vote: the clerk: mr. moran, aye. the clerk: ms. ernst, aye.

it the clerk: mr. bennet, no. mr. menendez, no. the clerk: mr. murphy, no.

the clerk: ms. cortez-masto, no. ms. butler, no. mr. kennedy, aye.

the clerk: mr. blumenthal, no. mr. budd, aye.

the clerk: ms. collins, aye.

mr. cruz, aye. the clerk: mr. van hollen, no.

the clerk: mr. warnock, no. mr. coons, no.

the clerk: mr. carper, no. ms. murkowski, aye. the clerk: ms. lummis, aye.

the clerk: mr. sullivan, aye.

vote:

the presiding officer: on this vote the nays are 48 -- on this vote the yeas are 48, the nays are 50. the motion is not agreed to. mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the mandatory quorum call with respect to the cloture motion on the house message to accompany h.r. 815 be waived. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. schumer: i ask for the yeas and nays. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to concur on the house amendment to the senate amendment to h.r. 815, an act to amend title 38 united states code, and so forth and for other purposes. signed by 18 senators. the presiding officer: by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. the question is, is it the sense of the senate that debate on the

motion to concur in the house amendment to the senate amendment to h.r. 815, an act to amend title 38, united states code to make certain improvements relating to the eligibility of veterans to receive reimbursement for emergency treatment furnished through the veterans community care program, and for other purposes, shall be brought to a close. the yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. the clerk will call the roll. the clerk: ms. baldwin. mr. barrasso. mr. bennet. the clerk: mrs. blackburn mr. blumenthal. mr. booker. mr. boozman.

mr. braun. mrs. britt. mr. brown. mr. budd. ms. butler. ms. cantwell. mrs. capito. mr. cardin. mr. carper. mr. casey. mr. cassidy. ms. collins. mr. coons. mr. cornyn. ms. cortez masto. mr. cotton.

mr. cramer. mr. crapo. mr. cruz. mr. daines. ms. duckworth. mr. durbin. ms. ernst. mr. fetterman. mrs. fischer. mrs. gillibrand. mr. graham. mr. grassley. mr. hagerty. ms. hassan. mr. hawley. mr. heinrich. mr. hickenlooper.

ms. hirono. mr. hoeven. mrs. hyde-smith. mr. johnson. mr. kaine. mr. kelly. mr. kennedy. mr. king. ms. klobuchar. mr. lankford. mr. lee. mr. lujan. ms. lummis. mr. manchin. mr. markey. mr. marshall. mr. mcconnell. mr. menendez. mr. merkley. mr. moran. mr. mullin. ms. murkowski.

mr. murphy. mrs. murray. mr. ossoff. mr. padilla. mr. paul. mr. peters. mr. reed. mr. ricketts. mr. risch. mr. romney. ms. rosen. mr. rounds. mr. rubio. mr. sanders. mr. schatz. mr. schmitt. mr. schumer. mr. scott of florida. mr. scott of south carolina. mrs. shaheen. ms. sinema.

ms. smith. ms. stabenow. mr. sullivan. mr. tester. mr. thune. mr. tillis. mr. tuberville. mr. van hollen. mr. vance. mr. warner. mr. warnock. ms. warren. mr. welch. mr. whitehouse. mr. wicker. mr. wyden. mr. young. the clerk: senators voting in the affirmative --

bennet, blumenthal, boozman, carper, cassidy, collins, coons, cramer, duckworth, durbin, ernst, fischer, graham, grassley, hickenlooper, hirono, hoeven, hyde-smith, kennedy, klobuchar, lujan, manchin, mcconnell, mendendez, moran, murray, ossoff, peters, reed, rounds, schatz, schumer, shaheen, stabenow, sullivan, thune, tillis, van hollen, warnock, welch, whitehouse, and wicker. mr. daines voted in the negative. mr. heinrich, aye. mr. fetterman, aye. ms. murkowski, aye. mr. cardin, aye. mr. kaine, aye.

mr. king, aye. mr. lee, no. mr. booker, aye. mr. cotton, aye. mr. murphy, aye.

the clerk: mr. budd, no. the clerk: ms. baldwin, aye.

the clerk: mrs. britt, aye. the clerk: mr. ricketts, aye.

mr. tester, aye. mr. merkley, no. the clerk: mr. crapo, aye.

the clerk: mr. lankford, aye. mr. rubio, no. mr. hawley, no.

the clerk: ms. lummis, no. the clerk: mr. risch, aye. mr. schmitt, no. mr. marshall, no.

the clerk: mrs. blackburn, no.

the clerk: mr. sanders, no. #

the clerk: ms. cantwell, aye. the clerk: mr. wyden, aye. mr. casey, aye. ms. sinema, aye.

the clerk: mr. scott of south carolina, aye. mr. kelly, aye. mr. tuberville, no.

the clerk: mr. johnson, no. the clerk: mrs. capito, aye.

the clerk: mr. romney, aye. mr. rosen, aye. mr. markey, aye. mr. young, aye.

the clerk: mr. brown, aye. the clerk: mrs. gillibrand, aye.

the clerk: mr. cornyn, aye. ms. cortez masto, aye. mr. scott of florida, no.

the clerk: mr. cruz, no.

the clerk: mr. hagerty, no.

the clerk: mr. barasso, no.

the clerk: mr. warner, aye.

the clerk: mr. braun, no. mr. mullin, aye. mr. padilla, aye.

vote: the clerk: ms. hassan, aye. ms. smith, aye.

the clerk: ms. warren, aye. mr. vance, no. ms. hassan, aye.

the presiding officer: on this vote the yeas are 80. the nays are 19. three-fifths of the senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in the affirmative, the motion is agreed to. cloture having been invoked, the motion to refer and the amendments pending thereto fall. mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: could we have some order, please, mr. president. the presiding officer: memberswill take their conversations outside. mr. schumer: mr. president, today the senate sends a unified message to the entire world. america will always defend democracy in its hour of need. we tell our allies we will stand with you. we tell our adversaries don't mess with us. we tell the world we will do everything to defend democracy and our way of life.

in a resounding bipartisan vote, the relentless work of six long months has paid off. congress is sending the supplemental to president biden's desk. getting this done was one of the greatest achievements the senate has faced in years, perhaps decades. a lot of people inside and outside the congress wanted this package to fail. but today those in congress who stand on the side of democracy are winning the day. to our friends in ukraine, to our allies in nato, to our allies in israel and to civilians around the world in need of help, help is on the way. to our friends in ukraine, america will deliver more ammo and air defenses and basic supplies that you need to resist putin on the battlefield. to our friends in israel, america will soon deliver aid to help you fight the scourge of hamas and stand up to iran.

to innocent civilians in the midst of the war -- in the midst of war from gaza to sudan, america will deliver food and medicine and clothing. and to our friends in the indo-pacific, we will stand with you to resist the chinese communist party. and to the whole world, make no mistake, america will deliver on its promise to act like a leader on the world stage, to hold the line against autocratic thugs like putin. a few months ago putin made a bet that american aid would sooner or later come to an end. we are showing putin that betting against america is always, always a grave mistake. over the past few months i've spoken repeatedly and at length about the supreme importance about getting the supplemental package done. starting in october and through thanksgiving and christmas and new year's and into the spring,

i said again and again that we had to work in a bipartisan way. democrats and republicans alike if we wanted to pass this bill. and when we succeeded in getting the supplemental through the senate the first time in february, it was two two -- for two reasons above all, persistence and bipartisanship. at certain points it might have seemed hard to see how we'd reach our goal, but we never lost hope, that if we persisted, we could finish the job. today, thank god, our persistence has been validated. and the bill the senate sent to us by the house is largely the same as the bill in substance as what the senate has championed all along. it wasn't easy to reach this point but today's outcome yet confirms another thing we've stressed from the beginning of this congress. in divided government, the only way to ever get things done is

bipartisanship. i'm very pleased that in this moment when it mattered most, both parties found a way to work together, even when it wasn't easy. again, persistence and bipartisanship is what saved the day. leader mcconnell and i would not always agree, worked hand in hand and shoulder to shoulder to get this bill done. together we were bipartisan and persistent. now, it's troubling that a very small minority within the hard right tried desperately for months to prevent congress from doing the right thing. these isolationists have now secured their ignominious place in history as the one who would see america stick its head in the sand as our enemies sought to undermine us. had they won, they would have presided over a declining america. i'm glad that today we will see that effort fail. this is an inflection point in

history. western democracy perhaps faced its greatest test since the end of the cold war. the conflicts we see right now in europe and the middle east and the tensions of the indo-pacific will go a long way in shaping the balance of power between democracy and autocracy in the decades to come. and the consequences for america's long-term security will be profound. if putin is allowed to seize the territory of a neighboring sovereign nation, if chinese communist party is allowed to consume the indo-pacific, if iran is allowed to dominate the middle east, and if america were to stand by and do nothing, it is the united states that would suffer the consequences most of all in the long run. failure to act now could not only undermine the legitimacy of our democratic values, it would have impacts across american life. it would hurt us politically,

economically, militarily, and socially. it would harm the competitiveness of u.s. businesses, endanger the safety of our troops, cripple america's innovative potential and make the world a more hostile place for our civic values, individual liberty, freedom of expression, equal justice under law, and opportunity for all. we always try to live up to these ideals, but they will not survive if autocratic powers like putin and the chinese communist party overtake america in this century. that's what's at stake in the war in ukraine where we face putin. that's what is at stake in t the -- in indochina where we face xi. that's what's at stake in conflicts in the middle east where we face iran. nothing less, nothing less than the future of american security and the future of the democratic order that has survived since the end of the second world war.

so we have a choice. we can either make a downpayment on defending our security or finding ourselves on the back foot facing much graver thrifts in years and decades to come. the only answer is the right one. we must act now. we have learned in recent years that democracy is a fragile and precious thing. it will not survive the threats of this century, the new threats if we aren't willing to do what it takes to defend it. and if america will not lead the way to project democracy in this age, no other nation will. that is the burden, that is the duty of a nation as great as ours. there are so many people on both sides of the yiel who deserve credit -- aisle who deserve credit for this immense accomplishment. i thank president biden for his stalwart leadership. he never flifrnled or wined. he knew how important this was

and was also working with us. i thank leader mcconnell as i mentioned before working hand in hand with us, not letting partisanship get in the way. i thank speaker johnson who rose to the occasion. in his own words said he had to do the right thing despite the enormous political pressure on him. and i thank leader jeffries who worked so well together in his bipartisan way with speaker johnson. and let me say this once again about my friend, the republican leader. we are of one mind to get this bill done. it was our bipartisanship, our linking of arms together that got this large and difficult bill through the congress despite many political ideologues who wanted to bring it down. bipartisanship once again prevailed and i thank him for his leadership. i want to thank my senate colleagues, particularly in my

caucus, the dedication and unity and strength that you have shown has made this possible. i was able as leader to work with the republican leader in the house, the speaker, the minority leader in the house and the president because i knew i had our full caucus behind us, strongly, fervently. the speeches we heard at our tuesday lunches made by many who are sitting here would make every american proud. and i thank you, thank you, thank you for that. the past six months our friends and allies across the world have been watching what's been going on in congress and asking themselves the same thing. will america stand by her friends to face down the forces of autocracy? will america follow through on its commitment to be a leader on the world stage and safeguard the cause of democracy?

will america summon the strength to come together, overcome this intrif cal pull of partisanship and rise once again to meet the magnitude of the moment? today with both parties working together, the senate answers these questions with a thunderous and resounding yes. i yield the floor.

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from washington. ms. cantwell: mr. president, i rise to urge my colleagues to pass this important legislation, and i want to thank senator -- leader schumer for his tremendous leadership on this entire package. it is amazing his dedication and support to getting this done really, really held steadfast. owl caucus, as -- our caucus, as the just described, and so many of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle. i also with a with to thank senator murray for her continued leadership on appropriations bills. this supplemental will supply

ukraine with desperately needed equipment and weapons and training and logistics. for two years the ukrainian people have shown courage and resilience enabling them to resist russian aggression. and as just described by our leader, it would be disastrous for our national security and democracy and human rights if we had not supported them. this bill also continues to support american taxpayers by authorizing the president to use an estimated $5 billion in frozen russian assets. these assets will help pay for ukraine's reconstruction, and it designates the u.s. economic assistance which ukrainians will have to pay back once they have repelled the russian situation. the supplemental also includes support for our middle east ally israel, including support to make sure that just like this past few days in shooting down 99% of missile drones attack by

iran, it also includes $9 billion of humanitarian aid for gaza and for people caught in conflicts around the world. these conflicts have taken an immeasurable toll. the supplemental also contains a range of sanctions that will make it harder for each of israel's and iran's and ham -- and hamas to finance their operations. it consequencetains the ship act which requires the president to impose sanctions against individuals and companies that knowingly help evade oil sanctions. illegal revenues funnel billions to illegal organizations terrorist groups and it builds on legislation senator murkowski and i enacted over a decade ago that helped expose the middle men that were helping iran evade these sanctions. it also involves billions of

dollars for a critical part of the world where we stand shoulder to shoulder with these democracies. it also contains legislation to fend off fentanyl act which i was proud to be a cosponsor. critically important legislation that does a couple of things. one, it declares that fentanyl is a national emergency. this enables the president to impose sanctions on fentanyl traffickers, enabling the u.s. treasury to better fight fentanyl-related money laundering. those fentanyl traffickers and money launderings have ties to organized crime and to drug cartels. so these issues have been clearly outline in my state by communities, health providers, law enforcement, and others who want help in stopping the traffickers. part of the solution is stemming the flow of fentanyl. and this supplemental would how the proceeds of those seized

assets by those narco traffickers to be used by law enforcement in our local communities to fight this fentanyl scourge. we must give our communities all the tools they can to stop this product from flooding across our borders, and this legislation will do just that. i also want to address that technology should be a tool to help solve our greatest challenges, to improve our human conditions, and drive innovation and support economic opportunity. but foreign adversaries use technology for social and political control. there is no individual right to privacy or freedom of speech in these autoocracies. u.s. media companies are not allowed to operate in china. in fact, china leads the world in using surveillance and censorship to keep taps on its own population and to repress dissidence. governments that respect freedom

of speech do not build backdoors into hardware or software, into apps on phones or on laptops. backdoors allow foreign advocates to target people. backdoors allow foreign adversaries to use proxy bots to bombard vulnerable populations, americans, with harmful content or even to blackmail people. the u.s. department of justice has stated, quote, hostile foreign powers are weaponizing b bulk data and the power of artificial intelligence to target americans, end quote. i do not want technology in the united states used this way. i want the united states to work with our most sophisticated technology countries, likeminded democracies, places like japan, south korea can our europeanian

allies and set the global standard for technology and data protection. i want to see a technology nato, one in wit our allies come together and say, there cannot be a government back door to any hardware or software if it wants to see a global adoption rate. we should have a trusted frame rate for cross-border data flows as has been discussed. and criteria for trusted data flows should include commitments to democratic governancern the rule of law, and the protection of property rights and free speech. i believe in trade, and i want trade. and i believe that business is for business. but business is not for business when foreign adversaries weaponize data, weaponcize technology, and weaponize into approaches that hurt americans.

