[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 25 (Tuesday, February 7, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Page S246]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                 CHINA

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, now on the Chinese surveillance balloon, 
I strongly--very strongly--condemn President Xi's brazen incursion into 
American airspace with the Chinese surveillance balloon, and I commend 
President Biden for being calm, calculated, and effective in taking 
down the balloon over water to ensure the safety of Americans on the 
ground and to ensure we maximize our intelligence gains as we examine 
this balloon, which is far less likely to burn and crash into a million 
pieces in water than over land.
  Instead of criticizing China, I was shocked to hear MAGA 
Republicans--before they even knew what was happening, before they even 
knew the whole story--direct their criticism toward the President, 
saying that we should have shot down the balloon the moment we saw it. 
So it is clear that the MAGA Republican criticism was at best premature 
and at worst political.
  This is one area where we don't need politics. We need Democrats and 
Republicans to come together to condemn China and be a unified front 
against the CCP.
  President Biden and his team did the right thing. They waited and 
took down the balloon carefully, precisely, and with what both the 
military and intelligence experts urged them to do. Had the President 
not gone along with what the military said, I can imagine that some of 
these same Republicans, so highly political in their criticism, would 
have then criticized the President for not listening to the military 
leaders. But now we can recover most of the equipment and begin to 
analyze the technology in the way it was done.
  Again, I applaud President Biden for his leadership. And on Thursday, 
all Senators--all Senators--we have upgraded this. Because so many 
Senators wanted a briefing, I asked the administration to do it as an 
all-Senators briefing instead of the Gang of 8, and that is what is 
going to happen. So all Senators will receive a classified briefing 
from administration officials on the surveillance balloon.

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