[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 211 (Tuesday, December 7, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8952-S8955]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          MOTION TO DISCHARGE

  Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I move to discharge S.J. Res. 31 from the 
Foreign Relations Committee.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The motion is pending.
  Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, the most common cause of famine and 
starvation is war. Saudi Arabia's air and naval blockade of Yemen has 
led to thousands and thousands of deaths in Yemen from lack of food and 
medicine. The United States should end all arms sales to the Saudis 
until they end their blockade of Yemen.
  President Biden said he would change the Trump policy of supporting 
Saudi's war in Yemen, but it is not all that apparent that policy has 
changed.
  Today, we challenge the Biden administration's sale of $650 million 
worth of arms, including air-to-air missiles in Yemen.
  Just 2 months ago, the Biden administration approved $500 million 
worth of arms, including maintenance for attack helicopters that are 
used in Yemen.
  Some want to differentiate offensive weapons from defensive weapons, 
but, really, even defensive weapons can be used to allow a country to 
absorb attacks in order to continue their offensive operations.
  The real question is not an artificial designation of weapons as 
offensive or defensive but whether Congress is serious about using the 
leverage of arms sales or withholding arms sales to end the blockade in 
Yemen.
  That the Biden administration continues to reward Saudi Arabia with 
weapons seems to indicate that President Biden is not really serious 
about withholding arms sale to end the war in Yemen.
  Indeed, if this administration were serious about ending the Saudi 
blockade, they could do one thing, and this thing would end the war 
tomorrow, would end the blockade tomorrow. The Saudis, I think, would 
immediately stop the blockade if this administration would stop sending 
spare parts and stop fixing the planes.
  Bruce Reidel of Brookings writes that ``the Saudi air force would be 
grounded in short order'' if we quit sending them spare parts, quit 
repairing their aircraft. We could stop this war if we really had the 
will to do it.
  All America should be appalled at the humanitarian disaster caused by 
the Saudi blockade of Yemen. For years now, ships that would otherwise 
carry food, fuel, and medicine are turned away by the Saudi-led 
coalition, depriving the Yemeni people of the necessities to sustain 
civilization.
  Yemen is one of the poorest countries on the planet. They have to 
import their food. The blockade is killing their children.
  Saudi Arabia's intervention in the Yemeni civil war is a chilling 
example of the cruelty of warfare by starvation. According to the 
United Nations, in Yemen 5 million people are one step away from 
succumbing to famine and disease, and 10 million more are right behind 
them.
  We can start the process of ending this crisis by enacting this 
resolution of disapproval.
  The children of Yemen who survive Saudi's barbaric blockade will 
inevitably tell their sons and daughters of the horrors of their youth, 
and those sons and daughters will tell their sons and daughters. 
Through oral tradition, a thousand generation of Yemenis will know of 
the Crown Prince's ruthlessness, and they will also know that it was 
the Americans who sold the weapons to wage this murderous campaign.
  The reports from Yemen are literally a nightmare. The Washington Post 
reported recently of a 3-year-old boy who cannot walk or speak, who 
weighs 10 pounds--a 3-year-old boy who weighs 10 pounds. The images are 
grotesque. His face is ``skeletal.'' His arms and legs are as ``thin as 
twigs.'' He weighs 10 pounds. His father says that he sometimes goes 
days without any food.
  And we are complicit. We are arming the Saudis and allowing this to 
happen. Offensive, defensive--they shouldn't get any of our weapons. We 
should stop selling them any weapons until they stop starving the 
country of Yemen.
  The New York Times tells the story of a mother who, after 3 days of 
failing to get a ride, carried her 8-month-old while walking 2 hours to 
reach medics to treat her child's acute malnutrition. But even after a 
week of treatment with enriched formula, the boy still lay motionless 
on his hospital bed.
  Tens of thousands of children have already died from disease and 
malnutrition from this war, and we should not be complicit. We should 
not be aiding the Saudis.

[[Page S8953]]

  International aid agencies, which also have to fight the Saudi 
blockade to provide assistance, put it this way:

       The people of Yemen are not starving. They are being 
     starved.

