Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2026: Motion to Proceed: Resumed
Mr. President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 311, H.R. 7147.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The senior assistant executive clerk read as follows:
Mr. President, if one thing is abundantly clear from polling,
One poll, in fact, showed that a whole lot of voters already believe proof of citizenship is required to register--I assume because it seems pretty darned common sense to most people to ensure that those registered to vote are eligible.
I mean, Americans are pretty used to proving eligibility--joining the military, signing up for Little League, applying for SNAP benefits, signing up for Medicare, starting a new job, all situations in which Americans have to prove that they are eligible.
And you know what? Americans are doing a pretty good job in those situations. I haven't heard a lot of sob stories about how someone would have signed up their kids for Little League if only the paperwork wasn't so darned complicated. And yet, do you know what Little League requires? A birth certificate, and not one, not two, but three proofs of residence. And yet somehow every year thousands of kids sign up for these teams.
Do you know what else you need a birth certificate for? Signing your kid up for public school. That is right. A birth certificate is an extremely common requirement, and somehow parents of all sorts of backgrounds and income levels have managed to produce their child's birth certificate to sign them up for school. If only Democrats knew that.
The senior Democrat Senator from Vermont was on the floor the other day bewailing the SAVE America Act's birth certificate requirement for voter registration. This is what he said ``[A]s many as 69 million married women have last names that do not match their birth certificates and would need to provide additional documentation proving their name changes in order to register to vote,'' he lamented. ``Further, an estimated 4 million Americans have had their birth certificates or other necessary documents stolen or destroyed. If you are watching this out there, just think: Do you have a birth certificate? How are you going to get a birth certificate? . . . You will have to go through all of the bureaucracy to get your birth certificate.''
Well, first, can I just say how nice it is to hear a Democrat Senator worried about government bureaucracy. The very same Senator who has repeatedly introduced legislation to drown your healthcare in government bureaucracy is now worried about the bureaucracy at vital records offices. It is nice.
But setting that aside, let's talk about the rest of his statement. Let's say you are one of those Americans that the Senator claims have had their birth certificates stolen or destroyed. Well, let's see. What would you do?
Probably the same thing you would do if you misplaced your child's birth certificate and had to register him or her for school or Little League: A quick Google search to find the replacement process in your State--frequently an in-person visit, an online application, or a mail- in application. It is your choice. You can do any of the above.
And as for married women, well, let's talk about married women. Throughout this debate, Democrats have pushed the ludicrous narrative that married women will be disenfranchised under the SAVE America Act. Well, give me a break. Let's go over the scenarios if you are a married woman.
One, if you decided not to change your name, then you don't have to do anything about your voter registration.
Two, if you have changed your name socially but not legally, then, once again, you don't have to do anything.
And, three, if you have changed your name legally and apply for a new driver's license, you can update your voter registration at the same time--just as you can under the current motor voter law.
So the scenarios in which a married woman would have any trouble voting are somewhere between exceedingly rare and nonexistent. But just in case, the SAVE America Act adds a provision to allow women to sign an affidavit testifying to their name change. And if their State allows same-day registration, they can do that on the same day that they vote. So married women will be just fine under the SAVE America Act.
Sometimes I wonder about the view my Democrat colleagues seem to have of the American people and, in this debate, of their voters in particular. The junior Democrat Senator from Oregon had this to say at the beginning of the debate:
Well, one of two things is going on here. Either the Senator from Oregon thinks there are a lot of noncitizens voting in our elections and they are voting for Democrats or else he has a pretty poor opinion of Democratic voters. Is he suggesting that Democrat voters are too dumb to be able to obtain a birth certificate or a driver's license? How does he think they are starting new jobs or signing their kids up for school or going to the doctor or doing any one of the hundred other things that require a birth certificate or a photo ID--for themselves or for their child? I may be a Republican, but I am 100 percent confident that Democrat voters are capable of obtaining their birth certificate, if they don't already have it, and producing a photo ID.
Is this where Democrats get their belief in Big Government? Do they think Americans are too stupid to figure out how to do anything for themselves and so they need Democrats in Washington to do things for them? Come on. Americans are more than used to providing documentation, whether that is a birth certificate, Social Security card, photo ID, or a passport. I don't think it is too burdensome to suggest that we require some of that same documentation for voting to maintain the security of our elections.
The American people certainly don't seem to think it is too burdensome. Poll after poll shows that Americans support proof of citizenship to vote and a photo ID at the polls. Perhaps Democrats should listen to them.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant executive clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. President, the last speaker was the Republican Senator who leads the majority in the Senate. He is talking about a bill that is pending before us which changes the way people in America will be required to register to vote. It is a question of proving who you are and where you are from.
We know, historically, that showing an ID is pretty common. If you buy an airplane ticket, you show an ID. It happens all the time. And what do we usually show? Our driver's license. It has our picture on there and basic information to prove who you are, and it is sufficient in virtually every place in America--but not for this bill.
This bill, creating a new law, says that your driver's license is not enough identification. What can you use to prove who you are and where you were born? A passport. You have heard it suggested that obtaining a passport is rather routine. It is not routine. If you have done it, you know what I am talking about. First, you are going to have to pay a fee for a passport: $165. You may have to wait 3, 4 weeks or maybe even a month or more. So if you are trying to get a passport in time to register to vote, to vote in an election, you had better think ahead a few months, and you better have the money--$165--to get the job done.
There is another proof that you can make, and that is your birth certificate. Of course, that is not always easily available for everybody. Do you know where your birth certificate is, a copy that you can use? I think mine is upstairs in the closet in the bedroom. I have to check. I think that is where I left it, but I am not 100 percent certain. And there is a complication on the birth certificate if you are a married woman. You may have taken his name now, and so your birth certificate doesn't reflect the name that you use legally today.
The third possibility may be some form of ID with a photo on it. It is not clear in this bill.
So you say to yourself: Why would we--if we do 50 million voter registrations a year--and that is on the average--50 million a year-- why would we change all of those registrations to vote with new standards of proof? Because of the argument on the other side that there are illegal aliens voting in America.
Well, they had better take care if they try that. It is against the law today, without any change on the Senate floor, if you try to vote and you are not legally an American citizen. How often does it happen? Well, we are talking about 50 million registrations a year.
So between the years 1999 and 2023, in that 24-year period of time, how many people who were not American citizens were actually caught trying to vote in America? Fifty million people a year registered. Would you guess 7 million, to justify us changing the law for everybody in America? No, it is not 7 million. How about 700,000 in a 24-year period of time? No, it is not 700,000. How about 70,000? No. How about 700? No.
Seventy-seven people in the United States of America, in a 24-year period of time, tried to vote when they were not legally entitled to vote--77 people. So the Republicans want us to change all of the laws on registration across the United States because of 77 people over a 24-year period of time. Does this sound like a crisis situation? Not to me.
We have the most accurate and honest and valid voting system in the world; there is no doubt about it. Trying to create the impression otherwise is just plain wrong. The facts don't back you up.
Then what is this all about? Why would we have to pass this bill before any other measure, any other legislation? That is what President Trump said: I won't consider anything. If a proposal was brought to him to make sure that people working at the airport are paid on time, he said: I am not taking that up until you pass the voting bill.
Why is it so important to him to change registration to vote? Because it is going to create chaos in the situation for the next election, which is only a few months away. He is worried about the outcome. Historically, the President's party doesn't do well in an off-year election, and so he is trying to find ways to diminish the number of voters in America in certain areas. It is their strategy. It is their algorithm that they are following. It doesn't make sense.
We need to protect the right for legally eligible Americans to register to vote and to vote. We shouldn't have a poll tax, like a new passport fee of $165, to make you eligible to go register to vote in your precinct. Fifty million people a year are going to register to vote based on what we change. If it is a true constitutional challenge, if it is a true legal crisis, let's change it. But 77 in 24 years? That, to me, doesn't strike me as any kind of a crisis. It is a crisis that is being created by the Republican leadership to push a bill that is unnecessary.
Many people fought and died for our right to vote. We shouldn't have it taken away from us because we have stacked up bureaucracy in the path toward registration. That doesn't make sense.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader is recognized.
Mr. President, well, I would first like to talk about the voter ID amendment that Senator Thune talked about on the floor.
Today, Leader Thune is going to appease the MAGA far right with another amendment Republicans claim is about commonsense voter ID.
But let's be very clear: This amendment is a giant coverup. It was never in the original bill.
The bill--98, 99 percent of it--is about suppressing voters, about taking them off the voter rolls, unbeknownst to them, so they cannot vote.
The bottom line is very simple: 99 percent of this bill has nothing to do with voter ID--what a voter does when they arrive at a polling place to vote. The vast majority of this bill, the overwhelming bulk, is about suppressing people on the voter rolls--taking them off, not even knowing about it.
And it is a coverup. When the Republicans saw that everyone saw through their so-called voter ID amendment, which is not about voter ID but about suppressing the vote, they got worried. So they added this amendment to the original bill, and now Leader Thune is going to ask for a vote on it.
But it is a coverup to cover up what is a giant voter suppression bill. That is the real purpose. That is what 99 percent or so of this bill does, but they can't say that because it is so devastatingly wrong, unconstitutional, and unpopular with the American people. So they are trying to cover up with this amendment.
Let me talk about the amendment.
Republicans say their amendment is a reasonable approach to voter ID. It is not. It is not true when you look under the hood. What Republicans won't tell you is that, first, this MAGA voter ID proposal is more sweeping and restrictive than every State--every State-- Democrat or Republican.
So Republican Senators, this will make it even harder for people to identify themselves in your States.
This amendment would preempt all State laws and was drafted by a MAGA think tank expert who was part of the Trump 2020 fake elector scheme.
Second, MAGA's voter ID provision would block student, veteran, and other State and Federal IDs.
Can you imagine? You can't use your--under this amendment, you can't use your veteran ID, after you served the country and you want to come back and vote, and you show your voter ID, which has been used for so many different legitimate purposes.
And they say: Nope, it doesn't meet this new law.
Third, Democrats support commonsense voter ID standards. States require varying forms of voter ID, either at registration, at the polls, or both. We support both. We support those.
Democrats' Freedom to Vote Act, from a few years ago, set flexible, comprehensive standards based on West Virginia's then-law for voter ID requirements. It was something I think that Senator Manchin talked about and helped get written into the bill.
Ours is supposed to help people vote by making ID within reach. Theirs is very limiting. It doesn't even allow a soldier's ID as a mechanism.