i want to yield to my colleague, the chairman of the senate intelligence committee, for his perspective on why this legislation before us is so important. mr. warner: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from virginia. mr. warner: mr. president, first of all, i want to agree with my friend, the chairman of the commerce committee, on the issues she has already outline, whether it be the need for aid for ukraine, support for israel, humanitarian aid for gaza, our necessary funding that's taking place for the indo-pacific and obligation legislation fending off fentanyl. i want to particularly commend her for her comments she's made on that's technology issues. over the last seven years, as vice chair and now chairman of the intelligence committee, i've spent an awful lot of time looking at what i think is one of the most significant intelligence failures of the last half-century, and that was the failure we had to anticipate

and disrupt western efforts to meddle in our elections. since that time, we've seen a wide spectrum of foreign adversaries who've tried to copy the russian playbook. but don't just take it from me. a succession of now-declassified intelligence assessments have described the way in which foreign adversaries like iran, like the people's republic of china, and others are seeking to stoke social, racial, and political tensions in the united states. they are seeking to undermine confidence in our institutions and our election systems and even to sow violence amongst americans. the extent to which our adversaries have exploited american social media platforms is a matter of public record. the committee i chair has held many hearings, open hearings, on the failure of u.s. social media platforms to identify the

exploitation of their products by foreign intelligence services. the senator, along with the senator from washington, i've been one of the leading critic of these platforms for their repeated failures to protect consumers. and while the exploitation of u.s. communication platforms by adversaries continues to be a serious issue, at the end of the day, our platforms are at least independent businesses. they do not have a vested interest in undermining our basic democratic system. the truth is, though, i can't say the same for tiktok, the fastest-growing social media platform in the united states whose parent company, bytedance, is based in the prc. even as u.s. social media platforms have fumbled in their response to foreign influence operations, there was never any concern that these platforms were operating at the direction

of a foreign adversary. again, i cannot say the same for tiktok. i yield back to senator cantwell. ms. cantwell: i thank senator warner for his perspective as chairman of the intelligence committee and his hard work. and he and i introduced legislation years ago to deal with tissue. india tiktok users migrated to other platforms including google's youtube and i understandian small businesses foreign other ways to operate on other platforms. this smeltal contains the protecting americans from foreign adversary-controlled application act. congress has a nonpunitive policy proposal in passing this electricals. -- this legislation. congress is not acting to punish tiktok, bytedance or any other individual company. congress is acting to prevent

foreign adversaries from conducting espionage, surveillance, maligned operations, harming vulnerable americans, our servicemen and women and our u.s. government personnel. mr. warner: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from virginia. mr. warner: i would like to expound a little bit on what senator cantwell has just said. because it has been made absolutely clear that a number of chinese laws require chinese companies and their subsidiaries to assist prc agencies and abide by the government directives. the truth is, these chinese companies at the end of the day, they don't owe their obligation to their customers or their shareholders, but they owe it to the prc government. in the context of social media platforms used by nearly half of americans, it's not hard to

imagine how a platform that facilitates so much commerce, political discourse, and social debate could be covertly manipulated to serve the goals of an authoritarian regime, one with a long track record of censorship, transnational aggression and promotion of disinformation. in recent weeks, we've seen direct lobbying by the chinese government indicating perhaps more than anything we can say on the floor here how dearly xi jinping is invested in this product, a product, by the way, that's not even allowed to operate in the chinese domestic market itself. story after story over the last 18 months has exposed the extent to which tiktok has grossly misrepresented its data security and corporate government practice. countless stories have refuted

the claims made by tiktok executives and lobbyists that it operates independently from its controlling company, bytedance. we've also seen documented examples of this company surveilling journal is and we've seen corresponding guidance from leading news organizations, not just here in america but across the world, advising their investigative journalists not to use tiktok. these public reports based on revelations of current and former employees also reveal that tiktok has allowed employees to covertly amplify content. unfortunately, those who suggest that the u.s. can address the data security and foreign influence risks of tiktok through traditional mitigation have not been following tiktok's long track record of deceit and lack of transparency. i yield back to senator cantwell. ms. cantwell: i thank senator warner for his comments because

i find most disturbing that they used tiktok to repeatedly access u.s. user data and track multiple journalists covering the company. researchers have found that tiktok restricts the information that americans and others receive on a global basis. as of december 2023, an analysis by rutgers university found that tiktok posts mentioning topics that are sensitive to the chinese government including tiananmen square, uighurs, the dalai lama or significantly less prevalent on tiktok than instagram. foreign policy issues disfavored by china and russian governments also had fewer hashtags on particularing to, such as pro-ukraine or pro-israeli ttacker tags. here are some of those . the examples of tiananmen s square, which we know was an example of students standing up to the military. yet, tiananmen square, there are

8,000 more hashtags on instagram than tiktok. the uighur genocide protecting a muslim population, there are 1970 more posts about that on instagram than on tiktok. and my personal favorite, just because i had the privilege of meeting the dalai lama here in the capitol, 5,520 more times the dalai lama is mentioned on instagram on on tiktok. and pro-ukraine, 750 times more rash tags on instagram than on tiktok about ukraine and support for ukraine. i think that says it all in this debate today. are we going to continue to allow people to control the information that is an export-controlled algorithm based on a chinese source code?

my colleagues and i are urging for this deweaponization by having an important activity of saying that this source code could be sewed. now, i know that the chinese had an export control on that, but congress believes that you have to have an adequate time to sufficiently address this issue posed by our foreign adversaries. that is why the legislation before us is to bytedance to sell a stake in tiktok, which is the source of the source code being held. we think a year is an ample time to allow potential investors to come forward, for due diligence to be completed, and for lawyers to draw up and finalize cont contracts. this is not a new concept, to require chinese divestment from u.s. companies. the committee on foreign investments in the united states requires chinese disvestment

from hotel management platform stay in touch, health care app called patience like me, from the popular lgbtq dating app called grindr, and even there, americans had continuity of service on these platforms. so mr. president, i turn it back to my president -- back to my colleague, but we are giving people a choice here, to improve this platform and have the opportunity for americans to make sure they are not being maligned by our foreign adver adversaries. i ask my -- the president if i could enter into the record the house resolution originally on this legislation. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. cantwell: thank you. i turn it back to my colleague, senator warner, and thank him for his leadership. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. warner: thank you, mr. president. i commend the senator from washington for her leadership going through the disparate

effects of tiktok versus other social media platforms. tiktok i think realized they had a problem over a year ago, so they tried to develop a response. it was something called project texas, to allegedly address concerns relating to tiktok's handling of american data. however, project texas would still allow tiktok's algorithm, source code, and development activities to remain in china. they would arrange so under bytedance control and subject to chinese government exploitation. project texas allows tiktok to continue to rely on engineers and back-end support from china, to update its algorithm and source code needed to run tiktok in the united states. how could they say there's not the possibility of interference. this again makes it vulnerable to chinese government exploitation. that's why project texas does

not resolve the united states national security concern about bytedance's ownership of tiktok. now, let me acknowledge, i think senator cantwell and i worked or a more frankly comprehensive approach that, in a perfect would, we might have been debating today. but we work in the world of getting things right. so i stand firmly in support, as senator cantwell has, of taking action now to prevent the kind of intelligence failure we first saw back in 2016. again, chair of the commerce committee indicated this is not some draconian or novel approach. for decades, we've had systems in place to examine foreign ownership of u.s. industry. we've seen even more scrutiny in instances where foreign buyers have sought to control u.s. telecom and broadcast media platforms. frankly, this country should have adopted a similar regulatory approach for social

media, something senator cantwell and i worked on, which has considerable for considerably more scale and barriers to entry than broadcast media had a decade ago. about you this bill is an important step in fixing that glaring gap. it goes a long way towards safeguarding our democratic systems from covert foreign influence. both in its application to tiktok and forward-looking treatment of other foreign adversary control over future online platforms. before i yield back, i want to make clear to all americans, this is not an effort to take your voice away. for several months now, we've heard from constituents how much they value tiktok as a creative platform. as the maker yesterday, it was the four-year anniversary of my once wirea tuna melt video on another social media platform, i can kind of understand why tiktok is such a cultural touchstone. to those americans, i emphasize

this is not a ban of the sfris you appreciate -- of the service you appreciate. many american, particularly young americans, are rightfully skeptical. they've not seen what congress has seen. they've not been in the classified briefings congress has held, which delved more deeply into the threat posed by foreign control of tiktok. what they have seen, beyond even this bill, is congress' failure to enact meaningful consumer protections on big tech and they cynically view this as a diversion or worse concession to u.s. meade platforms. to those -- social media platforms. to those young americans, i say we hear your concern. we hope tiktok will continue under new ownership, american or otherwise. it could be brought by a group from britain, canada, brazil, france. it just needs to be no longer controlled by an adversary defined as an adversary in u.s. law. with that, mr. president, i

yield the floor, urge that we take action on this item. again, i appreciate the great leadership of the chairman of the commerce committee on working with our friends in the house to bring this important legislation to the floor of the senate. with that, i yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: the clerk: ms. baldwin.

mr. tuberville: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from alabama. mr. tuberville: i ask for consent to suspend the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. tuberville: mr. president, i cannot believe that we're here again, americans cannot believe what we're witnessing here t today. less than a week ago, house republican leadership sold out americans and passed a bill that sends 95 billion to other countries, with the speaker's blessing the house rules committee approved a package of foreign aid bills that undermines america's interest abroad and paves our nation's path to bankruptcy. the speaker relied on democrats to force this 95 billion-dollar package through committee over the objection of three conservative members. unfortunately, our leadership here in the senate, both democrat and republican, are

complicit. the senate is about to follow the house's lead for the violating the trust of those who sent us here. we're about to vote on another 60 billion for ukraine. this on top of the 120 billion american taxpayers have already sent to this black hole with no accountability. we are a country that is 35 trillion in debt. we are a country whose southern border is wide open, thanks to the biden administration. illegal immigrants are invading our country. drugs, including fentanyl, are flooding across, killing hundreds, hundreds of americans a day. we are printing money for other countries while inflation continues to crush the american citizen. not one dollar of this bill is paid. not one. we will have to print more money or borrow it from china. all to fund foreign wars while

we are losing the fight at our own southern border. what we're doing is a slap in the face to the americans who sent us here to represent them. instead of debating legislation to close the border and fix the economy, we're about to send billions of dollars to one of the most corrupt countries in the world. the war in ukraine is a stalemate, has been for a while. pouring more money into ukraine coffers will only prolong the conflict and lead to more loss of life. no one at the white house, pentagon, or state department can articulate what victory looks like in this fight. they couldn't when we sent the first tranche of aid over two years ago. we should be working with ukraine and russia to negotiate an end to this madness. that's called diplomacy, by the way, a tactic this administration has been completely unwilling to use.

