[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 206 (Tuesday, November 30, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8805-S8811]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2022

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the 
Senate will resume consideration of H.R. 4350, which the clerk will 
report.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 4350) to authorize appropriations for fiscal 
     year 2022 for military activities of the Department of 
     Defense, for military construction, and for defense 
     activities of the Department of Energy, to prescribe military 
     personnel strengths for such fiscal year, and for other 
     purposes.

  Pending:

       Reed/Inhofe Modified Amendment No. 3867, in the nature of a 
     substitute.
       Reed Amendment No. 4775 (to Amendment No. 3867), to modify 
     effective dates relating to the Assistant Secretary of the 
     Air Force for Space Acquisition and Integration and the 
     Service Acquisition Executive of the Department of the Air 
     Force for Space Systems and Programs.

                   Recognition of the Majority Leader

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The majority leader is recognized.


                               H.R. 4350

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, after spending--this is on NDAA. After 
spending months insisting that the Senate should take swift action on 
our annual Defense bill, last night, Republicans mounted a partisan 
filibuster, blocking this Chamber from moving forward on the NDAA.
  For the information of all, before the vote closed last night, I 
changed my vote to ``no'' and then entered a motion to reconsider the 
cloture vote so we could find a path forward on this important bill.
  Now, we have heard over and over and over again from Republicans, in 
some form or another, that the Senate must act on NDAA and must act 
quickly. One Republican colleague called it a core duty, a bare 
minimum. Yet another colleague said it was ``the best way to thank our 
soldiers and sailors for their service.''
  But, last evening, Republicans blocked legislation to support our 
troops, support their families, keep Americans safe, and support jobs 
across the entire country. Republican dysfunction has again derailed 
even bipartisan progress on our annual defense bill--an outrageous 
outcome that shows how the Senate and Republican leadership have 
changed in recent years.
  Previous leaders, knowing that Democrats had offered Republicans a 
whole lot of amendments, would have said: ``Let's vote cloture''--but 
not this leader, not yet.
  And there should be no mistake: The process that Democrats, and 
particularly my colleague Chairman Reed, have offered Republicans on 
NDAA has been more than fair and reasonable. For months, my colleagues 
in the Armed Services Committee have been working to produce a 
bipartisan product that could come to the floor for a vote.
  The bipartisan Reed-Inhofe agreement--a Reed-Inhofe agreement--was 
what we brought to the floor yesterday to vote on.
  During the markup, Members considered 321 amendments and adopted 143

[[Page S8806]]

bipartisan ones before reporting the bill out of committee by a vote of 
23 to 3--23 to 3, bipartisan.
  In preparation for the Senate floor, the managers worked on a 
substitute amendment, which had at least 50 amendments--27 of them, the 
majority, from Republicans. Senator Inhofe, the ranking member of the 
Armed Services Committee, worked with Democrats and had agreed to this.
  And on top of all that, Senators Reed and Inhofe also reached a 
bipartisan agreement to hold votes on 19 amendments here on the floor 
before Republicans blocked that proposal 2 weeks ago.
  Nineteen amendment votes--19--that is more than the total number of 
amendments to NDAA that received votes under the Republican majority 
and under Leader McConnell when we debated this bill in 2017, 2018, 
2019, and 2020--not more than in each year, more than all of them put 
together.
  We just had 2 amendments on NDAA in 2017, when McConnell was majority 
leader. We had 5 in 2018, when Mitch McConnell was majority leader; 3 
in 2019; and 7 in 2020. Adding that up, that is a total of 17. That is 
over 4 years.
  This year, we offered 19 amendment votes, including bipartisan 
measures to combat ransomware, repeal the 2020 Iraq AUMF, and support 
improved cyber defense of our critical infrastructure. But when we 
tried to get consent to move on this package of amendments, our 
Republican colleagues came down to the floor and objected not once but 
seven times.
  So we have had ample debate. This has been a fair and reasonable 
process that has showed respect to the other side. But this is a new 
Republican Party, unfortunately, and it was not good enough for them 
even on the Defense bill.
  Passing the annual Defense bill should not be in question, and 
Republicans' blocking this legislation is harmful to our troops, to 
their families who sacrifice so much, and to our efforts to keep 
Americans around the world safe.
  Now, we Democrats are not going to let Republican intransigence stop 
us. We are going to keep working forward on a path forward, and we hope 
our Republican colleagues, as they discuss this among themselves, will 
see the light and come up with a fair proposal to allow this bill to go 
forward.
  Nineteen amendments--a total of 17 on all the other NDAA bills--to 
say that we are being unfair, to say that we are not giving enough 
amendments is poppycock, and they know it.
  Let's move forward. Let's move forward.