Our bill--our proposal in the Democratic Freedom to Vote Act--from a few years back, provides flexibility for States and inclusive options for voters. That is a commonsense approach to election integrity and voter access.
This Republican amendment, however, does not. As I said, this is a giant coverup to disguise the real purpose of the SAVE Act, which is to kick 20 million people off the voter rolls, most of them not even knowing that it has happened to them.
Mr. President, now, talking about this bill, Senators continue negotiations to reach an agreement to fund TSA, fund the Coast Guard, FEMA, and CISA, and fund other critical Agencies, while at the same time securing real reforms to rein in ICE.
We had made some modest progress over the weekend, before Donald Trump threw a temper tantrum yesterday, demanding that the SAVE Act be part of any deal to pay TSA workers. Attaching voter suppression to TSA paychecks was an outrageous demand from the start. Democrats knew it. Republicans knew it. And we wasted a day of negotiations because of Donald Trump's temper tantrum. A day may not seem like a lot to the President, but that is another day TSA workers are needlessly waiting for checks, another day of travelers standing for hours at a time at security.
Fortunately, it seems like things are getting back on track this morning. Donald Trump, perhaps realizing that Democrats will block voter suppression in the Senate--the SAVE Act--seems to have gotten over his temper tantrum--we hope, for a little while. With him, you never know.
Republicans can, hopefully, now come back to the table and get serious about reaching a solution to pay TSA workers ASAP.
We await to hear from them in a written proposal that we will review, because, right now, the situation at our airports is untenable. TSA wait times in Houston reached 6 hours at one point over the weekend.
And what does Donald Trump do? He sends ICE agents to the airports. ICE
And it sounds like ICE agents aren't really doing anything once they get to the airport--many of them. They are just paid to stand around, posted by exits and baggage claims, just people watching.
What is the point? What is the point? As Americans are waiting hours in line at the airport, they are asking each other: Why is Trump paying these ICE agents, who seem to have little to do, instead of using those dollars to pay TSA agents so the lines can go much more quickly? Americans waiting in line are asking those questions.
Just because something popped into Donald Trump's head--put ICE agents at the airports--and his administration just says, ``Yes, sir,'' even though they know it is a ridiculous idea, doesn't mean we should continue.
We should have the TSA paid.
Of course, perhaps, it may not be that security is Donald Trump's main goal in sending ICE to the airports. Listen to this.
Yesterday, in a podcast, former Trump adviser Steve Bannon said Trump should use these agents ``as a test run . . . to really perfect ICE's involvement in the 2026 . . . elections.''
Again, Bannon: Trump should use these agents ``as a test run''--his words--``to really perfect ICE's involvement in the 2026 . . . elections.''
This is bone-chilling. Steve Bannon is saying the quiet part out loud, calling ICE's deployment to airports ``a test run'' for the midterms.
This is how authoritarians turn law enforcement into intimidation forces. This is why Democrats are so intent on reining ICE in.
The disease of undermining elections is rampant in the rightwing of the Republican Party, and it seems they will use any means they can to achieve that goal. They know that Donald Trump and Republicans are in trouble this November, and they will do whatever it takes--legal or not--to prevent a legitimate election.
ICE needs to leave the airports now. Trump needs to pay TSA workers now and push Republicans to reach a deal. No intimidation forces at our airports, no more chaos at checkpoints--enough is enough.
Mr. President, let me just finish with this on vote-by-mail. This morning, the New York Times reported that Donald Trump--who constantly complains about vote-by-mail, who says it is rife with fraud--used vote-by-mail himself in a special election in Florida.
Can you believe it?
According to Donald Trump, vote-by-mail is cheating when other people use it, but perfectly fine when he does it himself. What a hypocrite this man is--what a hypocrite.
Maybe Donald Trump should ask for another amendment to the SAVE Act to create a Presidential exception for mail-in ballots because, apparently, his own rules do not apply to him.
And, of course, the White House is now offering ridiculous excuses, saying: The President is a busy man. He obviously lives in the White House.
This is all nonsense. A single mom with three kids and two jobs is just as busy as Donald Trump, and he is doing everything he can to stop her from voting, while voting by mail himself because he is busy.
Donald Trump goes to Mar-a-Lago almost every weekend. His polling location is less than 15 minutes away by car. If he wanted to vote in person, he easily could. His decision to vote by mail shows just how hypocritical Donald Trump is about fraud and cheating.
That is who he is, I am afraid. That tells you everything. It shows not only Donald Trump's hypocrisy but the complete baselessness of his claims about voter fraud. It shows that the whole point of pushing this bill is to make it harder for people to cast a ballot.
And as I mentioned in the beginning, voting for the Thune amendment along those lines is just a coverup to hide what the bill, the SAVE Act, really does.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas.
Mr. President, the recent decision to waive oil sanctions on Russia and Iran in an attempt to stabilize oil prices frees up both of these adversaries to sell their oil at market prices.
Waiving oil sanctions now enriches the very countries that we wish to harm. It advantages the countries that wish to do us harm.
Iran and Russia are actively working to place Americans and other innocent lives at risk. Iran has provided Russia with critical drone technology to use in terrorizing Ukrainians. And Russia is reportedly providing intelligence that allows Iran to target U.S. facilities and critical infrastructure throughout the Middle East.
I urge the administration to immediately delist these waivers and not renew them once they expire after 30 days.
Last October, President Trump took the extraordinary step of imposing sanctions on Russia's two largest energy producers, LUKOIL and Rosneft. This move was long overdue, and it corrected yet another error of President Biden's handling of Russia's war against Ukraine.
Here in this body, in the Senate, more than 80 Senators have added their names to legislation to further sanction Russian oil, and there is significant support to get this legislation passed.
In the months following President Trump's new sanctions, Russia's revenue dropped significantly. Vladimir Putin was beginning to feel the budgetary pressures, forcing him to choose between which domestic program to cut to sustain his war of aggression in Ukraine.
The effect of President Trump's sanctions policy is now at risk of being reversed. To combat rising oil prices, the Treasury Department recently lifted sanctions for a period of 30 days on Russian oil already at sea.
The Financial Times estimates that Russia is earning $150 million a day, or nearly $2 billion, since the Strait of Hormuz was effectively closed at the start of the month. In the span of a 30-day waiver, Russia could reap nearly $5 billion in a single month.
Similarly, with the waivers for Iran announced last Friday, one report says Iran could make as much as $14 billion from their sales. It makes no sense. It makes no sense to provide financial relief to a country that we are currently fighting.
The impacts of these waivers will be immediate. Russia can now more easily fund its war machine, from producing more drones and ballistic missiles to offering more pay for enlistees.
The influx of cash is a gift to one of our Nation's greatest adversaries intent on continuing its war in Ukraine; dividing NATO; and cooperating with China, Iran, and North Korea to undermine American interests.
The infusion of money for Tehran will enable it to rebuild capabilities that have been degraded over the past several weeks. Iran can also fund its proxy networks that threaten our interests in Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen. The waivers signal desperation to the Iranian regime and reinforces that their strategy of taking the Strait of Hormuz hostage is working.
Since Putin began his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, he has wagered that he can outlast the United States of America. He can outlast Europe and other nations supporting Ukraine.
Likewise, the Iranian regime believes it can endure pain for longer than its neighbors and the United States. It is up to us to make sure that that bet they both lose.
Here at home, Americans are not immune to the sacrifices that come from waging war. Certainly, our servicemembers and their families are paying a price, but it is not expected that Americans can go without suffering as well.
This is a reminder of the urgent need to reduce our dependence on foreign oil and strengthen domestic energy production. Energy touches every aspect of daily life, whether heating our homes, irrigating our crops, operating a business, or simply filling up the tank.
To secure a stable and affordable energy future, we must pursue a long-term strategy that expands and diversifies our domestic energy portfolio. That includes drilling more oil domestically, permitting reform and advancing biofuels, hydrogen, and the next generation of nuclear technologies and
I have long supported allowing the year-round, nationwide sale of E15. Expanding access to this affordable fuel blend gives consumers more choices at the pump and strengthens markets for our Nation's farmers and ethanol producers.
Now is the time to continue to invest in our own energy production so we are not dependent upon foreign countries to supply us with energy.
In both Russia and in Iran, the economic pressures of sanctions had begun to bite. Russia cannot achieve a breakthrough on the battlefield, and more money is needed to bribe ordinary Russians to fight.
In Iran, mismanagement of the economy under sanctions led to major protests over the past decade.
President Trump's sanctions are an essential component to the efforts to pressure Putin into ending his war and forcing Iran to come to the negotiating table. This tool is more important now than ever. Now is the time to keep the pressure on through the use of sanctions and choke off Russia and Iran's oil revenues that is funding their military operations. They are our adversaries. We should keep the sanctions on.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nebraska.
Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2026: Motion to Proceed
I move to proceed to Calendar No. 311, H.R. 7147.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. President, colleagues, in a few moments I am going to call up for a vote--a resolution on a privileged motion to end the war in Iran.
I am going to be joined on the floor by several of my colleagues, all of us here in astonishment that 4 weeks into the most significant conflict in the Middle East in most of our careers in this body--12- plus Americans killed, $2 billion at least being spent every day, thousands dead throughout the region--we have still not yet had a single hearing in the United States Senate on the war in Iran.
We have not had a debate on a war authorization. We have not had a vote to allow Senators to weigh in--up or down--as to whether they want the United States to be at war again in the Middle East.
This is an extraordinary moment, and I know we risk engaging in hyperbole these days, coming down to the floor and naming one moment as extraordinary after another moment. But I don't think we have had a moment like this, where the United States has been unquestionably at war with a foreign power, where American soldiers are dying as we speak and it is being hidden, actively, from the public by the Congress.
It is bad enough that we haven't had a debate and vote other than those forced by Democrats. We haven't had a hearing in the Foreign Relations Committee. We haven't had a hearing in the Armed Services Committee.
Now, I think we know the reason. The reason is that this administration cannot defend and explain this war. But if they cannot and if they are not willing to come to Congress and defend this war, it speaks to the indictment of the preparation and the strategy.
I am going to read to you an excerpt from a Washington Post article. Now, the Washington Post has been very careful about their criticism of the President recently:
Let me restate that for you. The Trump administration now says that the goal of the war is not to dislodge an anti-American regime in Tehran; it is not to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon; it is not even to permanently end Iran's ability to have missiles that can reach their neighbors or drone capacity that can provoke in the region. The primary goal now is to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Here is the problem: The strait was open before the war began. We are now seeking to solve a problem that we created. This is insanity. Two billion dollars is a lot of money. That is the minimum amount of money that is being spent every single day on this war.