instead, congress is rushing to further bankroll the waging of a war that has zero chance of a positive outcome. the speaker claims he is privy to special classified information that justifies support for this massive package. if this critical information exists, all elective representatives being asked to vote on this massive spending package have, and should have, access to it. republican leaders in the senate argue that russia will go roll through ukraine and into nato if we don't immediately send another $60 billion we don't have. i wouldn't be surprised if we get a letter signed by 50 or so, quote, higher ranking former intelligent officials, end quote, confirming this and the dire consequences of delay. don't fall for it. i had a classified briefing from the department of defense just this morning. i can tell you, there is no justification to prioritize ukraine security before our own,

none. to add insult to injury, we are financing this conflict on the backs of the american taxpayer. as i said earlier, this cou country's 35 trillion in debt. today, we're printing $80,000 a second. you heard that right, $80,000 a second, 4.6 million a minute. i want this body to explain that to the american people next election. this is irresponsible and unsustainable. on top of that, we're now considering another $95 billion to that mountain of debt with this foreign package. this funding will be financing by deficit spending the american people will eventually have to pay back. this group doesn't have to pay it. the american people do. it's easy to spend somebody else's money. unlike the so-called loan to ukraine, loan we're hearing, which will never be repaid -- don't be fooled --

unfortunately, some of my colleagues will vote yes on this bill, claiming hey, this money is a loan. this was a concept originally flooded -- floated by president trump. how, this bill only allows the president to set the terms of loan repayment. the president. not in this bill. it lets him cancel the payment anytime, and the interest on it. sounds a little fishy to me. i and the majority of americans are highly skeptical we will ever see a cent paid back to the american taxpayer. if the chickens are going to come home to roost, and when they do it's going to get really, really ugly. every member of this body should be laser focused on getting our own house in order, not bankrolling foreign wars. 26 billion of this foreign aid package is supposedly for israel. sadly, that's not reality. if you read the fine print, 9

billion of that funding would go to the palestinians for what is billed as humanitarian aid for gaza. of course, sending any money to gaza will immediately be used to line the pockets of hamas terrorists. they will provide zero relief to the civilians suffering under their control. there is no requirement that any hostages also in this bill be released for any exchange of this money. why is that not happening? we have american citizens, we have israeli citizens captive for five, six months. we're giving 20-something billion dollars, nine billion to the people holding hostages, and we're not getting relief from the people suffering as hostages going on six months. why in the world would america agree to funding both sides of this war? israel is our greatest ally in the middle east. we should be standing firm in support of our friends in the

battle against hamas. sadly, the white house is more focused on playing politics, politics and appeasing the radical pro-palestinian base. why else would we send billions of dollars to hamas? is this a political payoff in election year? it sounds like it to me. what a sad state of affairs this country is in. while congress rushes, rushes today to bankroll ukraine and the palestinians, our leadership is avoiding the key crisis facing our nation -- our southern border. wake up. kofrth a recent -- according to a recent gallup poll, immigration is the top concern of people in the country that pay our bills. but the american people were just sold out. it's that simple. you are witnessing the swamp at its worst, a swamp more concerned about maintaining power, and being smarter than everybody else, and lining the pockets of their friends than representing the interest of the american people. colleagues, wake up. the clock is ticking.

how many americans must die before we take on our own security as serious as we're taking on other people's borders, including ukraine? we lose 100,000 people a year to fentanyl. does anybody care in this body? haven't heard it. this is the direct result of the border policies of president biden. fentanyl is manufactured in china and ran by the cartel in mexico. at what point does that horrific reality become important enough for us to come in here and vote and shut this dang border down. the left loves to tell you about threats. what kills more americans biden border policy? nothing. the biggest disaster in history since i've been alive and a citizen of this country. ukraine is losing soldiers by far fewer than the number of americans who are dying from fentanyl. we have to take care of our own people before we take care of the rest of the world. the biden administration is failing this country.

we know what the problem is. we know the solution, but nobody wants to solve it. that's an ineffective government. president trump proved that we can get op be racial control of our -- operational control of our border. he had control. the problem is no one in this administration or this body actually wants to solve this problem, which means we are also failing this country. americans are counting on this body to stand up and correct the course. i hope we don't let them down. and for these reasons, i will be voting against this massive supplement of taxpayer money that we don't have today going to ukraine. i yield the floor.

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from north carolina. mr. budd: thank you, mr. president. you know, we meet this week at a critical time. the threats we face on the world stage are demanding our attention in a way that we have not seen in decades. from the middle east to europe to the indo-pacific, weakness from president biden has allowed chaos to spread across this globe. in israel, they are in a fight for survival against genocidal hamas terrorists. in the indo-pacific, china is saber rattling and making provocative means towards taiwan and the philippines. in ukraine, russia continues its brutal war of aggression by committing war crimes against

innocent civilians rhode island here at home, we're facing a crisis of our own. most notably, the worst border crisis in american history. the truth is that the consequences of our border crisis affect our citizens the most. for example, in my home state of north carolina, we've seen a 22% increase in drug overdose deaths, the highest level ever recorded. this is primarily due to deadly fentanyl that was transported into our country through an open southern border on president biden's watch. police departments from charlotte to raleigh have uncovered tens of thousands of pounds of fentanyl, enough to kill every man, woman and child not just in north carolina, but in the whole country. and right now we have an administration ignoring that crisis, and the only attempt the senate made to address it, it fell far short of what's needed.

so as we again debate foreign aid and foreign spending, i will repeat what i've said throughout the process. we must secure our own border before we help other countries protect theirs. in order to be a strong nation, we first have to have a strong border here at home. during one of my recent telephone town halls a few months ago, i asked a poll question to the thousands of people that had joined me that evening on the phone. i asked, if you could be assured that the southern border was secure, would you then support sending aid to allies and partners? roughly two-third of the respondents said yes. you see, most people aren't opposed to helping our friends. they just think that we need to take care of our own country first. for me, america first does not

mean america only. so when i oppose this package, it won't be because i oppose helping our friends and our allies. we should send israel the weapons they need to eliminate hamas and free the remaining hostage, one by the way, who is a north carolinian. we should counter the chinese communist party's military aggression in the indo-pacific and social media subversion inside our country. we should counter russia's brutality and force putin to the negotiating table on terms most favorable to ukraine. we should rebuild the arsenal of democracy and make significant investments in our national defense. we should do all those things, but not before we fix what affects our own citizens first. too many americans are suffering. too many americans are dying. this is an order of priorities, and my first priority, my first

priority as united states senator will always be to make life better for us here in the united states and back home in north carolina. i will oppose this foreign aid package because we must put america first. not alone. not alone, but first. i yield the floor.

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from massa massachusett. mr. markey:mr. president, i rise today not in defense of tiktok but in defense of tiktok users, especially the 167 million american users. congress is heading towards passing legislation that will likely lead to the blocking the

most popular application among young people in this country, whose purpose is to facilitate and promote speech, an act that has revolutionized how people connect, share, do business, and communicate online, an app that is bringing competition to the heavily concentrated social media market. it should be a serious flag that a bill with such significant implications for freedom of speech and online competition has gone from being an idea in the house of representatives to all of a sudden being passed on the floor of the senate in a matter of weeks. just weeks. so when political elites who otherwise fiercely disagree with each other come together to pass legislation that may result in significant censorship, yes, censorship, often in the name of national security, we should be hypervigilant about the true

intentions of this legislation. episodes in history of using national security as a pretext to crack down on dissenting or unpopular speech loom as warnings about the ease of compromising our values when national security is supposedly at stake. i want to be clear. i rise today on this greatest of debate floors not to defend tiktok. i don't deny that tiktok poses some national security risks. instead, i come here today with a plea to my colleagues to think carefully about the impact of this bill, the consequences of its implementation and the trade-off between supposed national security threats and freedom of expression and basic rights to free speech. this legislation may address, at least mitigate a national security risk, but it could and

likely will result in widespread censorship. andish censorship -- and this censorship would most predominantly affect young people in our country, many who are just obtaining the right to vote. we should be clear-eyed about this stake. censorship is not who we are as a people. we should not down play or deny this trade-off. some say the legislation merely forces bytedance to sell tiktok within a year. that's a sale that won't affect its users at all. the ownership will change, so bill supporters say, but the app will stay the same. realistically, the actual chances of a divestment in a year, if ever, are very small. a tiktok sale would be one of the most complicated and expensive transactions in history, requiring months if not years of due diligence by both

government and business actors. we should be very clear about the likely outcome of this law. it's really just a tiktok ban. and once we properly acknowledge that this bill is a tiktok ban, we can better see its impact on free expression. 170 million users, 170 million americans use tiktok to watch videos, learn about the news, run a business, and keep up with the latest pop culture trends. they connect with friends and family, sell new products and build community. the culture and expression on tiktok are unique and unavailable anywhere else on the internet. in fact, tiktok is a threat, a business threat to facebook and instagram and other american companies precisely because of

its unique style and community which cannot be replicated anywhere else. and while many of my colleagues are sincere in their fears for u.s. national security, others appear to support this legislation for a far more dangerous reason. they want to ban tiktok because of its users' content, because ever tiktok's viewpoint. they don't like that many tiktok users support progressive or liberal politics, or perspectives that they simply don't agree with. the bill supporters dress up this censorship by arguing that the chinese government is manipulating tiktok's algorithm to promote certain viewpoints. and this view, a tiktok ban is about combatting chinese propaganda, not penalizing tiktok's content. tiktok is from their perspective poisoning the minds of young

americans with pro-communist china propaganda. this isn't just some hypothetical risk, critics say, but an actual ongoing operation by the chinese communist party. don't be fooled by these arguments. although the chinese government certainly censors online speech in china, there's no credible evidence that the ccp has done so in the united states through tiktok. in fact, when u.s. national security officials talk about the risk of china manipulating tiktok's algorithm, they refer to it as a hypothetical risk, a hypothetical risk. this is the real objection. an objection to the political con content, the most valuable and protected speech in a democracy. we should be very clear about

the impact and intent of this legislation. this bill is for all intents and purposes a ban on tiktok. and it is intended to suppress disfavored speech on the platform, plain and simple. we can see that in the cross-examination, the questioning in the house of representatives hearing on this subject. but my colleagues who are awake through this reality, they may nevertheless believe that such each suppressant is a small cost to pay to keep americans safe. to them i urge a strong note of caution. the defense -- a little speech suppression is necessary when our national security is at stake is ultimately un-american. this reasoning may seem convincing that american history has too many examples of controversial laws that

ultimately infringe on civil liberties in the name of national security. in the united states we often look back on these episodes with regret. we should not add tiktok to that history. so don't get me wrong. tiktok has its problems. number one, tiktok poses a serious risk to the privacy and mental health of our young people. in fact, tiktok paid a fine for violating my children's online privacy protection act just five years ago. but that problem isn't unique to tiktok. and it certainly doesn't justify a tiktok ban, which is what we heard over and over again in the ho house of representatives in their hearing on this issue. and the reason is that youtube and facebook and instagram and snapchat are making our children

sick as well and exploiting our children and teenagers and their information -- they're information for profit. american companies are doing the same thing, too, to children and teenagers in our country as is tiktok. so why aren't we thinking of this as a common goal that we're going to have in order to protect those teenagers and children. if the bill supporters truly wanted to protected well-being of our young people, they would broaden their lens and address the youth mental health crisis plaguing our children and teenagers that has in part been caused by big tech in the united states, in the united states along with tiktok. so i want you to hear the statistics to my colleagues. it's powerful. one in three high school girls

in the united states just two years ago considered suicide. at least one in ten american high school teenage girls attempted suicide that year, attempted suicide. and amongst lgbtq youth, the number is more like one in five attempted suicide just two years ago. now, it's not exclusively because of social media. what tiktok, instagram, facebook, discord, call of them are doing but it plays a big role, according to our own centers for disease control. it plays a big role according to our own surgeon general. it plays a big role. and we should be talking about that out here. that's a clear and present danger. that's not a hypothetical

danger. that's not a hypothetical threat that may occur sometime in the long distance future. it's happening right now. and if we're talking about tiktok, we should be talking about all the other companies at the same time. instead of suppressing speech on a single application, we could be addressing the root causes of the mental health crisis by targeting big tech's pernicious privacy invasion business model of teenagers and children in our country. we could be passing my bipartisan children and teens online privacy protect act or carpa2.0 and banning targeted ads to kids and teens on tiktok and everywhere else. my legislation with senator bill cassidy has been intensely vetted, passed through senate committee, and is supported by the chair and ranking member of the senate commerce committee and unlike a tiktok ban, it addresses a problem that is

universally recognized, the compromised health and well-being of all of our children and teenagers. so today if you hear out on the floor senators talking about the impact tiktok is having upon young people in our country, it's a good question, and we should be dealing with it but you can't deal with it just by talking about tiktok. you have to talk about every american company that actually created the model that has led to this mental health crisis. and we're not doing that today. that's something that is of clear and present danger right now, not a height net cal -- hypothetical threat in the future, which is what we're actually doing by passing this legislation. instead of protecting young people online, we're censoring their speech. and this is a grave mistake. we should be having a much bigger discussion right now about what the implications of this legislation are, is, for the future, and i thank you, mr. president, for giving me the

opportunity to come out here on the senate floor to talk about this very important issue. with that i yield back. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. rubio: in a few hours, it appears, in a few hours here the press headlines are going to read that the senate just passed the ukraine funding bill. that's what they'll call it. this bill is about a lot more than just ukraine. there's a lot in this bill and i want to go through some of it. first of all, it provides something i have strongly supported, which is providing in this case $26 billion to the state of israel to defeat hamas, to defend itself against its enemies. this is something we actually tried to pass on its own and could have passed on its own months ago. it was blocked, held hostage for ukraine funding but it's something we should have done months ago. it's interesting, you know, i think israel in and of itself is a miracle country. on the first day of its

existence, it was invaded i believe by 12 separate armies, the whole world thought they would be overrun and defeated very quickly and they survived. and they have throughout their entire existence. had to deal with the fact that everywhere they turned, they have enemies all around them. it also happens to be the only pro-american democracy in the middle east. and today it's engaged in a battle to not just defeat these vicious criminals and terrorists who committed slaughter on the 7th of october of last year, but they also have to deal with rockets being launched against them from lebanon. you have 90,000 something potentially. israelis are permanently displaced in their own country. they can't go back to where they lived in the northern part of the country and the threat from iran and all the terror groups, hezbollah and the like that are constantly targeting israel. and then having to face all of the things that are happening around the world as well in this effort to d delegitimatize the

right to exist as a state. we should have done this weeks and months ago. and it could have been done all on its oeven as its own -- own as its own bill but it was held hostage. it provides $8 billion to help nations in the indo-pacific, particularly taiwan. and the purpose of that is to build up the military capacity of our partners in the region, frankly, to dissuade and prevent the chinese communist party from starting a war in the indo-pacific that would make the one that's now going on in europe look like child's play, far more dangerous. and by the way, it does something i've been trying to do since 2019. i believe he was the first member of congress to call for a banning -- not a banning of tiktok, a banning of bytedance which is the company that owns tiktok. bytedance sells tiktok. tiktok continued to operate. we should not have a company operating in the united states about the algorithm that it has and access to the data that it has that powers that algorithm.

