January as "Muslim-American Heritage Month" and Celebrating the Heritage and Culture of Muslim Americans in the United States
Forty bills and seven resolutions were introduced, as follows: S. 199-238, S.J. Res. 4-6, and S. Res. 31-34.
Pages S334-35
Measures Passed
Washington University in St. Louis Bears Women's Soccer Team: Senate agreed to S. Res. 34, congratulating the Washington University in St. Louis Bears women's soccer team for winning the 2024 NCAA Division III Women's Soccer Championship.
Page S329
Measures Considered
Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act--Cloture: Senate began consideration of the motion to proceed to consideration of H.R. 23, to impose sanctions with respect to the International Criminal Court engaged in any effort to investigate, arrest, detain, or prosecute any protected person of the United States and its allies.
Pages S307-10
A motion was entered to close further debate on the motion to proceed to consideration of the bill, and, in accordance with the provisions of Rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, a vote on cloture will occur upon disposition of the nomination of Sean Duffy, of Wisconsin, to be Secretary of Transportation.
Page S307
Prior to the consideration of this measure, Senate took the following action
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Legislative Session.
Page S307
Duffy Nomination: Cloture
Senate began consideration of the nomination of Sean Duffy, of Wisconsin, to be Secretary of Transportation.
Page S307
A motion was entered to close further debate on the nomination, and, in accordance with the provisions of Rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, a vote on cloture will occur upon disposition of the nomination of Scott Bessent, of South Carolina, to be Secretary of the Treasury.
Pages S310-18
Prior to the consideration of this nomination, Senate took the following action
Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to Executive Session to consider the nomination.
Page S310
Hegseth Nomination: Agreement
Senate resumed consideration of the nomination of Peter Hegseth, of Tennessee, to be Secretary of Defense.
Page S318
During consideration of this nomination today, Senate also took the following action
By 51 yeas to 49 nays (Vote No. EX. 14), Senate agreed to the motion to close further debate on the nomination.
Page S318
A unanimous-consent agreement was reached providing for further consideration of the nomination, post-cloture, at approximately 10 a.m., on Friday, January 24, 2025; and that all time during recess, adjournment, and Leader remarks count post-cloture.
Page S341
Nomination Confirmed
Senate confirmed the following nomination: By 74 yeas to 25 nays (Vote No. EX. 13), John Ratcliffe, of Texas, to be Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
Pages S317-18
During consideration of this nomination today, Senate also took the following action
By 72 yeas to 26 nays (Vote No. 12), Senate agreed to the motion to close further debate on the nomination.
Page S310
Statements on Introduced Bills/Resolutions:
Pages S336-38
Quorum Calls
One quorum call was taken today. (Total--2)
Page S318
Record Votes
Three record votes were taken today. (Total--14)
Pages S310, S317-18
Adjournment
Senate convened at 10 a.m. and adjourned at 7:11 p.m., until 10 a.m. on Friday, January 24, 2025. (For Senate's program, see the remarks of the Majority Leader in today's Record on page S341.)
Every speech and line is the Congressional Record's own text, read from GovInfo. Speakers are matched to members by GPO's own metadata. Referandom places each turn on the Clerk's video by matching its words: 46 of 99 spoken turns were found. Turns without a time are still listed; they just can't seek.
Mr. President, today marks 5 years since the Robinson family of Iowa City, IA, has been matched with their adoptive child way over in China. Sadly, this is not a celebratory anniversary of that date, as the Robinson family, along with 300 other American families, have yet to be unified with their adoptive children, many with unique medical needs.
You see, in August of 2024, China very abruptly ended its intercountry adoption program without even clarifying what that would mean for the families already matched with their child.
The Chinese Embassy cited that cross-border adoption has fulfilled its mission for the country, as now many more Chinese families have stronger will and capacity to adopt the orphans in China. While that is good news for those orphans, the country has made a commitment to American families that is not being kept. China still hasn't given a straight answer on whether these matched cases will be completed.
I have been told that families from other countries have been invited to travel to complete their adoptions but not Americans. Why not Americans?
It has been 5 years since families like the Robinsons have prepared their homes to welcome these adoptive children, 5 years of a developed familiar relationship.
I hope that President Trump and the incoming administration see that these matched adoption cases be completed. President Trump talks about wanting to meet with Xi, have more friendly relationships with President Xi. Hopefully this is an environment that can bring the Robinsons and their child together.
China made a commitment, and I think and everybody thinks China ought to honor its commitment. China ought to do that for no reason other than they want the respect of the world. They seem to be working to get that respect, and when people question that respect, they get very uptight about it.
Mr. President, on another issue, I want to talk about the 30-year anniversary of a piece of legislation that I have been involved with.
A lot has happened during the first week of the second Trump administration. Within just 3 days in the White House, President Trump has put the pedal to the metal, delivering on the mandate voters expected when they went to the polls on November 5.
Now, thinking of history, it brings to mind a message the voters delivered 30 years ago. Some of my colleagues will remember what is called the Contract with America. That was a platform, if you remember, engineered by former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich that led to what was called the Republican Revolution of 1994. In fact, it was so much of a revolution that I remember that in President Clinton's State of the Union Message, he said and opened his statement with these few words:
That is how much the Gingrich contract rattled Washington, DC.
So the American people expressed that they were fed up with government-knows-best and a Washington mindset that applied rules for thee but not for me. Sounds familiar, doesn't it, 30 years later with the Trump mandate?
So I come to the Senate floor today to talk about one particular issue that still comes up at my county meetings. For years, Iowans have asked me something like this: Why doesn't Congress have to follow the same laws as we have to follow? That used to be true until we passed the Congressional Accountability Act. In fact, that law became law, law of the land, 30 years ago today.
Prior to 1995, Congress was exempt from about a dozen workplace laws that applied to the private sector but not to us in the Congress. I want to revisit how it came about.
In 1994, the American people delivered a landslide victory to Republicans. We gained majority control of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. It was an epic victory considering that Democrats had run the
The best approach to good leadership is to keep an ear to the ground and a finger to the pulse of the American people, much like our 45th and 47th President has done since 2017. Throughout my public service, that is how this U.S. Senator has worked to represent Iowans. By listening, by keeping in touch, and by going home every chance I get, I hold myself accountable to the people. This year, I will start my 45th consecutive year holding meetings with Iowans, holding Q&A meetings in each of Iowa's 99 counties.
Now, for a basis for keeping in touch and keeping government responsible, let's look at Federalist 57. In that Federalist Paper, James Madison wrote about the vital need for what he called ``communion of interests'' between the people and their leaders, ``without which every government degenerates into tyranny.'' In the 21st century, you could call that having skin in the game.
Back to this 30th anniversary of the Congressional Accountability Act, during the period of Congress having exemption from some workplace rules, Iowa's small businesses and Main Street civic leaders hit the nail on the head. They said to me and other Members of Congress: What is good for the goose ought to be good for the gander.
So some of us rolled up our sleeves and got to work. I teamed up with former Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut here in the Senate. Like many legislative efforts, it took years to build a bipartisan coalition to have these laws applied to the Congress of the United States. The 1994 electoral victory was the boost that we needed to get across the finish line.
On January 4, 1995, I reintroduced the Congressional Accountability Act. My good friend and former Senate majority leader Bob Dole summed up the reason for this legislation better than anybody else. I quote Senator Dole:
That double standard had to end. We had to restore confidence with the American people. That is why I championed the Congressional Accountability Act--to inject common sense into lawmaking.
This Federal law would provide that lawmakers walk in the shoes of our constituents, abiding by the same workplace rights and worker protection laws, including civil rights, age discrimination, disability, overtime pay, and occupational safety and health laws.
One of my opponents during those years of trying to get this legislation passed was Senator Stevens of Alaska. I remember as this bill passed the U.S. Senate and I was victorious, he came up to me and poked his finger in my chest and said: I hope you are the first Senator to get sued because of this legislation.
Well, I haven't been sued, and I don't think anybody has been sued.
The first bill that we sent to the President's desk in the 104th Congress was the Congressional Accountability Act. President Clinton signed it, as I mentioned earlier, 30 years ago today, on January 23, 1995.
Since then, I have led reforms to expand whistleblower protections to employees in the legislative and executive branches. In 2018, President Trump signed into law reforms to the law's reporting and resolution process for workplace harassment claims.
Although the ink has long dried on the Congressional Accountability Act, we all still need to be fighting every day to keep a reality check here in Washington, DC.
I am going to finish with this ironic statement. Even though this legislation was passed 30 years ago and even though I have heard about its need for a long time before that, I still--as I say, ironically-- hear at my town meetings some constituents say to me: Why don't you have to live under the same laws that we live under? Then I have an opportunity to tell them about the Congressional Accountability Act.
Mr. President, I think we all remember the situation just a few short months ago in the lead-up to the election. Democrat Senators and Senate candidates were declaring their commitment to eliminating the filibuster or creating carve-outs that would render it meaningless. The Democratic leader himself made it very clear that the days of the filibuster were numbered, telling a crowd at the Democratic National Convention that his party would be changing the rules to pass the Democrats' Federal takeover of elections. The filibuster, it seemed, was on its way out.
Fast-forward to yesterday. Yesterday, it seems there was a sudden change of heart because yesterday every Senate Democrat--the Democratic leader, new Democratic Senators, long-serving Democratic Senators who had expressed their desire to get rid of the filibuster--joined together and filibustered a bill. That is right. Every Democratic Senator participated in a filibuster of yesterday's legislation.
I will leave aside the disturbing fact that Democrats chose to unite to block a bill to protect living, breathing, newborn children born alive after an attempted abortion.
What I want to talk about today is Democrats' apparent belief that there should be one rule for Democrats and another rule for everyone else. Back in 2017, during President Trump's first term, when Republicans controlled the Senate, 32 Senate Democrats--many of whom, I might add, are still serving today--joined a letter to Senate leadership asking for preservation of the legislative filibuster. Then Democrats took power, and all of a sudden Democrats started to find the legislative filibuster a major inconvenience. They wanted to pass highly partisan legislation like their Federal takeover of elections, and they discovered the filibuster was getting in the way.
Now, Republicans are in power again, and it seems Democrats are back to supporting the filibuster. And the only thing I can gather from that is that Democrats think they should be free to pass any legislation they choose when they are in power but the Republicans should not; that the rules should apply when they serve the aims of the Democratic Party and that the rules should be abolished whenever they interfere with Democrats' far-left agenda; in short, that one party, the Democratic Party, should be making decisions in this country.
That is not a very democratic attitude. It also betrays an elitism, a disdain for half of the electorate that perhaps had something to do with Democrats' electoral defeat in November.
Now, there is no doubt that the filibuster can sometimes be frustrating. I am frustrated that we couldn't pass legislation yesterday to uphold basic human decency by requiring that babies born alive after an attempted abortion receive appropriate medical care. But the filibuster serves a crucial purpose.
The Founders intended the Senate to be a counterbalance to the House. It was designed to be a more stable, thoughtful, more deliberative legislative body to check ill-considered or intemperate legislation or tyranny by the majority. And as time has gone on, the legislative filibuster is the Senate rule that has had perhaps the greatest impact in preserving the Founders' vision of the Senate.
The filibuster acts as a check on imprudent or ill-considered legislation. It forces discussion and compromise, and, critically, it ensures that Americans whose party is not in power also have a
I expect that Democrats will continue to display a renewed enthusiasm for the filibuster during this Congress. And while I may strongly disagree with their choice of when to use it, I will continue to defend their right to do so. Keeping the Senate the Senate and ensuring it continues to fill the role envisioned for it by the Founders is more important than temporary political gain. I hope that when the day comes that Democrats retake the Senate, their time in the minority will have reminded them of the crucial role the filibuster plays and that they will carry their newfound enthusiasm for the filibuster with them when they again find themselves in our shoes.
Mr. President, I will be filing cloture on former Congressman Sean Duffy's nomination to be Secretary of Transportation here shortly.
Yesterday, the Commerce Committee favorably reported Congressman Duffy's nomination in a 28-to-0 vote--in other words, unanimously--and I hope we will be able to move this nominee quickly, as we did with Secretary Rubio, who was also unanimously reported out of committee.
Congressman Duffy is highly qualified for this position. He served five terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. As the cochair of the Great Lakes Task Force, he played a role in advancing a number of transportation and infrastructure projects. At his hearing last week, he demonstrated his knowledge of the issues that will be his responsibility in this role. Our colleague Senator Baldwin said that he is ``the right person for this job.''
There is no reason to delay this uncontroversial and qualified nominee. If Democrats want to spend their nights and weekends taking votes on uncontroversial nominees, we can do it that way, but one way or the other, these nominees will be confirmed.
Mr. President, today, the Senate will hold votes on two pivotal Cabinet nominees. First, we will vote to advance the nomination of John Ratcliffe to serve as CIA Director. I will respectfully vote no, not because of our political difference, which, of course, exists, but because I am deeply worried that Mr. Ratcliffe will be unable to stand up to people like Donald Trump and Tulsi Gabbard, who are known to falsify intelligence.
As CIA Director, Mr. Ratcliffe will have to make decisions based on intelligence and fact. There may be no Agency more important than the CIA that has to be fact based. Sometimes, these facts will lead to inconvenient conclusions for his superiors and the President. It is in those cases where truth--not fiction, not ideology--must prevail, and I have my doubts that Mr. Ratcliffe will be able to hold firm.
Most troubling about Mr. Ratcliffe were the answers I got from him about Tulsi Gabbard, President Trump's nominee to serve as Director of National Intelligence. If confirmed, Ms. Gabbard would oversee the CIA and our entire intelligence community, and I think she would be colossally disruptive for American security.
If there is anyone who hasn't been fact based as you have listened to her statements over the years, it is Tulsi Gabbard. She seems to make things up out of thin air. No one could be worse in a position of DNI than someone who doesn't believe in facts.
So I told Mr. Ratcliffe he should urge President Trump to drop her nomination. If he really cares about the CIA and its integrity, he couldn't report to somebody like Tulsi Gabbard in good conscience. She is simply too risky.
Ms. Gabbard has a whole history of spreading falsities, cheering America's adversaries, and, if confirmed, I am worried she will push false intelligence for political ends. Those are precisely the moments Mr. Ratcliffe will have to hold firm, reject what she says, and go to the President and speak truth to power.
His answers to my questions about that were unsatisfying. So I am voting no because it is such an important position.
Now, on the Hegseth vote, today the Senate will vote to advance one of the most unqualified, erratic nominees for a major position we have ever seen in America. No position in the Cabinet carries the weight, the responsibility of Secretary of Defense.
The Secretary of Defense is in charge of keeping us safe and keeping the men and women in our Armed Forces and the civilians safe. So you need someone who has a steady hand. You need someone who has had experience in this kind of stuff. You need someone who, when he shows up to a meeting, you are sure that he knows all the facts and is going to be able to conduct himself properly.
If there is any Cabinet that should be universally trusted and uncontroversial, it is the Secretary of Defense. Unfortunately, Mr. Hegseth is
I want my colleagues to think about how absurd it is that this nominee has even made it to the floor. It is a shame that that has happened. We are being tasked to trust our Armed Forces to a man with a history of erratic behavior. One of the kindest words that might be used to describe Mr. Hegseth is ``erratic,'' and that is a quality you don't want as head of DOD.
He has a history of excessive drinking, of alleged domestic abuse, and zero experience leading a large organization of any kind.
The new allegations that came out yesterday are even more troubling. And people say: Well, how do we know they are true? Well, first, the person who did it has no strike against her; but, second, it just corroborates in an even worse way of what we have known about Hegseth in the past. He has a clear problem of judgment, as you have seen by his statements. It is like saying your heart surgeon has twitchy hands, but I will let him do surgery on me. No one would do that.
How on Earth can America entrust our safety and security to a man who has allegedly shown up to work and other events inebriated? What if he shows up inebriated during a crisis? What is going to happen? This is dangerous.
If confirmed, he would be in charge of a workforce of over 3 million people, a budget of 850 billion. Where in his history does it show he is capable of doing that? And what if his erratic behavior spills over to his job at the Pentagon, a high-pressure job? And when people are having this behavior, usually high-pressure jobs make them more, not less, erratic.
What mystifies me so much about Mr. Hegseth's nomination is that there are so many other conservative defense leaders that President Trump could have nominated--people I wouldn't agree with, maybe, ideologically, on some of the issues that affect Secretary of Defense but people who would be capable of running the department. I know there are plenty of Republican Senators who would instantly make a better option than Mr. Hegseth.
Is Pete Hegseth really the best the Republicans have to offer? How low--how low--has this party come in making him the nominee? I don't believe he is the best. I don't believe he is close to the best. I would be voting, with complete conviction, no. Given his history confirming Mr. Hegseth is, simply put, a risky roll of the dice that Americans cannot afford, especially in such an important position.
Another of these pantheon of just awful nominees--not all of them are awful at all, but some are, too many are--is Russell Vought. With his nomination to be OMB Director, Donald Trump has made it official: Project 2025 is coming to the White House. The man who was the chief cook and bottle washer for 2025, who pushed it, who endorsed it, is now in one of the most powerful and sensitive positions in the government, OMB, which has a say over all government programs.
Golden age? It is sure not going to be a golden age for the American people if Mr. Vought becomes the head of OMB. It is one of the most important Agencies in the government. They oversee every Federal Agency, every town, every locality. Every family is going to be affected. You want to get your drug prices lowered? Vought doesn't like that; look at 2025. You want to feed hungry kids? Vought doesn't like that; look at 2025. You want to preserve and expand $35 insulin? Vought doesn't like that. You want to make the tax system fairer and not have tax cuts for the very wealthy but help the middle class with tax breaks? Vought doesn't like that. He wants it to go to the wealthy.