There are over a dozen families who are burying their loved ones in the United States, and there may be dozens more if this war continues. Prices are skyrocketing--not just in America but all across the world. Notices just went out from DuPont to their customers that the price of plastic is doubling. The price at the pump in many States is at $4, $5, and going higher. Fertilizer: soon to be unaffordable for American farmers. The consequences of this war are stunning in their scope: higher prices for American businesses and American families, a potential global recession, the wasting of billions of dollars of hard- earned taxpayer dollars, and new conflicts in the region that didn't exist before the war began.
In the last day, there have been 12 missile attacks inside Israel. Just during this last vote, news broke of another missile attack on a community, Bnei Brak, with nine people injured, six children injured. Just in the last week, there have been multiple missile and drone attacks on cities throughout Israel; six ballistic missiles from two separate attacks hit the Kurdish region in Iraq, killing six Kurdish fighters; and an Iranian missile attack on the Iranian-United States base in Diego Garcia. That is 2,500 miles away from Tehran.
UAE has basically stopped giving out information about these drone and missile attacks because they happen so frequently, but on Monday, they did publicize they engaged with 16 drones and 7 ballistic missiles. That was just on Monday.
Israel has invaded Lebanon. Those two countries are on the verge of full-scale war. One-sixth of the population of Lebanon has already been displaced. Syria is at risk of falling apart again.
We have created a catastrophe in the Middle East. We are lighting taxpayer dollars on fire. We are causing prices to go up for everyone.
And what is our new war aim? Reopening the strait that was open before we started the war.
This is basic incompetence. This is what you get when you put talk show hosts and real estate developers in charge of American national security: a war that makes absolutely no sense.
Even though our war aims have been reduced to simply undoing the damage
That is not what happened before the war. We have created a new reality in which Iran has more power over the global economy than they have ever had before. We have not been able to stop their ability to project power. They are still, today, 4 weeks into the war, firing missiles and drones at their neighbors.
The regime that is in charge now is, according to analysts, worse than the regime that it replaced. Yes, we killed a whole bunch of people, including the Supreme Leader, but from everything we understand, the group now in charge is more adversarial to U.S. interests and is going to be more provocative in the region.
So this war makes absolutely no sense. And the only way to save American consumers, the only way to try to put the pieces back together in the region is for the war to end.
So I am glad to be joined here on the floor today by several of my colleagues. Many of them have introduced similar resolutions. This will be the third time that we have brought a War Powers Resolution before the floor--Senator Kaine and then Senator Booker. This will likely not be the last resolution that we will bring before the floor because we have a sacred obligation handed to us by our Founding Fathers for this body and the House of Representatives to decide war. It was a very deliberate decision not to give the power to make war to one individual--to the President of the United States--but to give it to the people. And the people make their voice heard through their elected Members of Congress.
And so if our Republican colleagues will not do their duty, if they are going to engage in an effort to hide the consequences of the war, if they are going to refuse to ask questions of our incompetent national security leaders at the White House who have waged this war without planning for the foreseeable consequences, then we will force a debate and a vote on this floor.
This war is not going to make more sense the longer it goes. It is not going to become more popular. Right now, by a 26-point margin, Americans do not support this war. It will be harder as time goes on-- not easier--for my Republican colleagues to continue to vote for this war as a vote against this resolution will be. But it is our responsibility under the Constitution to have this debate, and I am glad to have my colleagues on the floor to make this case to the Senate as well.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
Mr. President, I thank Senator Murphy.
Every day since he started this embarrassment of a war, Donald Trump has saluted our troops with one hand and given them the middle finger with the other--because despite the lies he tells on Truth Social, he is actively making the choice to use our heroes as cannon fodder.
From the moment this conflict began, Trump has tried to shroud his incompetence behind their valor. When asked to justify his actions, he has tried to hide his ignorance and cowardice behind their courage. He has tried to act as if questioning why we are at war is the same as questioning the skill and bravery of our troops themselves. It isn't-- not at all.
I know that our military will always do the best job possible. When given a mission, our servicemembers don't say: Why me? They don't ask: But will I be safe? And they sure as hell don't run to their podiatrist crying ``bone spurs.'' No.
Instead, they pack their rucksacks; they lace up their boots; they show up. And they do what is asked of them--time after time and tour after tour. They will always--always--execute their orders to the maximum capability of their professionalism, and they are proud to do it.
The problem is the man who is giving those orders. The problem is that the Commander in Chief not only has no idea what the end state looks like in this war of choice but probably doesn't even know what the term ``end state'' means at all.
Look, I ran for Congress so that when the drums of war started beating I would be in a position to make sure that our elected officials fully considered the true cost of war, not just in dollars and cents but in human lives of our heroes as well. So as those drums sound louder than they have in years, I am here today because, despite what he thinks, Trump does not have the authority to unilaterally force our Nation into war. He may have never read the Constitution, but I have.
So for the third time since this war began, let me direct his attention to article I, which makes clear that the President does not have the power to declare war--only Congress does. We are the ones tasked with deciding when and how Americans are sent into combat. We are the ones charged with that most solemn duty. Yet Trump is acting as if article I simply doesn't exist, as if obeying the Constitution is something that is optional, as if our founding document is just a yellowing, crumbling piece of paper he can crumple at will.
Refusing to allow him to get away with this should not--must not--be a partisan issue. No matter if you are struggling to pay rent or your name is plastered in fake gold on a building on Fifth Avenue, no one can ignore the Constitution. No matter if you are a Mar-a-Lago worker pulling double shifts or the President of the United States, no one is above the law. And no matter if you are a Democrat or a Republican, you should know that our military men and women will always do their jobs.
So it is beholden on us as legislators to do our jobs before more of our warriors lose their lives in service of theirs. Right now, our duty is to demand accountability. It is to get answers. It is to make sure that their mission is justified and feasible and worthy of the sacrifices we are asking our military to make.
That is why I am here today: to make sure that we never again get ourselves into an ego-driven forever war, just like we experienced the last time a President rashly sent our sons and daughters into an unjustified war in Iraq.
I am here now to stop a man who was never brave enough to serve in uniform himself from using our heroes as cannon fodder.
Look, I am no dove. I know there are certain solemn, urgent times when our military must make the call and be called up to defend our Nation. There are certain moments when the threat in question is significant and imminent, when military force is the most effective tool at hand, when using it is necessary to protect Americans, and when using military force would not create more threats than it eliminates.
Trump has shown no evidence that this was one of those times. Yet he has had almost a month to do so. But if the administration actually does believe that this war is justified, then they need to come to Congress and tell us why. We are not hard to find. The Capitol is the building with a big dome on top. It is about a 20-minute walk from the White House. They just need to walk through our doors and actually do their jobs.
They need to explain their case, respecting the American people enough to tell them why they are being forced to take on the cost of this conflict. They need to prove that they have thought this through, that they can tell us what their plan is to stop this war. They need to show us that they have even a concept of a plan of how to get to an end state in Iran that would make us safer, not more threatened. Then, when their case has been made, when Congress' debate is done, we in these Chambers must vote. It is our job. It is our responsibility. It is our burden.
Look, centuries ago, our Nation's Founders feared that one day, America would be burdened with a Chief Executive who would be too fond of conflict and chaos and that that leader's affinity for bloodshed would have unthinkable consequences for the Nation at large. That-- that--is why they placed the power to declare war in the hands of Congress, not a single person.
Trump won't bear the cost of this war that he started. His children won't serve in harm's way. Even though they could volunteer, none of them have. He has been lining his pockets with corrupt billions since the moment he took
As those elected representatives, it is our obligation to consider the interests of our constituents over those of one man and to stop our Nation from teetering further into this nightmare. That is what we are doing here this evening as we vote on Senator Murphy's War Powers Resolution.
Americans deserve better than unanswered questions, unjustified conflict, and unnecessary tragedy. Our men and women in uniform sure as hell do as well. So until we get some answers, I will keep coming to this floor; I will keep voting to withdraw our sons and daughters from hostilities with Iran.
I am going to keep working to prevent the boots on the ground that the President so casually, so callously threatens when he talks to the press. I am going to keep demanding that the administration end this deadly vanity project if they cannot justify the cost we have already been forced to bear, both in dollars and cents and daughters and sons. It is the least we can do for those willing to sacrifice the most for our Nation.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
Mr. President, last Friday, public reports indicated that more than 2,500 marines stationed at Camp Pendleton in San Diego County were now on their way to the Trump war in the Middle East, the Trump- Iran war.
This is the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit aboard the USS Portland, the USS Comstock, and the USS Boxer. Their voyage joins the amphibious assault force aboard the USS Tripoli, which also called San Diego home until last year.
With great uncertainty, Californians are now being called upon to be the potential tip of the next spear in this war. The Marines' recruiting slogan, going back to their founding in 1775, is ``First to Fight,'' and they continue to live up to that slogan and that ethos. They have been boots on the beaches of islands in the Pacific, the trenches of Europe, in the mountains of Afghanistan, in the sands of Iraq, in Syria, Africa, and theaters of American war everywhere, and for centuries. And that is just it--they are boots on the ground in times of war.
So as thousands of men and women have been called up to mobilize around the world, what solace can we offer their families about what awaits them? What can we tell them about this so-called excursion, as the President refers to it, or, as he called it today--reluctant to use the word ``war'' all of a sudden, he called it a military operation.
Well, this weekend marks 1 month that our Nation has been at war with Iran, and already we have lost one American servicemember nearly every 2 days of the conflict.
On the second day of the war, that servicemember was CW3 Robert Marzan from Sacramento, CA. He was killed in Kuwait by an Iranian strike. His memory has burned brightly in the hearts of those who knew him, and since his death, we have seen tributes pour in.
One said:
Another said that Chief Warrant Officer Marzan and his family ``served as the surrogate family for a lot of soldiers'' for their unit based in Des Moines.
In the true American spirit, these stories have been shared widely as communities have come together to raise money to help fly those who knew him home to California for his funeral later this month. That is a solidarity that Americans know in time of war.
But the people who led us into this war did so without the consent of the American people and without the authorization of this Congress. The Commander in Chief, who called it war in his first public comments about the strikes in Iran, now engages in semantics while thousands more servicemembers ship out, halfway around the world.
We were also told that this war would end soon, but now the President's extended deadline puts us on track for at least a month of conflict, with more fighting in the future if Iran refuses to yield. There is no deadline that anyone at this point can rely upon.
At least one Republican Senator is overtly calling for boots on the ground, saying:
I just remind Members that the cost of Iwo Jima was high--6,821 dead, 19,217 wounded.