we should not have a company like that operating in the united states. it has something to do with everything the chinese communist party tells them to do. but the reason why the headlines are going to be about ukraine funding is because that's the part of this bill that frankly has been controversial. it has people that oppose it. i personally believe it is in the national interest of the united states to help ukraine. ukraine was invaded not once but twice by vladimir putin. i supported ukraine and helping ukraine back in 2014. when then -- whether they were first invaded by putin and president obama would only supply them with blankets and meals ready to eat. and i support continuing to help them now to defend themselves. they didn't start this war. i support helping them defend themselves to the extent we can afford and to the extent we can sustain it. but while this invasion of ukraine most certainly poses a

national security interest to the united states and a risk to our country, the invasion of america across our southern border is even more important. is even more a severe threat. today and every single day for the last three years, thousands of people, many if not most of whom we know very little about, are pouring into the united states across our southern border. and i made it clear months ago that while i support helping ukraine, i would only vote to do so if the president issued executive orders that would help stop this. it was as executive orders ordering us not to enforce immigration laws that yated and incentive and driver that has led to this crisis and only that, only executive orders to begin to enforce our immigration la laws would allow us to stop what is happening now.

but the president continues to refuse to issue those executive orders. he continues to refuse to enforce our immigration laws and so the crisis continues. and sadly just a few moments ago we took a vote here that basically says we here in the senate will not be allowed to vote on amendments to make changes to this bill. and so we are left with the choice. i am left with this choice. if i want to help israel, if i want to help taiwan, if i want to ban bytedance from operating tiktok in the united states, then i have to drop my demand that the president enforce our immigration laws and by the way, i have to vote for billions of dollars to be spent on all kinds of programs around the world that i'll describe in a moment. including for people that are illegally entering this country. this is moral extortion.

first, nine million people over three years. that's what's entered our country. this is not immigration. we have -- should always be a country that welcomes immigration. it enriches our country -- controlled immigration in which we control how many people come, who comes, knowing enough about them. that's immigration. nine million people and counting in three years? that is mass migration. and mass migration is never good. there is never such a thing has a positive mass migration, particularly of nine million people in three years. but at a time when our country, from the inside and the outside, is being infiltrate add by people and by movements that seek to destroy america, mass migration is catastrophically dangerous. last week in a coordinated effort -- and it was a coordinated effort; they admit it -- in a coordinated effort to

cause the most economic dact on the united states, at least until our leaders abandon israel, we had pro-terrorist mobs. these are not protesters. these are mow pro-terrorist mobs, shut down traffic on an interstate in oregon. they blocked passengers from he going to the airport in seattle. it closed down the golden gate bridge in san francisco. at this very moment right now as i speak on the senate floor, some of our most prestigious universities are closed because they've been taken over by pro-terrorist mobs. others are chanting go hamas, we love you, we support your rockets, too. others, i've heard these chants, we say justice, us say how. burn televisa to the ground --

burn tel aviv to the ground. the situation has gotten so intolerable that just two days ago a rabbi advised jewish students to leave columbia university and go home for their safety. this morning i got a text message from a friend, a jewish friend -- and i read something i never thought i would have to read. here's what he wrote me. quote, i have to tell you for the first time in my life, i see jewish people scared for their safety and considering exit strategies from the usa, including buying homes in foreign countries and looking to liqu liquidate usa assets. i never thought i would ever read that from anybody -- in america. these mobs, by the way, don't want to just destroy israel. they want to destroy america. some of these mobs are out there chanting death to america, in the streets of american cities. and as one of the mob leaders at

one of these riots, this is what he said through a microphone. quote, it is not just genocide joe that has to go. it is the entire system that has to go. any system that would allow such atrocities and devilry to happen and would support it, such a system does not deserve to exist on god's earn. you know what system he's talking about? this system, our system. our system of government. that's what he was talking about. where did all this come infrastructure? -- where did all this come from? how can things we once only saw happening in the streets of tehran manufactured by the evil regime, those things are now being chanted in our streets, in our country? where did this come infrastructure? -- where did this come from? hamas and hezbollah have been very very public about how these violent anti-israel, anti-semitic mobs are part of their strategy to intimidate american leaders to support

policies that will help destroy israel. hamas, hezbollah, other terror groups, they have repeatedly called on their supporters around the world to protest in cities everywhere, and they boast about how their friends, or what they call their friends on the global left, were actually now responding to their calls. by the way, they openly brag. this is all coming from interviews that they do on television programs that can be monitored. they openly brag because of the flukes of colonialism, racism and slavery studies into history curricula, end quote, and they go on to say, many young americans have been -- my term, a term i read in "the wall street journal" -- have been groomed to support armed resistance, to support intifada in the united states.

by the way, it is not just the mobs that we're seeing. beyond that as the director of the fbi has acknowledged, isis generated income, they generate revenue by running a human smuggling ring that brings migrants to the united states. and so just the bare minimum common sense would lead you to conclude that if isis has a business to smuggle migrants into the u.s., why wouldn't they use that to smuggle a few terrorists here to do in america what at the in moscow a few weeks ago? so we have hamas, hezbollah, calling for intifada inside america. we already have students here on student visas calling for death to america and isis controls a migrant smuggling ring that they can use to bring people into the united states to conduct attacks. but if i want to help israel, if

i want to help taiwan, if i want to help ukraine, if i wasn't to ban tiktok, i have to vote to do nothing to stop thousands of people a day that we know literally nothing about, just allow them to come across our border appeared be released in -- and be released into our country. as far as some of the money that's being spent all over the world, i have always supported the world being engaged in the world, and i continue to be. but i ask you this -- i have senior citizens, i have veterans, and they call my office and they call all our offices and they say, i have nowhere to live. house something too expensive. i met a senior a couple days, a still in his 80's. he literally lives in a mobile home. in, like, a trail area, parked in someone's park yard. these people call. they've lived in this country their whole life. they served our country. and they call for help and the

most we can often do is help get them on a waiting list for section 8 housing. this is a problem that exists in america right now. but if i want to help israel, if i want to help taiwan, if i with aens to help ukraine, if i want to ban tiktok, i have to vote for spending billions of dollars to give to charity groups so they can fly people around the country, put them in hotel rooms or help them resettle in another country. we have rich countries in the middle east, allies of ours, but their leaders own some of the largest yachts in the world. some of their leaders own some of the most expensive horses you could possibly buy in the world. they've built some of the most extravagant and luxurious resorts. these are rich countries and strong supporters of the palestinian cause, as they call it. but if i want to help israel, if i with aens to help taiwan, if i want to help ukraine, if i with

aens to ban tiktok, i have to vote to send american taxpayer money to deal with the catastrophe that's been created by hamas in gaza. 100% by hamas. there was no war. there was a cease-fire before hamas crossed over and voughtered and raped -- and slaughtered and raped and kidnapped. now the american taxpayer is on the hook. look, i understand that in our republic, in our system of government, compromise is necessary. we have to do it all the time. i passed a lot of bills. every one of them involved me finding someone from a different ideological perspective from the other side of the aisle, and you have to compromise. meaning you're not going to get everything you want. you're going to have to give them something they want in exchange for something you want or you may have to change the way you wrote what you want. that's what you have to do in order to pass laws.

i understand compromise. i do. but this bill is not that. this bill is not compromise. this bill is basically saying that if i don't agree to drop my demands that the president secure our border, if i don't agree to spend billions of taxpayer dollars all over the world to resettle people here and in other places, in the midst of you are a own migratory crisis, if i don't agree to all of that, then israel and taiwan and ukraine do not get the help they need and that i support. and that tiktok does not get banned. this is not compromise. this is legislative blackmail. and i will not vote for blackmail. i yield the floor.

mr. ricketts: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from nebraska.

mr. ricketts: mr. president, does anybody believe that the hashtag stand with kashmir is more popular than stand with taylor swift. it has more posts than -- this is an example to skew public opinion on foreign events in their favorite. china is our chief foreign adversary in the world. they are they are a threat to our national security, our values, our economy, and the ccp works tirelessly every day to undermine our entire way of life. tiktok is one of the ways they're doing that. i understood that as governor. that's why i was the first

governor in the country to ban the use of tiktok on government devices. that's why i'll be vetting for this bill today. today we are taking action to end the chinese communist party ability to own and operate tiktok in the united states. tiktok's active users include over 150 million americans. that's almost half our country's entire population. it's become the most influential news platform in the country. the percentage of tiktok users who regularly get their news from this app has doubled since 2020678 the problem, however, is that news is what slant news has and it's entirely being controlled by the chinese communist party. we don't allow this for tv stations or radio stations. you have to be a u.s. citizen to own a tv station or radio station in this country. why are we letting our greatest

adversary in the world own a news platform? tiktok under ccp ownership demotes content based 0en whether it alliance with the ccp's interests. and it's agenda. this has major real-world implications here at home and around the world. look what's happening on our college campuses right now in this country. pro-hamas activists are take over public santa fes -- public spaces. jewish students are being told to leave campus because their universities can't guarantee their safety. there are a lot of other things wrong with this, including the failure to prioritize student safety over appeasement of terrorist sympathizers. but why is this happening in let's look at where young people are getting their news. nearly a third of adults 18 to 29, these young people in the u.s. are regularly getting their news exclusively from tiktok.

pro-palestinian and pro-hamas hashtags are generating 50 times the views on tiktok right now despite the fact that polling shows americans overwhelmingly support israel over hamas. these videos have more reach than the top ten u.s. news websites combined. this is not coincidence. the chinese communist party is doing this on purpose. they are pushing this racist agenda with the intention of undermining our democratic values. if you look at what's happening at columbia university and other campuses across the country, they're winning. i want to talk about another example that means a lot -- to the folks back home where i represent in nebraska. we know that test. covid pandemic originated in china. instagram and tiktok currently have about the same number of users in the u.s.

however, if you look at the content, there's a 400-1 ratio for the content that blames china compared to tiktok. instagram 400 number the times of posts. they have done this for tiananmen square which again on instagram there's 80 times the posts around tiananmen square than there is on tiktok. and on hong kong where there's 180 times the posts on hong kong's being censured or repressed citizens on tiktok. the federal government's job is to protect americans against foreign and domestic threats. tiktok is a major foreign threat. the bill we are passing today

puts an end to that. that bill ensures or citizens are not improperly targeted, surveilled or influenced by any foreign adversary. right now the major threat is tiktok, but china can make another tiktok. that's why instead we are, instead of going after any specific app, this bill simply prohibits marketplaces like the app store or google play from hosting applications controlled by foreign adversaries. this is just common sense. it also establishes a narrow framework to protect against future apps. it allows the federal government to require divestment control by a foreign adversary. that power has very strict guidelines. the authority can only be exercised if an application is under the control of an adversary or foreign entity presents a national security threat and has over one million active users annually.

it also protects individual use. no enforcement action can be taken against individual users of banned applications. civil enforcement actions may only be initiated against companies that violate the act. the bill incentivizes china to divest from tiktok or tiktok will face a ban. if divested from the ccp it will continue to operate in the u.s. if the restrictions are already in effect and tiktok has divested later, the restrictions will be lifted. i believe the chinese communist party is the greatest threat we face in this nation. they are fighting smart trying to undermine us from within and using technology like tiktok to do it. together by passing this bill, it is my hope that we will send a loud message, a clear message that america is not open to the chinese communist party p for influence. we are taking a stand to protect our own, protect our values, and

then a major chinese communist party tool to attack us. thank you. i yield back my time.