I asked him--he was in my office yesterday--I asked him: What part of 2025 would he disagree with? He couldn't point to a single one. In this panoply of awful proposals, he couldn't name a single one he didn't like.
He is also a proponent of impoundment of funds. It may be unconstitutional, but it could cause real damages as the cases would go through the courts when he sued for it. And that means he can pick what he doesn't like and just end it, even if Congress has lawfully voted for it in a bipartisan way.
So this man would be devastating to the families of America if he got into office. I hope my Republican colleagues will look at his record and vote against him. Nobody can claim to be pro-worker and then vote for Russell Vought.
Mr. President, on the EOs and the GOP agenda, the more people look at President Trump's Executive orders, the more obvious it becomes that no golden age is coming to America, unless, of course, you are very rich, well-connected, or own a drug or oil company. With the ferocity of a bulldozer, Donald Trump has spent his first few days in office dismantling decades of progress that help working people, help middle- class families, help people afford healthcare.
There are many Executive orders signed by the President that have flown under the radar but, nonetheless, also have proved devastating.
He has halted, for one, leasing for wind energy projects in the outer continental shelf, putting at risk billions of dollars of investments and killing good paying jobs in the United States, in my State of New York out on Long Island, particularly.
He thinks he can cut them off. Of course, we are going to fight that, and people will fight it in the courts. But President Trump yesterday was out there touting a new program, a new proposal, by some foreign investor to create more energy because we need it. But in his EOs he says: No clean energy, no offshore wind. Is that ridiculous?
It is robbing Peter to pay Paul. It is talking out of both sides of your mouth. It is one hand doing one thing, and another hand doing the opposite. It is devastating--devastating--and we are going to fight that proposal tooth and nail because it is so important to New York, to Long Island, to America.
He has repealed the Biden-era policies that make it easier for Americans to enroll in the ACA; 20 million Americans pay less for healthcare. That is in the Executive orders; get rid of it.
And in his first week in office, he has killed policies that provide a year of postpartum care for low-income moms in Medicaid. How is that the idea of a golden age?
Here in Congress, it is the same story with our congressional Republicans. They continue to dedicate the lion's share of their energy into fighting the best ways to pass their multitrillion-dollar tax cuts for the ultrarich.
But I want to leave my Republican colleagues, who are now talking about budget and debt ceiling and all of that, with a thought, food for thought. All this planning and agonizing about one bill or two bills is a side show. Eventually, it is going to be clear they can't pass anything without Democratic help. Republicans have spent their entire time talking among themselves about tax breaks and radical budget cuts when they should be spending more time with Democrats talking about bipartisan policies that do not prioritize the ultrawealthy. Thus far, at least, Republicans haven't even pretended to be bipartisan.
Instead of indulging their hard-right ideology of tax cuts for the ultrawealthy, Republicans should put the needs of ordinary Americans first. Make it a golden era indeed, but for the middle class and working people, not for the powerful and privileged. We look forward to them coming and working with us on these issues.
Mr. President, today this Senate will confirm John Ratcliffe to be the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. This is a win for our national security. Frankly, this should have been done 2 day ago, but Democrats unnecessarily delayed this important vote.
John Ratcliffe is undeniably qualified for the job. He is going to lead the
Once the Senate confirms John Ratcliffe, we will move to consider the nomination of Pete Hegseth to be Secretary of Defense. America needs a strong, intimidating, and lethal military. Our men and women in uniform, they want to serve in that kind of a military. They didn't join to be joining a safe space or a faculty lounge. They volunteered to serve in the U.S. Armed Forces, the greatest fighting force in human history.
Our Nation is counting on President Trump and our military to defend America and to restore peace through strength. The problem is our servicemembers are trapped in a broken system with misguided values.
Today, we face the most serious significant recruiting and morale crisis since the creation of the all-volunteer military. The military, in 2023, missed its recruiting goals by almost 40,000 people. The Pentagon says that they met their goals in 2024. You know how they did that? They conveniently lowered the goals from the 2023 number. Easy to make the mark when you lower the bar.
According to the Department of Defense, more than half of all young Americans say they have never ever thought of serving in our Nation's military.
In addition to the recruiting problem and the morale problem, we also, at the Pentagon today, have an accountability problem. The Department of Defense last month failed its seventh audit in a row. We need to change course at the Pentagon. We need to get the Pentagon back on track, and President Trump has selected Pete Hegseth to do just that.
As Pete said at his hearing last week:
As a decorated combat veteran, Pete brings a fresh set of eyes to the Pentagon. He is confident. He is knowledgeable, and he is courageous. He knows the cost of war, and he knows the price of weakness. He clearly loves our Nation. He loves this country. He is a champion for our servicemembers and their families, and he wants to continue serving the country.
That is why I believe Pete Hegseth is the right choice to lead our military.
At the Senate Armed Services Committee, Pete answered hard questions with clarity and with resolve. Pete was clear about our mission and his mission. It is, as he said, to make the Pentagon ``laser-focused on lethality, meritocracy, warfighting, accountability and readiness.''
Ultimately, the Senate Armed Services Committee voted in favor of Pete's nomination. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough for the Democrats. No, no, they decided to then run their desperate playbook of distract and delay so that they could try to search and destroy.
Senate Republicans are not going to be stopped by Democrats' political games. We are moving forward.
Perhaps no other Cabinet position is more important to the safety and security of our Nation than the Secretary of Defense. The American people deserve to have a Secretary of Defense in place and on the job.
Now, Mr. President, on a related matter, on confirmation here, our work in confirmation continues and it will continue later today. Senate Republicans are readying votes on more of President Trump's nominees, and it is a strong roster.
Kristi Noem is the nominee to be Secretary of Homeland Security. She will secure our borders.
Scott Bessent is the nominee to be Secretary of the Treasury. He will strengthen our economy and stop the Democrats' $4 trillion tax increase.
Sean Duffy is the nominee to be Secretary of Transportation. He will build our Nation's crumbling infrastructure. The Commerce Committee was unanimous in support of his nomination.
In fact, all of these well-qualified nominees received bipartisan support in committees. The Senate has an obligation to confirm them quickly. To deny a President his Cabinet is wrong, especially when we are talking about the national security team. Any delay denies our Nation a Homeland Security Secretary when open borders endanger every community in America. It denies the country a Treasury Secretary at a time when painfully high prices are hurting families and hurting small businesses. It denies the country a Secretary of Transportation when our ports and our airlines need urgent attention.
The President deserves to have his team in place, and Senate Republicans will overcome the roadblocks, and we will confirm them. The choice for Democrats is simple: the easy way or the hard way.
Mr. President, we are going to get them confirmed.
Mr. President, the United States continues to face a host of serious challenges around the world that demand serious leaders. This is recognized by members of both political parties, where country rises above party politics. In fact, over the last three decades alone, every single Senate-confirmed Secretary of Defense, but one, has received broad bipartisan support.
I would like to take a moment to share my reservations about the nomination of Pete Hegseth to serve as our next Secretary of Defense. From the outset, he has failed to position himself as someone with a strategic plan to face the threats of our Nation, to equip our warfighters with the technologies of the future, or to support them and their families with the benefits they have earned and deserve.
Aside from serving in the National Guard for some years, Mr. Hegseth lacks the necessary qualifications to lead the Department of Defense.
Imagine the size of that responsibility: more than 3.5 million servicemembers and civilian employees, a budget of $900 billion a year, and hundreds of thousands of platforms and assets.
He has, over the years and even during his confirmation hearing, disparaged women serving in the military and questioned their right to adequate healthcare. He advocated for pardons for war criminals and questioned the rules of engagement that are designed to protect civilians from harm. And he exhibited a stunning lack of basic knowledge on the threats our country faces.
This is to say nothing of the numerous, troubling personal allegations against him relating to the use of alcohol, personal misconduct, financial mismanagement, and more--all of which raises questions about his fitness and vulnerability to serve in this high position.
This is an unusual situation. I would say the Armed Services Committee and the Department of Defense are two of the most bipartisan efforts I have seen in my time in Washington. It is customary to have both political parties in lockstep together working for the defense of this Nation, as they should.
But for some reason, Mr. Hegseth has decided that he would break with tradition and not meet with the Democratic members of the Armed Services Committee, aside from the ranking member, Jack Reed of the State of Rhode Island. That is unfortunate. The bipartisanship should be honored, even if it is difficult and challenging. Unfortunately, Mr. Hegseth did not agree with that position.
It is for these reasons that every Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee voted against advancing his nomination, and I will oppose him on the floor.
(The remarks of Mr. Durbin pertaining to the introduction of S. 229 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the nomination of John Ratcliffe, of Texas, to be Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, shall be brought to a close?
The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. BARRASSO: The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Tennessee (Mr. Hagerty).
Further, if present and voting: the Senator from Tennessee (Mr. Hagerty) would have voted ``yea.''
Mr. DURBIN: I announce that the Senator from Pennsylvania (Mr. Fetterman) is necessarily absent.
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 72, nays 26, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 72, the nays are 26.
Mr. President, there is no right that is more sacred to Americans than the First Amendment right to liberty of conscience, to liberty of worship, to liberty of free expression. These rights are more than words that are written on a piece of parchment; these rights are solemn commitments that Americans make to one another, commitments that undergird our society; that establish its moral foundation and basis; that testify to the world that we are a society built on liberty, we are a society built on conscience, we are a society built on the right of individuals to follow the call of God on their lives, to respond to that call as they feel led and as they see fit within, of course, the bounds of the law.
These rights--this foundational right to the liberty of conscience, the freedom of religious worship, the freedom to follow and respond to God--this is what establishes us most fundamentally as a free nation. This is what gives us our moral character as a nation, and it is what has defined us as a nation--the largest Christian Nation in the world-- since our founding.
But I have to say, no administration in the history of this country has assaulted these rights more deliberately, more fervently, more grotesquely than the Biden administration. For 4 long years, this administration carried out one persecution after another against people of faith. It started during the COVID era with their shutdowns and lockdowns, when they targeted religious communities--evangelicals and Catholics and Orthodox Jews. It continued with their use of statutes to go after Christians and other religious believers who objected to abortion.
Mr. President, I want to draw attention today--I want to draw the attention of this body today, to draw the attention of the American people today--to the plight of just a few Americans, 20 or more Americans who are imprisoned even now because of the persecution of the Biden administration, because of their choice to violate that solemn pledge that Americans make to one another, because of their choice to target the First Amendment rights of law-abiding, freedom-loving, peaceful Americans.
I am talking about people like Mark Houck, Mark Houck from Pennsylvania--here he is with his family at mass--a man of faith, a man of family, a man of work and commitment and responsibility, whose crime--whose crime--according to the last administration, was to take one of his young sons to an abortion clinic and there to stand peacefully, to pray, to sing, to engage with those who wanted to talk about the alternatives to abortion.
What did Mark Houck do when a pro-abortionist came and shoved his young son? Mark Houck defended his son. For this, the Biden administration sent a SWAT team--an FBI SWAT team--to his door in the early morning hours. Why? Well, just to terrorize him, to terrorize these children, to send a message to religious believers and pro-lifers all over this country: Don't you dare exercise your First Amendment rights. Don't you dare speak up in favor of life. Don't you dare take a stand.
They took his case all the way to trial, where, I am glad to report, he was swiftly acquitted, completely exonerated.
But other Americans have not been so fortunate. I think of Bevelyn Williams. Bevelyn is 33 years old. She is from Tennessee originally. She has a remarkable life story. She started a ministry that specializes in care for the homeless and for those who are living rough on America's streets. This follows from her own incredible personal transformation.
She dropped out of high school when she was just 15 years old. She had two abortions herself and was later arrested for money laundering. Then she met Jesus Christ, became a Christian, changed her life, decided to dedicate her life to the service of others, to dedicate her life to those like the homeless, who have nowhere to turn, to those on the streets who have nowhere to go, and, yes, to those mothers who, like she did at a young age, struggled with an unexpected pregnancy, those mothers who felt, as she did at a young age, that there was no hope.
So Bevelyn founded ministries that would reach out to these young women, that would serve these young women. And what did the Biden administration do to her because she had the temerity to exercise her First Amendment rights, because she went to an abortion clinic and there sang and prayed and worshipped, because she there told women who were coming into the clinic that there really were alternatives, that life didn't have to be this way? Because she told her own personal story, she was prosecuted--prosecuted--by a Federal court and sentenced to 41 months in prison. And what was her supposed crime? She leaned on a doorway in a manner that hurt the hand of a staff member. Let me say that again. She leaned on a doorway in a manner that hurt the hand of a staff member. For this, this amazing African-American woman was sentenced to 41 months in prison--41 months.
I think of Lauren Handy. She is 31 years old. She is from Alexandria, VA. Lauren was one of two individuals who, in 2022, discovered a box of 115 fetal remains here in Washington, DC, 115 pieces of remains of aborted babies, a number of them late-term abortions--not permitted to happen under Federal law--babies who had come to term and had been killed and whose remains had then been put into boxes and then discarded like so much common trash. They came to be known as the DC Five. Lauren helped discover them.
Lauren also dedicated her life, at even her young age, to serving mothers in need, to helping those who had no hope. And what was she given in return?
In August of 2023, she was prosecuted under the so-called FACE Act. She was
I think of Jean Marshall, 77 years old, nurse, lifelong nurse from Boston, MA. In her thirties, she began a ministry using her nursing skills of reaching out to mothers who were dealing with unexpected pregnancies who did not know where to turn. She took to sidewalk counseling, going and volunteering her time, standing along the sidewalks outside of abortion clinics, peacefully talking to mothers who wanted to talk, helping them find resources, helping them find alternative medical care. She was prosecuted by this last administration for exercising her First Amendment rights for nothing more than trying to save the lives of unborn children, for calling out, for fulfilling her duty as a nurse to help those in need, for doing what she had been doing for 40 long years. This administration, the Biden administration, took her to court, prosecuted her, and sentenced her to 24 months in prison--24 months.
There is Jonathan Darnel, 42 years old, from Kentucky. He is a former U.S. Army officer. He is a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He started out with a computer science degree and with a promising career in front of him where he could have made a lot of money, but he decided instead to go and wear the uniform of the United States and serve this country.
And when he was finished with his service honorably, he decided to go and try to provide resources for those in need, for those experiencing crisis, to try to rescue the innocent unborn and to help their mothers who were in a period of crisis, in need, and for this, for his service to this country, for his love for the innocent unborn and the helpless in our society, he was sentenced to 34 months in prison.
There is James Zastrow from my home State of Missouri, Columbia, MO. He is 27 years old. He was protesting peacefully outside of a Nashville clinic, alongside his sister and alongside others, again, offering the women who were there alternatives, asking them if they could help in any way. He was given 3 months in prison followed by 3 years of house arrest and probation.
And then there is Eva Edl. Eva is 89 years old. She is a survivor of a concentration camp in Eastern Europe. Her mother was kidnapped by the Soviets right after the Second World War, and then she and her siblings were sent to a communist concentration camp in Yugoslavia.
Amazingly, they endured, and the hope and faith that she found in that time led her to come to this country. It led her, once here, to begin to minister to women who were in crisis. It gave her a passion for the voiceless, a passion for the innocent, a passion for those who had no one to defend them, and none more than the innocent unborn.
And so she began years and years of faithful witness to the value of life, to the hope of life, and faithful work in trying to provide for mothers in crisis help and alternatives and medical care.
Here is what she was doing when she was arrested. She was singing hymns in a clinic hallway from a wheelchair. That is right, she was arrested for singing hymns in a clinic hallway from a wheelchair.
This concentration camp survivor, 89 years old, immigrant to this country, was put in prison--Federal prison--by the last administration because she sang hymns from a wheelchair.
I cannot begin to express--words do not capture the injustice of what this administration has done. And when you consider who the Biden administration saw fit--saw fit--to pardon while they were prosecuting and persecuting these good Americans, Joe Biden on his final days in office commuted the death sentence of one Jorge Avila Torrez, who was convicted of strangling a naval officer in her barracks while he was serving as a marine in Arlington. He pled guilty later to sexual assault and murder of Laura Hobbs age 8, of Krystal Tobias, age 9.
This is whom Joe Biden saw fit to give pardon to; this is whom he saw fit to waive the rule of law for; or there is Kaboni Savage, a Philadelphia drug lord, who was convicted of killing 12 people, including 4 children.
When you look at the disparity between those this last administration chose to reward and those it chose to persecute, it is hard not to feel anger. To be honest, it is hard not to feel rage. This is a grotesque abuse of the conscience of this country. This is a grotesque assault on the principles of this country, and that is why I have urged President Donald Trump to pardon all of these pro-life prisoners, unjustly persecuted, unjustly targeted, unjustly imprisoned by the corrupt Biden administration, and I do mean corrupt.
From a man who used his power illegitimately to pardon his own family, to pardon his own son, to excuse his own kin of wrongful, willful illegalities, who protected drug lords and killers and murderers and kingpins and yet sent concentration camp survivors to prison because they spoke up for life, it does not get morally worse than that, morally debased any more than that.
And so this is a time to turn the page. More than that, this is a time to right a wrong. President Trump can turn the chapter on this dark period of our history. He can write the wrongs this last administration perpetrated. He can begin to restore the requirements that the conscience of our country puts in front of us.
He can, again, renew the commitment that is found right there in our Constitution, that commitment to honor liberty of conscience, to honor the right to follow God, to live out our faith peaceably, which is exactly what these pro-life prisoners, still prisoners, were doing.