We have seen the timelines, the rationales, and even the baseline facts of this conflict change by the day or even multiple times during the same press conference. The goalposts have moved from regime change and imminent threat to long-term freedom for the Iranian people and then back to preventing them from building out a nuclear program that was supposedly obliterated in a military operation only 9 months earlier.
We can be fairly sure that before this war is over--perhaps even before this week is over--the goalposts will move again. That is why last week we stood here and forced the Senate to again go on record. We cannot become ``Lucy with the football,'' constantly convinced that the latest market-calming post by the President in the morning will mean we will not have sent new marines off to the conflict zone that evening.
Last week, I stood here and reminded my colleagues of the words of President Eisenhower, the architect of one of our Nation's greatest military victories over a murderous regime.
He said:
It is a reminder to all of us that Americans pay not just in the loss of our servicemembers and the pain that overwhelms their families but in the hardships and poverty that we will no longer be able to address here at home, the illness that will go untreated, the school that will go unopened, the road that will go unpaved, the senior that will go unfed--as we drop the cost equivalent of 10 new hospitals a day on Iran.
The Pentagon is proposing a $200 billion supplemental to fund this war. Do you know what that means for your family? That means that the cost for your family is $1,400. That is just the starting cost for this supplemental funding bill--$1,400 for your family. That is not including all the more you are paying at the pump and for everything else; that is just the cost that is being proposed for your family.
Well, tonight, I stand here to remind my colleagues not just of Eisenhower but of another Republican President, Herbert Hoover.
Hoover said:
The youth who are put at risk like the 2,500 marines sailing from San Diego as we speak; the youth like the thousands of others already sleeping in bunks aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln and the Gerald Ford.
In this case, older men have not even given them the decency of a declaration of war. Instead, we have quietly walked up to the redline that I know so many hold in their hearts when it comes to American military power being used abroad.
We are on the cusp of American boots on the ground. And as the goalposts have continued to shift and as we in this Congress have continued to abdicate our responsibility, I ask my colleagues: Will that still be your redline or will the President be allowed to put American Special Forces in harm's way for a war that Congress has not authorized, that has not been debated, that has not even held a single open hearing to discuss; a war whose true purpose has been kept hidden from most Americans; a war that by Saturday will have gone on for an entire month without the support of the majority of the American people and without the approval of the only part of government to whom the Framers gave the power to approve military force: the Congress?
One month of war. And for what? A new Supreme Leader? A new hardliner with a new appetite for revenge? A new windfall for Russia made possible by American sanctions relief? A new skyrocketing price of gas? A new rising
It is time to put a stop to this war before its costs rise further still. It is time for the Congress of the United States to do its job.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
Mr. President, there is something awful going on here in the U.S. Senate, and people should focus on it right now. The Senate is not doing their job. And we see a President unilaterally going off to fight a war--to declare war without any authority from the U.S. Senate or the U.S. Congress.
What does it mean when the body that is supposed to provide checks and balances checks out? What does it mean when the body that is supposed to provide oversight covers its eyes and refuses to see what is happening? What does it mean when the body that should be having hearings on this war will not hear, will not look, will not ask questions?
We are in a constitutional crisis, and Americans are paying the cost--the worst of all costs: the deaths of our men and women, with 13 dead and over 200 injured. And Congress is doing nothing--no checks, no balances, no oversight, no hearings.
What does it mean when Americans all over this country are paying the cost with the worst energy shock crisis in the history of our country? According to the International Energy Agency, as of yesterday, the crisis we are experiencing is larger than the two major oil shocks of the 1970s combined. And what does Congress do? Nothing. No oversight. No hearings. No checks. No balances.
Americans are feeling the pain already of this administration cutting healthcare for millions. They are feeling the pain already, seeing their energy prices go up. They are seeing the pain already from billions being cut from our Veterans' Administration and millions more being cut from student lunch programs and the services we provide for special needs. And Congress does nothing.
We are supposed to be the body that declares war. Well, we are at war. But we also have the power of the purse. And what is happening with the purse right now? We have just spent $25 billion in Donald Trump's war--that kind of expenditure with no oversight, no hearings, no checks and balances.
Twenty-five billion dollars is enough to provide health insurance for over 3 million Americans. Twenty-five billion dollars means 30 million children could have free school lunches. Twenty-five billion dollars could provide millions of Americans with affordable housing or housing assistance.
There are things going on right now that nobody on either side of the aisle thinks the President should be able to do without any kind of oversight, without any kind of hearings, like give Russia billions of dollars, relieving them of sanctions, the very adversary that continues to prosecute their war in Ukraine and undermine our democracy at home-- no hearings, no checks and balances, no oversight. This is not just a constitutional crisis. This is a shame upon this body.
I am grateful for the War Powers Resolution that Chris Murphy has brought forward. I am grateful for Tammy Duckworth, Tammy Baldwin, Tim Kaine for joining together to force these War Powers Resolutions so that the Congress is not silent, that at least people have to take a vote.
But think about what is happening right now. We see a President moving to move more American troops. It was reported that the Pentagon is considering deploying 3,000 soldiers from Fort Bragg's 82nd Airborne Division. That is 3,000 of our American courageous sons and daughters-- no oversight, no hearing, no checks and balances.
The biggest military engagement since the war in Afghanistan--tens of billions of dollars, American lives, the worst oil shock ever, prices going up--and what does this Senate do? Nothing. It is a shame upon this body. It is a surrendering of our duties. It is the submission before Donald Trump and his authoritarian-like inclinations to declare war and not come to Congress as the Constitution dictates.
We swore an oath in this body to defend the Constitution. Our fealty should be to the Constitution and not what this President is doing.
So we bring War Powers Resolutions, and we will bring more. My fear is that this body, amidst this shame, will be dismissed for a recess. How many soldiers will die during that recess? How many billions of dollars will be spent during that recess? How far will they go with this war?
I call this what it is: one of the more shameful stretches of this body--no hearings, no oversight, no checks and balances.
It is time that we stand up for the Constitution and stand up to Donald Trump's unconstitutional war.
I know my colleagues and I, we have been calling these War Powers Resolutions. We will continue to do so until this body does its job and lifts the shame off of this body and checks a President, who is clearly running us into a war with no off-ramp in sight, putting more of our men and women in danger as Americans suffer from skyrocketing costs.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
Mr. President, the horrific murder in Chicago last week has reminded this Nation that the battle to defend the American people, strengthen our Republic, and yield constitutional authority for the common good is not confined to the southern border. It is being fought and lost right here in our own cities, in the heartland, in the streets where our sons and daughters walk to class or watch the Northern Lights.
Sanctuary cities are not a polite exercise of State sovereignty or some virtue of federalism. Sanctuary cities are a declaration that illegal aliens' lives matter but American citizens' lives do not.
Sheridan Gorman was an 18-year-old college student at Loyola University in Chicago. Her family described her as a daughter, a sister, and the heart of their family. She was full of life, full of kindness, and full of love that she gave freely to everyone around her.
She made people feel seen. She made people feel valued. She was the kind of kid, the kind of daughter American families hope to raise; raised polite, hard-working, and the first in her family to go away to college, carrying the hopes of parents who still believe in the American dream.
Sheridan Gorman was not some statistic. She was somebody's everything. Whether it was her friends, her family, or someone she had just met, Sheridan had a way of leaving people better than she found them.
She was only 18 years old and just beginning her journey as a college freshman, embracing new experiences, building friendships, and living the life every parent hopes their child will get to live.
But last week she was murdered in cold blood by an illegal alien from Venezuela. She was killed, her life taken from her and a daughter stolen from her family by a criminal illegal alien who would not have been in this country but for the Democrats' open border and sanctuary city policies.
Border Patrol caught him in May of 2023. The Biden administration's open border policies let him go. That was the Democrats' first chance to prevent Sheridan's murder.
Democrat-run Chicago then had another chance to prevent Sheridan's murder. It arrested the same illegal alien Jose Medina-Medina for shoplifting. But Illinois and Chicago's sanctuary policies ordered the police to say nothing to ICE.
So instead of handing him over to Federal custody, they turned this monster loose on the streets of Chicago, the safety of American citizens be damned. And then last week, the same illegal alien shot Sheridan in the back as she went on a walk with her friends.
Pause for a moment and really sit with the facts of Sheridan Gorman's murder. That illegal alien was previously in law enforcement's custody twice, and both times radical Democrat policies released him back onto the streets to prey on the American citizenry.
It is uncomfortable for Democrats to confront the reality that their policies and radical ideology are causing preventable murders of American sons and daughters at the hands of illegal aliens. So they try to deflect.
A Democrat Chicago alderwoman had the audacity to say that Sheridan was
Sheridan Gorman was in exactly the right place at the right time. She was exactly where an American college freshman should be: near the campus, with her friends, chasing the Northern Lights on a beautiful spring night.
No, the only person who was in the wrong place at the wrong time was the illegal alien murderer whose very presence in the country was the direct result of Democrat open border policies and sanctuary jurisdiction policies. He should have never been there. And if those policies had not existed, he would have been back in Venezuela years ago.
Rather than admit this sanctuary city policy caused the preventable murder, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker released a statement saying that ``Republicans need to stop politicizing heinous tragedies.'' What an ugly, revealing statement.
We are not politicizing the tragedy. We are exposing the truth. Sanctuary policies are getting American citizens killed. I know it; the American people know it; and deep down the Democrats know it too.
The truth is, sanctuary cities force us to confront a test, the most fundamental test of any government: Does it still understand its first and only real obligation is to protect its own citizens?
The duty is older than the Republic, older than modern politics itself. It is the reason government exists. Yet through these policies, Democrats made a deliberate choice: They sided with Jose Medina-Medina, a criminal illegal alien, over Sheridan Gorman, an American citizen and a college freshman.
They have chosen an open border's ideology over the American Nation. At root, the scourge of sanctuary cities forces us to answer the same question as the SAVE America Act: Who or what comes first?
Is it the American people, American sons and daughters, or is it illegal aliens and this radical open borders ideology? Or, dare I say, a theology? Not in theory, not in slogans, but in practice--when the handcuffs go on, when the phone call to federal law enforcement is made or not made, when lives hang in the balance.
If the answer is not the American citizen, if the answer is not Sheridan Gorman or Laken Riley or Stephanie Minter or Katie Abraham, then we are no longer arguing about immigration policy. We are confronting something far more fundamental: whether our government still understands the basic purpose for which it exists. The American people know the answer.