                           Government Funding

  Mr. President, now on government funding, there is another critical 
priority that the Senate must also address before the week's end: 
passing a continuing resolution that will keep the government funded 
beyond the December 3 deadline.
  As soon as tomorrow, the House is expected to take action to pass a 
CR that will fund the government into next year. Senate Democrats are 
ready to pass this legislation and get it done as quickly as possible.
  To avoid a needless shutdown, Republicans will have to cooperate and 
approve the government funding legislation without delay. If 
Republicans choose obstruction, there will be a shutdown entirely 
because of their own dysfunction.
  We cannot afford to go down that road. As winter begins, the last 
thing Americans need right now is an avoidable, Republican-manufactured 
shutdown that will potentially harm millions of Federal workers, harm 
their families, and harm local communities that rely on an open and 
functioning Federal Government.
  Democrats are going to work all week to make sure no government 
shutdown comes to pass, and we urge our Republican colleagues to work 
with us.


                               Debt Limit

  Mr. President, on debt limit, also, soon the Senate must take action 
to assure that the United States does not--does not--default on its 
sovereign debt for the first time in history. I recently had a good 
conversation with the Republican leader about this issue, and I expect 
to continue those talks on achieving a bipartisan solution to 
addressing the debt limit.
  By now we know the dangers of an unprecedented default. Secretary 
Yellen has warned that failure to extend the debt ceiling would 
``eviscerate'' our economic recovery and says our country could yet 
again slip into ``a deep recession.''
  Both parties know that this is simply unacceptable, and so I look 
forward to achieving a bipartisan solution to addressing the debt limit 
soon.


                           Build Back Better

  Mr. President, finally, on Build Back Better, before we hit Christmas 
Day, it is my goal to have the Senate take action to debate and pass 
President Biden's Build Back Better legislation.
  This week, Senate Democrats will focus on continuing to meet with the 
Parliamentarian so we can finish making the technical and procedural 
fixes necessary for reconciliation. Once that is complete, it will be 
time to bring Build Back Better here to the floor of the Senate.
  I have said many times before that nobody should expect legislation 
of this magnitude to be easy. We have been at the task for several 
months, but we need to take a step back and recognize that we are, 
hopefully, less than a month away from acting on the largest investment 
the American people have seen in generations.
  Here is what we are going to do in this bill: lower the cost of 
childcare, make pre-K universally accessible, cut taxes for parents and 
working and middle-class families, and take the next bold step in our 
fight against the climate crisis.
  All this we want to tackle before the Christmas break. So we will 
keep working this week and until we get it done.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The majority whip.


       Remembering Major Ian Fishback and Guantanamo Bay Closure

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, earlier this month, while we were all home 
for the Thanksgiving recess, an American patriot passed away. His name 
was MAJ Ian Fishback.
  During his life, Major Fishback defended our Nation during four tours 
of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. He was an accomplished scholar, with 
degrees from both West Point and the University of Michigan, and a 
lifelong champion of justice.
  Tragically, like too many of our Nation's veterans, Major Fishback's 
life ended far too soon. He died at the age of 42. Though his time on 
Earth was short, he left behind a legacy. He changed our Nation for the 
better. He inspired the Members of the Senate to make a historic stand 
against injustice.
  You see, in 2005, while Major Fishback was serving as captain in the 
U.S. Army infantry, he spoke out against America's inhumane treatment 
of detainees after 9/11. In a letter to then-Senators John McCain and 
John Warner, Major Fishback wrote: ``I have been unable to get clear, 
consistent answers from my leadership about what constitutes lawful and 
humane treatment of detainees. I am certain that this confusion 
contributed to a wide range of abuses including death threats, 
beatings, broken bones, murder, exposure to elements, extreme forced 
physical exertion, hostage-taking, stripping, sleep deprivation and 
degrading treatment. I and troops under my command witnessed some of 
these abuses in both Afghanistan and Iraq.''
  Major Fishback's courageous letter shed light on the atrocities that 
were being committed shamefully in the name of our Nation, and he felt 
that he had ``failed'' the servicemembers under his command. The 
reality is, our leaders failed Major Fishback.
  In the wake of 9/11, the Bush administration tossed aside our 
constitutional principles as well as the Geneva Conventions. By 
condoning torture, they dishonored our Nation and actually endangered 
our servicemembers.
  After reports emerged about horrific abuses at Abu Ghraib in Iraq, I 
tried for a year and a half to pass legislation to make it clear that 
cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment of detainees was illegal. Two 
military heroes, my former colleague Senator John McCain and Major 
Fishback, turned the tide in this effort.
  In speaking out, Major Fishback rallied the Members of this Chamber 
to support a torture amendment authored by Senator McCain and myself, 
which was added to the defense spending package for that year over a 
veto