  The Saudi's siege of Yemen is made possible because of American 
weaponry. The arsenal provided by the United States includes billions 
of dollars' worth of military aircraft and thousands of air-to-ground 
munitions.
  Only weeks ago, the Biden administration approved a new $650 million 
sale of 280 advanced medium air-to-air missiles and 596 missile 
launchers. As painful as it is to admit, the United States is an 
accessory to this Saudi savagery.
  President Biden says the latest sale is merely to help defend Saudi 
territorial integrity, but the Commander in Chief's words do not match 
Saudi actions. According to William Hartung, the director of the Arms 
and Security Program for the Center for International Policy, ``the air 
blockade is enforced by a threat to shoot down any aircraft, military 
or civilian, that enters Yemeni air space. . . . The provision of air-
to-air missiles gives further credibility to this threat, dissuading 
any government or aid group from bringing in crucial medicines or 
flying patients in and out of Yemen.
  These weapons are not purely defensive. They are used as a threat to 
any aircraft that brings aid into Yemen, and they are part of the 
blockade. They are part of the problem, and it is our leverage.
  These weapons belong to the American people. They may be made by 
private companies, but they are owned by the American people because we 
commission these weapons, and we should not give them to countries that 
are starving children and committing, essentially, genocide in Yemen.
  In other words, no weapon is exclusively defensive, and continuing 
arms sales means continued death and destruction in Yemen.
  We must end America's complicity in Saudi Arabia's war on the Yemeni 
people. If you believe in humanitarianism, if you believe America is a 
force for good that serves as a model for other nations to emulate, if 
you believe that the crushing of the Yemeni people must be stopped, 
then you must vote for this resolution of disapproval.
  We have a chance to tell the Crown Prince that American arms sales 
will end until he gives up his starvation campaign. We can end the 
Saudi blockade and bring relief to the long-suffering people of Yemen.
  Should we fail to seize this opportunity, history will not let us 
forget that America, the last best hope for humanity, failed to protect 
defenseless civilians from the cruelty of a criminal regime.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I find myself in the somewhat 
uncomfortable and unusual position of agreeing with Senator Paul. And 
let me thank him and Senator Lee for their hard work in reclaiming 
Congress's congressional war powers, another very important issue. The 
understanding that it is Congress that has the constitutional 
responsibility to authorize war--not the President--should, in fact, 
transcend partisan disagreements.
  On November 18, we introduced a congressional resolution of 
disapproval to block the sale of 280 air-to-air missiles, 596 missile 
launchers, and other weapons and support--totaling some $650 million--
to Saudi Arabia. That is what we will be voting on in a few minutes.
  Let me be very clear. As the Saudi Government continues to wage its 
devastating war in Yemen and repress its own people, we should not be 
rewarding them with more arms sales. We should be demanding that they 
end the devastating war in Yemen, which has killed over 230,000 people 
in one of the very poorest countries on Earth. For more than 6 years, 
the Saudi-led military intervention in Yemen's civil war has been a key 
driver of the largest humanitarian disaster in the world--the largest.
  According to UNICEF, four out of every five children in Yemen need 
humanitarian assistance--that is over 11 million children--400,000 
children suffer from severe malnutrition; 1.7 million children have 
been displaced from their homes by violence from this war; and some 15 
million people, more than half of whom are children, do not have access 
to safe water, sanitation, or hygiene.
  United Nations humanitarian relief coordinator Martin Griffiths said 
in September: ``The country's economy has reached new depths of 
collapse, and a third wave of the pandemic is threatening to crash the 
country's already fragile healthcare system.''
  According to Griffiths, millions of Yemenis are ``a step away from 
starvation.'' In other words, this poor country is hell on Earth. It is 
the worst humanitarian disaster on a planet.
  Under first the Obama administration and then the Trump 
administration, the United States was Saudi Arabia's partner in this 
horrific war. In 2019, Congress made history--and I am very proud of 
that, and we did this in a bipartisan way--by passing the first-ever 
War Powers Resolution through both Chambers of Congress, pressing then-
President Trump to end this military support. It marked the first time 
that Congress invoked the War Powers Resolution of 1973 to direct the 
President to withdraw troops from an undeclared war.
  Sadly, tragically, President Trump vetoed that resolution.
  Many of us welcomed the Biden administration's announcement earlier 
this year that it would end U.S. support for offensive military 
operations led by Saudi Arabia in Yemen and name a special envoy to 
help bring this conflict to an end, but the crisis has only continued.
  American defense contractors continue to service Saudi planes that 
are waging the war, and the U.S. military also continues to provide 
intelligence to the Saudi Armed Forces. And now, tonight, we are 
looking at a new $650 million arms sale to the Saudi Armed Forces.
  Now, I am aware that ending U.S. military support for Saudi Arabia's 
brutal assault will not alone end the multisided conflict in Yemen. The 
Houthis are launching bloody attacks on the central Yemeni city of 
Marib and increasing cross-border attacks on Saudi territory. Violence 
has also erupted between rival factions in the south of Yemen. A U.N. 
expert panel found that all parties to the conflict may have committed 
war crimes.
  U.S. policy toward Saudi Arabia and this war should be clear: The 
United States must do everything in our power to bring this brutal and 
horrific war to an end. Exporting more missiles to Saudi Arabia does 
nothing but further this conflict and pour more gasoline on an already 
raging fire.
  In my view, the United States must support an international observer 
mission along the Saudi-Yemeni border and spearhead generous 
international development efforts to rebuild Yemen. This aid should be 
focused on bolstering local humanitarian and development initiatives, 
like Yemen's Social Fund for Development.
  We must also dramatically increase our diplomatic engagement to press 
Saudi Arabia, the Riyadh-based Republic of Yemen Government, and the 
Houthis to accept the U.N.'s roadmap as the basis for a compromise that 
ends foreign military intervention and allows Yemenis to come to an 
agreement. The war has gone on for too long, and it is time for the 
United States to be bold and to be decisive in bringing about peace.
  I also think that it is long past time that we took a very hard look 
at our relationship with Saudi Arabia, a country whose government 
represents the very opposite of what we profess to believe in. Saudi 
Arabia is an extremely undemocratic country that is run by a 
hereditary, authoritarian monarchy, one of the wealthiest families in 
the world whose wealth is estimated to be over $1.4 trillion.
  At a time when children in Yemen are starving to death, when that 
impoverished country's healthcare system is collapsing, when the people 
of Gaza are suffering mass unemployment and environmental devastation, 
when people throughout that region lack clean drinking water, Saudi 
Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman bought himself a $500 million yacht, a 
$300 million French chateau, and a $450 million Leonardo da Vinci 
painting. Mass starvation in the region that he helped create, children 
do not have housing or drinking water, and this guy buys himself a $450 
million da Vinci painting.
  According to Freedom House, a respected human rights organization:


[[Page S8954]]


  

       Saudi Arabia's absolute monarchy restricts almost all 
     political rights and civil liberties. No officials at the 
     national level are elected. The regime relies on pervasive 
     surveillance, the criminalization of dissent, appeals to 
     sectarianism and ethnicity, and public spending supported by 
     oil revenues to maintain power. Women and religious 
     minorities face extensive discrimination in law and in 
     practice.

  Freedom House also notes that working conditions for the large 
migrant labor force are extremely exploitive.
  Saudi Arabia is home to millions of migrant workers, many from 
African countries but also from Pakistan, India, and elsewhere. These 
workers constitute more than 80 percent of the private-sector 
workforce, often as laborers and other service workers. They are 
governed by an abusive system that gives their employers excessive 
power over their mobility and legal status in the country. As a result, 
these migrant workers are vulnerable to a wide range of abuses, from 
passport confiscation to delayed wages and forced labor.
  According to Human Rights Watch, under the government headed by Crown 
Prince Muhammad bin Salman, ``Saudi Arabia has experienced the worst 
period of oppression in its modern history.''
  Human Rights Watch reported earlier this year that ``accounts have 
emerged of alleged torture of high-profile political detainees in Saudi 
prisons,'' including Saudi women's rights activists and others. The 
alleged torture included electric shocks, beatings, whippings, and 
sexual harassment.
  And I think we all understand the nature of this government. Every 
Member of Congress and I hope every American knows--and our own 
intelligence services made this very clear--that Muhammad bin Salman 
himself ordered the murder and the dismemberment of Washington Post 
columnist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018 in retaliation for Khashoggi's 
criticisms of the Saudi regime. We all remember that terrible, terrible 
murder of a Washington Post columnist.
  We also know that the Saudi regime has waged a campaign of harassment 
and attempted kidnapping against other critics, including on U.S. soil.
  My simple question is: Why in the world would the United States 
reward such a regime which has caused such pain in Yemen with more 
weapons?
  My friends, the answer is we should not. I urge my colleagues to 
support S.J. Res. 31.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. President, I rise today to oppose the joint 
resolution of disapproval on the sale of air-to-air missiles to Saudi 
Arabia, which are being used to defend against armed drone attacks from 
the Houthis.
  I think everybody in this body well knows that I carefully consider 
every arms sale that comes before the Senate Foreign Relations 
Committee for review. Arms sales are a critical tool of foreign policy 
that can help bolster alliances while keeping Americans and our 
partners safe.
  However, we have to ensure that our arms sales policies adhere to our 
core values, including respect for human rights and human dignity. It 
is for that very same reason that I, along with a series of my 
colleagues here, introduced the Safeguarding Human Rights in Arms 
Exports Act--or the SAFEGUARD Act--to make the protection and promotion 
of human rights a core statutory principle in our arms sales export and 
monitoring process.
  This legislation would enhance our collective oversight of all arms 
sales to countries that abuse human rights, and I hope it receives 
consideration in this body and in the House soon.
  Now, my colleagues may well remember in 2019 and 2020, that when I 
truly believe an arms sale undermines our American values, our national 
security, or when 22 sales are notified under false ``emergency'' 
pretenses, for example, I will not hesitate to use the tools we have to 
stop those sales. In fact, that is exactly what we did in this body 
when I came to this floor and led that effort, in conjunction with 
others.
  Beyond these extreme measures, the committee carefully consults with 
the State Department and others on the ground to fully understand how 
weapons will be used.
  We have all known for years that there is no military solution to the 