Democrats' conduct--their conduct betrays their answer. Democrats value illegal aliens more than Americans. This is a sick ideology.
I actually can't believe--in a State where I come from, Harry Truman would be rolling in his grave. John F. Kennedy would be rolling in his grave.
This idea, this toxic empathy, this suicidal empathy to placate the left is driving this debate we are having right now where they don't want to fund Federal law enforcement. They would rather a sanctuary jurisdiction not tell ICE that a murderer or a rapist is being released from prison to be deported. They don't want to do that. They hold onto this altar of this crazy ideology.
So all this discussion we are having about this negotiation, I have been skeptical from the beginning. I litigated with Democrats on title 42 and ``Remain in Mexico.'' Deep down in the DNA now is something that has been lost. I don't understand it. Democrats admitted as much last night in an interview.
By failing to give illegal aliens a pathway to citizenship, this Democrat noted that ``we failed to deliver for the people we care about the most, undocumented migrants.''
The people Democrats care about most are not you or your family. Instead, it is Jose Medina-Medina and the 15 million other illegal immigrants that the Biden administration let into this country.
Once you understand this reality--that this is the driving, operating principle of the modern Democrat Party, this is not an outlier--the other actions are predictable, including this negotiation, this supposed negotiation that is happening, that is supposedly taking place.
Once you see this hierarchy of needs and wants and preferences, everything makes sense. Democrats right now value illegal aliens more than traveling Americans. That is why they have defunded DHS and TSA.
They value illegal aliens more than the American families hit by a disaster. That is why they are defunding DHS and FEMA.
They value illegal aliens more than Sheridan Gorman, Laken Riley, Stephanie Minter, or Katie Abraham. That is why they have built sanctuary cities in Chicago, in New Orleans, in Los Angeles, in Minneapolis.
As a Senator from Missouri, where we still believe the first job of government is to keep Missouri families safe, I say this plainly: Prioritizing illegal aliens to American citizens is unacceptable, and it is downright un-American.
The alternative, putting Americans first, which used to be something maybe we could agree on, is not complicated and is consistent with both the Constitution and common sense. Enforce Federal immigration laws. These laws were passed by Republicans and Democrats alike, enforced by Republican and Democrat Presidents alike until recently.
So enforce the laws. Deport the illegal aliens. Prioritize the safety of American citizens over ideology and illegal aliens because at the end of the day, this is not about ideology or politics. It is about whether or not we remain a country in which the government fulfills its most basic and fundamental obligation, a country where the law is enforced, a country where the responsibilities of governing for the common good is taken seriously, a country where the safety of its people is not treated as negotiable.
If we cannot agree to affirm all those principles, then we are drifting, slowly but unmistakably, away from the principles that sustain a free and ordered society. And that is a drift we cannot afford to ignore any longer.
I want to close by reading part of a statement from the Gorman family:
This case must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of both State and Federal law. There can be no gaps, no shortcuts, and no second chances that put others at risk. Accountability must be complete.
To the Gorman family: I am so sorry for your loss. As a dad who has my first daughter headed off to college next fall, I cannot imagine the grief and the pain that you feel when you send your little girl off to college and she is murdered in cold blood by somebody who should have never been here and there were two opportunities to get him the hell out of here.
I pray for you. I pray for Sheridan and all those who loved her.
I pray for every parent who now lives with the fear that the next knock on the door will be one that destroys their world.
We will not let this be memory-holed as ``wrong place, wrong time.'' This was a violent, preventable act, enabled by radical policies that put illegal aliens ahead of American citizens.
This case must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of State and Federal laws. Accountability must be complete, and it will be. It is time--long past time--for this Senate to answer the question the American people have already answered: Whose country is this?
Enforce the laws. Deport the illegal aliens. End sanctuary cities once and for all. We must reclaim the foundational promise of this Republic that a nation of the people and by the people must be for the people. The American Government is for the American people.
The American people have made their choice clear. American citizens come first. That is the fight I came to Washington to wage, and with the help of the American people, that is the fight we are going to win.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wisconsin.
Mr. President, I rise today in opposition to Donald Trump's war of choice in Iran.
Donald Trump came into office promising that he would lower costs and end foreign wars, but with this war, he has broken both promises at once. Wisconsin families are already seeing higher costs at the pump and on airfare. Wisconsin farmers are staring down higher fertilizer and fuel costs as spring planting gets underway. Meanwhile, the uncertainty and chaos caused by this President is keeping interest rates high and shaking the global stock market.
Donald Trump is raising costs on Americans at the same moment he is spending billions of dollars on a war that Wisconsin families did not choose. In just 6 days, Trump's war in Iran has cost American taxpayers almost $12 billion. We are now nearly a month into this war, and it is estimated that we have spent around $30 billion of taxpayer money.
What Donald Trump spent in 3 weeks is what it would have cost to extend the Affordable Care Act's tax credits for a full year. Republicans said that extending these healthcare tax credits for working families was too expensive, but they have not said a word about Trump spending $30 billion for another war. That money could have stopped 22 million Americans from seeing their healthcare costs increase by double, triple, or worse. It could have stopped 1 million people from canceling their coverage because the costs were simply too high to manage without those tax breaks. That $30 billion could have paid for more than 30 million children's school lunches. That $30 billion could have put a safe roof over the heads of more than 3.1 million Americans. That $30 billion could have covered a year of childcare for nearly 2 million children.
Using that money for an illegal war that no one wants is a choice, and now President Trump is reportedly planning to ask Congress for $200 billion more for his war with Iran.
Here is my question: For what?
That is not a rhetorical question. I genuinely don't know, and the American people don't know either what the goals of this war are and why American families are being asked to shell out billions of dollars for it. The Trump administration has, so far, been unable or unwilling to give the American people a straight answer.
Just as Donald Trump tells the American people that we are close to ending this war, strikes continue, and all signs point to this conflict continuing to grow. We are hearing reports that the Pentagon is making detailed preparations for deploying United States ground forces in Iran as 5,000 marines and new warships are being deployed to the Middle East. Just today, it was reported that, roughly, 3,000 soldiers who are trained to parachute into enemy territory are being deployed to the region.
I have been demanding hearings for weeks so that Secretary Hegseth and Secretary Rubio can answer our questions under oath and in public before the American people. They need to answer why they are using taxpayer dollars on this illegal war instead of bringing down the costs of healthcare, housing, gas, groceries, and childcare for the families I represent.
Donald Trump ran and won on lowering costs for Americans, but his agenda has done just the opposite. He has started expensive wars; has pursued tariffs that have jacked up costs on consumers; and has slashed programs that have helped Americans afford their healthcare and put food on the table.
Enough is enough. It is time for the Trump administration to make their case to the American people. I personally don't think that they have one, but at the bare minimum, they need to tell Congress and the public why we are in this war, putting more servicemembers' lives at risk and not focusing on the kitchen table issues.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
Mr. President, I rise in support of Senator Murphy's War Powers Resolution, which I am proud to cosponsor.
I came to this body in 2013, and as I have described on multiple occasions on the floor under both Democratic and Republican Presidents, I came with one obsession, and that obsession was that the Nation should not be at war without a vote of Congress.
That obsession was born out of twin experiences--having had a child in the military and then having been Governor of Virginia and watching my Virginia guard members deploy repeatedly into Iraq and Afghanistan over the course of the years that I served in office. I had gone to too many deployments, too many homecomings. I had gone to too many wakes and to too many funerals to simply allow war to be waged on autopilot or at the say-so of any President--Democrat or Republican--no matter what their previous experience in military matters or lack of experience was.
The Founders of the Constitution were wise to decide that committing our kids' lives to war was not a decision that should be made by one person. There are exceptions recognized in the Constitution. A President can take action without Congress. If there is an ongoing attack on the United States, in self-defense, no permission is needed. A President can initiate military action if Congress has previously voted on an authorization that covers it; but other than that, there no shortcut, and there is no E-ZPass lane, and there shouldn't be.
So this is now the third resolution--and I thank my colleague Senator Murphy for bringing it--to basically ask the question of this body: Have we seen enough? Have we seen enough that we should at least have public hearings about this war? Have we seen enough that we should have a debate about whether this war should be authorized by Congress or not?
We plan on coming back every week and asking the question: Have we seen enough?--until the Senate does what the Senate is supposed to do according to the Founders, to the Framers, of our Constitution.
Since we were here last week, a number of things have happened. The number of casualties has continued to grow. The cost has continued to grow. There was significant reporting yesterday that other nations are encouraging the United States to continue this war. The reporting yesterday was that Saudi Arabia is encouraging the United States to continue this war. The reporting last week was that Israel is encouraging the United States to continue this war. Israel and Saudi Arabia are sovereign nations that have the right to make their own decisions for their own people, but they don't have the right to suggest what is the right course for the United States. We have very different interests--we have very, very different interests than those nations--and we should make the right decision for ourselves after consideration.
The price of oil has continued to significantly increase from last week. When I took the floor last week on Senator Booker's resolution, the price of oil had gone up $0.60 a gallon since before the war began on February 28. Now it has gone up $1.02. Just to convert that into the cost at the pump for Virginians, Virginians buy 8 million gallons of fuel at the pump every day. So, at $1 a gallon, that is $8 million that Virginians are spending for fuel every day that they weren't spending before the war. All indications by those who are experts in this area-- and I do not proclaim expertise in energy--is that the energy shock is likely to continue to drive up costs at the pump for Virginians and Americans for a very long time.
Why did the Framers set it up so that war should be debated before it is initiated?
So that you could ask questions.
What is the rationale for the war?
The President has suggested it was to obliterate a nuclear program that he claimed had been obliterated; to stop a ballistic missile program when the missiles' progress in Iran would have been years before they could have developed a missile that would have reached the United States; to change a regime; to back up Iranian protesters; maybe to control Iranian oil. We would have been able to ask questions about the rationale and get an answer rather than a shifting collection of answers that has been given.
We would have been able to ask questions about: What are your plans to minimize harm to civilians? We have already seen tragedies with respect to harm to civilians.
What are your plans to protect allies who, if Iran is attacked, are likely to face retaliatory attacks from Iran?
Many of our allies were not prepared to face what Iran did because the United States did not consult with them.
Just to use one item in this that would clearly have been a discussion if the administration had done what the Constitution requires and come to Congress: What about the Strait of Hormuz where massive percentages of the world's energy and critical minerals-- fertilizer and other byproducts--come through the Strait? What is the plan for that?
What is the plan to make sure that the Strait is not choked off in a way that hurts everyday American families and the entire global economy?
