[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 141 (Thursday, August 23, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5872-S5873]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                            Trump Presidency

  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, by any account, this has been a 
momentous week in the history of the Trump Presidency and the history 
of Presidencies in general. President Trump's former campaign manager 
was convicted on eight counts and still has another trial to go. The 
President's former personal attorney--his lifelong compadre for so 
long--pled guilty to multiple violations of bank fraud and campaign 
finance violations, implicating the President of the United States 
himself in one of those crimes. Let me repeat that. President Trump was 
named as an unindicted coconspirator in a Federal crime.
  What did we hear from our Republican friends on the Hill? Was this 
the moment when Republican leaders finally stood up and said 
``enough''? Amazingly, apparently not. Apparently, my Republican 
colleagues cannot rouse themselves to offer even a word of criticism 
for a President now implicated in a Federal crime; a President who 
casually tosses around the idea of pardoning his convicted former 
campaign chairman; a President who speaks favorably about that 
convicted felon because he didn't break, while disparaging a former 
confidant for collaborating with law enforcement. It sounds like a 
scene out of the ``Godfather.''
  Imagine if President Obama's campaign manager was convicted of 
several serious Federal crimes. Do you think my Republican friends 
would give circumspect quotes to reporters, or do you think they would 
be beside me on the floor beside themselves? The answer is obvious. 
Yet, when it comes to a President of their own party, there is hardly a 
word of criticism or censure from our Republican friends.

[[Page S5873]]

  At some point, after the ``Access Hollywood'' tape, after 
Charlottesville, after the Helsinki summit, and now after these most 
recent revelations, the broad failure of the Republican Party in 
Congress to condemn the President's behavior and what that behavior is 
doing to the American character becomes a form of complicity.
  Without strong voices in his party to tell him when he goes too far, 
the Republicans have become complicit in bringing down the character of 
the United States, which is probably the best thing we have going for 
us. The President keeps destroying, hurting, and gnawing at that 
character with amazing narcissism, with total ego, with bullying, and 
with misstatements of truth after truth. Our Republican friends--the 
only ones who can really stop him; we can't--just shrug their 
shoulders. President Trump thinks he can keep testing the boundaries, 
and our Republican friends say: Go right ahead. We are not going to 
stop you. We are going to be quiet. We are going to be silent.
  It seems that Republican Party leaders have made the ultimate 
Faustian bargain: forgoing their duty to the Constitution and the 
country in exchange for a corporate tax cut and stacking the courts. 
They are willing to ignore the corruption and lawbreaking so long as 
they have someone in the White House to sign their tax cuts, to gut 
healthcare, which they despise, and to nominate conservative ideologues 
to the bench.
  The mantra of the Republican majority in the 115th Congress is ``put 
your head in the sand.'' The symbol of the Republican Party--the 
elephant--is being replaced with the ostrich, the bird that puts its 
head in the sand when trouble occurs. They must tell themselves: Put 
your head in the sand; we want to pass a corporate tax cut. Put your 
head in the sand; we want to eviscerate Obama's healthcare law, even if 
it means raising costs on working Americans. Put your head in the sand 
like an ostrich; we want a conservative majority on the Supreme Court. 
If you ask me, the price of that Faustian bargain has already become 
too steep.
  I have real admiration for the ``Never Trumpers,'' hard-right 
conservatives who hardly agree with me on anything, but they have had 
the courage to say that the character of America, which Donald Trump 
day by day is destroying, is more important than a tax cut or a nominee 
to the Supreme Court because if our character goes away, we won't have 
much left.
  We all know what Donald Trump did. When I saw the majority leader in 
the House talk on FOX News, I said to myself, he must believe that 
Trump did what it is alleged he did--paid dollars to someone to avoid 
her telling what happened between her and him. Everyone knows that is 
true. No one doubts it is true. The President knows it is true, I am 
sure. Yet, the Republican ostrich puts his head in the sand and ignores 
the day-by-day erosion of the American character that Donald Trump 
creates.
  The Faustian bargain has become too steep, my Republican friends. 
Consideration of country and Constitution aside, if my Republican 
colleagues remain silent, the party will become coconspirator in the 
culture of corruption that surrounds this President.
  Now is the time for the Republican leaders to do what is best for 
their party and for their country. Sometimes it is as simple as saying 
``enough'' to this President. It would be far better, in addition to 
our Republican colleagues speaking out, to pass legislation to protect 
the special counsel from political interference, to hold hearings on 
the power of the President to pardon, to pass legislation to bolster 
election security and to hold Russia accountable, and to use Congress's 
power to investigate the serious crimes that were committed by the 
President's close associates during the election. But it has to start 
with our Republican colleagues recognizing the moment we are in and 
looking back at figures like Howard Baker, who rose to the occasion in 
a similar situation 45 years ago. Where are the Howard Bakers? Where 
are our Republican colleagues who--I know they love this country, but 
it is either fear or expediency or something else not admirable that is 
making them complicit with the President in their ostrich-like silence.
  It is time, my Republican friends, to quote the Scriptures, to speak 
truth to power.