[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 35 (Tuesday, February 26, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1448-S1449]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                   Declaration of National Emergency

  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, today, the House of Representatives 
will take up a motion to terminate the state of emergency proclaimed by 
President Trump. For many reasons, the measure should pass with 
bipartisan support.
  First, Members of both parties know there is no actual emergency at 
the border. Nearly 60 former national security advisers--Democrat and 
Republican, bipartisan--including former Secretaries of State and 
Defense, have written a statement saying there is ``no factual evidence 
of an emergency at the border.'' The President himself said, when 
announcing the state of emergency, that he ``didn't need to do this.''
  An emergency, by definition, is something you need to do. It is an 
emergency. In the President's own words, this is not a state of 
emergency.
  If we let Presidents, whomever they be--Democrat or Republican--
willy-nilly, because they want to get something done, just declare an 
emergency when it is clear it has been a long-term

[[Page S1449]]

condition, a long-term issue, this country is a different country.
  That leads to my second point. Members of both parties should be 
concerned about the President diverting money away from military 
construction projects in their districts.
  Again, the President doesn't like you for some reason. He says there 
is an emergency and takes money away from a project in your State that 
you have worked hard for. That is no way to govern.
  But at the top of the list is this: the Founding Fathers looking down 
upon this Chamber and upon these United States of America. They set up 
an exquisite balance of power. They were worried about an overreaching 
Executive. They knew what King George was all about. So they named the 
Congress, the House and Senate, the article I--article I, not II, III 
or IV--part of the government. Second, they gave the Congress one of 
the greatest powers any government has, which is the power of the 
purse.
  When the President tries to take these powers away, which clearly he 
is doing in this case--he called for an emergency when he couldn't get 
his way in Congress, not because some new facts came on the scene--it 
is a change in the fundamental, necessary, and, often, exquisite 
balance of power.
  I know many of my friends on the other side of the aisle understand 
that. In fact, true conservatism worries about too much power being 
centralized in any place because conservatism exalts the freedom of the 
individual.
  So to look the other way because Donald Trump wants this--because he 
is almost sometimes in a temper tantrum about this issue--is so short-
sighted and is so detrimental to the long-term health, stability, and 
viability, even, of how the balance of power works.
  So I implore my friends on the other side of the aisle to contemplate 
what it might portend for our democracy to allow this emergency 
declaration to stand. What would stop any future President from 
claiming an emergency every week and doing what they wanted--a total 
subversion of the balance of powers, a derogation of huge power to the 
Executive, which has plenty of power already?
  The National Emergencies Act has been used only once in its 
relatively short history, and that was to take action after 9/11--
clearly, an emergency. Now President Trump is trying to bend the law to 
his will, not to address a military emergency, not to address any real 
emergency. This has been an ongoing issue. He would say ``problem.'' 
That is OK, but he is doing it for personal political gain, to 
accomplish something Congress rejected and the American people oppose.
  He has tried several times to get this wall. Congress has resisted. 
Congress even resisted when Democrats didn't have control of the House, 
and now they do. Elections do matter. We are a democracy, President 
Trump. So it is hard to imagine a more senseless and destructive use of 
emergency powers than what the President has proposed.
  So let us, Democrats and Republicans, House and Senate, rise to the 
occasion. This will be a moment in history, a point where things may 
turn a bit. If Congress stands up, it will be a reaffirmation of our 
democracy. It will be a reaffirmation of the democracy the Founding 
Fathers wanted. If Congress stands up--Democrats and Republicans--when 
the Founding Fathers look down on this Chamber after the vote occurs, 
they will smile because this is the democracy they wanted. They did not 
want a democracy where a President could simply declare an emergency on 
a whim and overrule what Congress has done.
  So let us--Congress--first the House and then the Senate, speak up 
with one bipartisan voice to remedy this injury that President Trump is 
trying to do to our constitutional order.
  Whatever you think of the best way to secure our border, this is not 
the way for a President--any President--to exercise his authority. This 
is not about whether you are for or against a wall, and I, of course, 
am against it. It is about what America is all about, whatever your 
view on the wall.