I mean, this is not an unforeseen problem. The British closed off the Strait of Hormuz in the early 1950s to punish Iran. The Shah of Iran threatened that many times during the war between Iraq and Iran in the 1980s. As those two nations were fighting, tankers were hit in ways that often shut down the Strait of Hormuz. So the Strait of Hormuz being shut down and then having a massive effect on the global economy was an absolutely known and completely foreseeable consequence of a war in the region.
And yet in the last week, the reporting of this is that either-- either--the White House didn't consider it or the White House was warned by military officials that this could happen and it would hurt the United States and others--a warning that they ignored.
Now, either of those options is bad. If they didn't consider the possibility that history demonstrated was a likelihood, that shows incredibly slipshod planning, and if they considered that possibility because it happened before and dismissed it, that also demonstrates a shocking degree of naivete.
And so we see, just in that one instance, how Virginians are being punished by paying more at the pump because of the closure of those straits. This is an entirely predictable consequence of war that didn't get an airing before the public or before the Senate, who could have asked challenging questions.
Some believe subjecting a war plan to being asked challenging questions is a burden or is a hassle or, you know, it is going to be something that we don't want to do.
No, that is exactly what should happen. Any proposal of this magnitude that is going to risk the lives of our troops should be subjected to the most searing examination that we would do of anything in this body.
And I want to conclude, because there are others who want to speak, but I will just take it back to Virginia. Hundreds, if not thousands, of Virginians are currently deployed on the USS Ford Carrier Strike Group. That was a strike group based in Norfolk that deployed in June.
When it deployed, the normal deployment for a carrier strike group is 7 months. So the expectation of all who deployed was that they would be home by the holidays; they would be home with the family by the holidays. Instead, at the end of last year, the President ordered that the deployment be extended so that the Ford that was positioned in the Middle East could come into the Caribbean or the Pacific to assist in the effort to ultimately invade Venezuela. And so they extended the deployment another 2 months.
And then the Ford was told that it needed to deploy back across the water to provide support for the invasion and the attack of Iran, and so the deployment has been extended further.
The Ford is about to set the record for the longest deployment ever, but this has a cost. The Virginians and others who are deployed with the strike group thought they were going to be home at Christmas, and now it is being extended more and more and more.
And the Ford carrier is suffering significant maintenance challenges that threaten the actual lives of those on board. First, it was threatening quality of life with problems with the toilet systems and other onboard systems on the carrier, which are not hard to predict when you run a carrier at a much greater length than was planned for the original deployment, and these affected basic quality of life and morale.
But it got more serious. Last week, we learned that a fire started at the laundry facilities on the Ford that took 30 hours to put out, and 200 sailors on the Ford suffered smoke inhalation injuries because of that fire.
Now, recently, the Ford has been pulled out of frontline combat support activities and taken back to Crete for repairs. But, again, these sailors aren't coming home anytime soon, and that ship that was supposed to be out there for 7 months is now into the 11 months--well, I guess it would be now coming on 9 months, with more to come.
This is the kind of human cost that happens when you go into a war without a rationale or without a plan. And so what we need is a plan, I believe, to bring this to a close.
We were at war in the Middle East for 25 years, and I have yet to hear a single colleague of mine come and make a speech on the floor to suggest that those 14,000-plus American lives killed or the 65,000-plus Americans injured or the $8 trillion spent--I have yet to hear a single person come here and say that was a chapter in American life that we should be proud of.
We should have learned something from it. The first thing we should have learned is that another war in the Middle East probably makes no sense. But we certainly should have learned that, before we go into one, we have to examine it in significant detail to make sure that we are not sending our sons and daughters into harm's way for no valid reason.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
Mr. President, I am not going to speak for a long time. I have given this speech over and over again. Some people say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting to get the same results.
The Democrats here have been doing the same things over and over and over again, and they are going to get the same result again tonight.
Look, the conflict that we are in with Iran right now was not started by the United States. It was started by Iran when the Iranian regime took prisoner our staff at the Embassy in Tehran, 47 years ago, and held them for 444 days.
And then, over the next 47 years, they have continued to kill Americans by the thousands--not by the hundreds, but by the thousands-- and they do it in the most insidious ways, with roadside bombs and that sort of thing, simply because they are Americans and they are present in the Middle East.
The President of the United States said we have had enough. He had very good reason to pull the trigger at the time that he did, and, of course, those, as time goes on, will come out more and more.
The fact of the matter is, we are in conflict. We have our brave young men and women on the ground. We have our brave young men and women fighting for the United States of America. So we need to back those people. We need to back the President of the United States.
We all know this isn't going to go on very long, but it needs to be done. And our friends around us say: You need to get this done. Now that you are there, complete the job.
The President is going to complete the job.
I am going to end this with a couple of messages--the same message I have been giving for a long time.
The first one is to the Iranians: This is over. You people have lost. You have no navy. You have no air force. You are running out of missiles and other materiel to fight this. This is going to be over very soon.
And the other message I would have to the Iranians is: No one has come to help you. And--breaking news--no one is coming to help you-- with one exception, and I will talk about that in a minute.
First of all, let me tell you who is not coming to help. The Chinese are not coming to help. The Russians are not coming to help. The North Koreans are not coming to help. The Cubans are not coming to help. The Venezuelans are not coming to help. The worst actors on the planet, who are friends of the Iranians, are not coming to help. This is all on you, Iran.
No one is coming to help you--except there are 47 people over here who want to help you. They cannot help you.
What is going to happen here on the floor today is, on our side of the aisle, we are going to stand behind the Commander in Chief. Most importantly, we are going to stand behind our fighting men and women on the ground because they are involved in a kinetic battle.
When this happens--whatever happens--we, every American, should be standing behind our fighting men and women. They need to continue on. They need to complete the job. The President of the United States is going to do this.
So to my friends on the other side of the aisle, stop this. Don't try to help the Iranians. You are the only entity on this planet trying to help the Iranians. Stop it. Vote with us.
This is going to fail tonight. It would be nice if you joined us in standing behind our fighting men and women as we try to end the regime of the last bad actor in the region.
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 order for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Now, I thank Senator Murphy for his great leadership on this issue, for speaking so clearly and fiercely about the need for this resolution.
This war has dragged on for long enough. It is long past time for it to come to an end. And, today, with this resolution, the Senate must assert its power on matters of war and peace.
This is the third time--the third time--that Republicans have been given a chance to do the right thing and end this war. It is the third time, though, they stick their heads in the sand and pretend this war does not exist. But the war is expanding. The Senate has an obligation to step in.
I say to my Republican colleagues: If there was ever a time to stand up for the authority of the Senate, stand up for the powers given to us through the Constitution, the time is now.
Thirteen American servicemembers have been killed and thousands more injured. Energy prices are above $100 a barrel. And now the Wall Street Journal reports the Pentagon will deploy another 3,000 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne.
Enough.
The War Powers Act allows questions to be asked, allows the public to be drawn into the discussion. That is the way to end endless wars, not to tell no one what is going on, not to keep it secret, not to give anyone else any authority. That is a loser, and it will be a loser for the American people.
The American people are tired of sending our sons and daughters to fight endless wars. Americans are exasperated every time they go to the gas station and pay $4 a gallon. They are tired of Donald Trump making outrageous and deluded statements like saying he does both have a plan and does not have a plan. This is who is leading the war effort-- someone who changes his mind every day, who can't answer the question of what is the goal here? what is the endgame? how much does it cost?
So enough is enough.
Donald Trump does not have the authority to wage this war without the explicit authority from Congress.
I thank Senator Murphy for pushing this resolution. I am proud to support it. I urge some of my Republican colleagues to vote yes.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
Mr. President, whatever you think about this war, it should be unacceptable to all of us that we have not had a single public hearing, a single opportunity for the American people to hear directly through their representatives the justification and the endgame for this war.
I thank my colleagues for joining me here today.
Artificial Intelligence
Mr. President, we are at the beginning of the most profound technological revolution in world history, a revolution which will bring unimaginable changes to every aspect of our society.
Artificial intelligence and robotics will impact our economy, our political lives, our privacy, our emotional well-being, our environment, and even our survival--the survival of humanity on this planet.
The scale, scope, and speed of this change will be unprecedented. That is not the view of Bernie Sanders. That is the view of some of the most knowledgeable people in the world who have developed AI, who study AI.
According to Demis Hassabis, the head of Google's DeepMind--the head of Google's DeepMind--the AI revolution will be 10 times bigger than the industrial revolution and 10 times faster. In other words, the AI revolution will have 100 times the impact that the industrial revolution had.
People left the farms. They went to work in factories. People left factories. They went to work in offices. According to the head of Google's DeepMind,
Mr. President, it is not just what the leaders of the AI companies are saying. Take a look at what they are doing. This year, four--four-- AI companies are spending almost $700 billion to build out data centers across this country. As a percentage of GDP, that is 10 times greater than what we spent each year on Moon landings, going to the Moon.
Despite the extraordinary importance of this issue and the speed at which it is progressing, AI has gotten far too little discussion here in Congress. I fear very much that while the American people are deeply concerned about the economic, the spiritual, the political impact of AI, Congress is totally unprepared to respond to the existential changes that are taking place. We are way, way, way behind where the American people are in terms of their concerns.
Here are, in my view, a few questions, just a few, that Members of Congress and the American people should be asking.
Question No. 1, a rather obvious question: Who is pushing the AI and robotics revolution? Ordinary people going up and saying: Hey, we got to automate factories. We got to do that. Who is pushing it? Well, I think we all know what the answer is. The answer is Mr. Musk, Mr. Bezos, Mr. Zuckerberg, Mr. Ellison.
These are some of the wealthiest people in the world, and they are investing hundreds of billions of dollars in AI and robotics. Okay. Fair enough.
Why are they doing it? Why are these multibillionaires investing huge sums of money into these new technologies? Do you think it is because they are staying up nights and they are saying: My goodness, 60 percent of the American people are struggling economically? They are living paycheck to paycheck. Can't afford groceries. They can't afford housing. They can't afford healthcare. And that is why we are going to push these technologies, to improve life for ordinary Americans.
Well, maybe, but I doubt that very much. I think the answer is obvious. These multibillionaires are investing in AI and robotics because those investments will increase their wealth and power exponentially. They will make massive profits. In other words, the richest and most powerful people on Earth will become even richer and more powerful.
And another question I think that we obviously should be asking is: What will the impacts of AI and robotics be on our society? How is it going to impact us? Pretty obvious question.
