[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 81 (Monday, May 15, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1636-S1637]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                          Military Promotions

  Now, Mr. President, another topic I cannot believe I must address yet 
again here on the Senate floor is that of military holds.
  Over the past few months, the senior Senator from Alabama has 
singlehandedly--singlehandedly--hindered our national security by 
blocking hundreds of critical military appointments. Those holds are 
hamstringing our military.
  According to former Secretaries of Defense who served Presidents of 
both parties, this blanket hold is ``harming military readiness and 
risks damaging the U.S. national security.''
  But last week, the Senator's conduct, as bad as it has been just by 
holding up these hundreds of general officers whose lives are in limbo 
even though they have given decades of service to our country and whom 
we depend on for our national defense--he is holding them up, but the 
Senator went even beyond that.
  In an interview over the radio, Senator Tuberville was asked if White 
supremacists should be allowed in the military, to which he, a member 
of the Armed Services Committee, responded by saying:

       Well, they call them that. I call them Americans.

  It is hard to believe he really said it, but check the record. He 
did--revolting, revolting down to the last word. The Senator from 
Alabama's words were revolting to so many across this country.
  A few days later, when asked to clarify his views on the matter, when 
he

[[Page S1637]]

was given a chance to make up for this awful mistake that will be a 
block on his record forever, Senator Tuberville then responded with 
``What is a White nationalist?''--as if it is some great mystery.
  ``What is a White nationalist?'' Are you kidding me? Are you kidding 
me, Senator?
  Let me give my colleague a hint on how to define a White nationalist. 
The man who, just over a year ago, murdered 10 people at a Tops 
supermarket in Buffalo, seeking to murder Black people, was a White 
nationalist. The insurrectionists who waved Confederate flags through 
the halls of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, many of them were White 
nationalists. And, sadly, some of those insurrectionists had military 
backgrounds.
  Again, what is a White nationalist? How about the parade of 
belligerents who carried torches through the streets of Charlottesville 
while screaming ``Jews will not replace us''? Senator Tuberville, those 
were White nationalists.
  And then he followed up by saying--I couldn't believe he said this: 
``I look at a White nationalist as a Trump Republican.'' Really? What 
the heck is happening in America?
  Leader McConnell cannot allow a Member of his conference to make a 
mockery of our military and of the Senate the way Senator Tuberville 
has done.
  If any of my Republican colleagues care whatsoever about the well-
being of our military, they will denounce the Senator's words and urge 
him to drop his holds.