[[Page S8807]]

threat from the George W. Bush administration. That provision 
explicitly banned inhumane treatment of any prisoner held by the 
American Government--on American soil or overseas. It set us on a 
course to restoring American values that were cast aside after 9/11--
work that is still ongoing 20 years later.
  We have a defense bill before us on the floor with many things in it 
that are positive, and I will vote for it. But it is a moment to also 
reflect that this bill does more than protect our Nation and help our 
troops; it also protects our values. That is why I have an amendment to 
this bill, which I hope we will have a chance to offer, that will close 
the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay once and for all.
  Since the first group of detainees was brought to Guantanamo in 
January of 2002, four different Presidents have presided over the 
facility. In that time, the Iraq war has begun and ended, and the war 
in Afghanistan, our Nation's longest war, has come to a close. A 
generation of conflict has come and gone. Yet the Guantanamo detention 
facility is still open, and every day it remains open is an affront to 
our system of justice and the rule of law. It is where due process goes 
to die. That is precisely why military officials, national security 
experts, and leaders on both sides of the aisle have demanded its 
closure for years.
  The facility was virtually designed to be a legal black hole where 
detainees can be held incommunicado--beyond the reach of law--and 
subjected to unspeakable torture and abuse. In the words of a former 
senior official in the Bush administration, Guantanamo existed in ``the 
legal equivalent of outer space.''
  It was created to circumvent the Geneva Conventions. What are those 
conventions? We know. They were the internationally accepted standard 
of humane treatment for detainees and prisoners. Guantanamo was 
designed to circumvent it and other longstanding treaties. This 
subversion of justice has harmed detainees, it has undermined our moral 
standing, and it has failed to deliver justice, which it promised.
  For two decades, the families of Americans who died on 9/11 have 
waited for the alleged conspirators, who are being detained in 
Guantanamo, to be brought to justice. For 20 years, they have been 
waiting, but the case still hasn't come to trial. Imagine. If justice 
delayed is justice denied, how can this be justice at Guantanamo? 
Instead, the facility has become a symbol for human rights abuse, 
lawlessness, and everything Major Fishback decried in his letter to 
Senator McCain.
  The stories out of Guantanamo and CIA black sites are shocking. Let 
me tell you one of them.
  Last month, Guantanamo detainee Majid Khan testified before a 
military jury about the abuse he suffered in the facility and in CIA 
black sites. It was the first time a detainee has described his torture 
at a CIA black site.
  Let's be clear. Majid Khan is a former member of al-Qaida who should 
be held accountable for his actions, but there is no justification for 
torture.
  Mr. Khan recounted being abused in unspeakable, unthinkable ways by 
our government, including being waterboarded and shackled to a ceiling 
until his ankles swelled with blood. In one part of his testimony, he 
described a CIA medic sexually violating him with a garden hose.
  As Mr. Khan shared the excruciating details of his torture, the 
members of the jury listened closely. But pay heed: These weren't 
average citizens sitting on the jury; they were Active-Duty, senior 
military U.S. officials on the jury. When the hearing concluded, these 
high-ranking military leaders did something unheard of. Seven of the 
eight jurors signed a handwritten letter recommending clemency for 
Majid Khan. This is what they concluded, and I want to quote it word 
for word: ``Mr. Khan has been held without the basic due process under 
the U.S. Constitution. . . . [He] was subjected to physical and 
psychological abuse well beyond approved enhanced interrogation 
techniques, instead being closer to torture performed by the most 
abusive regimes in modern history. . . . [T]his abuse was of no 
practical value in terms of intelligence or any other tangible benefits 
to U.S. interests.''
  Remember, I have just quoted these senior U.S. military officials who 
sat on a jury where this man was being tried, and they, in a 
handwritten letter, wrote what I just read.
  Now, that last point is crucial. The human rights abuses committed in 
Guantanamo and CIA black sites are not merely inhumane; they don't 
work. They are ineffective.
  Khan testified: ``I lied just to make the abuse stop.''
  Torturing him brought us no clarity, brought us no truth, and brought 
us no closer to eradicating terrorism. Instead, stories about the 
torture of prisoners at Guantanamo have only galvanized America's 
enemies. They have been packaged into propaganda and recruitment tools 
for terrorism, which in turn endangers our service men and women as 
well as our allies.
  These accounts of abuse have also diminished our international 
standing. How can we claim credibility as a nation? How can we hold 
authoritarian dictators accountable if they can point to our own legacy 
of cruelty and indefinite detention? The man was held for 20 years, and 
others are still being held without being brought to trial.
  Worse yet, the degrading conditions at Guantanamo are being funded by 
American taxpayers. How much is the cost of Guantanamo? Astronomic, 
that is how high it is. We spend more than $500 million a year to keep 
Guantanamo open--$500 million. Half a billion dollars a year American 
taxpayers are wasting to detain how many people for half a billion 
dollars? Thirty-nine. Thirty-nine prisoners, $500 million, and 13 have 
already been approved for transfer. That works out to nearly $14 
million a year on each prisoner like Majid Khan--$14 million a year. 
Let me put that in perspective for a moment. That is enough money to 
expand Medicaid coverage to 1.5 million Americans over 10 years.
  Setting aside the cost, we have to acknowledge the larger truth. 
Guantanamo does not reflect who we are or should be. Indefinite 
detention without charge or trial is antithetical to America's values. 
Yet more than two-thirds of the people detained in Guantanamo today 
have never been charged with a crime. How can that be any form of 
justice?
  With or without the amendment I have introduced to this year's 
Defense authorization, we must accelerate the timeline to finally close 
Guantanamo. As I mentioned, 39 prisoners, $500 million a year?
  President Biden transferred his first detainee earlier this summer, 
but that pace--one every 6 months--is not going to set us on course to 
finally close Guantanamo. Like the war in Afghanistan, America's 
failures in Guantanamo must not be passed on to another administration 
or to another Congress. Can this Senate summon the courage to finally 
close this detention facility? I would like to test it on the floor of 
the Senate. As a matter of fact, isn't that why we are elected--to test 
a basic question like that?
  Next week, the Judiciary Committee is going to hold a hearing on how 
we can close Guantanamo once and for all. There are more steps the 
Biden administration can take to accelerate this closure. One is by 
appointing a special envoy to the State Department to negotiate 
transfer agreements for those inmates who are scheduled to be 
transferred--13 of the 39--to transfer them to other nations.
  We must also reach swift resolution in the remaining cases where 
charges have been brought, instead of moving forward with military 
commissions. Let's finally accept the obvious: Military commissions are 
not the answer in Guantanamo and have not been for 20 years. If there 
is one lesson we can learn from the shameful legacy of Guantanamo, it 
is that we need to trust our system of justice. The use of torture and 
military commissions that deny due process have hindered our ability to 
bring terrorists to justice. Going forward, we should adhere to the 
long-held values of humane treatment and the rule of law.
  Our Federal courts have proven more than capable of handling even the 
most serious, complex terrorism cases. Since 9/11, hundreds of 
terrorism suspects have been tried and convicted in our Federal courts, 
and many are now being safely held in Federal prisons. Compare that to 
the military commission case against the alleged conspirators behind 9/
11. It still hasn't come to trial more than two decades after that 
horrendous attack. The families who