In my view, and according to the people who have studied this issue extensively, including Nobel Prize winners, AI and robotics will bring about the most rapid societal transformation in human history. Let me repeat. AI and robotics will bring about the most rapid societal transformation in human history.
Among other things, AI and robotics will transform our economy with massive job displacement. It will impact our emotional well-being and how we relate to each other as human beings. It will lead to a massive invasion of privacy. It will threaten our democratic institutions, and it will bring severe harm to our environment.
Further and frighteningly, some very knowledgeable people fear that what was once seen as science fiction could soon become a reality, and that is superintelligent AI could become smarter than humans, could become independent of human control, and pose an existential threat to the human race. In other words, this is what they used to make science fiction movies about.
But some of the most knowledgeable people on Earth, including people who have helped develop this technology, actually believe human beings could lose control over the planet to artificial intelligence.
Question No. 4: What happens to working people, to ordinary Americans during this revolutionary upheaval? Well, don't take my word for it. I am not an expert on it. Let's hear what the leaders in the industry are saying in their own words, not Bernie Sanders. This is what the people who have invested hundreds of billions of dollars in the industry are saying.
Elon Musk, who has made massive investments in AI and robotics, recently said:
Now, is Mr. Musk exaggerating? Is he wrong? I don't know. But I think you might want to take a listen to one of the most powerful people on Earth, who is investing very heavily in these technologies.
Bill Gates, another multibillionaire investing heavily in AI, he predicted that:
Mustafa Suleyman, the CEO of Microsoft AI--the CEO of Microsoft AI-- said most white-collar work:
Not 12 to 18 years, 12 to 18 months. That is the CEO of Microsoft AI. Somebody might be a little concerned about that here in Congress.
Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that Jeff Bezos, the fourth richest man alive, who is worth over $200 billion, is seeking to raise $100 billion to purchase factories all over America. OK? One of the richest guys in the world is seeking to raise $100 billion to purchase factories all over the country.
His goal: Replace the millions of workers who are employed in these plants with robots. Maybe somebody here might be raising some concerns about the fact that we are on the beginning of the end of manufacturing jobs in the United States.
And for Mr. Bezos, this is not just an idle threat. According to The New York Times, Mr. Bezos plans to fully automate Amazon operations. He owns Amazon. He wants to fully automate Amazon operations, beginning by replacing at least 600,000 workers with robots.
So this is a guy who has a track record. That is what he is doing right now; and he wants to expand that vision all across the country, basically wipe out manufacturing jobs in America and get rid of millions of workers.
Why does he want to do it? Well, the answer is fairly obvious: Because AI and robots will cost employers far less than human labor. Robots work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Robots do not need sick days or healthcare. They don't take Christmas or New Year's Day off. They will end up costing employers a fraction of what human labor costs.
As Dario Amodei, the head of Anthropic, has said: AI isn't a substitute for specific human jobs but rather a general labor substitute for humans.
And according to Open AI's charter, its charter, its mission is to build:
In other words, what these guys are working toward is creating an AI which can do virtually any job better than a human being can do. What are the impacts of that? Well, you know, we might want to have a discussion about that here in the Congress.
As the ranking member of the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, I released a number of months ago a well-researched report, finding that AI automation and robotics could replace nearly 100 million jobs in America over the next decade--100 million jobs-- including 47 percent of truck drivers, 64 percent of accountants, and 89 percent of fast-food workers, among many other occupations.
There are towns and cities in America we are already seeing a lot of driverless vehicles. In Texas now, you have 18-wheelers going down the road, and nobody is driving those trucks. And everything being equal, that will be the future unless we begin to start talking about it and figure out how we make AI robotics work for workers, not just the richest people on Earth.
We are already--not next year, not 10 years from now--we are already starting to see the impact of AI on the working class in this country. Researchers at Stanford released a paper in November called ``Canaries in the Coal Mine? Six Facts about the Recent Employment Effects of Artificial Intelligence'' that found that there has already been a 16- percent relative decline in employment for younger workers in jobs exposed to AI like computer programming and customer service. Further, 42 percent of new college graduates are underemployed.
At the same time, for every new job posting, there are now, on average, 242 job applicants. In other words, for our
If OpenAI is successful in building what they want to build--``highly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most economically valuable work''--I have a very simple question that we might be discussing here on the floor of the Senate: What happens to those workers? How will they be able to find new jobs if there are no jobs to find? How are they going to feed their families? How are they going to buy healthcare? How are they going to stay alive if AI robotics eliminate millions of jobs and create massive unemployment? How will people survive if they have no income?
How do government programs like Social Security and Medicare survive if workers are not paying taxes? If you don't work, you don't pay taxes.
Another question that we must be discussing: What impact will AI have on our ability to relate to each other as human beings? What impact will it have on our emotional well-being?
Well, work is one of the ways we connect to each other. In many cases, work also gives our lives meaning and purpose. We all, whether we are doctors or janitors, scientists or snowplow operators, want to serve our communities and be productive members of society. We want to give back. What happens when millions of people lose their jobs, their meaning and purpose, and their source of connection to each other?
I am also concerned--and it is not just me; parents all over this country are deeply concerned--about the impact AI is having on the emotional well-being of our kids and, in fact, of all people.
According to a recent poll by Common Sense Media, 72 percent of American teenagers say they have used AI for companionship, and more than half do so regularly.
So let's take a deep breath and ask ourselves a simple question: What does it mean for our young people to form friendships and become emotionally dependent on AI while at the same time becoming increasingly isolated from other human beings?
Does anyone in America think that the past 20 years of social media have been good and healthy for children's mental health and cognitive capabilities? I suspect most people understand that is not the case.
The statistics are quite clear. Mental health among young people is in crisis. According to the U.S. Health and Human Services Department, one in five young people has a diagnosed mental health condition such as anxiety or depression. From 2016 to 2023, the prevalence of anxiety has increased by over 60 percent.
Further, and very importantly, studies indicate that there has been a cognitive decline in young people in our country and, in fact, in countries all over the world. In America today, more students are reading below a basic level than 20 years ago. It appears that the more time kids spend on screens, the worse it is for their brains.
Does anyone really think we should now entrust the same big tech companies that have gotten our kids hooked on screens and social media with even more power over our children's well-being and development? That is a question we need to be discussing long and hard.
Here is another question that I think we should be asking: Will AI result in a massive invasion of our privacy and our civil liberties?
For decades, companies have been collecting our personal information--what we search for online, where we visit, who we talk to, what we purchase. Now AI makes it possible for someone to quickly analyze all of that disparate information, find patterns, and create profiles of us.
Larry Ellison--the second wealthiest person on Earth and a major investor in AI--predicts an AI-powered surveillance state is coming wherein ``citizens will be on their best behavior because we are constantly recording and reporting everything that is going on.''
Last week, in my office, I had an extremely interesting experience. I spoke with Anthropic's AI Claude about the privacy risks posed by AI.
Here is what Claude told me:
That is from Claude. I don't know if you are supposed to quote AI, but that is what AI said.
In other words, with AI, we will reach the stage where every phone call, every email, every text, and every bank and medical record could be analyzed in a matter of minutes. Do we trust companies that have made billions of dollars in selling our information with this extraordinary power to instantly know everything about us?
My fear is that if we allow the current situation to continue, privacy as a human right will disappear.
Here is another question that needs to be seriously discussed: What impact will AI have on our democracy? We are already facing enormous threats from a corrupt campaign finance system, et cetera. What impact will AI have on our democracy?
AI will mean that images, statements, and videos you see from public officials and candidates may be totally false. In other words, words can be put into the mouths of individuals in a way that it is virtually impossible to detect.
Let me give you one rather personal example. Here is an image of a guy named Bernie Sanders, a Senator from Vermont. In this image or on this video, Senator Bernie Sanders is promoting a website that provides a government rebate. There is just one problem: I never said the words that they have coming out of my mouth. There is no government rebate. This whole thing is a total scam. Well, I must say the picture is not all that bad. But this is something we are going to see more and more of.
This is obviously not something just known to me; the so-called deepfakes have been created of many well-known people. Sometimes you are seeing people whom you know who say things that sound a little weird. Why are they saying that? Well, do you know what? They are not saying that. It is a fake.
I want you to appreciate that if 2 days before an election, a candidate gets up there and says all of these wild and crazy things and you say ``Wow. Why is that guy saying that?'' Well, do you know what? He or she may not be saying that. It may be a total fake.
The line between reality, which is what is true, and misinformation, which is the distortion of truth, is increasingly being blurred. We are seeing that every day on the internet.
If we cannot distinguish between reality and misinformation, what will, in fact, happen to our democratic institutions? It is an issue I think we need to be thinking about.
Further, what impact is AI having on our environment?
AI requires zillions of calculations. Those calculations require huge data centers, which, in turn, require a massive amount of electricity and water. For example, Meta is building a data center in Louisiana that is the size of Manhattan that will use as much electricity as 1.6 million homes. One data center will use as much electricity as 1.6 million homes.
The increased demand for electricity is leading to higher electricity rates. Over the past 5 years, wholesale electricity costs have increased by up to 267 percent in areas near data centers. Further, this increased demand will drive a massive expansion of fossil fuels when we are already seeing the devastating impacts of the global crisis of climate change.
A further question: Does AI pose an existential risk to our planet and to the survival of humanity?
It is rather a fundamental question that I think we might want to be discussing, so let me pose it again.
Does AI pose an existential risk to our planet and to the survival of humanity?
This guy is named Dr. Geoffrey Hinton. He is considered by most people to be the godfather of AI. He did the groundbreaking work which led us to where we are today. He received a Nobel Prize in Physics a few years ago. What Dr. Hinton says is that there is a 10- to 20- percent chance they wipe us out.
Many of the most knowledgeable people on this issue of AI believe that AI will become smarter than humans. It is not a question of whether that will happen; it is a question of when that will happen. AI has already developed concerning patterns. AI, today, can lie, it can cheat, and it can blackmail. In
What happens when AI becomes smarter than we are? This concern about superintelligence is why leading experts like the godfather of AI, Dr. Geoffrey Hinton, have warned there is a real chance that AI could wipe out humanity. I don't want to get people too nervous, but that is what some people are saying.
It is not just Hinton; there are a number of leading people. I was in California last month, talking to a number of people in the industry. The idea that humans can lose control of AI and that AI can act independently and cause extraordinary damage to the human race is not just science fiction; it is what many of these guys believe.
That leads to my final set of questions: Where is the Congress?