devastating and tragic conflict in Yemen. Indeed, the Senate Foreign 
Relations Committee passed my bipartisan Saudi Arabia Accountability 
and Yemen Act in 2019, which would have halted certain arms sales, 
stopped refueling, imposed accountability on the people involved in the 
murder of Jamal Khashoggi, and sought to end the suffering of the 
Yemeni people. Unfortunately, the full Senate failed to act.
  Make no mistake, the Saudi-led coalition bears the brunt of the 
responsibility for the devastation in Yemen. Yet I, along with most 
Members of this body, have always supported the use of weapons systems 
in defense of civilian populations.
  I wish to remind my colleagues that the Biden administration has 
largely suspended sales of many of the offensive weapons the Trump 
administration was all too happy to sell to the Saudis. However, there 
is no denying that the Houthis have been increasingly deploying more 
sophisticated weapons, particularly armed aerial drones, to target 
civilian populations in Saudi Arabia, and let's not also forget that we 
have 70,000 American citizens living in Saudi Arabia.
  The weapons up for discussion today are being used in this context to 
defend against these aerial attacks. As air-to-air missiles, they are 
largely incapable of attacking civilian targets or infrastructure--a 
critical factor in my decision to support the sale.
  While some have argued they could be used to support the Saudi 
blockade, the fact is that most humanitarian aid is delivered via land 
and sea. Indeed, tragically, the Saudis have been perfectly capable of 
blocking the delivery of aid for many years, and in more recent years, 
the Houthis have also created abhorrent obstacles for the delivery of 
food, medical supplies, and other vital humanitarian aid, contributing 
to the worst humanitarian crisis in the world.
  While I believe the United States must continue pushing for a 
political solution to the crisis in Yemen--and I agree with several of 
the things said by my colleague Senator Sanders--I also believe that we 
should continue supporting efforts to stop attacks on civilians. 
According to the State Department, there have been close to 400 Houthi 
attacks this year, many of which get past the Patriot missile defense 
system.
  I know that many see this vote as an opportunity to voice 
dissatisfaction with Saudi Arabia over a variety of its policies, from 
Yemen to the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, which we have not forgotten, to 
the harassment of American citizens and their family members.
  So let me be clear that I completely agree with the need to push 
harder to hold Saudi leadership accountable for a variety of actions. I 
even offered a bill last month as an amendment to the NDAA to do just 
that, and I am hopeful we will see some of that language in a final 
product. But I also believe it is important that our security partners 
know that we will uphold our commitments and prioritize security 
arrangements that protect civilians.
  For that reason, I will oppose efforts to stop this particular sale. 
I will continue to hold sales as I have--there are many other sales 
that have not moved forward that I have not permitted to get out of the 
committee--and continue my efforts to hold Saudi leadership accountable 
and encourage my colleagues to do the same.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, fellow Senators, I rise to oppose the 
matter that is before us, and I want to rise in support of the sale of 
these particular weapons to the Saudis.
  The Saudis are an ally of ours. As with many allies, they have items 
that we don't agree with, and those obviously have been highlighted 
here on the floor today. My colleague, the chairman of the Foreign 
Relations Committee, has laid out exactly why we need to see that the 
sale goes through.
  There have been 240-plus drone missiles to strike Saudi targets this 
year. The latest one was just yesterday. These are Houthi rebel drones 
that come out of Yemen. They are provided to them by the Iranians. This 
thing would be over if the Iranians would back away and get out of 
this.
  I agree that we need to press for a solution here. What is going on 
in Yemen

