[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 116 (Wednesday, July 11, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4884-S4885]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



            Calling for the Release of Pastor Andrew Brunson

  Mr. TILLIS. Mr. President, I come here in fulfillment of a promise 
that I made a couple of months ago to bring to the attention of the 
American people an injustice that is occurring in Turkey.
  I am here to talk about an American pastor, Andrew Brunson. He is 
from a church. He is from western North Carolina. He spent 20 years in 
Turkey as a missionary. He started out just doing missionary work 
without a church. Then he built a very small church that maybe can 
house 100 people, in Izmir.
  After the coup in 2016, Pastor Brunson was apprehended, and he has

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been in prison ever since. He was imprisoned for almost 19 months 
without any charges. For the vast majority of that time, he was in a 
cell designed for 8 people that had 21 in it, without charges. Earlier 
this year there were charges levied against him that are just 
absolutely absurd. I know from firsthand experience.

  After the indictment was issued, I heard through channels and through 
his wife Norine that Pastor Brunson was afraid that the American people 
were going to read this indictment, believe it, and turn their backs on 
him. So it was important for me to go to Turkey and let him know that 
is the last thing we are going to do and that I was going to bring this 
to the American people's attention until he was released.
  I went back about a month later. I sat through a court proceeding in 
a Turkish courtroom for about 12 hours, and I heard some of the most 
absurd claims you can possibly imagine. They were charges that would 
not keep an American citizen or a foreign national in an American jail 
for the afternoon. Yet they have kept him in prison for 642 days.
  This afternoon I am going to be traveling to Brussels to be a part of 
the NATO meeting that we have. I am going to seek to speak once again 
with the Turkish officials to tell them that justice needs to be 
served. Pastor Brunson needs to come home.
  Pastor Brunson has a court date next week. It could be the last 
hearing, and he could be subject to a 35-year sentence. He is a little 
over 50 years old. So that is effectively a life sentence.
  The charges are basically this. He has been a missionary. He has been 
providing humanitarian relief to Syrian refugees, to the Turkish 
people, and actually just offering and preaching the Word to those who 
want to hear it.
  So I ask President Erdogan and the Turkish officials to please let 
justice be served. Let Andrew Brunson come home.
  The last thing we are working on--and I hope it no longer has to be a 
provision in the NDAA--is that if he doesn't get released, we have to 
rethink our relationship with this NATO ally that has been in the NATO 
alliance since 1952. We have to ask ourselves about ramifications if a 
NATO ally will hold people illegally, imprison them, sweep them up--in 
a legitimate effort to tamp down an illegal coup--and hold this man 
hostage.
  I hope I come to the floor in a couple of weeks thanking the Turkish 
Government, the Turkish people, and the Turkish judiciary for having 
justice served. The only way I believe justice will be served is when 
Andrew Brunson comes home. Until he does, I will come back here every 
week to continue to bring attention to this issue. It should be 
important to every American.
  If any American is traveling to Turkey, right now I am not sure I 
would because you could have a meal, you could have a light on for a 
couple of hours in your hotel room. These are the types of charges that 
have been used as a basis for saying that this man was conspiring to 
plot a coup and was conspiring to support terrorist organizations--
eating a meal that looks like a meal that certain terrorist 
organizations like, which, incidentally, is a very popular meal in the 
Middle East; having a light on upstairs, in a room, incidentally, that 
doesn't have windows that some secret witness said could only be on 
because they were plotting some nefarious activity.
  I thank the Members of this body--some 70 Members--who signed on to a 
letter expressing their concern with his illegal detention. I promise 
Pastor Brunson and I promise any American citizen and some of those 
Turkish citizens who work with the State Department that as long as I 
am a Senator, I will be bringing attention to this injustice until 
justice is served.