mr. carper: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from delaware. mr. carper: are we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: no. mr. carper: mr. president, long before i ever thought of running for office, i was a little kid born in west virginia coal mining town called beckley. my sister and i ended up going

to the same grade school not too far from our house. as a kid, i was pretty well based. i didn't get into much trouble. but in first grade i got in a fight. i got in a fight. some kid was picking on my sister who was a year older, second grade. and she was -- he was a much bigger guy, and it was not a fair fight. and i got involved in it and took him out with one swing. that was my last punch i think i've thrown in anger. but i didn't like the idea of a big guy, a bully, trying to push around somebody, whether it was my sister or not. i've never cared for that in other situations growing up and watching the behavior of people in all kinds of different situations. our country, if you go back to

our founding, we were, we took on the biggest nation, the strongest nation on earth -- great britain. it was not a fair fight. they had us badly outdone, outnumbered. and somebody came to our rescue. the persons that came to our rescue was french. if it weren't for the french, we'd still be maybe a colony of great britain, but the french stood up and said that we're here to help. there was time for people to stand by and allow things to happen. there's a time to stand up and be heard. we were helped as a nation over 200 years ago by the french. we have, i think, a moral obligation to help make sure

that the ukraine has an opportunity to continue to go forward and to be a democratic nation. they are a democratic nation. they actually choose, elect their own leaders. vladimir putin doesn't care very much for that, thinks they shouldn't be allowed to do so and has decided to use force to be able to take away the obligation or the opportunity to be a free nation. and we have a couple of opportunities. we can criticize putin, the russians for what they're talking about doing, or we can actually do something about it. i served, i may be the last of the vietnam veterans serving in the united states senate. but if you go out to, from here i like to run, and many mornings i've gone for a run here in the capitol. i'll run out to the lincoln

memorial. on my way back, i run right by the vietnam memorial. it's black granite and there are names, i want to say maybe 59,000 people who died in that war that i served in. we got involved in that war. it was not a popular war. it wasn't popular with my generation, but we got involved in that war. the communists, north vietnam were coming in and trying to take over the south. we ended up, for better or for worse, siding with the south. we know what the outcome turned out to be. but a lot of people died. a lot of people died in that war. i know a number of them. my guess, as my colleagues -- my guess is my colleagues do as well. i tell that story because we

have a situation here, it's not altogether different, in which the ukranian people who want to defend themselves, they want to preserve their democracy, and they are willing to make the tough fight if we will help them. and the rest of the free world will help them. god bless our president and leaders of a bunch of other countries who said we're not going to walk away and let putin have his way and take away the democracy of the people of ukraine. we're going to help them. we're going to help them not by sending as we did in the vietnam war, our own young soldiers, sailors, airmen. we're not going to send them to ukraine to defend the ukraine. we're going to send them munitions, we're going to send them drones, we're going to send them missiles, aircraft, we'll

do that. that's really all the ukrainians are asking for. they're asking for that kind of h help. we ought to provide it. we ought to provide it. i used to fly missions. i was in a naval command officer p-3 aircraft. we used to fly a lot of aircraft missions around the world, track submarines everywhere around the planet. we flew missions off the coast of vietnam and a lot of missions off the south china sea. even the years, decades ago when i was flying missions with my squadron in the south china sea, we were concerned about the militarization of the south china sea by china, and china take over islands that were not theirs but maybe had been claimed by the philippines and other nations. and the chinese were taking them over with the idea of militarizing them and ultimately

making the maritime trafficking, moving of ships and aircraft through the south china sea more and more difficult. we used to fly missions in the vietnam war. we used to fly missions out of vietnam. i was commissioned in 1968. by that time we pulled a lot of land-based aircraft, b-52's, p-3's, we would pull them out of vietnam and we flew our missions out of thailand, big air force base. we flew missions out of taiwan, place in the southern part of the island, an air force base in taiwan. i had a chance to be deployed there, got a chance to meet the people. wonderful people, lovely people. you know what they were concerned about? they were concerned about china coming m and taking them over,

trying to take away their independence. and not just militarize the south china sea and transform a bufrnl of islands into -- a bunch of islands into the chinese military, but actually take over a democratic country that's never been a part of china and make them do the bidding of china. mark my word, if vladimir putin is successful in prevailing in the ukraine, if he's successful, if he's successful, taiwan will be next. as sure as i'm standing here today, president xi, the leader of china who says taiwan is theirs, he'll be right in, right into the hunt, right into the fight. and that would, could trigger a real world conflict between them and us. it wouldn't be good for either

of us, but we would, i think, be beholden to defend taiwan. but why don't we bring a halt to that idea of china getting involved and trying to to come after taiwan, why don't we just take care of it by make suring that the ukraine, the people of ukraine have the ships, the aircraft, the tanks, the missiles, the armament that they need to prevail on their own against russia. we wouldn't have to worry about the kind of body bags that came back from vietnam when i was serving in the vietnam war. we would end up with a free ukraine and i think we would have a much better chance of making sure that the folks in

taiwan were continuing to enjoy their independence as well. i -- i'm wearing a lapel pin here that people ask me about from time to time. they ask me what it is. it's an american flag and ukrainian flag as well. a couple of days after -- i sent somebody over from my staff to the ukrainian embassy to get this lapel pin. i've worn it every day since. every day since. a lot of people -- i go back and forth on the train, as my colleagues know, live in delaware, go back and forth on the train almost every day and it's -- a lot of people will ask me say, what is that? what is that that you're wearing? i don't recall one person ever

saying, you shouldn't wear that or that's a bad idea. people say, gad for you. good for you. we ought to help them. the presiding officer may recall a couple of months ago, in fact this year, maybe last year, president zelenskyy came here, not to this chamber, but he came to the old senate chamber just down the hall and he spoke in a closed room to the members of the senate, democrats and republicans, in a very emotional, very compelling language. he laid out the situation that they faced, laid out how important our support was and how grateful they were for us willing to stand by them, stand up for them. and his speech was interrupted any number of times by standing oh, vaegss by -- ovations by democrats and by republicans. i happened to be sitting right in front of his podium where he

was speaking, about as far away as the stenographer is standing from me today, and during the speech, we a couple of times had eye contact and i tried to give him encouragement in a sort of way, and i think i did. when it was -- when it was over, he walked away from the podium and i walked up to him and i shook his hand and i hugged him. i don't get a hug from actual leaders every day, but i hugged him and he hugged me. and i said to him, you're a hero. i said to him, you're a hero. he ranched over and -- reached over and touched my lapel pin and said to me, no, no, you're our hero. you are our heroes. i just want to say in the months

that have passed since then when we have floundered, trying to figure out if we're going to provide aid and support for ukraine -- and he was back a couple of months later and i had a chance to talk to him again. again he said you are hero -- you are heroes, talking about us in this body and the house of representatives. and i said to my staff and colleagues later that day, i said, you know, it's funny, i don't feel much leak a hero. because we were on the verge of like pulling the plug on the aid and assistance that we're going to provide to ukraine. there's a very real chance we could pull the plug, take away their help and putin and russia

would move in and take over. i didn't feel leak a hero with that staring us in the face. when we leave this week and go back to our districts, our states, our homes across the country, and reflect back on what we've done, what we've decided, i want to feel leak a hero. i want -- i want all of us to feel like a hero or heroine and deserve to feel that way. i'm a great student of world war ii, and some of my colleagues are as well, and remember a time when churchill was leading the allied world and rising and standing up and warning against the threat that germany faced, provided for the rest of us, and urging us to be

brave and be strong, be vigilant, come to the aid of europe. there was a -- another guy named chamberlain who was -- whose name was sort of thought of in terms of appeasement. churchill engaged, defend, be strong, chamberlain appeased. we have a chance here to be -- to be more like chamberlain, less like -- more like churchill, excuse me, and less like c like chamberlain. i hope that when we vote here today, maybe even tomorrow, that is what we will do. i want us to make not just the folks of the ukraine and taiwan and -- i don't want them just to be grateful, i want the people who we served, who elected us to

the senate here, i want them to be proud of the work we have done on our behalf and on behalf of these other countries. we are the beacon for democracy around the world. we have been the longest living constitution in the history of the world. it lays out how a democracy should operate and for all these years we have. we need to hold -- hold that to our heart and we need to do the right thing. the last point i'd say is this. my wmom was a deeply religious woman. i shared this with some of my colleagues before. she would drag my sister and me in a west virginia coal mining town, she would drag us to church every monday night, thursday night, and then we would go home and we would watch billy graham on television, she

would want us to have a deep faith, but she really wanted us to hold dear the golden rule, the idea that we should treat over people the way we want to be treated. how would we want to be treated if we were the ukrainian people today? how would we want to be treated if we were the taiwanese people? we would want the rest of the free world to come to our aid. not to send troops or fighter pilots and all, but give them in the tools they need to take on this fight and to win it. when we do that, if we do that, and i'm encouraged that we will, we'll deserve the word of president zelenskyy when he said, you are -- you are our hero. you are our hero.

let's be that hero. thank you very much. i yield back. the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. vance: thank you very much, mr. president. with respect to my colleagues who voted in the other direction on there piece of legislation, let me offer some serious concerns about the direction we're headed as a country and about what this vote represents in terms of american readiness, american capacity to defend itself and its yooels in the future -- allies in the future and most importantly, the american leadership's ability to acknowledge where we really are as a country, our strengths, our weaknesses, what can be built upon and what must be rebuilt entirely. i am extraordinarily aware of a couple of historical

anothingies -- analogies that should inform this debate, one that seems to always inform the debate and another that never seems to come up. opponents of further aid in ukraine, and i count myself among them, say that this is a chamberlain v. churchill kind of moment. you heard my colleague from delaware make this analogy. and no disrespect, but we need to come up with another analogy, we need history with not world war ii replaying itself over and over again. vladimir putin is not adolf hitler. it doesn't mean he is a good guy, but he has less capability than the german leader did in the late 1930's. america is not america of the late 1930's or early 1940's. we possess substantially less

manufacturing might in relative terms than we did almost 100 years ago. and most importantly, there are many ways in which in which the -- ways in which the analogy falls apart even if you ignore russia's and china's capacity and the like. there are other ways to look at it. i would like to point to a couple of those right now. the second world war, of course, was the most devastating war in the history of the world. first behind it is the first world war. what is the history lesson of the first world war? the lesson of world war i, is that if you're not careful, you could be in a brodeur regional conflict that kills tens of millions of people, many of them innocent. in 1914 the failure of statesmenship dragged two rival blocks of militaries into a

catastrophic conflict. in the past week alone, the council on foreign relations published an essay calling for european troops. some european leaders said they might send troops to support ukraine in a conflict. perhaps the history lesson we should teach ourselves isn't chamberlain versus churchill. perhaps we should ask ourselves how an entire continent and how an entire world set of leaders allowed itself to blunder into world conflict? is there possibly a diplomatic solution to the conflict in ukraine? yes, i believe there is. indeed, as multiple people, as critics of putin and ukraine pointed out, there was a deal on the table 18 months ago. and what happened to it? the biden administration pushed zelenskyy to set aside the peace agreement and to engage in a

disastrous koirnt offensive -- koirnt offensive, that defeated a decades worth of military stock and left us where we are now, where every observer of the war acknowledges that the war is worse for ukraine than it was 18 months ago. could we have avoided it, yes, we could and we should have avoided it. we would have saved a lot of lives and american weapons and we would have had this country in a better and more stable place if we had. there's another historical analogy worth pointing out and that is of the early 2000's. now in 2003, i was a high school senior and i had a political position back then. i believed the propaganda of the george w. bush administration that we needed to invade iraq, that it was a war for freedom and democracy, these who were

appeasing saddam hussein were inviting a broader regional conflict. does that sound familiar to anything we're hearing today? it's the same exact talking points 20 years later with different names. but ahave we learned anything? no, i don't think we have. we have learned if we baet our chest -- beat our chests instead of diplomacy, it will produce a good outcome. we learned that if we traumatic about world war ii, with we can bully people and lead the country straight into catastrophic conflict. now, it's one of the great ironies of my time in the united states senate for the last 18 months, i have been accused by multiple people of being a stooge of vladimir putin. i take jesh with that. in -- issue with that. in 2003, i are supported the

war, and later enlisted into the marine corps, one of the kids in my town to enlist in the marines that year. i served my country honorableably, and i saw when i went to iraq that i had been lied to. that the promises of the foreign policy establishment of this country were a complete joke. just a few days ago, we saw our friends in the house waving ukrainian flags on the floor of the united states house, which i would love to see them waving the american flags with such gusto and i won't complain about the fact that it was a violation of the rules of decorum, but it certainly was. but it reminded me and i believe in 2005, maybe 2006, when that same exact chamber, the members were raising their fingers stained with purple ink to commemorate the incredible iraqi elections that happened in 2005.

i was in iraq in this 02005 and for the parliamentary elections in december of 2005. i remember people of iraq happily voting, raising their fingers in the air. the people of iraq were not bad or this were not bad for voting in their elections. what i am saying is the obsessive focus on moralism, democracy is good, saddam hussein is bad. america is good, tyranny bad. that is no way to run a foreign policy because then you end up with people waving their fingers on the floor of the united states house of representatives even though they have walked their country into a disaster. i is a -- i say this has a proud republican. it is perhaps the most shameful period in the republican party's history of the last 40 years that we supported george w. bush and the prosecution of that military conflict. my excuse is i was a high school

senior. what is the excuse of many people that were in this chamber or in the house of representatives at the time that are now singing the exact same song when it comes to ukraine? have we learned nothing? have we updated nothing about our mental thinking, about the standard that we apply for when we should get involved in military conflicts? have we learned nothing about how precarious and sprecious u.. life is and we should be more careful about protecting it. back then in 2003 we he had an antiwar left in this country. now nobody is worried about prosecuting military conflicts overseas. nobody seems to worry about unintended consequences. but iraq had a lot of unintended consequences, a lot of consequences that were maybe foreseen by a few smart people, a lot of them that weren't foreseen by anybody, one of which is that we gave iran a regional ally instead of a

regional competitor. the george w. bush -- did george w. bush stand before the american people appeared say we're going to give one of our strongest enemies in the world a massive ally? did we think that iraq would become a base to attack american troops in the middle east? did we think it would empower one of the most dangerous regimes? we're now funding israel, as i think that we should, to defend itself against attacks that are originating in iran when the same people who are calling for more war all over the world were the same people who caused us to start a war that empowered iran. there's a certain irony in this, a certain sadness that i have that we never seem to learn the lessons of the past. we never seem to ask ourselves why is it that we keep on screwing up american foreign policy, why is it that we keep on making our country weaker, even though we say that we intend to make it stronger. here's another thing that we should learn from the iraq war.