[[Page S8955]]

is one of--not the but close to it--one of the worst humanitarian 
crises on the planet today. In fact, what is going on there, it is 
going to get worse as this year goes on. As the Senator from New Jersey 
indicated, the Houthis have been really unhelpful in getting 
humanitarian supplies to the people of Yemen, who badly need it.
  The Saudis, obviously, need the weaponry that is included in this 
sale. There are a lot of American citizens in Saudi Arabia, and we 
should support our allies when they are doing defensive things like 
this to defend themselves, to defend Americans who are present in their 
country. We all hope that this will reach a resolution in the near 
future.
  The Iranians are the ones who are stoking this fire. The Houthis are 
not helpful to us. But we need to help the Saudis defend themselves. So 
I would urge a ``no'' vote on this matter before us.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican leader.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, earlier this year, a disastrous retreat 
from Afghanistan gave our allies and partners reason to doubt that the 
United States could be counted on. Today, some of our colleagues want 
to double down on that mistake by blocking defensive support to yet 
another important partner.
  Saudi Arabia is literally surrounded by violent threats conceived, 
funded, and orchestrated by Iran. To the north, they have got Iran-
backed terrorists sowing violence in Iraq and Syria. To the east, they 
have a gulf filled with the flags of Iran's own increasingly 
belligerent navy. To the south, the Saudis have Iran-backed Houthi 
terrorists strangling Yemen and lobbying rockets, missiles, and armed 
drones over their border.
  To be sure, this violence and the plight of the Yemeni people have 
only worsened since the Biden administration removed the Houthis from 
the terrorist list and imposed new restrictions on our support to the 
Saudi-led coalition.
  Around the world, from time to time, we all have legitimate concerns 
about the behavior of our partners, but we are in a better position to 
influence their conduct if they trust in our partnership. So our 
colleagues don't get to vent their moral outrage in a vacuum without 
accounting for what comes next.
  A vote to block the sale of defensive military systems to Saudi 
Arabia would undermine one of our most important regional partners, but 
there is even more at stake. Whether we help or not, our Arab partners 
will still be under siege tomorrow. They still need military 
capabilities to defend themselves. And we know that Russia and China 
will happily sell them advanced weapons systems. The importance of so-
called great power competition is a matter of general consensus. So we 
should be wary of turning our backs on longtime partners and of pushing 
them into the arms of our adversaries.
  So here is what our colleagues' resolution would actually do. It 
would give the world yet another reason to doubt the resolve of the 
United States, and it would give our biggest adversaries a new foothold 
to exert their influence over a rapidly changing and important region.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
  Mr. MENENDEZ. I ask that all remaining time be yielded back.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                      Vote on Motion to Discharge

  The question is on agreeing to the motion to discharge.
  Mr. MENENDEZ. I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  The result was announced--yeas 30, nays 67, as follows:
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Leahy) is 
necessarily absent.
  Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Arkansas (Mr. Cotton) and the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. 
Lankford).

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 484 Leg.]

                                YEAS--30

     Baldwin
     Booker
     Brown
     Cantwell
     Casey
     Duckworth
     Durbin
     Gillibrand
     Heinrich
     Hirono
     Kaine
     Lee
     Lujan
     Markey
     Merkley
     Murray
     Ossoff
     Padilla
     Paul
     Peters
     Sanders
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Smith
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Van Hollen
     Warnock
     Warren
     Wyden

                                NAYS--67

     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blackburn
     Blumenthal
     Blunt
     Boozman
     Braun
     Burr
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Cassidy
     Collins
     Coons
     Cornyn
     Cortez Masto
     Cramer
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Ernst
     Feinstein
     Fischer
     Graham
     Grassley
     Hagerty
     Hassan
     Hawley
     Hickenlooper
     Hoeven
     Hyde-Smith
     Inhofe
     Johnson
     Kelly
     Kennedy
     King
     Klobuchar
     Lummis
     Manchin
     Marshall
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Murphy
     Portman
     Reed
     Risch
     Romney
     Rosen
     Rounds
     Rubio
     Sasse
     Scott (FL)
     Scott (SC)
     Shaheen
     Shelby
     Sinema
     Sullivan
     Thune
     Tillis
     Toomey
     Tuberville
     Warner
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Young

                             NOT VOTING--3

     Cotton
     Lankford
     Leahy
  The motion was rejected.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Hassan). The Senator from Washington.

                          ____________________