And so I urge him, I urge President Trump now from this floor to pardon these Americans unjustly persecuted, unjustly prosecuted, unjustly condemned. I urge him to pardon and to provide, once again, the moral clarity and moral leadership for which this country is known and to revive that moral clarity and moral leadership without which we cannot hope to lead the free world.
Mr. President, it seems like a long time ago that we had the general election on November 5. It seems like a lot of water under the bridge, over the transom, whatever your metaphor might be, but we do know with clarity that this election was a referendum on the policies of the Biden administration and on the direction that they had chosen for the country.
And the vast majority of Americans believed, according to public opinion polls, that the country was heading in the wrong direction. And so if you think about it, one of the great strengths of democracy in our great Republic is when people feel like the country is heading in the wrong direction, they have the power to change it, and, indeed, they did by electing President Trump and Republican majorities in the House and Senate on November 5.
Over the last 4 years, we know that people in my State of Texas and across the country have been living under the burden of high prices and high interest rates, almost exclusively caused by reckless, excessive spending by the Federal Government.
I had a chance to question Russ Vought who will be the next Director of the Office of Management and Budget, and he confirmed what Milton Friedman told us a long time ago; that inflation is almost exclusively the consequence of excess Federal spending.
And when you think about the gasoline that the Biden administration poured on the fire of inflation and what it did to decrease the standard of living for people in my State and across the country, it is a tragedy.
And then the Federal Reserve, of course, doing their job, trying to figure out how do you damp down inflation using the tools that they have. They raise interest rates, and, of course, everything became more expensive from home mortgage to buying a car. If you are a farmer or rancher, the cost of the inputs into your next crop are higher because of the cost of borrowing.
So I couldn't be more excited about President Trump's administration and this new direction for the country, what he called a new golden age of prosperity.
So I was thrilled also to happen to meet with and get to know some of the people that I did not know in his Cabinet. Fortunately, the President wisely
These three gentlemen bring a wealth of experience and expertise, and I have no doubt that America will be better off with them at the helm assisting President Trump during his administration.
As I mentioned, Howard Lutnick was one of the individuals I got to know a little bit better who has been tapped for Secretary of Commerce, and, of course, Mr. Lutnick is well-known in financial circles, having been a fabulously successful businessman and investor. He has successfully led organizations in the financial service industries for decades.
And at first glance, people may assume, well, this is just another rich guy serving in the Trump Cabinet, but there is much more to the story about Howard Lutnick than initially meets the eye, and I just want to tell that story just briefly.
Howard and his wife have four children, and he, quite literally, would not be with us today if it weren't for his family. On September 11, 2001, in New York, where they live, it was the first day of school--of kindergarten for his son, Kyle. And Howard, like a good father, decided he was going to take his son to school.
And so he was planning to go a little bit late to his office at Cantor Fitzgerald. Cantor Fitzgerald, his business, his company, was located in the World Trade Center, and we all remember the tragic story of 9/11, what happened that day. More than two-thirds of Cantor Fitzgerald's employees--Howard Lutnick's company--including his own brother, were killed that day.
Howard told me in my office, he said: These were my friends. He said:
And so his friends, his employees, two-thirds of them, including his brother, were killed that day. It is hard to fathom what a profound loss that must be.
As anybody can imagine, this company, now having lost two-thirds of its employees, was in a vulnerable state, and many people expected it to close shop.
Yet in the midst of this personal tragedy, with the future uncertain, Howard picked up the pieces and rebuilt Cantor Fitzgerald. This is a man unlike most men, a person of heroic character. There is no doubt in my mind that Howard Lutnick will be well-suited to help rebuild the American economy and help put the country back on track.
As a matter of fact, Mr. Lutnick basically gave a significant portion of Cantor Fitzgerald to his employees, something he was not obligated to do, in order to get them back on the right track.
In addition to Mr. Lutnick, President Trump has tapped other impressive individuals to lead his economic agenda. Last week, I had the pleasure of speaking with Scott Bessent in the Senate Finance Committee in which I serve. One of the issues we discussed during the hearing was something we all care about, which is the threat of the Chinese Communist Party.
Mr. Bessent named China as one of America's biggest challenges, which should come as no surprise to anyone here in the Senate. We all know, for example, that Chinese fentanyl is the No. 1 cause of death for young people in America between the age of 18 and 45. We all know that China is conducting joint military operations with Russia and continues to assert excessive and illegal maritime boundary claims in the South China Sea, threatening a regional conflict that may not be confined to a region.
President Xi, the President of the People's Republic of China and the head of the Chinese Communist Party, has signaled his plans to invade Taiwan by 2027. That is just 2 years away.
And, of course, one of the reasons China has been able to become such a threat economically and from a military standpoint to the United States is U.S. investments in that country.
Mr. Bessent rightly noted last week that China has one of the most unbalanced economies in the history of the world, and they are using their surpluses to fund their military machine to modernize and threaten the peace, not only in the Indo-Pacific but more broadly. I am glad Mr. Bessent shares this very serious concern of mine. It shouldn't be a secret to anybody in the Senate that I have been working on this issue for some time now.
Back in 2023, the Senate voted 91 to 6 to adopt my amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would have required transparency for outbound investments; that is, American investors investing in China. But then, unfortunately, that provision did not make its way into the final version of the National Defense Authorization Act. We came very close to passing provisions to address outbound investment in the continuing resolution at the end of the year, but, of course, that continuing resolution was loaded down with a whole lot of other last-minute provisions and collapsed under its own weight. So I am hopeful--and I am actually optimistic--we will get it done this year. But the fact of the matter is we are running out of time.
It is unfathomable to me that the U.S. Government, including our intelligence Agencies and our military, would be blind to the economic threat and the military threat of massive U.S. investment into China.
We know China does not respect any firewall or dividing line between the military and businesses. They actually have a law, a military- civilian fusion law, which requires companies in China to share their technology, their data, with the People's Liberation Army and the Chinese Communist Party. It is unfathomable to me that the United States would continue this process without regard to what the potential consequences might be. It is no exaggeration to say that it could well be investments from the United States into the People's Republic of China that allow them not only to build their economy but their military as well and threaten regional and world peace.
And as one of our colleagues, a former U.S. Marine, said: And end up nose to nose, gun to gun, with Marines when President Xi decides to invade Taiwan, if that day occurs.
So I was very pleased that Mr. Bessent agreed with me about the necessity of transparency for policymakers to understand exactly what is going on, especially in industries like artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and advanced semiconductors.
Mr. Bessent is going to be a great partner because he understands how the economy works and how it is intertwined with our national security.
Finally, I had the pleasure of speaking once again to Russ Vought, who was formerly the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, a job he held previously under President Trump during his first administration. Mr. Vought led the OMB then, and so he has had extensive experience to build on in President Trump's second term.
At yesterday's hearing, we had a chance to talk about the government's spending problem. We have approaching a $37 trillion debt. The Federal Government spends roughly $6.75 trillion a year. And while we talk about it on a regular basis, Congress has yet to do anything significant to deal with that mounting debt. And right now, we are paying more for interest on the national debt than we are on our own defense and national security. It is unsustainable.
Years ago, ADM Mike Mullen, who was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said ``the biggest threat to our national security is our debt.'' At the time I thought, Well, that is kind of an interesting comment. But what he said then has become actually true. We can't spend more as we need to do on our national security to reestablish deterrence, to prevent us from having to fight in wars--which is the goal of our military strength--if we can't afford it. And with the mounting demands of interest on the national debt, this is simply unsustainable.
I believe we have a historic opportunity with President Trump's second
Just like most families and most businesses, if you think about how much money you have coming in the door, you say: Well, we have got certain things that we need, we must have--food, shelter, and the like. You have other things, maybe, that you would like--maybe a new TV, a new car, whatever. And then you have things that you simply can't afford. That is what every family in America has to do. That is what every business has to do, but not the Federal Government. Well, it is about time that we do exactly that.
And, it is also important to get spending under control to ease the historically high inflation, which has robbed every man, woman, and child in America with a hidden tax, reducing their standard of living. That comes, in large part, from excessive Federal Government spending.
And then we talked about commonsense things, which I am really happy that Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency and President Trump have talked about, things like getting Federal employees back in the office in person. What a novel concept.
And, of course, reinstating work requirements for able-bodied adults to get them back in the workforce. We have a lot of means-tested programs, that means based on your income. But if you have an able- bodied individual who is capable of working and providing for their family, why should the taxpayers have to pick up the tab? So getting able-bodied men and women back in the workforce and off of these means- tested programs is really important.
There is no secret that the American people were profoundly disappointed at the Biden administration's handling of the U.S. economy, but I have no doubt that with President Trump, Howard Lutnick, Scott Bessent, and Russ Vought on President Trump's team, we will be in good shape to get the economy and our national security back on track and usher in not only a new age of American prosperity, but also to reestablish the sort of deterrence that will prevent the young men and women in this country from ever having to fight wars that could simply be prevented by reestablishing that deterrence.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. President, I come to the floor today to address some of my concerns about the qualifications of the President's nominee to lead the Department of Defense, Mr. Pete Hegseth.
Like many of my colleagues on the Armed Services Committee, I left Mr. Hegseth's hearing, last week, with a number of unanswered questions and some real concerns about his qualifications and abilities to serve in the role of Secretary of Defense. Now, every single nominee for Secretary of Defense, from both Democrat and Republican administrations, has met with me and other members on both sides of the aisle on the committee before their confirmation hearings, and I voted for every one of those nominees, from both Democrat and Republican administrations--Secretaries Panetta, Hagel, Carter, Mattis, Esper, and Austin. I didn't always agree with their views or their policies, but I thought they all had the qualifications and the temperament to be the Secretary of Defense. So I supported their nominations.
But Mr. Hegseth chose not to meet with me or with any other Senate Democrat except the ranking member, Jack Reed, and he broke with strong, longstanding tradition to ensure that our work on national security remains free from partisanship. And I think that is the important point. We are stronger as Senators, as a Congress, and as a nation if we are acting together. The committee, unfortunately, was not afforded the opportunity to ask a number of rounds of questions. So there were a number of questions about his views, particularly regarding foreign policy and military policy, that we did not get an answer to.
I have become the ranking member on the Foreign Relations Committee. So I am very concerned about the role of the United States in the world. I think the American people expect transparency regarding Mr. Hegseth's ability to stand by our allies and partners, to uphold international agreements, to abide by rules of engagement, and--the bottom line--to support the men and women in the military in a way that not only keeps us safe but that protects them as well. The almost 3 million men and women who serve our Nation in uniform deserve a Secretary of Defense who will not needlessly throw them in harm's way or seek to divide them with partisan politics.
So I would like to address a few issues now that we were not able to get to at the hearing because we were not able to ask more than one round of questions. I want to start with the role that our alliances and that our allies and partners play in our own national security.
I believe--and we have seen it many times from the start of this Nation--that we are stronger and safer when we lead together with our allies, and we are fortunate because we have strong allies and partners. We don't see that coming from Vladimir Putin or from Xi in China, and we don't see it from the North Koreans or the Iranians. But the United States has strong allies who can stand with us.
The most important security agreement we have had, I think, any time in our Nation's history has been with NATO. NATO is a critical, indispensable part of our national security. Yet the President's nominee for Secretary of Defense wrote in his book ``American Crusade'' that NATO is a ``relic'' and that it ``should be scrapped.'' Since his nomination, Mr. Hegseth has tried to walk back his opposition to one of our key international alliances, to NATO, and in advance policy questions from the committee, he calls NATO a ``vital U.S. interest in defending Europe and American interests from Russia and Vladimir Putin.'' This sudden reversal is welcomed because I think it is very important that our Secretary of Defense understands how critical NATO is and that it is stronger now than it has been at any time since it was formed, probably.
We now have 32 members of NATO, but Mr. Hegseth's eleventh hour conversion to understanding the importance of our allies and partners raises questions about what he really believes. We asked in our questions for the record about NATO, and we didn't get much of a response.
Now, if I had had the opportunity, I would have also brought up Ukraine and Mr. Hegseth's head-spinning contradictions on this matter. Just as America's national security interests are not to be trifled with, neither should be our commitment to defending democracy and the international world order. Any inconsistency in that commitment--let me start that again because this is really important. Any inconsistency in our commitment to support our allies and partners, to support democracy around the world, to support the international world order is going to be seen and exploited by our adversaries.
So, again, I am puzzled as to how I should think about Mr. Hegseth's contradictory positions on a variety of national security and foreign policy issues.
For example, he was critical of the Biden administration, as have many of us been on both sides of the aisle in this Chamber, for not moving fast enough to aid Ukraine, but then he questioned the wisdom of sending any U.S. assistance to Ukraine at all.
In 2022, Mr. Hegseth called Vladimir Putin a ``war criminal'' and called for faster U.S. aid to Ukraine. Now he says the idea of Russia's launching a nuclear war is ``overinflated'' and plays
Now, I agree with President Trump that the American people want to see a resolution to this yearslong war, and I am sure that is true of the Ukrainians as well. But Mr. Hegseth has not, either in his hearing or in response to the questions that we submitted to him for the record, expanded on what the Department of Defense's role should be with respect to Ukraine, even though we have already invested $66 billion in military assistance.
Again, I think it is very important that we stand by our ally Ukraine because of the message it sends not just to the Russians and Vladimir Putin but because of the message it sends to Xi in China, to the Iranians, to the North Koreans, and to anyone who is an adversary of the United States. If they think we are going to walk away from our allies, they are going to do everything they can to divide us.
On Afghanistan, Mr. Hegseth has also been inconsistent in his views of the President's foreign policy. Actually, he has been inconsistent in general on the President's foreign policies.
In the lead-up to the 2016 election, Mr. Hegseth was highly critical of then-Candidate Trump's foreign policy stances, particularly on Iraq and Afghanistan. Mr. Hegseth called Mr. Trump, who was a candidate at the time, ``all bluster, very little substance'' and an ``armchair tough guy.'' He criticized then-Candidate Trump in 2015 for advocating for the withdrawal of forces from Afghanistan, but then he took the criticism back. He sharply criticized the 2021 Afghanistan withdrawal as did I, but he has failed to publicly comment on President Trump's 2020 deal with the Taliban, which is what set the date certain for withdrawal in 2021 that then the Biden administration was actually tied to.
Now, I agree. I agree that that withdrawal was not what I wanted to see--I didn't support it--but they were terms that President Trump, in his first term, set with the Taliban--terms that I thought gave away the store to the Taliban because there were no concessions from them on what we were to get for the United States. The Government of Afghanistan was not at the table when the terms were negotiated, and now we are seeing the fallout from that.
I know that no one is watching for gaps in U.S. national security policy more closely than President Xi and the People's Republic of China. Mr. Hegseth identifies China as our peer competitor--something that I think all of us on the Armed Services Committee and probably everyone in this Chamber agrees with. But if Mr. Hegseth is so concerned about China, then he should realize that nothing will encourage President Xi's aggression more than seeing America abandon our allies and partners. Mr. Hegseth sees China's ambitions as a ``fait accompli.'' Yet he doesn't seem to recognize that his own inconsistencies on all of these foreign policy positions could contribute to this.
A question I would like Mr. Hegseth to attempt to answer is, What message would it send to our adversaries if the United States ceases its support not just for Ukraine but for the international rules and norms that underpin the global order?
I am also concerned about that with respect to the conduct of conflict. In his book ``The War on Warriors,'' Mr. Hegseth argued:
Well, the rules that he is talking about are the Geneva Conventions, which established bare minimum protections against violence, torture, and inhumane treatment. They don't just protect those people who are fighting on the battlefield. They protect American soldiers.
During his hearing, Mr. Hegseth doubled down to say ``restrictive rules of engagement have made it more difficult to defeat our enemies'' and that it would be his priority that ``lawyers aren't getting in the way.''
Well, unfortunately and dangerously, this appears to be one of the few issues that Mr. Hegseth is consistent on. He has a documented history of supporting individuals who have violated military and international law by committing war crimes. These are individuals who were turned in not by our enemies but by members of their own units. They were convicted of crimes by our own military juries--individuals for whom Mr. Hegseth lobbied to get pardons.
I don't think we can afford to entrust the safety and success of our men and women in uniform to a man who would himself disregard the laws of armed conflict and leave American credibility and moral authority in tatters on the world stage.
While embracing officers convicted of war crimes, Mr. Hegseth has stated it is his intent to review all general officers currently serving in the Department of Defense. When asked if he would remove the current chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mr. Hegseth responded on the record that ``all senior officers will be reviewed.''
Let's just think about what that means. Subjecting our general officers and our military that is not politicized to a political litmus test is not only unprecedented; it is dangerous. It will convey to the American public that their leadership is political.
One of the most important roles of the Secretary of Defense is to seek out and consider open, honest, and direct military advice from the senior officers in charge of our forces. I don't know how Mr. Hegseth expects to receive open and honest advice from his commanders when he is advocating for a purge of anyone who disagrees with him.
I am also deeply troubled by the idea that Mr. Hegseth would act as a yes-man himself, putting his own personal political interests above the well-being of our military men and women.
At Mr. Hegseth's confirmation hearing, when asked what he would do if he received orders from President Trump that he knew to be illegal or unconstitutional, Mr. Hegseth wouldn't give a straight answer. All he could do was deny that President Trump was capable of giving an illegal order. And just for the record, to be clear, in his first term, President Trump did give an illegal order that then-Secretary Esper refused to follow, and for that, Secretary Esper was fired by the President.