[[Page S8808]]

lost loved ones on that day deserve better. America deserves better. 
And American patriots like Major Fishback deserve better as well.
  We all deserve better than these black holes that violate our 
national values and make true legal accountability impossible.
  As Major Fishback wrote to Senator McCain all those years ago, ``If 
we abandon our ideals in the face of adversity and aggression, then 
those ideals were never really in our possession.''
  It is time to live up to those ideals that our troops have risked 
their lives to defend.
  It is time, at long last, to face reality and honestly say, Close the 
detention facility in Guantanamo. Let's put this dark chapter behind us 
once and for all.
  And in the memory of Major Fishback and the U.S. officials on that 
jury who spoke out, I thank them. I know it wasn't easy. It is far 
easier to remain silent and to avoid the obvious. But they showed 
courage in disclosing to the American people what occurred at 
Guantanamo.
  Now, do we even have the courage to even debate this issue and vote 
on it on the floor of the Senate?
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                   Recognition of the Minority Leader

  The Republican leader is recognized.


                               H.R. 4350

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, yesterday, a bipartisan majority of 
Senators rejected the Democratic leader's efforts to shut down debate 
on the National Defense Authorization Act and block new measures to get 
tougher on Russia.
  The Democratic leader wants to block the Senate from fully and 
robustly debating a number of important issues--from how to manage the 
fallout from the reckless Afghanistan retreat to how to respond to 
China's dramatic and destabilizing military modernization, to how to 
restore deterrence against an emboldened Iran.
  The NDAA is supposed to be the bipartisan forum for debating and 
acting on these kinds of issues. Months ago, the Armed Services 
Committee moved this process forward--listen to this--23 to 3, but the 
Democratic leader has botched the floor process.
  It is especially bizarre to see the Democratic leader so focused, so 
intent, on blocking the Senate from dealing seriously with the growing 
aggression from Putin's Russia. He seems downright desperate to block 
new bipartisan action on Nord Stream 2. It is really quite strange to 
see. Senators Risch and Cruz have proposed language concerning this 
Putin pipeline that the House was able to pass almost unanimously. 
Unlike the House provision, the Risch-Cruz amendment includes a waiver 
provision that would give the President more flexibility, which makes 
the Democratic leader's effort to shut the process down and block their 
amendment all the more baffling.
  If there is opposition to the amendment--if it can be improved with 
modifications--then, by all means, let's have a public debate.
  Likewise, Senator Portman has been a leading voice for bolstering our 
European partners and delivering more meaningful support to Ukraine's 
military. As Putin amasses forces on Ukraine's border, the Senate 
should debate how to help the Ukrainians defend themselves. The 
Democratic leader is trying to shut that down as well.
  So the NDAA is not finished yet. So the Senate cannot be finished yet 
either. We need the same kind of normal, robust, bipartisan amendment 
process that always characterizes this bill, and we need the Democratic 
leader to stop trying to block the Senate from sanctioning Putin's 
cronies.


                               Inflation

  Now, Mr. President, on an entirely different matter, 88 percent of 
Americans are concerned about inflation--most of them are very 
concerned--and 77 percent of Americans say inflation has affected them 
personally. We have a big and diverse country. It is hard to get that 
many Americans to agree on anything. But President Biden did promise he 
would unite the country, and on the Democrats' watch, under the 
Democrats' policies, the American people are united in their fear and 
frustration at runaway prices, falling purchasing power, and all the 
consequences of inflation. The men and women of this country are 
spending 20 percent more than last year for beef at the grocery store, 
50 percent more to fill up the gas tank, 26 percent more for less 
choice in used cars.
  One recent article in the New York Times suggested that perhaps 
Americans should forget about trying to buy their family members normal 
gifts and settle for exchanging handwritten promises to tackle 
household chores, such as ``washing out the reusable plastic bags.'' I 
guess the Grinch is doing some ghostwriting in his spare time.
  Some weeks back, the White House Press Secretary tried to laugh off 
reporters' questions about the supply chain and inflation crises. She 
literally laughed at the idea that anybody would be worried about the 
``tragedy of the treadmill that's delayed.''
  Well, the President's staff are yukking it up, but working parents 
aren't laughing. Middle-class families aren't laughing.
  A Kentuckian named Mike Halligan isn't laughing either. He runs a big 
food bank in Lexington called God's Pantry. They distribute more than 
40 million pounds of food every year at the local pantries all across 
my State.
  Here is what he says:

       We've seen the cost of our ``sharing Thanksgiving basket'' 
     go up this year by 14.5 percent. . . . We've seen our costs 
     go up by about 50 percent. The transportation component of 
     that is literally doubled.

  And he also explained that, since inflation is also hammering his 
contributors, charities and nonprofits may face ``donor fatigue'' at 
precisely the time they cannot afford a fall-off. The Democrats' 
inflation is hitting, literally, every part of our society.
  A famous economist once said that inflation is the only form of tax 
that can be levied without any legislation, but what is remarkable 
about 2021 is that Democrats did directly legislate a big chunk of this 
inflation into existence. It is unusually traceable to deliberate 
policy decisions they have made.
  One of the most famous Democratic economists in the country, Larry 
Summers, tried to warn them. On February 4, he wrote that the 
Democrats' stimulus could ``set off inflationary pressures of a kind we 
have not seen in a generation.'' He said the same thing all springtime 
long.
  So did President Obama's CEA chair:

       Jason Furman . . . said that the American Rescue Plan is 
     definitely ``too big for the moment,'' stating, ``I don't 
     know of any economist that was recommending something the 
     size of what was done.''