something that i as a christian care a lot about and think think that -- and i think that many of my colleagues, who are not christians many of my fellow americans should care about. the united states remains to this day the largest christian nation, we are the largest christian nation by population in the entire world. and yet what are the fruits -- by your fruits ye shall know them, the bible tells us. what are the fruits of american foreign policy when it comes to christian populations all over the world over the last few decades? this iraq before we invaded there were 1.5 million christians in iraq, many of them ancient communities, people who traced their lineage and ancestors to people who knew the literal apostles of jesus christ. now nearly every single one of those historic christian communities is gone. that is the fruits of american labor in iraq. a regional ally of iran and the eradication and decimation of

one of the oldest christian communities in the world. is that what we were told was going to happen? did the american people, the largest christian nation in the world, did they think that's what they were getting themselves into? i certainly didn't. we did. we did all of those things because we weren't thinking about how war and conflict lead to unexpected places. now, that sounds is far-fetched i'm sure when we apply these lessons to the ukraine conflict certainly. certainly this has that noific are -- this has no risk of spilling over into a broader world conflict. certainly not in fact. i was being sar c -- sarcastic. yes, the ukraine war threatenses to become a broader regional conflict. what about the assault on traditional christian communities? just today the ukrainian parliament is considering

enacting a law that would dispossess large numbers of christian churches and christian communities in the country of ukraine. now, they say it's because these churches are too close to russia. that's what they sociality and maybe some of the churches are too close to russia. but you don't deprive an entire religious community of their religious freedom because some of its adherents don't agree with you about the relevant conflict of the day. i believe standing here that this war will eventually lead to the displacement of a massive christian community in ukraine and that will be our shame, our shame in this chamber for not seeing it coming, our shame for not doing nothing to stop it, our shame for refusing to use the hundreds of billions of dollars that we sent to ukraine as leverage to ensure and guarantee real religious freedom.

the other thing -- one final point on this historic contingency point. it was true then and it was true today, there's this weird way or the debate in this country has gotten warped, where people can't engage in good-faith disagreement with our ukraine policy. you will immediately be attacked for being on the wrong team, for being on the wrong side. i remember as a young conservative high schooler how opponents from the conservative side of the iraq war, well, you're just all for saddam hussein. and you believe in -- you believe that saddam hussein should be allowed to continue to brutalize the iraqi people. you have no love for these innocent iraqi people. you don't believe in america. and the same exact arguments are being applied today, that you are a fan of vladimir putin if you don't like our ukraine policy.

you're a fan of some terrible tyrannical idea because you think maybe america should be more focused on the border of its own country than on someone else's. this war fever, this interability for -- this inability for us to actually process what's going on in our world to make rational decisions is the scariest part of this entire debate. you see people who served their country who have been advocating for good public policies -- agree or disagree with them -- for their entire careers smeared as agents of a foreign government simply because they don't like what we're doing in ukraine. that's not good-faith debate. that is slander, and it's the type of slander that's going to lead us to make worse and worse decisions. it should make us all feel pretty weird when you see your fellow americans making an argument and the response to that argument is not, well, no, no, no, here's why you're wrong, or here's why i disagree with

you. but they fling their finger in their face and say you're a putin puppet. you're an asset of a foreign regime. this way of making decisions democratically is how we bankrupt this country and start a third world war. we should stop doing t so let me make some arguments for why our ukraine policy doesn't make any sense. the first -- we do not have the manufacturing base to support a land war in europe. this must be appreciated, and it's interesting, mr. president -- when i was making this argument that we didn't have the manufacturing base to support a military conflict in eastern europe, to support a military conflict in east asia and that also to actually support our own national defense, that america was spread too thin, i was commonly met 18 months ago with a very common rejoinder.

i was told that the ukraine war represented a fraction of a fraction of american gdp, that we could do everything all at once and it would not stress america's capabilities. now everyone seems to agree with me. now everyone seems to acknowledge that we are severely limited not in the number of dollars that we can send to ukraine -- there are limits there -- but in the number of weapons, of artillery shells, of mills that we don't make enough of the weapons of with aer to send them to all four corners of the world and also keep ourselves safe. but people will say, well, jd is right. we need to rebuild the defense industrial base. we need to rebuild our capacity to manufacture weapons. but now the need to manufacture more weapons is an argument for the ukraine conflict instead of an argument against t it is interesting how advocates of this conflict always find a new justification when the

justification of a few months ago falls apart. so let me deal -- let's deal with some cold, hard facts. the ukrainians have argumented publicly, their defense minister has said this, that they require thousands of air defense interceptor missiles every single year in order to keep themselves safe from russian attack. do we make thousands? no. if this supplemental passes, as i expect it will in a few hours, we will go from making about 550 interceptor missiles to about 650. there are a few other missile systems that can provide protection in terms of air defense, but ukraine's air defenses are being overwhelmed right now because we don't make enough air defenses. europe doesn't make enough airence defenses and by the way we're being stretched in multiple different directions. the israelis need them.

the ukrainians need them to push back against russian attacks. we may, god forbid, need them. and the taiwanese will need them if they are ever invaded. we don't make enough weapons. so inrather -- so rather than stretching ourselves too thin, we should be focused on the task of diplomatsly and making it possible for our friends and allies do as much as they can but to recognize the limbations and to ensure that we most of all our own people in our own country can look after our own defense. it is not just. military shells, one of the most military weapons for the land war in europe. the united states makes a fraction of what the ukrainians need. if you combine what the united states needs with what the europeans -- or what the united states provides with what the europeans are able to provide and other figures are able to

provide, we are massively limited in whether we can help ukraine close the gap that it currently has with russia. now, you've heard senior figures in our defense administration say that unless this bill passes, unless this bill passes, the ukrainians will face a 10-1 disadvantage when it comes to critical munitions like artillery. what gets less head is lines is that currently the ukrainians have a 5-1 disadvantage and there is no credible pathway to give them anything close to parity, and i am not even talking about this year. i am fog next year, too. during conversation with a senior national security official of the biden administration, i was told that if the united states radically ramps up production and if the europeans ramp up production, the ukrainians will have a 4-1 disadvantage by 2025. that was treated as good news.

you cannot win a land war in europe with a 4-1 disadvantage in artillery. especially when the country you are going up against has four times the population that you do. and of course the most important resource in war, even in modern war, is not just air defense missiles and is not just artillery shells. the most important resource is human beings. human beings still fight our wars, as tragic as that is and as much as we wish it wasn't true. and ukraine has a terrible manpower, too. "the new york times" recently wrote a story about how they had conscripted, perhaps accidentally -- i certainly hope so -- they had conscripted a mentally handicapped person into service. they have now dropped the conscription age and still they are engaged in draconian

measures to conscript people into this conflict. that says nothing about the fact, by the way, that approximately 600,000 military-age men fled the country. this war is often compared, as i said earlier, to the u.k.'s fight against nazi germany. in the height of world war ii, did a million britts, over a million britts leave britain to avoid being conscripted by the germans? i high lay doubt it. so there is a deep reserve problem, a reserve of weapons. a reserve of manpower. there isn't enough -- there aren't enough men. this is the problem that the res

the longer this goes on, the more needless people will die. the fewer people will tall be left to rebuild the country of ukraine and the less capable ukraine will be of actually functioning as a country in the future. but i'm not just worried about whether ukraine can win. i also worry about, as i said earlier, unintended consequences. and now we should spend a little bit of time discussing some more of those. a few things come from our obsessive focus on ukraine. number one, we have at multiple levels in this congress passed pieces of legislation that deal with ukraine, that attempt to explicitly curtail the diplomacy powers of the next presidential

administration. now, i know we don't often talk so directly about politics and i'm sure i disagree with my friends on the other side of the aisle about how the next president should be. but we want to empower the next president, whoever that is is to actually engage in diplomacy, not make it harder to engage in diplomacy and multiple provisions of this legislation but also other legislation this chamber passed and i opposed tried to tie the next president's hands. let's say the next president decides that he wants to stop the killing and engage in diplomacy. this chamber will be giving a predicate to impeach that next president for engaging in basic diplomacy. hard to imagine a more ridiculous judgment on the priorities of american leadership that we are already trying to make it impossible for the next president to engage in any measure of diplomacy. that's not leadership and that's

not toughness. that is a blind adherence to a broken foreign policy consensus, which is unfortunately exactly what we have. the ukraine supplemental that is, again, likely to be passed in the next few hours, funds ukraine's border while turning a blind eye to the united states's own border crisis. the bill includes hundreds of millions that could be used to strengthen ukranian border security and support the state border guard service ukraine. good for them. i'm glad that they care about their own border security. the supplemental extends benefits for ukranian parolees in the united states and includes $481 million for refugees and entrant assistants which could be used for the office of refugee settlement to provide assistance for ukrainians arriving in the united states. also to other organizations who also, because money is fungible, who could resettle other migrants from other countries into our country. so the very same moment that we

are supporting the ukrainians to secure their own border, we're not just ignoring our own border. we are funding ngo's that will worsen joe biden's migration crisis. it's completely senseless. and, yes, that's what we're doing. let's talk about something else. this bill includes a provision that is wildly popular called the repo act. in short, the repo act does something very simple. the repo act allows the treasury department to seize russian assets to help them pay for the war. that sounds great. of course russia shouldn't have invaded ukraine and of course they should have to pay for some of the consequences, all of the consequences that they created. but ask yourself are there unintended consequences that come from seizing tens of billions of dollars from foreign assets. and in fact there are. a number of economists from

across the political spectrum have argued that the repo act could potentially make it harder to sell u.s. treasuries. this is something a lot of americans don't care about. i'm sure their eyes might glaze over a little bit. but this country is almost, is running almost $2 trillion deficits every single year. and you ask where do those $2 trillion come from? they come from selling treasury bonds on the open market. that's how we pay for the deficit spending in this country. and what happens when people start to worry that u.s. treasuries are not a good investment? we've already seen the consequences over the last couple of years. interest rates go up. inflation goes up. home mortgages become more expensive. are we at least a little bit worried that the bond markets could react negatively to us seizing tens of billions or hundreds of billions of dollars of assets? we certainly should be worried about it because we already

can't afford the deficit spending in this country to begin with. treasury yield rates are already extraordinarily high. and thanks to the biden spending programs, they've actually shown a remarkable stubbornness over the last few months. here's another unintended consequence. germany has, it's an important american ally and it has by some standard the fourth or fifth largest economy in the entire world. a very, very important country. a very important ally. and, by the way, a beautiful country with beautiful people. but germany, under the influence of a series of so-called green energy policies, is rapidly deindustrializing. germany, by the way, was one of the few countries in the wake of world war ii, especially in the 70's, 80's, and 90's that actually kept its industrial might largely intact.

think about german cars and all the other manufacturing things that come from the country of germany. germany is much less powerful in terms of manufacturing today than it was ten years ago. why? because it takes cheap energy to manufacture things. you need cheap energy if you want to manufacture steel. you need cheap energy if you want to manufacture cars. that's one of the reasons, by the way, the manufacturing economy has done so poorly under the biden administration is because their energy policies don't make any sense. but germany should be told that the united states will not subsidize its ridiculous energy aken german manufacturing.that we should send a message to the germans that they've got to manufacture their own weapons. they have to field their own army. and they have the priority and they have the responsibility to defend europe from vladimir putin or anyone else. i ask the question, how many

mechanized brigades could the german army field today? by some estimates, the answer is zero. by other estimates, the answer is one. so the fourth most powerful economy in the world is unable to field sufficient mechanized brigades to defend itself from vladimir putin. now this isn't yesterday. excuse me. this isn't five years ago or ten years ago. this is yesterday. so for thee years the europeans have told us that vladimir putin is an existential threat to europe. and for three years they have failed to respond as if that were actually true. donald trump famously told european nations they have to spend more on their own defense. he was chastised by members of his chamber for having the audacity to suggest that germany should step up and pay for its own defense. even today germany, by some estimates, fails to hit its 2% of gdp threshold where it's

supposed to spend 2% of its economy on military. and even if it hits that 2% threshold in 2024, it will have hit it barely after literally decades of being chastised. is it fair that the americans are forced to front this burden? i don't think that it is. but i'm actually more worried -- i'm less worried about the fairness, i should say, and i'm more worried about the signal this sends to europe. if we keep on carrying a substantial share of the military burden, if we keep on giving the europeans everything that they want, they're never going to become self-sufficient and they're never going to produce sufficient weapons so they can defend their own country. you hear all the time from folks who support endless funding to ukraine that unless, that unless we send resources to ukraine, vladimir putin will march all the way to berlin or paris. first of all, this doesn't make

any sense. vladimir putin can't get to western ukraine, how is he going to get all the way to paris? and second of all, if vladimir putin is a threat to germany and france, if he's a threat to berlin and paris, then they should spend more money on military equipment. some of my fellow americans have been lucky enough to travel to europe. it's a beautiful place. but one of the things that europeans often say about americans is that we have way too many guns and way too little health care. one of the reasons why we have less health care access than the europeans do is because we subsidize their military and their defense. if the europeans were forced to step up and provide for their own security, we could actually take care of some more domestic problems at home. but, no, too many in this chamber have decided that we should police the entire world, the american taxpayer be damned.

let me make one final point here. i'm cognizant that i have colleagues who wish to speak. can i ask, mr. president, how much time do i have? the presiding officer: the senator has 28 minutes remaining. mr. vance: great. i see my colleague from florida, so i will be relatively brief here. for 40 years this country has made largely, i'd say it, a bipartisan mistake. it has allowed our manufacturing might to get offshored and to get outsourced while simultaneously increasing the commitments that we have all over the world. we basically outsourced our ability to manufacture critical weapons while stepping up our responsibilities to police the world. and of course if we're going to police the world, then it's american troops who need those weapons. with one hand we weakened our own country and with the other we've overextended.

there is a certain irony that if you look at the voting records and the commitments of this chamber, the people who have been most aggressive, my colleagues, some of them my friends, who have been most aggressive in sending our good manufacturing jobs to china are now the ones who are most aggressive and assert we can police the world. what are we supposed to police the world with? our artillery manufacturing, our weapons, our air defense manufacturing, our basic military industrial complex has become incredibly weakened, and this bill you'll hear people say fixes it. it doesn't fix it at all. in fact, this bill while it does invest some -- and this is a good thing, by the way. it's not all bad. while it does invest some in critical manufacturing of american weapons, it sends those weapons overseas faster than it even reflen nishs them. this is not a bill to rebuild the american industrial base.

