[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 167 (Tuesday, October 22, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5932-S5934]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                            Turkey and Syria

  Madam President, on Syria, today the 5-day pause on hostilities in 
northern Syria is set to come to an end. What happens next is 
completely unknown. Will Erdogan continue his military incursion into 
Syria? Will the Kurds--facing another Turkish offensive--leave their 
posts guarding ISIS prisoners to once again defend themselves, allowing 
ISIS prisoners, dangerous to America, to escape? Will Presidents 
Erdogan and Putin cut a new deal that is bad for America and our 
allies? Nobody knows the answer to any of these.
  What we do know is that the situation has rapidly deteriorated 
compared to just a few weeks ago.
  What caused this deterioration? One thing: the President's abrupt 
decision to withdraw U.S. troops from the region after a phone call 
with President Erdogan. When ISIS had been degraded and more than 
10,000 detainees--many of them hardened ISIS fighters--were under lock 
and key, to undo that is putting America's security at risk. That is 
what President Trump has done. This so-called tough warrior backed off 
in a call with a much lesser power, President Erdogan. He has done this 
before. We don't know how many of these 10,000 detainees and their 
families have escaped. We don't know where they have gone, nor is there 
any plan to get them back into detention facilities. These are 
dangerous people--dangerous to our homeland, dangerous to New York and 
Chicago and Miami and Dallas and Denver and Los Angeles--and we don't 
know where they are or what they are doing all because of President 
Trump's precipitous action. I get excited about this--angrily excited, 
negatively excited--because my city has suffered from terrorists 7,000 
miles away, a small group, who did such damage.
  As the New York Times reported after ISIS had been on the run, ``Now, 
analysts say that Mr. Trump's pullout [of U.S. troops from northern 
Syria] has handed the Islamic State its biggest win in four years.''
  President Trump has handed ISIS its biggest victory in 4 years. How 
can any American support that? How can so many of our Republican 
colleagues and Republican supporters of President Trump shrug their 
shoulders?
  Let me repeat: President Trump's ``pullout has handed the Islamic 
State its biggest win in more than four years and greatly improved its 
prospects.''
  The President's incompetence with Erdogan and Syria has handed ISIS a 
``get out of jail free'' card and has simply put American lives in 
danger. For the sake of our national security, President Trump and his 
administration need to get a handle on this situation.
  I believe Senators from both parties have been trying to get the 
administration's top officials, including Secretary of State Pompeo, 
Secretary of Defense Esper, and General Milley, to give the Senate a 
briefing on its Syria policy and a plan to contain and further degrade 
ISIS. They canceled the scheduled briefing last week, pulled the plug 
on a briefing that was supposed to be this afternoon, and have so far 
refused to commit to a new date. We need that briefing to happen.
  Secretary Pompeo, Secretary Esper, General Milley, and CIA Director 
Haspel have the responsibility to report to Congress on what is 
happening in this dangerous situation, and, once again, this 
administration is withholding vital information. It is a disgrace. It 
is probably because they don't have a plan, so they don't know what to 
do. But bringing them here may help formulate that plan or push them to 
get a plan.
  In the meantime, Democrats are set to meet with Brett McGurk, the 
Presidential envoy in charge of countering ISIS, at a special meeting 
Wednesday so that we can try to come up with some answers, even though 
it should be the administration doing that.
  The American people should be very concerned that the Trump 
administration does not seem to have any plan to secure the enduring 
defeat of ISIS in Syria. Senate Democrats will try to learn as much as 
possible from the experts available to us--folks like Mr. McGurk--but, 
ultimately, the President alone has the authority to correct our 
Nation's course.
  So it is still very important for the Senate to pass the House 
resolution condemning the President's decision to precipitously 
withdraw from northern Syria. The President tends to listen when the 
Republicans here in Congress express their disapproval. That is what 
happened in the House, where over 120 Republicans voted with Democrats 
on a bipartisan resolution, including Leaders McCarthy, Scalise, and 
Cheney, hard-war Republicans, but at least they knew how bad this was 
for America. I wish our Senate Republican colleagues would have shown 
the same bit of courage that McCarthy, Scalise, and Cheney showed.
  If the House resolution is tough enough for House Republican 
leadership, surely it is good enough for the majority of Senate 
Republicans. So we will keep trying to pass the House resolution here 
in the Senate because it means we could send a bill to the President's 
desk that shows him a bipartisan majority of Congress is against his 
reckless decision to consider it in Syria. This is extremely, extremely 
troubling, and I am very angry--very angry.

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