Now, it is hard not to imagine that these issues we are talking about are of enormous consequence to every man, woman, and child in this country. And this is not new news. Poll after poll shows the American people are deeply concerned about the economic impacts on their kids, the existential threats, et cetera.
So where is Congress? What exactly have the House and the Senate done so far to address the extraordinary challenges posed by artificial intelligence?
The answer: Not much.
Well, why has Congress been totally ineffective on this issue?
The answer will not surprise the American people: We have a corrupt campaign finance system, and too often, Members of Congress are worried about their campaign contributions rather than the needs of their constituents.
The AI oligarchs, some of the wealthiest people in the country running enormously profitable and well-funded companies, have already spent over $150 million buying influence, $150 million telling Congress: Leave us alone. We got it. Don't get involved in these issues. We will determine--we, the wealthiest people on Earth--will determine the future of humanity.
Meanwhile, last week, the Trump administration put out a ``comprehensive'' legislative framework on AI that is all of four pages long--not quite so comprehensive. In the midst of a massive and unprecedented attack on the working class of this country, the Trump administration's solution says:
Leave the multibillionaires running the industry alone. They make a lot of campaign contributions--the rich are getting richer. Leave them alone.
In the midst of a massive and unprecedented attack on our humanity, the Trump administration's solution says:
In other words, instead of the U.S. Congress representing the interests of ordinary Americans, the Trump administration and many Members of Congress--in both parties, by the way--want to allow a handful of billionaires to race forward to develop AI for increased power and wealth for themselves. That is the bad news, and it is pretty scary news.
Now, here is the good news: The American people--despite the inactivity of Congress, the American people are fighting back. In community after community, Americans are organizing against data centers that are powering the AI revolution, and they are winning, taking on very powerful corporations. And many of these communities are deeply red, conservative; some are progressive. But ordinary people look around them and say: You know what. We don't think these data centers are going to do our community any good. They are going to raise our rates, put pressure on our water, destroy the local environment. We don't want them. In fact, more than 100 local communities around the country have enacted moratoriums on data centers, and 12 States are pushing forward with statewide moratorium proposals.
And here is an important point that I think has not gotten anywhere near the discussion that it deserves. Three years ago, in March of 2023, more than 1,000 leading AI experts, including Elon Musk, Yoshua Bengio, Stuart Russell, and many, many others--these are leaders in industry--called for AI labs to ``immediately pause for at least 6 months,'' and if such a pause were not enacted, called on governments to ``step in and institute a moratorium.''
They recognized that ``advanced AI could represent a profound change in the history of life on Earth, and should be planned for and managed with commensurate care and resources.''
And then these experts--again, these are some of the most knowledgeable people on AI in the world--they asked a series of questions:
These are some of the leading and most knowledgeable people in the AI industry 3 years ago. They concluded:
And I agree with what these scientists and industry leaders said. We need to slow down the development of AI to give democracy, to give ordinary people, a chance to catch up.
Unfortunately, several years have come and gone since this letter has come out, and there has been no pause, and there has been no action of significance on the part of Congress.
And that is why I will be introducing legislation tomorrow to ban the development of new AI data centers. A moratorium will give us the chance to figure out how to make sure that AI benefits the working families of this country, not just a handful of billionaires who want more and more wealth and more and more power. A moratorium will give us the time to figure out how to ensure that AI is safe and effective and prevent the worst outcomes. A moratorium will give us the time to figure out how to make sure AI does not harm our environment or jack up the electric bills that we pay. Bottom line: A moratorium will give the American people the time to determine how we can make AI and robotics work for them, not just a few wealthy people.
We need to pass this moratorium here. We need to slow down the development of AI around the world, and we need to bring the international community together to address the risk posed by AI.
And I can tell you that, in China, in Europe, in countries all over the world, there is deep concern about the safety of AI and the possible loss of human control over AI.
So we are looking at the most sweeping and impactful technological revolution in the history of humanity. It will impact all of us in so many ways. Yet Congress remains too busy raising contributions from the industry rather than standing up for the needs of the working people. That has got to change.
I look forward to working with my colleagues to make sure that we finally pass a moratorium, slow this down, and make AI robotics work for all of us, not just the few.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
Madam President, the business of this body today has been the so-called SAVE America Act, a legislative proposal from my colleagues in the Republican Party that is presented as a simple voter ID bill. Who could be against that, requiring ID to vote?
But it is actually a far more destructive bill, a bill that could be characterized as the ``Save Republicans From Accountability Act,'' the bill that is designed to make it much harder to vote for tens of millions of Americans. And so to try and address some of the underlying problems, challenges, with this bill, I have offered several amendments, and I want to speak to them this evening.
My Republican colleagues who have spoken repeatedly on this floor about this bill love to say how popular voter ID is: 83 percent of Americans support it. Well, if my Republican colleagues believe we should pass this bill because of its popularity, shouldn't we start with another policy that is even more popular? Eighty-seven percent of Americans believe criminal background checks should be required for all gun purchases. That would mean closing existing loopholes that allow folks in the United States to purchase weapons without going through the background check process.
And that poll saying 87 percent support it, it is not from some leftist group; it is from FOX News. Of course, universal background checks are popular. Americans are sick of the daily tragedies of gun violence in our communities across our country. They are sick of attacks in schools, in grocery stores, at concerts, in churches, in communities. They are sick and tired of tiny coffins. So I have introduced an amendment to the SAVE Act, adding a provision that would require universal background checks. So let's get this popular and bipartisan amendment passed. And if, as my colleagues claim, the SAVE America Act is not a burden but actually a protection of the right to vote, shouldn't other constitutional rights, fundamental freedoms, be subject to the same sorts of rules? Forty-seven thousand Americans were killed in gun violence in 2023, the leading cause of death for children and teens in many States.
And the SAVE Act is presented as a solution to the problem of those who are not citizens voting. It is a solution in search of a problem. The Heritage Foundation--the Heritage Foundation--went through and looked, over decades, over all the ballots cast in 23 years and found 77 proven cases of ballots cast by noncitizens. That is a tiny percentage.
For every ballot cast by a noncitizen, 14,000 Americans are killed by a gun each year. You can tell me which is the bigger problem.
So shouldn't buying a gun be at least as difficult as voting under the bill advanced by my colleagues? My amendment would bring the same restrictions that the SAVE America Act wants to bring to voting to gun buying. If you need a passport and a birth certificate to vote, why not to buy a semiautomatic rifle? All of our constitutional rights should be protected, so why not apply the standards to the Second Amendment that my colleagues hope to apply to the right to vote?
I hope we will take it up, debate it, and pass it.
Let me speak to another amendment that I am offering to the SAVE America Act. The SAVE America Act takes away the ability to register to vote by mail or online. You have to go in person to a specific place with documents, and yet millions of Americans live in rural areas, hours away from these relevant government offices. What if you can't drive? What if you can't take time off of work? What about the cost of all that gas as the price of gas keeps skyrocketing? It would take away the ability to reregister and to vote for these rural Americans. So I filed an amendment that says: For those Americans who live 50 miles away or more from the closest election office, they can register by mail or online.
The passport process is particularly challenging for rural voters who can't get a new passport online or by mail. You have to show up in person at a government office to apply, then get to the election office to register once you get your passport. How many more hoops do my Republican colleagues want to make rural voters jump through in order to vote?
My amendment would permit those who live 50 miles or more away from a passport office or an election office to apply for their passport online or by phone.
The cost of living keeps going up. To get a passport doesn't just take time and travel, it costs $165. So I filed an amendment that would make passports for the purposes of voting free for American citizens.
The SAVE America Act has another basic flaw. It would make it difficult to vote for the nearly 70 million American women who changed their name in marriage, where their current name is different than the name on their birth certificate. That includes, obviously, many people of concern but particularly my wife and my mother have different last names today than they did the day they were born.
One of the things that is, I think, a fundamental flaw to the SAVE America Act is it allows those women to vote if they have a passport. Yet millions of Americans do not have passports, and the cost and the difficulty of getting them, I think, is too big a barrier to voting.
What about veterans? Will we actually make them drive for hours to reregister? I am working on an amendment to partner with the VA to make it easier for veterans to administer.
And so, frankly, I have many amendments I would like to discuss, but these are the few I will bring up this evening because, before we get to a final vote on the SAVE America Act, we need to perfect it because the right to vote is a sacred right in America, and this is a bill in search of a problem, not solving that problem.
Madam President, the Trump administration owes my constituents money. It owes a lot of Americans money. The administration owes you $166 billion in illegal tariff revenue. Just over a year ago with what he called ``Liberation Day,'' President Trump imposed wildly irresponsible tariffs on virtually every country on Earth, including our closest allies and those with whom he concluded trade deals like Canada and Mexico. It has damaged our relationships abroad, it has harmed our national security, and frankly, it has imposed what is the equivalent of a national sales tax on hundreds of millions of consumers.
Well, after a year of litigation, the Supreme Court ruled in February by a 6-to-3 majority that those tariffs are illegal, that under the Constitution, the tariff power--the taxing power--is assigned to the Congress, not to the President. Trump promised Americans he would bring down costs on day one, but through tariffs did the exact opposite. If someone had stolen money out of your wallet, out of your family's bank account, you would want it back.
The average American household has paid $1,700 in tariffs now declared illegal by the Supreme Court. Our President took that money out of the pockets of Americans and should now give it back, so I am here demanding Delaware's money back for Delawareans. I am a proud cosponsor of a bill to do just that. Families need that money back now because they are increasingly struggling.
Because of the war in Iran, gas in Delaware was $2.87 a gallon just over a month ago; it is now, today, $3.79. The cost of groceries have gone up. The cost of healthcare has gone up. The cost of electricity has gone up. The cost of gas has gone up. Why are these costs going up? Partly the reckless war with Iran, but also tariffs. After the Supreme Court struck down the IEEPA tariffs--that is the law on which they were based--Trump proposed and put in place a new 10-percent global tariff.
One of the things I get called about the most is the cost of housing. Our little State of Delaware needs to build 24,000 new homes by 2030 to meet the demands for housing, yet many of the key inputs--lumber from Canada, drywall from Mexico, fixtures and features, the faucets and bathroom vanities--imported from outside our country face stiff tariffs.
The costs of home ownership and housing keep going up, and my Tariff Exclusion Act would eliminate those tariffs and bring those costs back down because this just isn't right or fair to the people of Delaware and our Nation--folks who are building and innovating, folks who are farming, folks who are launching small businesses, folks just trying to put food on the table, clothes on their kids' backs, and send them to school and keep them safe. They have paid too much in tariffs, and our President should pay our people back.
I yield the floor.