  But Washington Democrats had already decided months ago they would 
try to use the temporary pandemic as a Trojan horse for permanent 
socialism.
  Remember last spring, when one of the senior-most House Democrats 
called it a ``tremendous opportunity to restructure things to fit our 
vision'' or, earlier this fall, when President Biden himself said the 
pandemic ``does present us with an opportunity.''
  For Democrats, this go-around, it has never been about what families 
need; it has only been about what activists want.
  So we got the first massive spending bill in the springtime, and now 
a majority of Americans ``worry they won't be able to afford what they 
need during the holidays due to inflation.''
  President Biden inherited an economy that was primed and ready for a 
historic comeback--a fantastic inheritance. Since then, they have had 
less than a year at the controls, and we have got more than half the 
country actively worried their checking accounts might not even get 
them through the holidays.
  But Democrats aren't offering the country any contrition, any 
apology, or, more importantly, any course correction. Amazingly enough, 
they want to come back around for an even bigger bite at the apple. 
They want to try to inflate their way out of inflation.
  Our colleagues have spent months huddled behind closed doors, 
neglecting the most basic governing duties, writing another reckless 
taxing-and-spending spree that even the most conservative estimates say 
would add about $800 billion to deficits over the next 5

[[Page S8809]]

years alone. They want to take the inflationary fire they helped start 
and pour jet fuel on it. Even the CBO, which has to swallow most of the 
Democrats' gimmicky math, estimates this bill would spend nearly $2 
trillion and pile almost hundreds of billions more onto deficits over 
the next decade.
  Perhaps more realistic are the outside, nonpartisan estimates that 
actually account for what we all know: Democrats would never let the 
new entitlements in their bill expire. Those more realistic estimates 
put the total cost--listen to this--just short of $5 trillion, at a 
time when Chairman Powell, who has been willing to let the country run 
hot, is now warning that current uncertainties could keep inflation 
elevated to a troubling level.
  Now, I could talk all day about how the actual contents of this bill 
would hurt American families even more, about how it would take another 
big step toward socialized medicine and pour cold water on the 
innovations and cures that save lives, how it would incinerate huge 
chunks of our energy sector and the jobs it supports in order to keep 
pace with green preferences of California liberals, how it would 
wrestle authority over intimate decisions about childcare away from 
American families and put it in the hands of Washington bureaucrats, 
but the overall picture is impossible to mistake: Inflation is hurting 
the American people, and Democrats want to print, borrow, and spend 
trillions more--the most out-of-touch agenda you could possibly 
imagine.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Padilla). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                                Abortion

  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, tomorrow the Supreme Court will hear oral 
arguments in the Dobbs case, which deals with a Mississippi law that 
would prohibit most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. This case 
offers the best opportunity in many years to see Roe v. Wade overturned 
or modified--something that is long overdue.
  Roe v. Wade was a bad decision that should long ago have been 
reversed. Legal scholars from across the ideological spectrum have 
criticized the decision, noting, in the words of one expert:

       As constitutional argument, Roe is barely coherent. The 
     court pulled its fundamental right to choose more or less 
     from the constitutional ether.