So I am very concerned that Mr. Hegseth lacks the consistency and the moral clarity to lead the most combat-credible military in the world, and I am very disappointed that this body would put a nominee on the floor without the due process of advice and consent that the position of the Secretary of Defense deserves. Our men and women in uniform deserve better. Therefore, for the first time since I was elected to represent the people of New Hampshire in the U.S. Senate, I plan to vote against this nominee for Secretary of Defense.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.
Mr. President, first, I want to commend Senator Shaheen for a typically thoughtful and compelling speech concerning the proposed nomination of Mr. Hegseth to be Secretary of Defense. I will follow by rising to express my opposition to Mr. Pete Hegseth's nomination to be Secretary of Defense.
Mr. Hegseth is the ninth Defense Secretary nominee I have considered as a member of the Armed Services Committee. I have voted in favor of all of his predecessors, including those in the first Trump administration. While some former Secretaries and I have disagreed politically, there was always an understanding that partisanship has no place when it comes to providing for our men and women in uniform.
Indeed, the weight of this position--Secretary of Defense--is enormous. The Secretary is responsible for leading a Department of 3\1/ 2\ million servicemembers and civilians; an annual budget of nearly $900 billion; and hundreds of thousands of aircraft, ships, submarines, combat vehicles, satellites, and our nuclear arsenal. They also play a powerful role with allies, partners, and adversaries abroad, having to
At a bare minimum, former Secretaries of Defense have had the experience, wisdom, and character to do that job. Mr. Hegseth, however, is simply not qualified to meet the overwhelming demands to be Secretary of Defense.
Last week, the Armed Services Committee held a nomination hearing for Mr. Hegseth. During the hearing, my colleagues and I raised a number of concerning reports about him. A variety of sources, including his own writings, implicate him with disregarding the laws of war, financial mismanagement, racist and sexist remarks about men and women in uniform, alcohol abuse, sexual assault, sexual harassment, and other troubling issues.
Instead of addressing these reports, many of which are documented and on the record, he dodged and deferred. He did not attempt to alleviate the fears my colleagues and I have that there is blackmail material and a pattern of abuse in his personal history that could be used by adversaries to try to influence him, to try to deflect him from his sworn obligations and duties to the United States, and, frankly, to embarrass him as Secretary of Defense.
These reports are unlike anything we have seen for a nominee of this importance, and if they are confirmed, they would undermine his ability to be an effective leader.
As I have said for months, it is critical that the FBI and the Trump transition team carry out an exhaustive background investigation on Mr. Hegseth. In that regard, I must say that I am extremely disappointed by the investigation process.
Before Mr. Hegseth's hearing, I was briefed by the transition team on the findings of the background check. I was alarmed that investigators had neglected to contact critical witnesses and whistleblowers, and I urged them to reopen the investigation.
During my experience on the Armed Services Committee, it is unprecedented that the FBI has returned to my office two more times--as recently as last night--to provide additional information on a nominee. Frankly, I still do not believe the background investigation is complete.
Last week, after the hearing, I was made aware that an individual with disturbing information about Mr. Hegseth has been interviewed by the FBI in December as part of the background investigation. However, their testimony was not adequately included in the briefing provided by the Trump transition team. As such, I asked this individual to recount to me directly the testimony that she had provided to the FBI. I was disturbed by what I received.
Earlier this week, the Armed Services Committee received a sworn affidavit from Pete Hegseth's former sister-in-law that alleges specific incidents of Mr. Hegseth's alcohol abuse, threatening and abusive behavior toward his second wife, and a repeated pattern of offensive public misconduct. The affidavit was signed and sworn under penalty of perjury, and it has been made available to all Senators to review, and I hope they do. I will share a few examples from her sworn testimony, which she gave to FBI investigators.
Once, while drunk in uniform--which is a violation of military law-- Mr. Hegseth was so inebriated that his brother had to carry him out of a Minneapolis strip club. This occurred during a drill weekend with the Minnesota National Guard.
The FBI was also told that Mr. Hegseth's second wife had an escape plan that involved texting a ``safe word'' to her friends and family to urgently request help without putting herself in more danger. This escape plan was executed on at least one occasion. On at least one occasion, his second wife hid in her closet out of fear.
In many detailed examples, the FBI was told that Mr. Hegseth regularly became so drunk that he passed out, vomited, and had to be carried out of family events and public settings, sometimes shouting sexually and racially offensive comments.
My point is this: We know that Pete Hegseth's former sister-in-law testified to the FBI about his history of abuse, alcoholism, and disgraceful public behavior; however, we know now that her testimony was not adequately included in the Trump transition team's background briefing to the Senate. This begs the question, what else is missing from the FBI report?
The Senate is not considering a low-level appointee right now; we are advising and consenting on a nominee for Secretary of Defense. We cannot risk installing a leader who may have a history that is exploitable by our adversaries, nor can we risk confirming a Secretary of Defense who has shown that he is incapable of being responsible, accountable, and law-abiding 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, as that job requires.
In addition to Mr. Hegseth's troubling personal conduct, I also have grave concerns about actions he would take as Secretary of Defense.
During his nomination hearing, I asked Mr. Hegseth about disturbing efforts underway within the Department of Defense to intimidate military personnel and their families and reports that the Trump administration may implement a so-called purge board to screen senior military officers for ``unfitness'' to lead. This raises the chilling possibility that the Trump administration may fire officers who are deemed to have the wrong political view. I believe that the Tuesday firing of U.S. Coast Guard Commandant ADM Linda Fagan, who by all objective accounts was an admirable leader, proves that the purge is underway.
Unfortunately, Mr. Hegseth would not categorically condemn those efforts during his hearing and instead talked about ``meritocracy'' and ``restoring accountability'' within the senior ranks of the military.
If the Senate confirms Mr. Hegseth this week, who will be fired at the Department of Defense next week? I doubt very seriously it will be based upon merit or anything else other than a political agenda. That would be the beginning of the unraveling of the core element of our military. It is not political. It serves neither party nor person. It protects and defends the Constitution of the United States. If we lose that, we will have lost something that is, I think, the key to our success not only as a military force but as a nation.
Despite Mr. Hegseth's comment, the U.S. military is already one of the finest meritocracies in the world. Every member of the military is in their position because of their ability. They are chosen by boards of other senior officers who evaluate their performance, who look closely at what they have done, and render their best professional opinion of the capability of that person to move on and assume a particular job.
Every member of the military is in their position because of their ability. When there is always a possibility that you need to count on the person next to you to save your life, there is no other choice but meritocracy and value. There is no other choice that you must or can make other than to pick someone whose focus, whose heart, and whose spirit is to protect their fellow soldiers, sailors, marines, airmen, guardians--not to exploit them, to make a judgment about their colleagues not based on their political affiliations but on the fact that they are a fellow soldier, sailor, or airman.
I see a dangerous, dangerous point at which we will divert from this historic and compelling approach and become a political organization. We have seen it happen in other places around the world, where militaries are undermined and subjected by political leaders who have a particular political point of view and passion, and they become essentially not an army but an extension of the political aspirations of the great leader. We can't see that here in America.
Our present servicemembers can and should be confident that with hard work and skill and character, they will be successful in their military careers. That is the key criteria.
Indeed, this very meritocracy would prevent a person like Mr. Hegseth from rising higher in the ranks of the military. The totality of his own writings and conduct would disqualify any servicemember from holding any leadership position in the military, much less being confirmed as the Secretary of Defense.
If there was evidence that a serving officer in the military was drunk in
Moreover, our servicemembers, since the birth of this country 249 years ago, have taken an oath to the Constitution. Their mission is to protect the country and all of its citizens and the ideals this country was founded on, which should endure no matter who is President or what political party is in power. Mr. Hegseth's idea of meritocracy, however, seems to be that servicemembers should pledge fealty to a President who will be in power for only 4 years and fit the ideas of a party that only half of this Nation supports. There is no faster way to undermine the lethality and morale of our Nation's military--and support of the Nation's citizens for it--than to inject politics into the system. Mr. Hegseth, if confirmed, will not improve our military but destabilize it and weaken the institution.
Further, during his hearing, Mr. Hegseth failed to convince me and many of my colleagues that he is capable of running any organization remotely as complex as the Department of Defense. Mr. Hegseth has been the head of two separate veterans organizations. From 2008 through 2010, he led the organization Veterans for Freedom, which had an annual budget of less than $10 million. Each year he was in charge, outlays exceeded revenues, until the organization verged on bankruptcy and had to be merged with another group.
From 2011 until 2016, Mr. Hegseth ran the organization Concerned Veterans for America. During each of those 5 years, tax records show that the organization spent more than it raised.
If this is how Mr. Hegseth manages organizations with a comparatively small staff and budget, how can anyone have confidence that he will be able to effectively manage an organization with hundreds of multi- million- and multi-billion-dollar contracts that literally drive the economy of many parts of this country?
If confirmed, Mr. Hegseth would be the leader of millions of men and women of every race, religion, and political belief. He can only be an effective leader of an effective fighting force if he has respect for those he leads, and they trust he supports them. Unfortunately, Mr. Hegseth has shown disdain and outright hostility for many he would lead. His writings and his speeches make clear his opposition to diversity issues. He has said:
On a recent podcast, he said:
Mr. Hegseth has also written:
That is not the spirit to bring to lead the men and women of our military forces.
When I joined the Army as a young officer in the 1970s, the U.S. military was rife with racial tension, women were prohibited from serving in most roles, gay servicemembers were banned, and we relied on a national draft to fill our ranks. The soldiers I served with were proud to do so, but it was certainly not the Nation's most capable military by any standard.
We have made great progress since then. Today, the Department of Defense is fully integrated, every race and religion is accepted, women serve in all combat roles and leadership positions, sexual orientation is irrelevant to service, and the All-Volunteer Force visibly reflects the Nation it protects.
Our military is more diverse than it has ever been, but, more importantly, it is more lethal than it has ever been. This is not a coincidence. This diversity and nonpartisanship is the bedrock of our military power. But Mr. Hegseth seeks to destroy that.
One other strength of the U.S. military which has made us respected around the world is the adherence to the rule of law and clear standards on the battlefield to protect civilians and treat prisoners with humanity. Once again, this nominee for Secretary of Defense, if confirmed, will put that principle in doubt. Mr. Hegseth has championed the pardoning of military members who were turned in by their fellow soldiers and SEALs as well as military contractors convicted of killing 14 Iraqi civilians without cause. He has advocated for the reinstitution of interrogation methods like waterboarding that have been defined as torture and has belittled the advice and counsel of the Judge Advocates General while on deployment.
In his book ``The War on Warriors,'' he wrote:
How can our military personnel trust each other and the partners and allies we need in this dangerous world trust the United States if such rules and conventions are tossed aside? What a bounty this would give our adversaries.
And how would we have the moral authority to criticize the North Vietnamese, for example, who tortured pilots like our colleague John McCain if our Secretary of Defense is saying waterboarding is perfectly fine?
We wouldn't. In fact, I think our pilots would be very much concerned if they felt there are no rules of the game and that, if they went down behind enemy lines, they would be just brutalized, tortured, et cetera, and we don't even have a moral objection to it.
Finally, my top priority as a U.S. Senator has always been national security, and my colleagues, I hope, know this. I don't seek partisan wins or the political spotlight. I want to do right by our men and women in uniform, and I refuse to compromise or cut corners on national security issues.
The greatest privilege I have had in my life is to lead soldiers, to understand and respect them, to do my best by example and leadership so that they would have confidence that their best interest was my sole interest. That is not what I heard from Mr. Hegseth, and that is not what he would bring to the Department of Defense.
Process is important for a nomination of this sort. Other than me, Mr. Hegseth refused to meet with any of my Democratic colleagues on the committee--an unprecedented act, a signal that he is not trying to be a nonpartisan Secretary. He is, in fact, going to be very partisan-- again, injecting politics into the Department of Defense, which is, in my view, fatal.
The committee was denied a second round of questioning of Mr. Hegseth, although we needed it at that time. And I should point out, historically, when Secretary Hagel was here, we had three rounds of questioning; when Secretary Carter was here, we had two rounds of questioning. So the precedent was strongly in favor of an additional round. So we have essentially been denied the kind of access that would have revealed more of Mr. Hegseth's qualities, conduct, and thoughts. And that is not appropriate.
And as I said previously, the FBI background check was inadequate-- again, the first time I have ever had a background check supplemented by two additional addendums of background check. That is not the way I have experienced this.
So I would hope my colleagues are a bit alarmed and are asking themselves: Does this individual have the character and the competence and the composure to be Secretary of Defense? I, frankly, am not convinced and am stunned, in many respects, at the lack of scrutiny which too many of my colleagues are using to consider this nomination.
The lives of thousands and thousands of men and women in uniform, the security of our Nation--and, indeed, the world--is at stake. I hope we will all take time to reflect on whether we are ready to confirm Mr. Hegseth to be Secretary of Defense.
I will personally urge my colleagues to vote against this nominee.
With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
Mr. President, in a few moments, the Senate will vote on the confirmation of our next CIA Director, and then immediately following there will be a vote on cloture on the nomination of Mr. Peter Brian Hegseth, President Donald Trump's nominee for Secretary of Defense. I am going to
Three months ago, 77 million Americans voted for change in the United States, and they sent President Trump back to the White House. It was a decisive victory and a clear mandate to focus this Nation on prosperity and peace. That work begins at the Pentagon, where we must return to a policy of peace through strength.
We are facing the most complex and dangerous global security environment since World War II. The next few years will shape the direction for the remainder of the 21st century. It could be led by the United States, a future which would lead to freedom and prosperity for all Americans and the absence of armed conflict, or it could be led by despots.
The Chinese Communist Party is working against us. Its dictator, Xi Jinping, uses military force and economic coercion to try to reshape the world order with the help of his junior partner Kim Jong-Un of North Korea. At the same time, the despot Vladimir Putin remains intent on territorial expansion. Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and their like continue to attack Israel and the United States, and ISIS remains set on killing Americans every day--every day.
Unfortunately, the Biden administration wasted precious time and significant resources pursuing divisive social policies at DOD. For instance, we just spent months organizing with the administration over whether the Defense Department should pay for hormone therapies or puberty blockers for minors out of taxpayer dollars. Seventy-one percent of Americans oppose that policy, including more than half of Democrats, so I am glad we are going to abandon that type of policy. I could go on, but let me now turn to focusing on the future.
Together, Congress and the President have a lot to do, and we don't have much time to do it. We have a broken shipbuilding industrial base to fix. We have defense manufacturing jobs to build up and munitions lines to expand. We have an ossified budgeting system to update, and we have got an audit to finish for the first time in decades. And we have a resourcing problem that needs attention.
On his way out the door, Secretary Austin now tells us we need to spend a lot more on national security. Well, thank you, Secretary Austin; it is an admission 4 years too late. We are simply falling behind our adversaries in too many ways.
So President Trump seeks to reverse this trend and bring much needed change to the Pentagon, and he has chosen a man to lead the Pentagon. His choice to spearhead these efforts is Pete Hegseth, a retired major and combat veteran in the Army National Guard.
Admittedly, this nomination is unconventional. The nominee himself is unconventional, just like that New York developer who rode down the escalator in 2015 to announce his candidacy for President. That may be what makes Mr. Hegseth a good choice. He is not beholden to the status quo, and he is open to new ideas.
He is intent on lethality and readiness, and shouldn't we all be? His experience in the line of fire and his servicemember advocacy make at least one thing clear: Pete Hegseth will put the men and women of our military first.
Congress has often seen defense secretaries delay and evade Congressional oversight. I think Pete Hegseth will be willing and eager to partner with us in that regard.
Last week, the Senate Armed Services Committee convened to consider Mr. Hegseth's nomination. In testimony lasting nearly 4 hours, he addressed three key audiences: our committee, the U.S. Senate as a whole, and the American people.
I think the American people liked what they saw; I know I did. He showed each of us why President Trump chose him to be the next Secretary of Defense.
First of all, he articulated a clear vision of the Pentagon, and it is clear to anyone who listened that he is going to bring energy and fresh ideas to shake up the Department's stagnant bureaucracy.
He will restore a warfighting ethos and relentlessly focus on the military's core mission: to defer conflict and, if necessary, to win a war.
Mr. Hegseth is committed to bringing a swift end to the corrosive social policies that serve to divide our servicemembers rather than unite them. And as I have pointed out earlier, the American people are behind him in this regard overwhelmingly.
He correctly stated that we need to change the way the Pentagon does business. He will restore a culture of accountability by cutting redtape, incentivizing innovation, and rebuilding the defense industrial base.
He affirmed his intent to tackle the hardest systemic problems that plague the Pentagon, challenges that previous secretaries have proven unable to fix. And I mentioned that audit. I sincerely believe we will get an audit done under his oversight.
And, importantly, he agreed that maintaining the inadequate Biden-era defense budget levels would be dangerous to our national security. And we hear, as I said, the outgoing secretary admitting that very thing.
In his testimony before our committee, Mr. Hegseth said this:
Well put, Major Hegseth. I am confident Mr. Hegseth, supported by a team of experienced top officials, will do exactly that. Pete and his family have endured numerous smears and false news stories. Less reported is the outpouring of support this nominee has received.
Pete Hegseth has devoted his career to fighting for his fellow soldiers, and his fellow soldiers--men and women--are now speaking out on his behalf. In the past few months, a host of flag officers signed an open letter enthusiastically commending Mr. Hegseth. I thank these generals and admirals for doing so.
The Armed Services Committee has received letters from female soldiers who support Pete. We received messages from those who served alongside him on the battlefield, including a moving statement from a Medal of Honor recipient who backs Pete Hegseth to the hilt.