this is a bill to further extend this country. with that, mr. president, i will yield, recognize that go my friend from florida wants to speak. i appreciate it. mr. scott: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. scott: mr. president, i want to thank my colleague from ohio for his hard work and his commitment to making sure it protects our country. president biden has shown the american people that he will pander to his anti-semitic base over supporting israel. israel, one of america's greatest allies and the only democracy in the middle east, the only democracy in the middle east. one of president biden's first actions was to resurrect the failed iran deal. and since then he's granted billions of dollars in sanctions relief to iran, the world's largest state spofr terrorism. his pandering can be seen on cities and college campuses

where radical extremists rally violently in support of hamas and extermination of jewish people. this cancer has taken over the democratic party and could cause violence against jewish communities. president biden has made clear with his decisions that the american people cannot trust his administration. i certainly do not, which is why i'm highly concerned that without proper safeguard, the biden administration will use this aid package as leverage against our great ally, israel. on october 7 israel-backed hamas terrorists burned people alive in their homes, beheaded babies, raped women and young girls and murdered parents in front of their children. they brutally murdered 1,200 innocent people in israel, including americans. and 200 days since the attacks are still holding 8 americans and more than 100 innocent people hostage. i was in israel last month, my

sixth visit to the jewish state in my years as florida governor and now as u.s. senator and helped lead the charge to support our great ally israel. i have voted for the israel aid in this bill only to see it fail in the senate with all democrats, all democrats voting against it. for years i have voted for significant funding for the iron dome, david sling and other key military assets that help israel defend itself from iran-backed terrorism. i'm leading the stop hamas funding act to make sure we don't send a single dollar of american taxpayer dollar to gaza unless the president certifies it won't end up in the hands of hamas. it has passed three separate times, including when i tried to

pass it in the foreign aid supplemental in february. it should not be difficult to say that we won't risk even $1 of taxpayer money from going to hamas. and pass commonsense legislation to stop that from happening. that shouldn't be hard. this is what worries about our country. we have a war raging not overseas but with the democratic party here in america. joe biden has ignited a civil war within the democratic party because he is an allowing and sometimes encouraging the takeover of his country with hamas-loving terrorist sympathizers, there are some who oppose this takeover and continue to stand with israel, but their voices are drowned out by anti-semitic hate.

we cannot avoid the hard truth here. joe biden is destroying u.s. foreign policy in an attempt to pacify democrats who support terrorism. they have chanted death to america in iran for years, but now democrat activists are chanting it in new york and michigan. look at what is happening at columbia university. how is this happening in the united states of america? but democrats are letting this happen because michigan is crucial foro win. he knows he is losing there so he is bending over backwards to support a small minority of people in michigan who support terrorism. and he's doing it hoping it will help him win this election and it shows what is wrong with the platform of my colleagues across the aisle. every single day we hear about

democrats scream about protecting democracy and how democracy is under attack. while they like to point fingers at republicans for being responsible for this, the truth is it's them. between israel and hamas which is ar stronger example of democracy? pretty simple answer. hamas hates everything that americans support, especially democracy. if you're a woman, if you're gay, if you like equality, democracy, freedom of speech, none of these things is supported by hamas. none of them. and some of them will get you killed by hamas. all of them are supported by israel. but democrats are so obsessed with winning an election they have taken the fringe radical of their party and put them center stage. think about that, democrats are so terrified of the hamas-loving

lunatics in new york city and michigan they are tearing down the only democracy in the middle east and propping up a terror organization that will create one of the most oppressive regimes in the world. democrats are giving voice to people who support terrorism. it's so bad over the weekend jewish students at columbia university in new york city were told to go home and not return to campus because it's not safe for them. they were told to go home and not return to campus because it's not safe for them. jewish students at columbia university in new york city, of all places, are not safe because the campus is being overrun by dangerous pro-hamas extremists. is anyone paying attention? look at what is happening in our country. we have a president of the united states who is leading a democratic party that is cowering to the radical left of

their party in a disgusting and dangerous attempt to get votes from hamas sympathizers, and this cowering means all over the country, even in new york city, jewish americans aren't safe. one, not one member of the united states senate should be okay with what is happening in our country today. i know terrorists are being glorified at columbia university right now. let me remind my democratic colleagues who hamas is as we consider a bill that could provide billions of dollars in aid to these monsters. when i was in israel, i saw the absolute evil of israel's enemies, hamas, hezbollah, all backed by and their brutality. hamas stormed into israel on october 7 and murdered jewish people who were killed for one reason -- just for being jewish.

i stood in the places where it happened, where the blood of these innocent jewish people still stains the floors and walls of their homes and the streets where they once lived and played. when hamas stormed in they raped women, murdered families and butchered and beheaded babies. you cannot imagine. hamas burned parents alive in front of their children. they dragged people out of area that homes and are now holding them hostage. what happened on october 7 horrified the world appeared struck me personally. one of the places i saw the devastation of hamas -- was a small can i beauts -- can i beauts -- kibbutz. i was worried about the kibbutz

because hamas is half a mile away. open fields. and when i heard the news that it was the sight of some of the most horrific and barbaric activities, my heart sank. i wanted to vomit. in 2019, my wife and i spent the afternoon there and it was the most peaceful place. i keep thinking about the moms and kids playing outside enjoying the warm summer weather. it is gut wrenching to think of the fate of the families we met that day. i spoke with a woman from the kibbutz, and she fortunately survived. i talked with shin and others who experienced the attack and thankfully survived. they talked about their families and friends. i saw parents setting up memorials at the noah music festival. i stood in a destroyed home and listened to the last words of a

young israeli woman audio recorded as she talked to her father before hamas gunned her down. i met with the families of american hostages whose devastation and grief is overwhelming. i saw first hand what israel faces from iran as proxies and what they would do to us too if they could. they would absolutely do it to us. i placed a poster outside my office that features the faces of the hostages held by hamas and i won't take it down until they come home. there cannots be a -- cannot be a ceasefire until hamas is dead. i want every single one of them dead. i know i said this before, these monsters beheaded children and babies, raped girls, shot people at pointblank just because they were jewish.

they dragged innocent people through the streets and now holding them as hostages in gaza, which these terrorists absolutely control. it is unimaginable that the united states would ever consider sending money to a place where we know -- we absolutely know that it will be used to help terrorists holding american hostages that exactly -- it is exactly what this bill does today. mr. president, i wanted to make sure everyone understands what i am saying here, which is a fact, every dollar that depose to gaza directly benefits hamas. i've said every day since october 7, telling the stories of those held hostage in iran-backed terrorists, i have a poster outside my office that features the faces of the hostages held by hamas. i will not take it down until they are all released. it has been 200 days since the

attacks and some parents are still waiting for their child to come home. can you imagine? one -- one baby spent its first birthday as a hostage and his 4-year-old brother is a hostage. i see their pictures every day and it makes me think of my own grandparents. they have been waiting to -- the parents have been waiting to hold their babies again. we have heard horrible reports that these innocent children may no longer be alive. it just makes you sick to think about it when you think about your own family. israel is dealing with the recovery from these attacks in its own countries, it is fighting the terrorists that want to destroy it, it is still fighting with these terrorists that want to destroy every jew and destroy israel. here is another takeaway with my

trip to israel. it was a meeting with netanyahu, while israel is dealing with recovering, they are preserving civilian life and get aid into gaza. war is hell. tragedies happen, and we wish we could prevent all of them. we wish there could be zero civilian impact of war, but that is not possible. when tragic incidents occur, we have accountability. israel has shown full accountability as it fights for existence against brutal attacks from hamas. israel is doing more to prevent deaths than any war-fighting nation has done in history and taking responsibility when tragic incidents happen. it seems accountability from israel is not for president biden, it's not enough for

democrats. it seems that the same president who has never held anyone accountable for the death of 13 american warriors in abbey gate in afghanistan and never held anyone responsible for an innocent afghan family for his botched afghanistan withdrawal. is openly attacking israel for mistakes it is taking full responsibility for. when president biden and democrats again and again attack israel and talk about sanctions, they do the bidding of iran and hamas. let us all remember who the enemy is. let us all remember who the enemy is and has always been. the evil terrorist-supporting regime in iran. since its first days, the biden administration has emboldened iran with appeasement and freed

billions of dollars to fuel iran's support of terrorism and turn its back on israel. israel is the only democracy in the middle east and one of america's strongest ally, but it took president biden months to meet or speak with prime minister netanyahu after he took office and the world took notice. since october 7, president biden and democrats in washington have continued to undermine israel's fight against iran-backed hamas terrorists, isolating its ally in its time of need. america and freedom-loving nations are less secure because of president biden's weakness and appeasement of evil regimes and the terrorists each support. now, the senate wants to pass legislation that gives billions of dollars to gaza which is 100% run by hamas, 100% run by hamas.

i'm not opposed to humanitarian aid to war-torn places like fwauz but i'm not -- gaza, but i'm not okay with giving aid to terrorists who want to destroy israel and the united states. i'm especially disturbed by giving aid to those who want to destroy israel and the united states who are also holding, also at this point holding american hostages. can you imagine giving aid to a country that wants to -- that -- anybody that wants to hold american hostages? why would we do that? how is that an opinion in the united states senate. how have they fallen so far from its base saying no, we will not provide humanitarian aid unless we certify it won't go to

terrorists who are holding hostages is not an okay position to take, okay position to even vote on? the eight americans held hostage by hamas have been held in captivity for 200 days. we believe five are still alive and three are dead and hamas is holding their bodies and robbing their families of the ability to bury their loved ones even when we know they're dead, hamas holds their bodies. do we see president biden or senior members of his administration and democrats in washington talking about that every day? absolutely not. what we do see from democrats is they continue to attack israel, call for the ousting of a democracy elected government. they call for the ousting of its democratically elected government. and allow the abandonment of our ally at the united nations. they abandon our ally, israel, at the united nations and on the world stage. and it is disgusting that while they launch these attacks on our

ally, democrats say little or nothing about the fact that american citizens, american citizens are being held hostage by a brutal terrorist organization that we know is committing horrific sexual abuse against these innocent people. why has biden given money to gazians who are holding americans hostages? why would he do that? why would we allow biden to give more money to gaza who are holding american hostages? when will this stop? why the heck are we allowing biden to send more money to gaza in this bill when we know that every dollar, every dollar that goes to gaza funds the terrorism of hamas. what are we doing to get american hostages released? what has happened? have we sent the troops in? have we done anything? have you heard anything? watched biden in the situation do anything? absolutely nothing. i want to -- i won't stop

stating this fact. every dollar we give goes to hamas. i have been fighting for years to pass a simple bill. stop taxpayer funding of hamas. which simply prevents u.s. taxpayers going to gaza unland the biden administration can certify that not a single cent will go to hamas. pretty simple. this isn't a solution in search of a problem. it addresses a very real threat of taxpayer funding back -- that is holding american hostages. we cannot allow -- how can it be fair to allow an american family with a family member being held hostage in gaza to see their tax dollars go to the same people who are holding their family member hostage? we've seen reports that the palestinian authority has been paying over $300 million a year in monthly salaries to terrorists, prisoners. monthly allowances to families of dead terrorists. the palestinian authority who

pays terrorists and their families should not receive u.s. tax dollars. and this bill is going to allow more of that. in 2021, president biden's state department said, quote, we're going to be working in partnership with the united nations and palestinian authority, kind of, kind of channel aid in a manner that does its best to go to the people of gaza, end quote. the official went on to say, quote, as we've seen in life, as we all know in life, there are no guarantees, but we're going to do everything that we can to ensure that this assistance reaches the people who need it the most, end quote. the biden administration thinks the risk of resources going to hamas terrorists is okay. quote -- this quote, in life there are no guarantees, unquote, i reject that. i do not believe we should leave anything to chance when it comes to preventing u.s. taxpayer

dollars from being sent to the brutal terrorists that slaughtered so many israelis and americans and are holding american hostages. senate democrats have plied clear -- made clear that they're so ter fwieed of losing votes of hamas-loving leftists they can't -- simply makes sure we're not sending money to thugs that brutally murdered 1200 innocent people, including more than 30 americans. on october 7 and are still holding americans hostages. they won't even allow us to have a vote on it. it's hard to imagine this is where we are today and this bill that is before us does nothing to address this while approving billions in aid for gaza that we know will go straight to hamas. nothing, absolutely nothing in this bill says that money will not go to hamas because there is nothing in this bill that prevents it. again, there is nothing in this bill that prevents your taxpayer

money from going to gaza where it will directly benefit hamas. i've heard about my colleagues on the left talking about needing to support the children of gaza. no child should suffer, but the children of gaza suffer every day not because of israel, not because of america, but because of hamas. they suffer every day because hamas takes aid dollars that comes into gaza to fund its terror against israel and the united states. if my democrat colleagues want to make sure any u.s. tax dollars only go to help the children in gaza, they would fully support my stop taxpayer funding of hamas act. but they won't even let me have a vote on it. it would make certain that no aid goes to hamas. it would not stop all aid from going to the children of gaza. it would just make sure that that is the only place it goes and not to hamas terrorists. but again democrats have combloked -- blocked the senate from even voting on this. it makes no sense to me.