  As another legal scholar put it, Roe is ``a very bad decision . . . 
because it is bad constitutional law, or rather because it is not 
constitutional law and gives almost no sense of an obligation to try to 
be.''
  Now, I should note that both of the individuals I just quoted are 
actually supportive--supportive--of abortion. But like many others, 
both recognize that Roe is simply bad law.
  In the Roe decision, the Supreme Court reached far beyond the 
Constitution in the Court's interpretive role to impose a new abortion 
regime on the entire country, and it is past time for this 
unconstitutional decision to be overturned and for the Court to return 
jurisdiction over abortion to the States.
  It is important to note that overturning Roe would do just that: 
return jurisdiction over abortion to the States and to elected 
officials who can be held accountable for the decisions and ultimately 
to the American people.
  Many assume, incorrectly, that overturning Roe would somehow 
automatically ban abortion nationwide. It would not. It would simply 
return jurisdiction to the people's elected representatives.
  Abortion law would become the domain of States and Congress, instead 
of the domain of unelected, activist members of the judiciary.
  Members of the radical pro-abortion lobby, which controls the 
abortion policies of the Democrat Party, are, of course, up in arms 
over the Dobbs case. They are terrified--terrified--that the Supreme 
Court will overturn Roe, and I suspect that the root of that fear is 
the knowledge that they need an activist Court for the radical abortion 
agenda.
  Why? Because the American people do not agree with the radical 
abortion lobby on abortion.
  For all its efforts to paint abortion on demand at any time up until 
the moment of birth as the only possible position, the pro-abortion 
lobby has completely failed to convince the American people.
  Polls consistently show that a strong majority of the American people 
support at least some restrictions on abortion. Gallup has been polling 
on abortion for decades, and in all that time, the percentage of 
Americans who believe abortion should be legal under any circumstance 
has always remained under 35 percent. In fact, for most of the past 
several decades, that number has remained squarely under 30 percent.
  An Associated Press poll from this June found that 65 percent of 
Americans believe that abortion should generally be illegal in the 
second trimester--or from about 13 weeks of pregnancy--while a whopping 
80 percent of Americans believe that abortion should generally be 
illegal in the third trimester. And it is no surprise.
  Despite the abortion lobby's attempts to dehumanize unborn children 
and portray them as nothing more than clumps of cells or unwanted 
growths, most Americans are well aware that an unborn child is a baby, 
a human being, an innocent human being.
  And because Americans generally gravitate toward justice and the 
defense of human rights and vulnerable human beings, they remain--
despite the best efforts of the abortion lobby--fundamentally 
uncomfortable with unrestricted abortion.
  And so I think the root of the abortion lobby's outrage is the 
knowledge that if Roe is overturned, their radical abortion agenda is 
unlikely to prevail nationwide because the American people simply do 
not agree with them on abortion.
  The pro-abortion lobby and its allies in the Democrat Party would 
like Americans to believe that Mississippi's 15-week abortion ban is 
extreme, radical legislation. Well, nothing could be further from the 
truth.
  In fact, the United States of America--the United States of America--
is a radical outlier on abortion. We are one of only seven countries in 
the world that allows elective abortion past 20 weeks--one of just 
seven countries in the entire world. Among those other countries are 
China and North Korea, not exactly the kind of company you want to be 
keeping when it comes to defending human rights.
  Forty-seven out of fifty European countries--47 out of 50--either 
require women to have a specific reason for seeking an abortion or 
limit elective abortion to 15 weeks or earlier. Thirty-two European 
countries, including France, Denmark, Switzerland, Norway, and many 
others, limit elective abortion to at or before 12 weeks' gestation.
  Now, let's consider that for just a minute. A substantial majority of 
European countries limit abortion to at or before 12 weeks. In other 
words, Mississippi's 15-week abortion law is not on the radical fringe 
when it comes to abortion; it is squarely in the mainstream for Western 