These men and women uniformly vouch for Pete Hegseth's leadership, tenacity, and passion for supporting the warfighter. On the day of his hearing, 100 Navy Seals marched from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial to the Senate office buildings. They marched together that distance, and rows of Mr. Hegseth's fellow soldiers sat behind him in solidarity for the entire 4-hour-long hearing. These patriotic Americans were willing to step forward and declare their support for Mr. Hegseth publicly--in stark contrast, I might add, to the anonymous attacks we have heard about.
In this critical moment for our national security, I believe we have the right man for the job.
I urge my colleagues to continue in their support of Mr. Hegseth's nomination to be our next Secretary of Defense.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that with respect to the Ratcliffe nomination, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action.
Mr. President, if there was one word--one word--that should never, ever describe a Secretary of Defense, it is ``erratic,'' but that is the one word that describes Mr. Hegseth best. Advancing a Secretary of Defense is one of the most important votes Senators are going to take all year. This man has lives in his hands--the lives of citizens, the lives of people of the world, and the lives of the brave men and women in our Armed Forces.
So I want my colleagues to think carefully. Of all of the people we could have as Secretary of Defense, is Pete Hegseth really the best one we have got? Come on. You know he isn't. You know he is not even close.
Is this the best man we have to lead the greatest military in the world? Is this man with a known history of excessive drinking the guy you want at the other end of the phone at 2 a.m., in a crisis, in control of the nuclear codes? Who are we kidding? Who are we kidding?
Is this the man--with a mile-long list of allegations of abusing, degrading, and harassing women--you want to be leading our men and women in battle?
Is this the man, with a track record of erratic behavior, the best you think the members of our military deserve as a leader?
Is this the man, with a truly horrific and devastating lack of judgment, the best you think our country and our fighting men and women deserve?
Pete Hegseth has proven to lack the necessary morality, sense, judgment. So I plead--I plead--with some of my Republican colleagues just to answer me this: Do you think this is the best person for the job? Do you think this is the best person we have to lead the best military in the world?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair now directs the clerk to call the roll and ascertain the presence of a quorum.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll, and the following Senators entered the Chamber and answered to their names.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. A quorum is present.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the nomination of Peter Hegseth, of Tennessee, to be the Secretary of Defense, shall be brought to a close?
The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 51, nays 49, as follows:
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 51, the nays are 49.
Mr. President, I rise today to urge my colleagues to support the confirmation of my constituent and friend Pete Hegseth.
Last week, during his 4\1/2\ hour confirmation hearing, America saw exactly why President Trump nominated Pete Hegseth to be our next Secretary of Defense. Pete is patriotic, smart. He is an energetic leader. His priorities are our warfighters and having their backs by focusing the Department of Defense on lethality and competence rather than extraneous political and social issues. He is the type of leader that can inspire, recruit, and retain the absolute best talent America has to offer.
Despite Pete's qualifications, the mainstream media, desperate to derail President Trump and his nominees, has gone after Pete's character by airing false and unsubstantiated claims. Take, for example, the article published Tuesday, just this week, by the New York Times. Despite the salacious and misleading headline in this paper, buried beneath 13 paragraphs of slanderous allegations, the Times actually disclaims the entire story with a direct quote from the supposed victim herself
Yet, look at this headline--``Hegseth's Ex-in-Law Claims He Was Abusive to Second Wife''--even though, in the same article, the second wife disclaims all of this. This isn't journalism. Take a moment to think about this. This is a hit job. The New York Times intentionally ran with the salacious and debunked account, buried the truth, and distorted the lead simply to undermine President Trump and his nominee.
The New York Times is not alone, unfortunately; NBC News, The Hill, Politico, and even the Associated Press all chose to run the same salacious false headline instead of the facts.
Unfortunately, I am not surprised. This is the type of misleading-- and often unequivocally false--reporting that we have learned to expect from the left-leaning media.
The American people remember that the New York Times is the same publication that denied and suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story leading up to the 2020 election. It is the same paper that endorsed Joe Biden in 2020. The same paper that endorsed Kamala Harris in 2024.
The American people are sick and tired of the deception stemming from this alliance between the Democrat Party and the so-called mainstream media. This is yet another example of a story published with an aim to do harm and despite evidence to the contrary. It is why media has lost much of its credibility with the American people who see this article for what it is, a desperate, last-minute attempt to generate controversy where none exists.
Pete Hegseth is someone who is going to fix the Pentagon and deliver on President Trump's vision of peace through strength. He is exactly the type of leader that the Pentagon needs in the face of an increasingly complex and escalating security situation that is occurring around the world.
So while I am disappointed, I am not surprised at this 11th hour attempt by the media to raise debunked and completely discredited falsehoods simply with an aim to derail a confirmation.
I urge my colleagues to see through this noise, evaluate Pete's nomination based on the merits, which is why I plan to vote for Mr. Hegseth.
Mr. President, I want to reiterate what my colleague from Tennessee just talked about, the importance of the vote that we just took just a few minutes ago--our nominee for new Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth.
Now, the procedure is--as we just voted--to close the vote, and now we wait 30 hours from just a few minutes ago and have the final vote on his nomination, which it looks like that he has the votes of the majority to be appointed or sent to the White House to be confirmed as the next Secretary of Defense.
I am on the Armed Services Committee, and I have watched 4 years of the destruction of the best military in our world--the United States of America.
It is a shame what has happened. The DEI, the woke agenda that is being pushed on the troops in our country, to me, is embarrassing. I am a military brat. My dad died on active duty in the military. Awarded five Bronze Stars and a Purple Heart at age 17, driving a tank across Europe after landing the first day of Normandy.
We have to change course in our military. And we can talk about inflation and pumping gas and the crime and all the things that we are having a lot of problems with, but if you don't have a strong military to protect our borders and protect the citizens in our country from adversaries all over the world, we have problems. And it has to start there.
Pete Hegseth is the choice, the right choice. I like his age; I like his demeanor; I like the things he brings to our military. He is exciting, and he will energize this military into the next decade. And I am excited about that.
So, hopefully, in about 30 hours, we will vote tomorrow night around 9:00, and we will vote to confirm Pete Hegseth as our new Secretary of Defense.
Mr. President, I concur with the remarks of my colleague from Alabama. We are looking forward to confirming Pete Hegseth. We are looking forward to working every single day until we get this Cabinet completed. And Brooke Rollins over at Agriculture, we know that she is going to do a stellar job. And I do commend the Senator for his FARM Act. I have joined him in cosponsorship on that bill to protect our Nation's farmers and our farmland owners and producers.
This has been an exciting week. On Monday, we started with the inauguration of President Trump, and I will tell you for so many of us in Tennessee and, indeed, across the country, this has been a reason to absolutely rejoice. It is so interesting to me. So many people say they survived the Biden-Harris administration. Isn't that an interesting way to think about it? The inflation, the border, all the issues--it was like survival to get through those 4 years. Because of this, the American people have really given the Trump administration and those of us in Congress a mandate. I refer to it as a to-do list because at the Blackburn household, when there is something that has to be addressed, Chuck and I put it on a to-do list, meaning you don't stop until you get it done.
Well, the good thing is, one of the top things is the southern border and securing that, and indeed we know President Trump has taken Executive action to address this. He cut off that CBP One app and ended these migrant flights from other countries. He has ended catch-and- release. He restored the successful ``Remain in Mexico'' program. Importantly, he is designating the cartels as ``foreign terrorist organizations.''
Now, there are other things he is doing. We all know that ICE is conducting raids and doing deportations, and we know that Congress is going to have to work with the Trump administration to make certain that these Executive actions that he is taking--that we pass laws so that this is in Federal statute.
Now, one of those is the CLEAR Act, which is legislation I have had for years, and it ensures that State and local law enforcement officials can help the Federal Government with deporting these criminal illegal aliens. By the way, that legislation requires ICE to reimburse those local law enforcement agencies.
Of course, my CONTAINER Act, which, again, has been here for a while, would empower the border communities, those communities that are right there on that border--farmers, ranchers, communities--those crossing illegally are running through their property. It would allow them to place barriers on Federal land in order to protect their communities.
My Preventing Violence Against Women by Illegal Aliens Act would require illegals convicted of sexual offenses or domestic violence to be deported. These are individuals who have absolutely no business being in this country.
Of course, we are going to have to do more than secure our border, and that means doing mass deportations, and here is the reason why: Under former President Biden, more than 10 million illegal aliens came into this country. Now, those are the ones we know about. On top of this, you have a classification that is called the ``got-aways.'' The ``got-aways'' are those that the Border Patrol could see on the camera, but they could not get to them to apprehend them.
We know that in this number, you have tens of thousands of criminal illegal aliens. These are not people that are coming for a better way of life; these are people that have committed crimes in their home countries and are looking to come here.
Now, we know this open border has caused far too many tragedies to begin to count, and this is the reason that this body voted in a bipartisan manner for the Laken Riley Act, and that is going to be one of the very first bills that President Trump signs into law.
Because of the American public's overwhelming support for a secure border, for an end to illegal immigration, we are on our way to making this country and making our communities safe again.
Now, we all know that border security is a critical part of national security. Indeed, that southern border is where national security and our foreign affairs actually meet because that border is being overrun by people from about 150 different countries every single year.
Now, we also know that when it comes to national security and how the
I think the American people are realizing that President Trump means business when it comes to our foreign policy and putting the interests of the American people in front of everything else.
Another issue we are focused on for the American people is getting the cost of living back under control. We all know that for the 4 years of the Biden administration, we saw record inflation, we saw reckless spending, and Tennesseans and indeed our citizens all across the country are still reeling from inflation.
You know, to me, it is just so interesting. When people talk about the rate of inflation, they know it is not 2.9 percent, which the Biden administration was touting as they left office. If you go back and look at where prices were in January of 2021, when Joe Biden took office and inflation was at 1.4 percent, and then you look at what has happened month by month, the true rate of inflation and price escalation--the true rate of inflation is north of 20 percent.
Indeed, I looked up what it is costing Tennessee families, and the numbers were astounding. If you look at a basket of goods and services that a Tennessee family would buy in January 2021--if they took that basket of goods and services and bought that same basket of goods and services today, their cost would be $1,060 more for the exact same basket of goods and services. Think about that--$1,060 per month. Now, maybe that is a house payment or the equivalent of a car payment. That is a lot of money.
This is why Americans are saying: We want life to be affordable again. It is why President Trump has already signed Executive orders to roll back regulations. It is why he is moving forward with DOGE, the Department of Government Efficiency, which will bring forward ideas of how we root out waste, fraud, and abuse in the Federal Government. It is why he has frozen Federal hiring, done that hiring freeze, which is so essential to being able to cap what the Federal employment rolls are and get going on DOGEing all of these Agencies.
Well, to support these efforts, I filed a series of bills called the DOGE Acts. You know, these are not things that are new; these are bills that I have been pushing for a long time because it is important that we hold government accountable for how they are spending the taxpayers' money. And President Trump is pushing forward with these concepts.
Another area where we are going to see attention in order to get the cost of living down is extending President Trump's tax cuts to ensure that the American people are going to have more money in their pockets at the end of the month.
You know, there is a gentleman in Tennessee that I ran into one day earlier in the Biden administration, and I asked how he was doing. He said, well, he had been fussing a little bit. What he was fussing about was the high price at the pump and the high prices at the grocery store.
He said: You know, under President Trump, I had some money left at the end of the month, and under Joe Biden, I have too much month left at the end of my money.
People are tired of being broke. They are tired of it, so they are ready to move forward.
Another area where they are wanting to see some action and they are so pleased with the steps President Trump has taken is protecting young women in sports.
It is amazing to me how the left has abandoned our high school and college female athletes.
You know, we have over 3 million young women who participate in sports every single day. They are competing.
Mr. President, you have two beautiful daughters. They are competitive athletes.
These girls work hard, and they deserve to be able to compete and win, but it is as if the Biden-Harris administration waged a war on these incredible young female athletes by destroying fair play and forcing them to compete against biological men, and the results are tragic.
Young women who often dedicate their entire lives to becoming so proficient and skilled at a sport are missing out on scholarships, on career opportunities, and on hard-earned records that they deserve to hold.
This harm, abuse, and unfairness is coming to an end. On Monday, President Trump signed an Executive order that requires the Federal Government to recognize the biological reality of two sexes: male and female.
Last week, I reintroduced legislation that helps to stand up for women and girls in sports. Now, there are two resolutions. One is calling on the NCAA to protect women in sports. They need to rescind their rule that allows biological men to compete against women in NCAA sports. The other is to take October 10 of each and every year and designate this as ``American Girls in Sports Day'' and celebrate the accomplishments of our female athletes.
I also have the Fair Play for Girls Act. It will require the U.S. Attorney General to submit an analysis of violence against women in athletics, to submit that to Congress as well as policy recommendations to support these young women.
Well, as you can see, the to-do list is long, and I have barely scratched the surface. The American people are looking forward to Republicans delivering on the mandate that they have issued, and they certainly are looking forward to what will be the golden age of America.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island is recognized.
Mr. President, I rise now for the 296th time to direct our attention to what is coming at us through fossil fuel emissions causing our natural systems to be significantly disturbed.
We are not yet all the way through the first week of the second Trump administration, and already Trump has made his priorities clear: Looters and polluters reign, and their feeding frenzy comes at the expense of the American people. I expect the looting and polluting have only just begun. So we have made a new chart that will surely see the Senate floor again.
When President Trump needed cash for his campaign, he knew just whom to ask. He convened Big Oil CEOs at Mar-a-Lago. He requested that they pony up $1 billion for his campaign. And he promised them he would immediately reverse dozens of President Biden's environmental rules and policies and stop new ones from being enacted. Giving him $1 billion, he said, would be a ``deal'' because of the taxation and regulation they would avoid thanks to him.
Well, he is right about that being a superdeal for polluters. The industry benefits from more than $700 billion a year in subsidy in the United States alone--$1 billion to Trump to protect $700 billion to the industry. That is a pretty good return on investment for fossil fuel.
Well, Trump won and the billionaires who funded Trump's campaign want their payback. Payback began this week with a big score for the leaders and polluters. On his first day, President Trump signed Executive orders to lay the groundwork for weakening vehicle emission standards, raising costs for families--raising costs for families--an average of $6,000 to $8,000, while also harming public health from the added emissions, and weakening our American automobile industry's global competitiveness, a major gift to Big Oil at the expense of regular Americans and consumers.
Review EPA's 2009 finding that the greenhouse gases are a danger, even though that finding has been upheld by the Supreme Court. The winners? The polluters driving climate change: dramatically reduce or eliminate the social cost of carbon to protect the fossil fuel free-to- pollute business model, made subsidized fossil fuel winners over domestic clean energy losers.
Do you remember when Republicans used to say government shouldn't pick winners and losers--until it is the fossil fuel industry.
Withdrew from the Paris climate agreement, helping fossil fuel undermine global efforts to reduce their greenhouse gas pollution; stopping offshore wind development, a clean energy competitor to his fossil fuel funders, at the expense of American
Rhode Island, by the way, is home to the Nation's first offshore wind farm and a growing number of good union jobs in the industry.
Would President Trump say to the country that, on his first day in office, it was time to repay his Big Oil donors? Well, that wouldn't have gone over well so he had to pretend all these donor handouts would benefit the public. His first day Executive order on energy begins by stating:
Virtually none of that is true.
So let's look at the claims one by one. First, yes, he got this right. America is, indeed, blessed with energy abundance. Where it is particularly abundant is in wind power. We have the third greatest offshore wind power potential of any country in the world. We have the fourth greatest onshore wind potential anywhere in the world. Indeed, wind resources in the Great Plains States alone could supply the United States with 16 times our electricity demand.
That is energy abundance.
Then, as this map from our national labs shows, we have amazing solar energy resource potential, particularly in the Southwest and through the Southeast.
Now, Trump defines energy as ``crude oil, natural gas, lease condensates, natural gas liquids, refined petroleum products, uranium, coal, biofuels, geothermal heat, the kinetic movement of flowing water, and critical minerals.'' Notice anything missing? That is literally every possible iteration of fossil fuel, plus nuclear, geothermal, and hydro; everything except wind and solar, which produced more electricity than coal last year and could power the entire country.
Trump next claims regulations have impeded the development of energy resources. And by that, as we just heard, he means fossil fuels. Well, as he would say, ``wrong.''
Under President Biden--and, actually, regrettably, from a climate point of view--the United States produced more oil than ever before in the Biden years, indeed, setting monthly records for oil production. So that wasn't true either.
Well, it is foolish to abandon those enormous wind and solar assets-- not good for our country or our economy, good only for their fossil fuel competition.
And there is an additional big economic danger if we stick with oil because the United States is a high-cost oil producer. The average cost to produce a barrel of U.S. crude ranges from $50 to $70. In Saudi Arabia, the marginal cost of production is around $10 a barrel--$50 to $70 for us, $10 for the Saudis. That means our industry will always be vulnerable to cheaper foreign producers. And by the way, it has happened before.
In 2015, the Saudis decided they didn't like America producing so much, so they turned on their spigots, causing a big hit to American oil and gas companies. Once they had tanked American production, they reduced their own back to normal levels and the price of gasoline spiked for our consumers.
They can do that again anytime they want. It is basic business and economic sense not to put all your eggs in an industry where you are the high-cost producer. We have a competitive advantage in wind and solar with those massive resources and continent-straddling range that spans multiple time zones, allowing wind and solar energy to be sent wherever the wind isn't then blowing or wherever the Sun isn't then shining.
We have massive clean energy opportunities.