we should aid our ally israel now. i've been trying to get that done for months and senate democrats have blocked it five times. while it is extremely important to continue to fund israel's defense efforts as i fought to do for years, i fear that president biden will use this as leverage he needs to advance his radical, anti-israel foreign policy to apiece -- appease the anti-semites in his own party. i was just in israel and clearly understood the urgency in delivering aid to israel, but without safeguards in place to ensure no money goes to hamas or biden cannot say, quote, strings attached, this aid doesn't protect israel from being forced into an unacceptable compromise with the biden administration while it's at war. what prime minister netanyahu said is give us time and space to destroy hamas and we will. to off -- too often washington

compromise means -- nobody has to make a tough choice. the bill before us is a perfect example of this, broken way of doing business that has become the norm in washington. if given an opportunity to vote on these issues independently as the house did, i would vote to support aid for israel in a heart beat with strong safeguards, as i have said multiple times, all which have been blocked by democrats prior to this vote. i'd vote to ban tiktok unless we see a total divestment by entities controlled by communist china. i would vote to sanction the evil regime in iran, vote to support aid to taiwan. i would vote for the repo act which allows for the confiscation of russian assets. while this bill allows president biden to send billions of dollars to -- of u.s. taxpayer dollars in unaccountable aid to ukraine, unaccountable aid to ukraine, including billions to pay the salaries of politicians in ukraine. why are we borrowing money to

pay for salaries of ukrainian politicians? it makes no sense for the towns borrow dollar after dollar so we can pay the salaries of politicians in ukraine while our border is wide open. i have had a red line in the debate about the future of any aid to ukraine. first, it must be lethal only and second, any action taken by the united states to secure the borders of ukraine must be tied by forcing -- only way it's going to happen. you have to force the biden administration to secure the u.s. southern border. some of his first actions of president joe joe biden took multiple actions to suspend the border security policies enacted by president trump which created the most secure u.s. southern border in recent history. the catastrophic results of buyereden's open border policies are being felt by nearly every american family. since biden took office, more than 10, 10 million, 10 million illegal aliens unvetted have

unlawfully crossed our border and more than 6 million have been released into the united states. we have no idea who these people are. deadly fentanyl, the precursors which are supplied by communist china and manufactured by the savage mexican drug cartels are killing more than 70,000 americans every year. why do the democrats care about this? terrorists -- dangerous criminals are coming across the border in drives -- droves. why do the democrats not care about this? we now have terror cells in the united states because of the open southern border. and we've all soon the horror brought to our communities by violent illegal aliens murdering innocent americans like laken riley. but the senate won't have the chance to vote on each bill which passed the house individually. no, we won't have a chance to do that individually. the way it was done in the house. and we're not going to have a chance to change this bill.

it's up or down. if you don't like a provision, tough luck. you don't get an amendment vote. it's a sad day to be shut out of the process like this. while some politicianswill claim the bill before the senate today is a magic bullet that will restore order and protect democracy across the world, we know that's a lie. most bills have some good p policy. this one is no different. however, i cannot bring myself to look the other way and vote for policies that will in many ways prolong the suffering that biden's weaknesses and appeasement of cause for americans and our friends and allies around the world each and every day. mr. president, i yield to my colleague from utah. and i retain the balance of my time.

the presiding officer: the senator from south carolina. mr. graham: are we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: no. mr. graham: thank you very much. i'd like to be recognized. can you let me know when 40 minutes -- thank you. the presiding officer: you will be notified. mr. graham: thank you very much. so our colleagues are talking today about how they're going to vote, why they're going to vote. i think it's important. history will judge what we do here today. let me say one thing upfront. there's no border security in this package. i regret that. i wish there were. there should be. the bill from the senate, i voted no regarding the border security provisions. i thought sort of an inadequate

task on parole and other things. my hope is it would get over to the house, we could negotiate stronger border security package. that did not happen. and i are he great that. so -- and i regret that. everybody who comes on this floor and says our border is broken, we should do something about it, you're absolutely right. and unfortunately, we didn't get there. president trump opposed a senate bill. we couldn't find a better way forward that would get 60 votes. i hate that but now we have to deal with what's left for us to take care of in the world. so the fact that we did not get provisions for our border in my view doesn't mean we can't deal with the other problems the world faces. we actually have to because if we don't get ukraine right and we don't get taiwan right, we don't get israel right, then our broken border is going to be a bigger problem. so the first thing i want to say is to those who want border security, you're right.

don't give up. but this is not just about ■ border security. this is a statement from the add minister of defense in israel and the supplemental package summited to the senate today is critical and urgent supporting israel's capabilities, faced threats posed about i iran and its proxies. we thank our friends in congress and urge our partners to stand with israel in the face of iranian terrorism. what is he talking about? this was issued earlier today. this is the minister of defense in israel. i know him very well. he's a very accomplished man, and he's urging us to vote for this package because israel needs it because they've been threatened by iran. now, since we took up this debate in the senate, a lot has happened. the iranians attacked israel from iran. over 300 drones and missiles

were launched at israel from iran and successfully engaged. nobody lost their life. but it wasn't because the iranians weren't trying. we're voting today on a package to help our friends in israel replenish iron dome. this is passover. so ironic, right? we're having this debate on passover. here's my passover gift to the israeli people. more weapons. replenish the iron dome so you can defend yourself and have another passover, that this won't be the last one. if you left it up to iran, it would be. so to those who are wondering what we should do, we failed on the border. you're right about that. we should vote yes to help our friends in israel. i can't think of a time since i've been here that they need more help than right now. they don't need any speeches. they don't need us to attend events. they need us to send them military aid that they're

desperate to have. they have diminished their iron dome stockpile. they need it replenished. they are dealing with hamas on one front, hezbollah on the other. and now they've been attacked by the iranian ayatollah from iranian soil. so the defense minister of israel is asking us for a yes vote because it's urgent to help our friends in israel. so if you're pro-israel which most people in this body are, they need you and they need you now. 20 something billion dollars of aid in this package is absolutely imperative to help the jewish state survive against iran and their proxies as the defense minister said. so from an israeli point of view, this is the most vitt cal time, maybe since its founding -- critical time, maybe since its founding because the efforts to destroy the jewish state are real. here's what i worry about. if we

don't help israel now, this war will get really out of hand. it is already out of hand. so there's about 100,000-plus rockets in the hands of hezbollah in lebanon that if they were all unleashed at the same time, that would be a nightmare for israel. they handled the 300 drones and missiles, but that's a fraction of what's available. i want to deter iran from going to the next step. how do you do that? let iran know that we have israel's back. that we're going to help them with their military needs in perpetuity so they can defend themselves. that we're not going to abandon israel at this critical time. what does israel have to do? not only do they have to knock down the rockets that have come their way, they need weapons dod l. -- to do that, they need deterrence much the best way to deter the enemies senior senator to let the world and the enemies

now america has israel's back. i want to say something about speaker johnson and democratic leader jeffries. well done. mike johnson and hakeem jeffries worked together to pass a package we have before us. we need more of this, not less. -- in a time of great peril for our allies and the united states. so this was a moment where the people in the house rose to the occasion. they set aside their party differences. they focused on giving us a package that i think is stronger but need it now more than ever. since we last had this debate in the senate, what has happened? a direct attack on the state of israel by iran. they need the money, and they need it now. vote yes. a great passover gift to the israeli people would be this aid package. now, i want to the put this

debate in a greater context. i've had a lot of my friends come to the floor talking about whether or not ukraine is in our vital national interest. i think it is. here's what's happening in europe as i speak. you have russia, who has launched an effort to destroy ukraine -- not just the crimea, but to take kyiv and turn it into a part of russia, ukraine, a sovereign nation that gave up 1,700 nuclear weapons they had in their possession after the end of the cold war -- the budapest memorandum in the mid-1990's -- the ukrainians gave up 1, 00 nuclear weapons with the assurance their sovereignty would be protected. so what do we have now? we have a situation where for the second time russia has invaded ukraine.

they did it in 2014. we had some kind of peace agreement. didn't hold. why? because putin wants all of ukraine. i'll talk about that in a moment. he wants more than just ukraine. he wants to reconstruct the russian empire, the old soviet union. listen to him, not me. i'll talk about that in a moment. go back in time to the 1930's. if you could go back to time and you could talk to the leaders of -- in the 1930's knowing what you know now, what would you tell them? you should stop hitler as soon as you can. you've got opportunity after opportunity to hold him to account before he got to strong. -- too strong. you had plenty of chances to lay down the gauntlet, but every time there was a chance to stop him, people blinked. people believed that he wanted german-speaking territory and that was all. they did not believe he wanted

to kill all the jews. that was a big mistake, because he did. he wanted a master race. he wrote a book. the biggest miscalculation of the 20th century was not to actually understand what adolf hitler wanted. he wanted everybody to speak german. he want add master race where there is no place for the jewish people and others. 50 million people died because we got it wrong. 1941 in this body, senator nye -- i don't know him -- getting into this returning engagement of war to europe is only as inevitable as we, the people of america, will permit it to be. staying out of this war is inevitable if only the people will continue and multiply their forceful demands upon the government at washington to keep its promise to the people to keep our country out of this mess which seems discontinued to

wreck every civilization that end wills its hand to it. he is on the floor of the senate in june of 1941 telling his colleagues, this war in europe, stay out of it. well, how well did that age? because in december of 1941, we were attacked by the japanese. here's a rule that stood the test of time -- when forces rear their ugly heads anywhere in the world wanting to dominate other people, destroy their religion, put them under the yoke of tyranny, it will eventually come up back to us. when the taliban blew up statues of buddha, it came back to me. evil unchecked and appeased, we always pay a heavier price than if we confront it. charles lindbergh, the very american hero in many ways, very

brave guy -- this is what he said on april 24, 1941. when history is written, the responsibility for the downfall of the democracies of europe will rest squarely upon the shoulders of the interventionists who led their nations into war uninformed and unprepared. when history is written, the responsibility for the downfall of the democracies of europe will rest squarely upon the shoulders of the interventionists who led their nations into war uninformed and unprepared. how well did this age? the democracies in europe fell because we allowed hitler to get strong. every time he would go into the sue day tan land, you name the early intervention, we wrote it off, we appeased it, no, mr. lindbergh, you were wrong.

the reason democracies in europe were at risk and failed is because we did not stand up to adolf hitler while it really mattered. the reason that 50 million people died is because you didn't get it. father coughlin, the demagoguery from this guy is being used today. demonizing people, trying to convince the american people, those people over there don't matter to you. well, let me tell you what matters to the american people. when forces like putin rear their ugly head to take ukraine, they're not going to stop. they're going to keep going, and we have nato commitments to countries around ukraine. vote yes for this package to help the ukrainians continue to fight the russians before americans are fighting the russians. and how does america get into this conflict? if a nato nation is attacked.

this is my favorite. september 11, 1941. now, when i say september 11, most americans kind of listen because that day does live in infamy. so charles lindbergh made a speech on september 11, 1941, in des moines, iowa. and here's what he said -- when this war started in europe, it was clear that the american people were opposed to entering it. why shouldn't we be? we had the best defensive position in the world. we had a tradition of independence from europe and the one time we did take part in european war left european problems unsolved and debts to america unpaid.

it's obvious and perfectly understandable that great britain wants the united states in the war on her side. england is now in a desperate position. her population is not large enough and her armies are not strong enough to invade the continent of europe and when win the war she has declared against germany. if england can draw this country into the war, she can shift to our shoulders a large portion of the responsibility for waging it and for paying the cost. he has argued that the lend-lease program that president roosevelt came up with to help the island nation withstand invasion by the germans was a foolish endeavor, that the small group of people in england cannot possibly win and we're betting on a loser. the loser is lindbergh. the winner is churchill and the british people. this attitude exists today.

people in this body right before i spoke talk about we can't help ukraine because we have too many problems in other places. they can't win. they were supposed to fall in four days. look what's happened 200-something days later. they've destroyed half of the russian army, taken back half the territory russia seized, and now they need our weapons in a desperate fashion. they're trying to defend their homeland, and they're asking for us not troops but weapons that can matter, and i will say to everybody in this body, you sell the ukrainians short at your own peril. you're in the camp of lindbergh trying to convince the american people, pull the plug on england. they're in a fight they can't possibly win. what lindbergh and others didn't realize is that their fight was our fight. let me tell you why ukraine's

fight matters to us. if we don't stop putin now, he will keep going. and let's talk about what he says. just as people in the 1930's -- lindbergh and father coughlin and chamberlain -- let's bring him black to life here. how horribling and fantastic and incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas masks here because of a quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing. this is when hitler annexed the sudetenland in violation of all the agreements they signeded in world war i. he was telling the british people, this is sort of a german thing. i know he's violate something the agreements we had to end world war i. but, you know, it really doesn't matter to us.

boy, were you wrong. he didn't want the sudetenland. he wanted a master race. and mr. chamberlain's analysis is not i am anning too well in history. -- aging too well in history. to the people of this body who are going to vote today, you're miscalculating putin if you think it's just about some dispute with ukraine or he's threatened by nato. no -- yeah, i'm sure he's threatened by nato. but he has an ambition here. putin in 2016 -- the borders of russia never end. putin in 2022 -- when peter the great was at war with sweden taking something away from it... he was not taking away anything, he was returning... when he founded the new capital, none of the european countries recognized this territory as part of russia; everyone recognized it as part of

sweden." he is telling you in russian history because you claim it, he wants it, the russians are going to take t this is medvedev. one of ukraine's former leaders once said ukraine is not russia. that concept needs to be to disappear forever. ukraine is definitely russia. this is the former president of russia. he's telling you, and you're not listening, that they want more than ukraine. ukraine is part of russia. the ukrainians don't believe that. they're fighting like tigers. i don't believe that. if you give him ukraine, he will want moldova, then the baltic dash the balkan nations. they'll make claims to them because they used to be part of the russian empire. hitler wrote a book and nobody believed him. putin and medvedev, to their credit, are telling you exactly what their amb