democracies, and it is, in fact, more permissive than the abortion laws 
of a majority of European countries. And yet the abortion lobby would 
have us believe that Mississippi is pushing some kind of extreme 
abortion legislation.
  Let's talk about unborn babies at 15 weeks. Fifteen-week-old unborn 
children have fully developed hearts that have already beaten more than 
15 million times. They yawn. They make facial expressions. They suck 
their thumbs. They respond to taste and touch. Scientific evidence 
suggests that they can feel pain.
  Pro-abortion activists may not like to hear it, but scientific 
evidence shows that the neural connections necessary to transmit pain 
are fully in place by around 20 weeks and that babies may actually 
begin to experience pain as early as 12 weeks.
  So when we are talking about a 15-week-old unborn baby, we are 
talking about a baby who may very well already be able to experience 
pain and will certainly be able to experience it a few weeks later, if 
she can't now. Yet in this country, it is perfectly legal to kill 
unborn children who are able to

[[Page S8810]]

feel pain and kill them with an abortion procedure so brutal and 
barbaric it is difficult to even describe.
  Yet it needs to be mentioned because we need to acknowledge the 
reality that we are killing unborn babies in this country capable of 
feeling pain, using a widely employed abortion procedure that involves 
dismembering the unborn child. As I said, it is incredibly hard--in 
fact, it is heartbreaking, really--to even talk about it.

  The abortion lobby would like to draw a veil over what happens inside 
abortion clinics, but the truth is that abortions are brutal and 
inhumane--certainly to the baby but, in many respects, to the mother as 
well.
  Since the Supreme Court handed down the Roe v. Wade decision, there 
have been an estimated 62 million-plus abortions in the United States. 
That number is so big, it is pretty much unfathomable. To put it in 
some kind of perspective, 62 million is nearly three times the 
population of the entire State of Florida. That is how many unique, 
unrepeatable human beings we have lost to abortion since Roe.
  We are better than this, and we have to do better than this. Our 
country was founded to safeguard human rights. We haven't always lived 
up to that promise, but we have never stopped trying. And it is time 
for us to continue that work by standing up for the most vulnerable 
human beings among us: the unborn children, whose human rights are not 
protected and whose lives can be taken away at any time.
  Thanks to medical advancements, it is possible for babies born at 22 
weeks to survive outside their mothers. It is also perfectly legal to 
kill unborn children at 22 weeks. Now, something is radically wrong 
with that picture.
  How can an unborn child of 22 weeks be regarded as a human being 
worthy of protection in one case and in the other case be regarded as 
nothing but a clump of cells to be disposed of in an abortion clinic?
  The cognitive dissonance is mind-boggling.
  The more we learn about unborn children, the more we see their 
humanity. It is impossible to look at an unborn baby kicking her feet 
and sucking her thumb on an ultrasound and see her as anything but the 
human being that she is. Science, medical advancements, and plain old 
common sense all point inexorably to the humanity of the unborn child.
  And human beings deserve to be protected. A good place to start would 
be with laws like Mississippi's, laws that would bring us into the 
mainstream of abortion laws worldwide. As I have said, the United 
States is one of just seven countries in the entire world, including 
China and North Korea, that allow elective abortion past 20 weeks of 
pregnancy. I would like to think that we can do a better job of 
protecting unborn children's human rights than China and North Korea.
  So I hope that the Supreme Court will uphold Mississippi's law and 
open the door to greater protection for unborn children. But win or 
lose--win or lose--I and many, many, many others will continue to stand 
up for the human rights of unborn Americans; and I am confident that, 
in the end, right and justice and life will prevail.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (The remarks of Mr. BARRASSO pertaining to the introduction of S. 
3287 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced 
Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
  Mr. BARRASSO. I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. KING. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                    Nomination of Corey Hinderstein