Trump claims that existing energy policies have reduced job creation. Again, wrong. Oil patch jobs have been reduced, not by regulations but by automation. Where the country has seen a job boom is in the low- carbon energy sectors with more than 400,000 jobs created since the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act. Low-carbon energy now employs more people than fossil energy. It is where the jobs are--not that Big Oil cares about that for 1 minute.
Trump claims that renewable energy is driving up energy costs for Americans. Wrong again. Solar and wind have, for some time, been the least expensive forms of energy that there are.
Wind is the bottom blue line, solar panels are the bottom yellow line.
They have been the cheapest since 2015 or, if you go back further, 2013. We have had a solid decade of wind and solar being the least expensive forms of energy for the American public. But Big Oil doesn't care. They just want to sell their dirty product.
What does actually drive up energy costs for Americans? The greed of Big Oil. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, OPEC, the international cartel, jacked up prices and U.S. oil producers rode along to epic profits off of those events. You just have to look at their sworn financial statements filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission about what profits they earned. They earned the biggest profits in the history of the world. In a nutshell, they gouged.
Electricity bills also rose when the price of natural gas spiked after that Russian invasion. Climate change means Americans are spending more to cool their homes because it is hotter than it has ever been. If you are living in Phoenix or Houston or Tampa, you are likely running your air-conditioner nonstop for months on end, and that is on your electricity bill. That is just going to get worse as Trump's looters and polluters have their way.
Climate change-fueled wildfires are forcing utilities in the West to spend billions burying transmission and distribution lines to avoid sparking more fires. That increases electric bills--another climate cost to consumers.
And, obviously, Trump's decision to let his big LNG donors export more LNG will drive up natural gas prices here at home. When there is less at home because more is going overseas, prices go up. That is supply and demand 101.
Here, again, under Trump, fossil fuel wins, American families lose and Big Oil doesn't care.
The wind and Sun and flowing water and the Earth's heat are all free fuels. Fossil fuels put us at the mercy of foreign petrodictators and predatory cartels. Just from a national security perspective, why not choose the free fuels that no outside actor controls?
And then, of course, come the costs of climate change itself burdening American families with climateflation, from grocery staples to insurance prices, to shipping costs, all rising as the result of climate change, disrupting agriculture, weather, and transit--even all the gas price-gouging by the industry thrown in.
That is just the climateflation.
Then comes the danger to our entire economy. For a look into coming attractions, check out what is happening out in Los Angeles, where raging Santa Ana winds turbocharged wildfires tearing through American families' homes much because of climate change. Climate change is perhaps the biggest systemic financial risk to our economy and, thus, to families' personal finances.
And where is this coming true first? In the insurance markets. Insurance markets are the leading edge of our time of consequences. The L.A. fires, with insured losses in the tens of billions of dollars and total economic losses likely in the hundreds of billions, on top of last fall's hurricanes--which resulted in hundreds of billions in economic losses in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia--are a dangerous blow to tottering insurance markets.
In recent years, millions of Americans had insurance policies canceled due to rising climate risk. Millions more saw skyrocketing premiums, particularly in Florida, that forced families in some cases to drop coverage, leaving their families' most important financial assets--their homes--exposed. Insurers are pulling out of some markets altogether. Insurers are going bankrupt. Insurers are flooding mailboxes with price hikes and notices of cancelation and nonrenewals, and that all hits property values.
So the concern here is cascading failures--cascading failures from the insurance market, to the mortgage market, to a property values collapse, and that ends in economy-wide catastrophe. Along the way, home ownership will move further out of reach for the middle class as homes are burdened with more risk and expense. Property owners will have homes that they aren't able to sell because they can't be insured, so a buyer can't get a mortgage to afford the house. There is a lot of pain before the collapse.
We have been through a long period of climate lies, and now, unfortunately, we are entering the period of climate consequences. To stave off the worst consequences, we must eliminate the carbon pollution that is the root of it all. President Trump's Executive orders do exactly the opposite, exposing us to grave economic dangers, and for the worst of reasons: to reward wealthy special interests who donated to his campaign.
The American people need to watch their wallets. When President Trump says he is fighting for you, think twice. He is actually fighting for the Big Oil donors--the fossil fuel billionaires--who got him elected. The looters and the polluters are looking to get ever richer, and they will loot working families, pollute Mother Nature, and damage our families' futures to do it.
So we fight on.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Carolina.
Mr. President, this weekend, I was thinking about all of the criticism President Trump is receiving right now from some in the liberal media and from some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle as they kind of look down their necks with: I am smarter than you. You are all wrong. You silly person. These sorts of narratives are going on all over the place. As I heard it this weekend, it reminded me of a book that I read back in the nineties about President Reagan. It was a biography--``Ronald Reagan: How an Ordinary Man Became an Extraordinary Leader.''
If you will remember back then--I was relatively young, but I remember people saying that Ronald Reagan has got this idea of Star Wars--they called it Star Wars--because he felt he had an obligation to protect the American people by having some sort of a shield against missiles. Now we call that HIMARS, and Israel calls it the Iron Dome. We have technologies deployed in space that are effectively a realization of that vision, but he was a silly actor from California who didn't know anything. What he did know was vision, what he did know were adversaries, and what he did know were other countries that were failing to do their part in defending and protecting democracy.
How does that relate to President Trump? President Trump, over the past couple of weeks, has said things--and you have to admit, when the President talks, he talks in big, beautiful words. He said something about Canada being the 51st State. He said something about Greenland maybe being a territory of the United States. He said he wants to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the ``Gulf of America,'' which he did through an Executive order, because of his frustration with Mexico. He also talked about the Panama Canal.
Now, if you are a member of the liberal press, you are just going to look down your nose at him and say he is a silly guy and he is just saying dumb things. If you are somebody who lived through those criticisms of Ronald Reagan, I have a little bit different take on it.
Let's start with Canada. Why is President Trump frustrated with Canada?
If you were to total up the shortfall of the Canadian Government's contribution to NATO over the last 24 years, they have fallen short by a third of a trillion dollars. Almost $300 billion for our mutual defense they have decided not to pay into. Because why? Because they happen to have the world's strongest, greatest enduring democracy right to themselves. They know the United States would prevent anybody from invading Canada, and they are taking it for granted.
President Trump is tired of being taken for granted. I don't care if he uses language like ``Trudeau is the next Governor''--whatever gets the Canadian people's attention. It is to let them understand that we have a serious problem with our mutual defense in North America, and Canada needs to pay attention. Canada needs to end their unfair trading practices when it comes to beef, when it comes to milk, and when it comes to the way they benefit from value-added transfers in the automobile industry. All of those are legitimate criticisms by President Trump, and I am glad he has had the courage and the insight to call them to account.
Now let's move to Greenland.
I am going to go back--and by the way, I take this personally because I am the Republican leader of the Senate NATO Observer Group and have been since 2018. I have spent a lot of time with our allies, and I believe that the NATO alliance is the most important treaty that has ever existed, and it is why we have free democracies today in the Western World.
When he is talking about Greenland, he is also trying to say: Folks, wake up. Russia and China, for the first time in history, had joint military exercises in the Arctic. Many people may not know that. We do. China is flexing its muscles, and Russia is flexing their muscles. They are in our space in the Arctic. We should take that seriously.
He is sending a message to Europe to say: Take care of our mutual defense. Project power in the Arctic. Check up against what we have already seen over the last year between China and Russia.
So, yes, if he wants to use the language that he uses, he is communicating a very important point: We need to project power in the Arctic in a way that we haven't before.
So those are the crazy comments about Canada and Greenland. Now let's go to Mexico.
Mexico currently has, right now, an additional coequal branch of government. They call them the cartels. If you go to the southern border, you will see the cartels in action. They have these things called plazas. So the cartels have decided that they are going to break up the geography on the southern border. They are going to charge people a premium to come across the border illegally--anywhere from $5,000 to $50,000. In plain sight, they let China import precursors in their ports. They transport them to factories where cartels manufacture fentanyl that they carry across the border and kill over 100,000 people a year here. The vast majority of that comes from Mexico.
So of course the President should threaten tariffs, and of course the President should say: You should get organized crime out of the decision-making process in Mexico. And if it takes the United States referring to the Gulf of Mexico as the ``Gulf of America'' to get the Mexican Government and the Mexican people's attention, I am fine with that.
They need to work with us on sealing the border. They need to focus on the southern border. They need to wake up because we have a new administration that is going to treat them like adults and not like what arguably sometimes can be petulant children. They have safety and security because of where they are on the globe and in their close proximity to the United States.
We expect both Canada and Mexico to be good partners, and I thank President Trump for taking them to task.
Lastly is the Panama Canal.
When President Carter agreed to transfer ownership of the Panama Canal, we made a mistake--and rest President Carter's soul. But the mistake we made was in not making sure that the governance and the protection of the Panama Canal could never come under the control of a communist nation. Now we know that China has actually business contracts on either end of the Panama Canal with the ports. They basically control the ingress and the egress to the Panama Canal.
Now, people will say: Oh, he is so silly. He said they control the canal. That is just not right. I saw that on CNN.
Here is what they didn't tell you: They control--they have contracts at either end of the Panama Canal, folks. We have to wake up. The President gets it. It is the most strategically important waterway in the world.
So I am going to wind up my remarks so that the Senator from Florida can
I, for one, appreciate--although I wouldn't necessarily always use the words that President Trump does, I don't disagree with his objective, and I hope he keeps his foot on the accelerator.
Mr. President, first, I want to thank my colleague from North Carolina for his comments with regard to Canada, Greenland, Mexico, and the Panama Canal. We have to support the President. He is acting in the best interests of the American public.
On November 5, the American public overwhelmingly elected President Donald Trump with a very clear mandate. Democrats here in Washington don't have to like it, but it is not up to them. That is what the American people decided. Let's remember, we work for the American people. We don't work for the Democrats' special interests or radical ideologies. Democrats need to get over the fact that Donald Trump won to make government work for the American people.
President Trump has put together a great team with the needed qualifications to deliver on that clear mandate. His nominees are fully qualified, and we have the votes to get them confirmed.
Think about this: When Barack Obama got elected in 2009, he had seven nominees confirmed on the first day--seven. How many do we have? One. By day three, President Obama had 12. Today is the fourth day of President Trump's term, and because of the Democrats' obstruction, we have only two of President Trump's Cabinet nominees confirmed. That is wrong.
In 2021, Joe Biden's Defense nominee Lloyd Austin was confirmed 2 days after Biden took office, but here we are on January 23, 2025. It has been 4 days, and President Trump's nominee to lead the Department of Defense has been reported out of committee but still has not gotten a vote.
Now that President Trump has been sworn in, it is time for Democrats to put country before politics and to quit their obstructionist and stall tactics and allow votes to confirm every single Donald Trump nominee.
It is time to get to work for the American people. This starts with voting to confirm Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense today--not tomorrow, not the next day; today. This Senate should not go home for the weekend until we vote on his confirmation.
As a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee and as a Navy veteran, I have seen clearly that we need a leader in the Pentagon who puts America's national interests above all else.
I have seen how the Biden-Harris administration pushed the Department of Defense to prioritize wokeness over being the most lethal military force in the world. They prioritized diversity quotas and bureaucracy over recruiting strong individuals who are ready to serve and protect our Nation. The Biden administration put our national security and the safety of our troops at risk, and we need someone who understands the mission and is ready to deliver.
The status quo in Washington, DC, has gone unchallenged for too long. The Pentagon, which failed seven consecutive annual financial audits, is the best example of a government that is completely unaccountable to the American taxpayer.
Pete Hegseth is a decorated combat veteran who understands the mission and what is needed to advance President Trump's agenda and reform the Department of Defense to make America's military the world's most lethal fighting force. That is what every American expects. He understands the sacrifice our military members and their families make because he has been to war. He has led his fellow service men and women into combat, and he knows individuals who have lost their lives or have been gravely injured in defending our Nation.
Pete knows how to hold people accountable, how to make sure we promote based on meritocracy, and how to get rid of the broken, woke policies implemented by the Biden administration.
After his Active-Duty service, Pete continued to stand by his fellow servicemembers here at home by leading the Concerned Veterans of America and by demonstrating a commitment to our Nation's fighters rather than to the status quo.
Although leftwing media has fixated on an anonymous whisper campaign in an attempt to discredit and dismiss his achievements during his time at the CVA, those who worked closely with him tell a different story, a positive story.
The policy priorities he championed were ultimately adopted by Congress and the Trump administration and will benefit veterans for generations to come.
The Department of Defense is one of the Federal Government's largest bureaucracies. That requires a leader who understands how to rely on a team, push for accountability, and bring needed reform.
Under President Trump and Pete's strong leadership, the U.S. military will once again become the world's most lethal fighting force that our enemies fear and our allies respect, and I will do everything I can to support their mission.
Americans elected Trump as a mandate for change, and he is building a team to deliver. Pete is the fighter we need and the right person to get the Department of Defense back on track.
We live in a very dangerous world and cannot risk the safety of this Nation any further by not having President Trump's national security nominees in office today.
I would like to encourage my Democratic colleagues to get over their loss--I am sure it is hard--and let these nominees come to the floor for a vote. They can vote however they want, but allow us to vote on these nominees.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
Mr. President, I appreciate the great Senator from the State of Florida with a haircut that is almost as good as mine. Thank you, sir.
Every year, the pages come through in cycles. I shouldn't say ``every year.'' There are multiple classes of pages. They are usually all extraordinary. This is an extraordinary class of pages. I have some issues with them, which I will air later.
But one of the traditions that we have resurrected in this new Congress is the page poetry contest. And this time, we had just a very small--a paucity of pages participated. That is an alliteration: A paucity of pages participated. And we have a number of them.
Katie Britt, in her eminent brilliance, and I have picked our top ones. Katie has picked one that I will mention, but we want to give these four of the six--I feel bad for the two we have left out. We want to give them our highest honors. But, first, the runner-up in the third position is Kaija.
There you are. You are the No. 3. I would read your poem, but we don't have time. You are articulate. You are eloquent. I teared up when I read your poem. It was so powerful and prodigiously potent.
And then the No. 2--before I read the two winners, the one selected by me and then the one selected by Katie Britt, the No. 2 is Holden. Where is Holden? Holden is over here as well.
Holden, your poem, too, brought me to depths--depths and heights.
It was to the nadir and to the zenith. It was very poetic, sir. You have talent as well.
And then the two winners. Katie Britt has chosen Jake. Where is Jake?
Jake, why are you sitting down?
Why can't I--why are those pages sitting down?
Pages, stand up. Be accounted for yourselves.
Jake, you are now going to forever go into the Senate Record. Are you prepared for this, Jake? Your work shall live forever. Here it goes.
I am going to pause. This might be the first time the Presiding Officer has ever cried.
Congratulations. You are one of the two poet champions of the U.S. page class--the fall page class.
(Applause.)
Yes, yes. Don't get an ego. Don't let it go to your head. Don't be like a Senator.
OK. The other one, the final champion, is Ms. Pallan. Yes.
(Applause.)
Yes. Here is your poem.
That was fantastic.
(Applause.)
I am grateful for the poetic effort. I am grateful for our poetry champions, who will forever live in the annals of Senatorial history.
But there are a lot of people on this floor right now who have come to anticipate how I will proceed to demonstrate that these page writings are good. But now I will show them by reciting my own original poem.
Before I do, let me make at these pages an angry poke. Dear God, you all have been here for 5 months, and you couldn't tell me one good joke? Come on. Come on. Painful. You are the worst joke tellers. Heaven knows. But I am done. I have got my poem to read. So here goes.
Mr. President, I see the extraordinary colleague here. We read her selected poem already. But I will tell you, there are 99 colleagues, but nobody is more the surrogate Senate page parent than Katie Britt, the Senator from Alabama.
I hope that you have learned from her the power of simple, everyday kindnesses.
Mr. President, I defer to my friend and colleague, the Senator from Alabama.
Mr. President, I walked out of a meeting and got to see my dear friend and distinguished colleague from New Jersey addressing these incredible individuals behind me, in front of me, and all around the room. And so, in typical fashion, I literally ran out of the door to come and be a part of this.
First, I think you know that for my distinguished colleague from New Jersey and I, one of our favorite things that we get to do each and every semester that you are here, is to host you--host you for lunch and conversation in a way that I think America needs to see. We do it across the aisle. We have laughs, thanks to this one, and we have a good time. And we get to dive into who you are and what your questions are and what this body is about.
Getting to be a part of this distinguished poetry contest that you have, that is a new one for me, and it is one that I hope I continue to get to do--because, guys, you all are incredible.
When I was reading through these, it reminded me not only how special it is that we get to walk in these doors every day, how incredible this body is, and the gravity of the jobs that we do; but it showed me how phenomenal each and every one of you are for giving up your time, your energy, and your talent to make sure that this institution and our Nation are better.
So thank you--thank you, thank you--for what you have given to this country through your service here the last couple of months.
And my distinguished colleague from New Jersey has said it best, but just to add a couple of pieces of advice on your way out the door: Be unafraid to fail. Folks, I am not going to lie to you. It is not fun to fail. But without your willingness to do it, you will never achieve what is possible for you and what God has in front of you. And look, when you do fail, learn from it. Take a step back. Figure out what role you played in that, what you can do better, how you can be better, and how you can grow as a result, because I have found that everybody knows your peaks in life, but it is your valleys that actually truly define you and prepare you to climb the next hill.
Also--and I hope you have seen this on the Senate floor--you do not have to agree with someone to show them respect. And, in fact, we are counting on you to be respectful to those that you agree with and disagree with. That is what this Nation was founded on: the ability to have these conversations--challenging conversations--with people that you respect and with people you have built a relationship with that you may not agree with.
