[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 51 (Thursday, March 18, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Page S1638]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                           National Security

  Mr. President, on another subject, I want to discuss the national 
security threats facing our country.
  A recent poll showed 45 percent of Americans acknowledge that China 
is the greatest threat to the United States. A year ago, that 
percentage was half that number thinking that China was a threat, the 
greatest threat to the United States.
  Frankly, this year, no other nation came close to what they think 
about China being a threat--not Russia, not North Korea, not Iran. 
These were all far behind.
  Half of Americans believe China is the world's leading economic 
power. A record 63 percent say that the economic power of China is a 
critical threat to the United States.
  Now, we all know the American people are smart. They are perceiving 
exactly what is happening with the United States vis-a-vis China or 
China vis-a-vis the rest of the world. China wants to supplant our 
country as the greatest nation and the greatest economy in the world, 
and China will do it if we are blind to that danger.
  Everywhere I see the threat of China's rise minimized. On Tuesday, I 
saw a very curious thing in the declassified ``Intelligence Community 
Assessment of Foreign Threats to the 2020 U.S. Elections.'' The 
intelligence community determined that China did not engage in 
pervasive election meddling but noted that was in part because China 
saw the risk associated with doing so.
  The intelligence community determined that China would not be excited 
if President Trump had won the 2020 election because he would 
``challenge China's rise.''
  The National Intelligence Officer for Cyber Issues, in particular, 
found that the Government of China wanted former President Trump to be 
defeated in the general election, preferring ``the election of a more 
predictable member of the establishment instead.'' And ``China took at 
least some steps to undermine former President Trump's reelection 
chances, primarily through social media and official public statements 
and media.''
  Yet some in the news media read this very same report that I read and 
declared triumphantly and falsely that there was nothing to fear from 
China in terms of influencing our elections. It is pretty clear why 
China would not want a President unafraid to assert American national 
interests. That means demanding reciprocal trade, secure borders, and a 
defense policy focused on American national interests.
  We all know that China has been playing us for suckers. China 
continues to try to expand its influence globally, including in 
international bodies like the World Bank and the World Health 
Organization. It doesn't seek to play by the rules but to exploit its 
influence for its own advantage at the expense of the United States and 
probably any free country because they don't like democracy.
  In this same assessment I saw that Iran, another enemy, also wanted 
to defeat a strong American President and sow division. Many others--
Lebanese Hezbollah, the Government of Cuba, and the Maduro Government 
of Venezuela--they all had the very same idea. They all wanted to 
defeat President Trump. Only Russia seems to have preferred Trump but 
just according to that assessment--although I remember reading a year 
ago during the primaries that Senator Bernie Sanders was also a 
favorite of Russia. He had to have a defensive briefing, meaning 
Senator Sanders, because Russia wanted to help his campaign.
  Also, remember, it was then-Vice President Biden who first announced 
the naive and disastrous Obama ``reset'' appeasement policy toward 
Russia. This, coming in the wake of Russia's invasion of our ally, 
Georgia, arguably gave Putin the idea that he could get away with 
invading Crimea and Ukraine.
  Let's also take this moment to recall that when the Obama Justice 
Department and the FBI saw threats from Russia during the 2016 
election, they didn't do what they did for Sanders. They didn't 
defensively brief Trump and his team. Instead, do you know where they 
went? They opened Crossfire Hurricane and outrageously used briefings 
to Trump and his associates as intelligence gathering operations, 
ultimately wasting years of taxpayer money and time.
  Abraham Lincoln once said:

       America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we 
     lose our freedoms it will be because we have destroyed 
     ourselves from within.

  In fact, the goal of what the KGB calls ``active measures,'' like 
disinformation since Soviet times, has been to pit Americans against 
each other to cause us to destroy ourselves.
  That brings me to another related point. As I see this seat of 
democracy fortified with walls and barbed wire while the people, the 
citizens, and the taxpayers are kept out, I can't help but think about 
where we will go from here.
  Yet the Democrats can only speak of destroying the filibuster during 
these difficult times. When I hear talk of destroying the filibuster--
the very tools that force bipartisanship and ensure that those 
representing all Americans are heard and that America act as one being 
abolished forever--I am worried. If the slimmest of majorities is about 
to impose its will on the other half of the country from inside an 
armed bunker, the Russians will have achieved their ultimate goal.
  We are not our own enemies to be silenced and to be fenced in. We are 
one Nation, but we must pull together and acknowledge what it means 
when countries like China and Iran, our enemies and our adversaries, 
don't want us to put our country's interest first.