  Mr. KING. Mr. President, I have the responsibility and the privilege 
to be the chair of something called the Strategic Forces Subcommittee 
of the Committee on Armed Services.
  Strategic forces is a euphemism for nuclear weapons, and it is one of 
the most serious threats that we continue to face. We face threats all 
over the world from pandemics, from terrorism, from a rising China, 
from a belligerent Russia, but one of the most serious that sometimes 
gets lost in the discussion is the unthinkable catastrophe that would 
be a nuclear exchange.
  Throughout the last 70-plus years, our principle strategy for dealing 
with that threat has been deterrence, the idea that if you use nuclear 
weapons against the United States of America, you will pay the heaviest 
of prices, and that deterrence has worked. There hasn't been a use of 
nuclear weapon since 1945, and there are now several--I can't say the 
exact number for classification reasons--but there are a number of 
nuclear countries in the world, nuclear-armed countries, China and 
Russia among them. China is expanding its nuclear capability 
exponentially. Over the past several years, they have been embarked on 
an enormous buildup of their nuclear capability.
  But I want to talk about a nuclear threat today in the context of the 
nomination that I am going to move in a few moments that, to me, is one 
of the most terrifying because it is a nuclear threat that deterrence 
doesn't work on--a nuclear threat that deterrence, the fundamental 
strategy of our prevention of nuclear conflict for 70 years, doesn't 
work.
  What is that threat? The threat of nuclear terrorism. If you are not 
representing a country and if you don't care about dying, then the idea 
of a nuclear response doesn't scare you. It doesn't deter you from 
taking that kind of action.
  How do we defend against that? What is deterrence 2.0 in the current 
world where international terrorism--although it has not been on the 
front pages recently--is still there?
  ISIS-K, ISIS, al-Qaida, al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula are all 
still there. Boko Haram in Africa--they are all still there. They are 
all plotting. They are all working on ways that they can attack the 
West and the United States of America.
  If they could get ahold of the nuclear technology and nuclear 
building block, which is enriched uranium, they would use it. The 
terrorists who killed 3,000 people on September 11 would kill--would 
have killed 3 million if they could have.
  And so keeping nuclear materials and nuclear technology out of the 
hands of terrorists is, to me, one of the most important functions that 
our government can perform.
  And that brings me to the nomination of Corey Hinderstein for the 
position of Deputy Administrator for Nuclear Nonproliferation. She is 
immensely qualified and has worked in this field for almost 20 years; 
has worked on nuclear proliferation and nonproliferation issues for 
most of those years, both in the government and in the private sector. 
I would venture to say there is probably no one in the United States 
who knows as much about this subject as she does.
  Ms. Hinderstein will be responsible for a major part of the budget--
$1.9 billion--but she is responsible for controlling the proliferation 
of nuclear materials, and that is so critical in light of the threat of 
nuclear terrorism. The only way we can keep them from attacking us is 
intelligence, knowing what is coming, and keeping these materials out 
of their hands; and that is why this job is so important.
  She was approved by the committee and recommended to the Senate 40 
days ago. It is time to move this nomination. Nominations can be held 
up for a variety of reasons and some policy reasons, and I understand 
that, but not in this case. And I am happy to report that it appears 
that this nomination will not be held up because I think all of our 
colleagues realize how important this function is in the government.
  The most--the best nuclear strike is the one that doesn't occur. The 
only way to prevent that is to stop the proliferation of nuclear 
materials. This problem is only growing. We know that Iran is now 
enriching uranium to a much higher extent than they did under the 
JCPOA. We know that North Korea is pursuing its own nuclear ambitions. 
India, Pakistan both have nuclear programs. So this is a clear and 
present danger to the United States of

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America, and that is why this nomination is so important.

                          ____________________