We need your generation to help us continue to bring that back. I have seen that from each and every one of
And then, last but not least, get in the arena. Right? Now, everyone's arena is different. Everyone's lane is unique. And that is not just OK; it is necessary. But we need you to be unafraid to jump in and to move this Nation forward because, at the end of the day, we need you to achieve what we need to do for the American people, not only just in your communities and States but truly across the country.
You have all been given a special gift, but it is up to you to utilize that to affect as many people as you possibly can in a positive way and make the world around you better as a result of who you are and the way that you conduct yourself.
And so all of that to say: It has been an honor and a privilege to get to know you. From the bottom of my heart and on behalf of all of our colleagues, we are grateful for you. And I am grateful for my friendship with the Senator from New Jersey, and I hope that our friendship has served as an example for you of what is possible when you maybe put differences aside; you get to know each other as people; you can have tough conversations, find common ground, and move good things forward.
I yield the floor back to my distinguished colleague from New Jersey.
Thank you to Katie Britt, the tough-as-nails Senator who will never quit, before I sit--I just can't stop myself. And thanks to Elizabeth, we should have all the poems put into the Senate Record.
So with that, I would like to ask unanimous consent that all six participants, including the two I didn't name--Gabriel, where is Gabriel? Solid, solid piece of work. I was splitting hairs, splitting hairs. The only thing that dissed you was:
I thought it was a lie that the subway is your home. I see you rarely on the subway. So your poetic genius was there; I dinged you because it was not truthful.
And then the other name I want to give is Xavier, where is Xavier? Where is Xavier? Xavier is not here; that is why Xavier did not get--I knew he would not be here. It is terrible. It is terrible.
I see no pride in his not being here right now. But I will say that they deserve to be in the Senate Record.
So, again, all six poems, all six participants will be there.
I ask unanimous consent that all six poems be printed in the Record.
Katie, thank you for your kind words, and we turn the Senate back over to its usual programming. Although I do not think anything that will happen on this floor will be as fun as the fun that Katie and I just had. Thank you very much.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:
Mr. President, in the United States, we believe in the peaceful transfer of power. In the United States, we believe that the people--not elected politicians--decide who is their President.
And both of those principles have served our democracy very well through thick and thin, through strife and turmoil, for the past 248 years.
Both of those principles were challenged on January 6, 2021. A mob that was incited by then-President Trump attacked the Capitol for the explicit purpose of using violence to overturn the peaceful transfer of power.
They were trying to intimidate elected politicians to substitute their judgment, their preferred candidate for President, instead of acknowledging the will of the people that they represented.
But our democracy endured. That is the very good news. And in testament to that, we just witnessed a renewal of America's commitment to the peaceful transfer of power with the inauguration of Donald Trump as our 47th President.
However, I speak today, sadly, about one of the first actions of President Trump, and that, of course, is pardoning 1,600 people and commuting sentences of 14 very dangerous criminals who were involved in that violent attack on January 6.
Speaking for myself, I condemn that action by President Trump. I was there that day. Many of us were. I was in the Gallery of the House of Representatives. It is a day I won't forget, but America will never forget. It has had a deep impact on our country, the citizens, the folks who work here, and that honorable tradition of the peaceful transfer of power.
You know, I was very amazed and proud to see officers--men and women--who withstood this assault. More than 150 officers from the U.S. Capitol Police and the DC Metropolitan Police Department were injured that day. Five officers died in the aftermath, and there was severe damage to the Senate Chamber, the House Chamber, the office buildings, and the Capitol Rotunda, where we just had another inauguration only a few days ago.
Blood, feces, glass, and other debris from the mob's attack was everywhere at a cost of close to $3 million.
So how is it that one of the first acts of our President, who wants to be a unifier, was to pardon those people who acted with such violence, such anger, and such contempt?
President Trump has tried to erase this attack and rewrite the history of what happened on January 6, calling the insurrectionists, including those who fought with the police, patriots and hostages. They were neither.
Should the President of the United States pardon a person who was sentenced to 57 months in Federal prison for stealing a police riot shield from an officer and then using it to assault officers?
Should a person who is affiliated with the neo-Nazi group and who was serving a sentence for breaking the law in Charlottesville in 2017 and who quoted Hitler before assaulting law enforcement in the U.S. Capitol, should that person be pardoned? I say no.
Should a President pardon a person who led an organization who orchestrated this riot after being convicted by a jury of impartial citizens and being convicted of seditious conspiracy? I say no.
Should a President pardon a person who was sentenced to more than 6 years for beating the police with a metal whip, assaulting them with bear spray--something that can cause lasting eye damage--should that person be pardoned? I say no.
Should a person who, at his own trial, said he didn't think he was subject to the laws governing the United States and who, before storming the Capitol, bragged that what the British did to DC will be nothing compared to what he does? Should that person be pardoned? I say no.
Should a person who said many of us should be hanged, should that person be pardoned? I say no.
I am very proud of the men and women of our law enforcement community, U.S. Capitol Police and DC Metropolitan Police Department who stood their positions and defended the Capitol and defended the peaceful transfer of power. And I have in mind someone who was standing over me in the Capitol when I was in the Gallery and the mob was trying to break down the doors, breaking the glass of the House Chamber, and this officer was a young man who commuted to work from about an hour away. He had two young children. He had his gun out, and I looked in his face, and I could see the last thing in the world he wanted to do was have to use that weapon. But I saw that he was going to do his job and whatever was required to protect the people who were in that Gallery.
And I just thought to myself, How is it that the people who are attacking could have such disregard for the reality of this person's life and how much it would change his life if he actually had to use that firearm?
And I am proud, too, of Officer Brian Sicknick, who lost his life; Officer Howard Liebengood; Officer Jeffrey Smith; Officer Gunther Hashida; Officer Kyle DeFreytag, all of whom died in the aftermath of January 6th.
These presidential pardons are disrespectful. They are also dangerous. They are disrespectful to the men and women who served, who suffered the violence, and are living with the consequences. And they are dangerous to the men and women of law enforcement who serve us every day. The pardons validate the violence of the mob and dishonor the service of those who protect us.
These unconscionable and appalling actions of January 6 should be repudiated by every Member of Congress. And whatever differences we have, it is vital that those differences be resolved at the ballot box and that the will of the people always be respected.
No citizen, however passionate they may be about their political beliefs, no matter how disappointed they may be at the outcome of an election, is justified in attacking the men and women of the Capitol Police. Their actions should be condemned by each of us and by our President. Those actions should not be condoned with pardons.
I yield the floor.
(Mr. MORENO assumed the Chair.)
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
Madam President, we are in the midst of considering Peter Hegseth to be the next Secretary of Defense. I don't think there is a more important office in this country, having power and responsibility for 3.4 million Americans, most of them in uniform, many of them civilians, all of them potentially putting their lives in harm's way.
The President's choice to lead the Department of Defense is not only one of the most significant he will make but is also probably the most unqualified nominee for this position of immense authority and responsibility in recent history.
It is clear that his history of mismanagement--he drove two veterans organizations into the ground financially--makes him patently incapable of the powerfully challenging management task that he will have as Secretary of Defense. This sprawling enterprise has to be directed and guided by someone who has had some significant management responsibility in the past. I hesitate to say how much because the standard and the bar have always been extremely high under both Republican and Democratic administrations, including President Trump's first term when he appointed General Mattis.
I voted for General Mattis. He was obviously a Republican nominee, but he had the experience--not just in combat but also at the Pentagon.
Now, I know the President wants to be a disrupter and a change agent. The Pentagon may be in need of some change and disruption, but not chaos, not financial mismanagement such as characterized Pete Hegseth's service as the head of Vets for Freedom and then Concerned Veterans for America.
What can be said about his service in those two organizations is that year after year, he spent more than he raised. He had deficits year after year--not by a little bit, by hundreds of thousands of dollars. So at the end of his service at Vets for Freedom, the board did an intervention. They had a forensic study done, which showed that there were tens of thousands of dollars in unpaid debt, and they, in fact, ousted him.
He then went to Concerned Veterans for America and same pattern, roughly the same financial failings--deficits year after year, significant in their number and total amount. There again, he left under a cloud, with a nondisclosure agreement, so we don't have, necessarily, the full story.
Just as a management issue, this nomination is fundamentally flawed. He left those two separate organizations smoldering in ruins after just a few years as their executive director.
We have documents from whistleblowers that detail a toxic workplace environment at those organizations. It was rife with alcohol abuse and sexual harassment under his leadership. Former employees have detailed that Mr. Hegseth routinely used organization funds to pursue personal pleasures, usually involving alcohol and women. His underlings referred to them as ``party girls.''
These veterans service organizations ran fiscal surpluses before Mr. Hegseth's tenure, and upon his exit, their budgets were really in flames. In one case, the organization simply ceased to exist. Vets for Freedom was absorbed by another organization.
He testified that he is proud of the work he did while he was at Vets for Freedom and Concerned Veterans for America, but he made a career of advocating for policies that would, in effect, contract and even defund the Veterans' Administration and harm servicemembers, veterans, and their families.
For years, he lambasted veterans who pursued disability compensation, and he advocated for for-profit colleges that make their living preying on servicemembers and veterans. These organizations and the policies he advocated could potentially have done grave harm to our veterans.
During his confirmation hearing, Mr. Hegseth also refused to answer questions regarding the use of Active-Duty military within the borders of the United States.
One of the President's own former Secretaries of Defense stated unequivocally that ``the option to use active-duty forces in law enforcement's role should be only used as a matter of last resort and only in the most urgent and dire of situations.'' Yet the President is apparently laying down plans to use the Active-Duty military to conduct mass deportations and to quell civil unrest.
Americans don't want the military, our men and women on Active Duty, raiding restaurants and farms, looking for individuals who have overstayed their visas. If the President is unwilling to invest in ICE, it should not be the Department of Defense, the Pentagon, our Active- Duty men and women going into homes, workplaces, schools, churches, hospitals, and in effect performing the raids--the law enforcement duty--that really are specifically prohibited by statute.
Pete Hegseth will be behind these policies. Many of them he has already endorsed. Most of them, unfortunately, were not delved into in any depth in his hearing because so much of it was on the sexual improprieties and alcohol abuse and other personal issues that would be disqualifying.
Let's make no mistake. There is a lot of focus on this latest affidavit. There is significant information--not anonymous smears, significant information--
So the focus on those personal aspects of his background took time. And by the way, we had very limited amounts of time because we were not permitted a second round of questioning. We were not given access to the FBI background report. We were not given, in fact, the benefit of a full FBI background investigation--an adequate one--because there were gaps, as shown by the affidavit, as to who was interviewed, and that is in part why that affidavit is important, because it shows that there were, in fact, gaps in the FBI's investigation.
The American people don't want the National Guard or our military reserves or their Active Duty, their own neighbors, on the streets of Des Moines, Cleveland, Hartford, Montgomery--places where they call home--checking their papers, conducting surveillance operations that could sweep vast amounts of their private data. That is our military going into our workplaces and our homes collecting information.
The Founders of this Nation never envisioned our military as a police force, and neither did Congress. That is why we have the Insurrection Act and other measures that forbid that kind of intrusion. In fact, it was that kind of invasion of their homes by the British military that caused them to adopt many of our constitutional guarantees against the use of the military for those kinds of purposes.
Mr. Hegseth declined to state his opposition to such deployments when asked during his hearing. What he said, and I take him at his word, is that he will heed the President's direction as Commander in Chief.
The reason he was chosen for this job obviously is not his experience as a manager; it is not his bona fides as a leader of major organizations; it is his loyalty to the President, to Donald Trump. And more than loyalty, it is fealty. It is that acquiescence, obedience, obsequiousness, blind loyalty that would lead him to take that order and, in turn, order American troops into people's homes.
There is no question that beyond what could happen in America on our soil, his confirmation would also present enormous problems for our allies and partners in the Middle East. I have been working with the senior Senator from South Carolina for some years to encourage the normalization of relations between the State of Israel and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It is an enterprise and an effort that I think has occupied many of us in this Chamber. We have visited the region together.
And one of our objectives, in fact, is a treaty or agreement that would bind us closer together--Israel, Saudi Arabia, America, perhaps the UAE--as part of normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and the regional nations and Israel.
Suffice it to say that the recent cease-fire announcement between Israel and Hamas is a historic shift in regional politics. I believe that Mr. Hegseth's personal beliefs would diminish our support of the peace process or derail it entirely because of comments he has made about Islam and Muslim nations. Those comments were explored in some detail in his testimony.
My concern is there have been numerous reports in addition to his own words that appear to convey a hostility on his part--if not outright antagonism--toward Islam and Muslims. A former employee of Concerned Veterans for America alleges that he shouted racist and Islamophobic chants during an official tour in Ohio, well-publicized and well-known, in the region where Muslim Nation and Islam are predominant.
In his book ``American Crusade,'' he expressed concern about Muslim birthrights and said the present moment for Christians is like the time of the Crusades and that Christians must arm themselves metaphorically, intellectually, and physically.
Well, we are not in a time where we need a crusader in the old- fashioned sense of that word and who says that Christians must arm themselves metaphorically, intellectually, physically--physically--for a fight that may be coming.
We are trying to engage those nations in a common purpose toward normalization, peace and stability, an expansion of the Abraham Accords. People in Israel are hoping that progress can be made, that there can be a successful effort to build on the Abraham Accords.
The current cease-fire agreement is the result of both the Trump administration and the Biden administration coming together--the two teams, Brett McGurk and Envoy Witkoff--making sure that peace was the objective, not antagonism or hostility. Ambassador Witkoff, I don't think, would want a Secretary of Defense talking about a crusade against Muslim nations.
I don't think that a more problematic and concerning nominee has been put before this body, and I urge my Republican colleagues to review what Senator Murkowski and Senator Collins said when they announced that they were going to oppose this nomination, as they did earlier today.
Senator Murkowski said:
She went onto talk about some of the allegations that have been made against Mr. Hegseth:
Now, the reason for that comment by Senator Murkowski was statements made by Mr. Hegseth 30 days before his hearing about the lack of value in women serving in the military and the inability, lack of capacity of women to serve in combat. He reversed himself, what one of my colleagues called ``nomination conversion'' and modified his previous remarks. But he couldn't tell you what caused him to have a different opinion.
And in the course of that hearing, he truly revealed that he continues to have that view of women, which is a problem for recruiting women. They are now 18 percent of our military force. And more than just recruiting women, retaining women, especially when the scourge of sexual assault continues to be so problematic in the military. We fought it for years. A number of us on the Armed Services Committee have supported measures that would provide for more effective prosecution through a system of investigation outside the chain of command. We adopted those reforms, and military leaders have joined us in seeking to combat sexual assault and harassment.
And here we have someone who has been accused, very credibly and plausibly, not just in this affidavit but by others, and the record is replete with them. There are accusations. There are no convictions here. Mr. Hegseth denies them. But, again, simply what he acknowledges having done would disqualify him from a role of command in the military. And that background and record can't help but discourage women from joining and staying in the military.
Senator Murkowski goes onto say:
Mr. Hegseth complained in our hearing that the military was lowering its standards for the men and women who serve in uniform. The only standards being lowered here are the standards for the Secretary of Defense if Mr. Hegseth is confirmed. President Trump is, in effect, dumbing down the Department of Defense, and it threatens to do great damage to that powerfully important institution.
Senator Murkowski goes onto say:
What a powerfully damning statement. Not damning, necessarily, Mr. Hegseth as a human being. I respect his service. I said at the hearing that I was grateful and respectful of his service to our Nation, including leading troops in combat and advocating for veterans. But these concerns about his personal background and about his lack of experience negate that respect for his service as a Secretary of Defense--as a Secretary of Defense.
We are not choosing him to be a colonel to be promoted. We are choosing him to lead the entire U.S. military, to make decisions that will be a matter of life and death.
I was moved, as well, by the statements made by our colleague Senator Collins very much along the same lines. And I want to repeat some of what she said, again, in the hope that our colleagues will listen to both of them. She said, as an expert, if I may say, on the global challenges that this country faces now:
That is, in some ways, the nub of the problem: what he has said, how he has failed in past management positions, how he lacks that credibility as a manager and a leader.
Senator Collins continues:
Mr. Hegseth has demeaned and dismissed the importance of the Geneva Conventions. In fact, he has berated the lawyers in the Department of Defense who set standards and guidelines for what can be done.
I will never forget talking to our former colleague--our great colleague, a friend and mentor to me--John McCain, about why he opposed torture and waterboarding--that kind of physical abuse--and why he believed that these laws have to be followed by our military, not just as a matter of humanity but as effective military strategy. Torturing to gain information often produces false information, but it also reduces the quality of our military performance.
Yet Mr. Hegseth seems to dismiss those ideas about the Geneva Conventions, about standards for military conduct, as categorically as he does many other of the standards that should apply.
I hope my colleagues will listen to Senator Murkowski and Senator Collins because, in their statements, they say more effectively than I am in this lengthier talk on the floor how important a vote against Mr. Hegseth is to the future of our national defense.
Much has been written about him. I urge my colleagues to review an article that appeared in The New Yorker--``Pete Hegseth's Secret History''--by Jane Mayer, which talks about some of these instances, not anonymous smears, as he said so many of them were, but a sourced and substantiated account of the kinds of misconduct that were detailed in a whistleblower report and other documents--again, not an anonymous smear but specific and explicit facts that were claimed. You don't have eyewitness proof in sworn testimony before the Armed Services Committee, but this report is powerful in what it shows.
I hope that my colleagues, in the hours that we have left before we will vote again on Mr. Hegseth's nomination, will reconsider, perhaps, their vote earlier today; that they will recognize they will be responsible if things go wrong, and we hope to God always that nothing goes wrong, especially all of us who have family members who have served--mine in the U.S. Marine Corps. My oldest son is a combat veteran, and my second son, Michael, is a Navy SEAL.
The responsibility of the Secretary of Defense to order men and women into harm's way is a truly awesome responsibility. Mr. Hegseth is not the person to have that responsibility, and I hope my colleagues will recognize that fact and vote against his nomination.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
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.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The resolution (S. Res. 34) was agreed to.
The preamble was agreed to.
(The resolution, with its preamble, is printed in today's Record under ``Submitted Resolutions.'')
Mr. President, after the Great Fire destroyed much of central London in 1666, the city was rebuilt with even grander and stronger buildings than before. The most majestic building of all in the new London was St. Paul's Cathedral, designed by the great architect Sir Christopher Wren. There is no monument to Wren. But on
Daniel Levin was a visionary real estate developer, civic leader, and generous philanthropist who loved Chicago, its neighborhoods, and its people. Sadly, he died earlier this month.
There is no monument to Dan Levin, either. But if you want to see what he meant to Chicago--and what Chicago meant to him--just look around our great city.
Over half a century, Dan Levin's real estate development and management company, the Habitat Company, built structures that redefined Chicago's skyline.
Drive into Chicago on the Kennedy Expressway and you will see the Presidential Towers, four soaring skyscrapers of upscale condos and apartments in the West Loop.
Take a cruise along the Chicago River and you will pass the East Bank Club, one of the finest health and fitness clubs anywhere in America.
Follow the river to where it meets Lake Michigan and you will come to Cityfront Plaza, another tower of apartments and condos surrounded by a bucolic green oasis of a park.
He created other landmark buildings including South Commons, Columbus Plaza, ONE333, and many others.
But Dan Levin didn't build and manage only luxury properties. His faith in Chicago's people and their extraordinary potential led to Habitat's creation of nearly 25,000 rental housing units for people of all incomes.
His ``North Star,'' his family says, was his belief that all people deserve to live in a home and a neighborhood they can he proud of.
He described his business philosophy this way: ``No project is only an investment in real estate. It is an investment in the future of the community and the lives of the people who live and work there.''
His confidence and his love for Chicago led him to take risks and to invest in parts of the city that others overlooked. And time after time, those risks paid off. His buildings attracted other new investments that transformed once blighted areas into vibrant neighborhoods.
Dan had a rare gift to see potential where others saw only problems. The Presidential Towers, for example, stand on what was once Chicago's Skid Row. The East Bank Club was built on the site of an abandoned railroad yard. In a once-gritty neighborhood that many Chicagoans feared to drive through even during the day, Dan created a world-class fitness club and an outstanding restaurant, where he loved to host Seders every Passover. You never knew who you would see at the East Bank Club. You might find yourself in a Pilates class with Oprah when she was member. Years ago, Dan became friends with a young law professor from the University of Chicago who used to come to the club to play basketball. That young hoopster-professor went on to become President of the United States, Barack Obama.
Dan Levin was a ``social entrepreneur'' decades before anyone had ever heard that term. He believed that he could make money and do good, and that is exactly what he did for 50 years. He almost certainly would have made more money if he had concentrated exclusively on upscale buildings. But Dan Levin wasn't in business to make a killing; he wanted to make communities.
Probably his biggest professional challenge came in 1987 when a Federal judge appointed the Habitat Company to serve as a receiver for the then-bankrupt and badly mismanaged Chicago Housing Authority. The job was massive: Manage all of Chicago's public housing, except senior housing, and rehab or replace thousands of dilapidated housing units. The receivership lasted 23 years--23 years. By the time it ended, hundreds of blighted apartment buildings across the city had been torn down, including highrises that had become towers of poverty. With Dan as chairman and Valerie Jarrett as the company's CEO, Habitat replaced the highrises with townhouses, and replaced concrete with green spaces. All told, the company built or rehabbed 4,000 units of public housing. Many developers might have been intimidated by such a massive undertaking. But Dan Levin saw it as a civic responsibility and a chance to give back to a city that had given him so much.
You see, Dan wasn't born in Chicago. He was born and grew up in Detroit, the grandson of Jewish Ukrainian immigrants. His father was a judge. One of his brothers became a Federal judge, and another became a justice on the Michigan Supreme Court. And two of his cousins, whom he thought of almost like his brothers, became distinguished Members of Congress, Senator Carl Levin and Representative Sander Levin.
Dan assumed he would follow in the family footsteps. He graduated from the University of Chicago law school and went to work as legal counsel for a Detroit real estate developer that constructed many buildings and homes designed by Mies van der Rohe, one of the giants of 20th century architecture. In 1960, the founder of that company, Dan's mentor, died in a plane crash. Dan stepped in to finish the project his boss had been overseeing, another van der Rohe building--and he discovered that he loved creating buildings. So he left the law and became a developer. A short time later, he moved to Chicago, the birthplace of skyscrapers and other architectural marvels. His buildings now stand shoulder to shoulder with some of the great architecture of the 20th and 21st centuries.
In addition to his work, Dan loved classical music. He was a devoted supporter and board member of WFMT, Chicago's classical music station. He was also a trustee of WTTW Public Television, vice chairman of the Environmental Law and Policy Center, and a generous supporter of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College and the Harris School of Public Policy at his alma mater, the University of Illinois.
He was kind, modest, and generous with a happy spirit and a twinkle in his eye. He was equally at ease speaking with Uber drivers as with Presidents.
He was devoted to his family: his son Josh Levin; his daughters Jil Deheeger and Betsy Bernardaud; and their spouses; his 11 grandchildren and 2 great-grandchildren; and his step-children Alyssa Rapp and Jeffrey Rapp. Most of all, he adored his wife and partner, former Ambassador Fay Hartog-Levin. The only time they were separated was when Fay served as U.S. Ambassador to the Netherlands, and even then, Dan crossed the ocean many times to be by her side.
Loretta and I offer our deep condolences to Fay and all of Dan's family in this sad time.
Daniel Levin was a good man, a visionary leader, and a true mensch. Loretta and I and the people of Chicago will miss him. But, as I said, if we want to see his legacy, all we have to do is look around. We are a better city because Dan Levin lived among us.
Mr. President, today I pay tribute to Ms. Mary Frances Early for the 25th anniversary of the Mary Frances Early lecture series at the University of Georgia and the 5th anniversary of the naming of the University of Georgia's College of Education in her honor.
Hailing from Atlanta, GA, where she was born and raised, Mary Frances Early played an invaluable role in supporting music education in Georgia and the desegregation of Georgia universities. After earning a bachelor's degree in music education from Clark College--now Clark Atlanta University--in 1957, Ms. Early began her career with Atlanta Public Schools as a music teacher. While teaching, she worked to expand access to music education for all students. In 1961, Ms. Early enrolled at the University of Georgia, helping to desegregate the graduate school. In 1962, Mary Frances Early made history when she became the first African-American to graduate from the University of Georgia, earning her master's degree in music education.
As her career continued, Mary Frances Early became the first Black president of the Georgia Music Educators Association, where she traveled the State to support music organizations and advocate for music education. After dedicating 37 years to public music education, she later taught at Morehouse College and Spelman College and served as head of the music department at Clark Atlanta University.
Ms. Early was also instrumental in creating the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Talent Development Program, a first of its kind program designed to identify, mentor, and develop middle and high school Atlanta musicians from underrepresented groups for careers as professional classical musicians.
In addition to these many accomplishments, the University of Georgia has honored Ms. Early's legacy by awarding her with the President's Medal in 2018, an endowed professorship, and two scholarships.
On the 25th anniversary of the Mary Frances Early lecture series at the University of Georgia and the 5th anniversary of the naming of the University of Georgia's College of Education in her honor, I would like to thank Ms. Mary Frances Early for her tremendous contributions to music education and her lasting impact as a trailblazer for civil rights, inspiring generations of students, schools, and communities across our Nation.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the text of the bill was ordered to be printed in the Record as follows:
S. 229. A bill to amend title XI of the Social Security Act to require that direct-to-consumer advertisements for prescription drugs and biological products include an appropriate disclosure of pricing information; to the Committee on Finance.
Mr. President, as President Trump begins his second term, I am concerned about his immigration policy, pardons for violent insurrectionists of January 6, and the grifters seeping into the White House. In each of these areas, I am prepared to fight with every tool at my disposal to stop abuses that harm Americans.
But I also believe we must find areas of agreement where we can, and one of those areas could be addressing the astronomical cost of prescription drugs, a real-life issue facing American families.
Thankfully, last week, President Biden announced 15 new drugs that Medicare will now bargain for, to lower prices for seniors across the America. Remember, those savings are only possible because of the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, which did not receive a single Republican vote.
There is more work to do though. On average, patients in the United States of America pay four times more--four times more--than people in similar countries for the exact same drugs. What is going on here? A drug is made in America and sold at four times the cost in America as is charged by the same companies overseas.
Why is the United States such an outlier? One reason is advertising. Have you noticed any ads for drugs on television lately? If you haven't, you don't have a TV. The United States is one of only two industrialized countries in the world that allows pharmaceutical companies to advertise on television. What is the other country that allows this? New Zealand--the United States and New Zealand.
You know these ads I am talking about--catchy jingles, flashy images; patients rock climbing, swimming, dancing. Big Pharma spends--get this now--$6 billion every year to flood the airwaves about the latest wonder drug. Why do they spend so darn much money on drug ads? Because it increases their profits. Big Pharma thinks, if they can pummel you with enough ads, not only will you be able to spell Xarelto, but you will be able to tell your doctor this is the blood thinner you have been waiting for.
Don't take my word for it. Here is what the American Medical Association says about these ads we are inundated with every single darn day on our televisions:
So when President Biden announced a list of 15 drugs that will be negotiated for discounts, I imagined most Americans already recognized many of their names: Ozempic, Trelegy, Ibrance, and Otezla.
Manufacturers spend hundreds of millions of dollars encouraging you to just ``ask your doctor'' about these drugs. The result? Medicare spent $22 billion last year on those very same four drugs that were heavily advertised medications.
A recent headline in the New York Times read:
It discussed the First Amendment challenges Pharma would raise as a result of that.
While I have strong concerns with President Trump's health nominee, I am glad this administration wants to join me to tackle these promotional ads. We already have an incredible strategy on the table.
For the last 8 or 9 years, I have introduced bipartisan legislation to crack down on these drug ads on TV and other places. Senator Chuck Grassley, Republican of Iowa, has been my partner.
When you turn on the evening news--get this--one-third of all commercial time is for prescription drugs. Do you think you are seeing a lot of ads? One-third of all commercial time is for prescription drugs.
Try to avoid it, if you wish. But the average American sees nine drug ads a day. I will bet it is more. It seems like more.
With billions in targeted spending, patients are bombarded with information. All of this information is being tossed at you, most of it at a mile-a-minute gibberish. But they do keep in the darkness one important factor: They never mention the cost, the price of the drug.
In 2023, Illinois company AbbVie spent $315 million on TV ads for Rinvoq. I have an ad here. Rinvoq is an eczema and arthritis drugs. However, in the commercial, they don't tell you one thing. The cost of this drug is $6,100 per month. My staff just corrected me before I came to the floor and said: You missed the latest increase. It is now up to $6,400 a month for Rinvoq.
Hang on. I am sure you will see one of those ads in no time at all.
Senator Grassley and I think it is time to end the big secrecy on the cost of these drugs. If they are going to advertise it and rattle off gibberish--I love the one that says: Don't take Otezla if you are allergic to Otezla.
That never would have dawned on me. That is part of their ad.
If you are looking at the ads and hearing the gibberish they throw at us, they tell you everything under God's green Earth, except a basic honest issue: How much does it cost?
That is why today we are introducing bipartisan legislation to require price disclosures in direct-to-consumer drug ads.
Our plan is simple. It actually passed the Senate once before, in 2018, and 88 percent of the American people support this kind of disclosure. In fact, after we worked to advance this measure, Donald Trump, then President of the United States, said this, and I want to make sure the quote is accurate. This is from his first term in office:
I may disagree with the President on many things, but I certainly agree with this statement there.
Big Pharma hates being honest with patients about the true prices of their drugs. They fear it might cut into their colossal historic profits. With the support of President Trump and Senator Grassley, I believe this will be the year we finally pass bipartisan legislation to bring sunshine to these ads and to actually lower health costs.
Mr. President, as President Trump begins his second term, I am concerned about his immigration policy, pardons for violent insurrectionists of January 6, and the grifters seeping into the White House. In each of these areas, I am prepared to fight with every tool at my disposal to stop abuses that harm Americans.
But I also believe we must find areas of agreement where we can, and one of those areas could be addressing the astronomical cost of prescription drugs, a real-life issue facing American families.
Thankfully, last week, President Biden announced 15 new drugs that Medicare will now bargain for, to lower prices for seniors across the America. Remember, those savings are only possible because of the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, which did not receive a single Republican vote.
There is more work to do though. On average, patients in the United States of America pay four times more--four times more--than people in similar countries for the exact same drugs. What is going on here? A drug is made in America and sold at four times the cost in America as is charged by the same companies overseas.
Why is the United States such an outlier? One reason is advertising. Have you noticed any ads for drugs on television lately? If you haven't, you don't have a TV. The United States is one of only two industrialized countries in the world that allows pharmaceutical companies to advertise on television. What is the other country that allows this? New Zealand--the United States and New Zealand.
You know these ads I am talking about--catchy jingles, flashy images; patients rock climbing, swimming, dancing. Big Pharma spends--get this now--$6 billion every year to flood the airwaves about the latest wonder drug. Why do they spend so darn much money on drug ads? Because it increases their profits. Big Pharma thinks, if they can pummel you with enough ads, not only will you be able to spell Xarelto, but you will be able to tell your doctor this is the blood thinner you have been waiting for.
Don't take my word for it. Here is what the American Medical Association says about these ads we are inundated with every single darn day on our televisions:
So when President Biden announced a list of 15 drugs that will be negotiated for discounts, I imagined most Americans already recognized many of their names: Ozempic, Trelegy, Ibrance, and Otezla.
Manufacturers spend hundreds of millions of dollars encouraging you to just ``ask your doctor'' about these drugs. The result? Medicare spent $22 billion last year on those very same four drugs that were heavily advertised medications.
A recent headline in the New York Times read:
It discussed the First Amendment challenges Pharma would raise as a result of that.
While I have strong concerns with President Trump's health nominee, I am glad this administration wants to join me to tackle these promotional ads. We already have an incredible strategy on the table.
For the last 8 or 9 years, I have introduced bipartisan legislation to crack down on these drug ads on TV and other places. Senator Chuck Grassley, Republican of Iowa, has been my partner.
When you turn on the evening news--get this--one-third of all commercial time is for prescription drugs. Do you think you are seeing a lot of ads? One-third of all commercial time is for prescription drugs.
Try to avoid it, if you wish. But the average American sees nine drug ads a day. I will bet it is more. It seems like more.
With billions in targeted spending, patients are bombarded with information. All of this information is being tossed at you, most of it at a mile-a-minute gibberish. But they do keep in the darkness one important factor: They never mention the cost, the price of the drug.
In 2023, Illinois company AbbVie spent $315 million on TV ads for Rinvoq. I have an ad here. Rinvoq is an eczema and arthritis drugs. However, in the commercial, they don't tell you one thing. The cost of this drug is $6,100 per month. My staff just corrected me before I came to the floor and said: You missed the latest increase. It is now up to $6,400 a month for Rinvoq.
Hang on. I am sure you will see one of those ads in no time at all.
Senator Grassley and I think it is time to end the big secrecy on the cost of these drugs. If they are going to advertise it and rattle off gibberish--I love the one that says: Don't take Otezla if you are allergic to Otezla.
That never would have dawned on me. That is part of their ad.
If you are looking at the ads and hearing the gibberish they throw at us, they tell you everything under God's green Earth, except a basic honest issue: How much does it cost?
That is why today we are introducing bipartisan legislation to require price disclosures in direct-to-consumer drug ads.
Our plan is simple. It actually passed the Senate once before, in 2018, and 88 percent of the American people support this kind of disclosure. In fact, after we worked to advance this measure, Donald Trump, then President of the United States, said this, and I want to make sure the quote is accurate. This is from his first term in office:
I may disagree with the President on many things, but I certainly agree with this statement there.
Big Pharma hates being honest with patients about the true prices of their drugs. They fear it might cut into their colossal historic profits. With the support of President Trump and Senator Grassley, I believe this will be the year we finally pass bipartisan legislation to bring sunshine to these ads and to actually lower health costs.
Mr. President, I have five requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority Leaders.
Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate:
The Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Thursday, January 23, 2025, at 10 a.m., to conduct a hearing on a nomination.
The Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs is authorized to meet in executive session during the session of the Senate on Thursday, January 23, 2025, to vote on a nomination, committee rules and procedures, and subcommittee organization and jurisdiction.
The Committee on Energy and Natural Resources is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Thursday, January 23, 2025, at 9:30 a.m., to conduct a business meeting.
The Committee on Environment and Public Works is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Thursday, January 23, 2025, at 9:15 a.m., to conduct a business meeting.
The Committee on Veterans' Affairs is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Thursday, January 23, 2025, at 9 a.m., to conduct a business meeting.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 10 a.m. on Friday, January 24; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and morning business be closed; further, that the Senate resume consideration of Executive Calendar No. 3, and that all time during recess, adjournment, and leader remarks count postcloture.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
