Congressional Record, Volume 172 Issue 55 (Tuesday, March 24, 2026)

[Congressional Record Volume 172, Number 55 (Tuesday, March 24, 2026)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1570-S1577]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2026--Motion to
Proceed

Mr. THUNE. I move to proceed to Calendar No. 311, H.R. 7147.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:

Motion to proceed to Calendar No. 311, H.R. 7147, a bill
making further consolidated appropriations for the fiscal
year ending September 30, 2026, and for other purposes.

Mr. THUNE. 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. MURPHY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

War Powers Resolution

Mr. MURPHY. Mr. President, colleagues, in a few moments I am going to
call up for a vote--a resolution on a privileged motion to end the war
in Iran.
I am going to be joined on the floor by several of my colleagues, all
of us here in astonishment that 4 weeks into the most significant
conflict in the Middle East in most of our careers in this body--12-
plus Americans killed, $2 billion at least being spent every day,
thousands dead throughout the region--we have still not yet had a
single hearing in the United States Senate on the war in Iran.
We have not had a debate on a war authorization. We have not had a
vote to allow Senators to weigh in--up or down--as to whether they want
the United States to be at war again in the Middle East.
This is an extraordinary moment, and I know we risk engaging in
hyperbole these days, coming down to the floor and naming one moment as
extraordinary after another moment. But I don't think we have had a
moment like this, where the United States has been unquestionably at
war with a foreign power, where American soldiers are dying as we speak
and it is being hidden, actively, from the public by the Congress.
It is bad enough that we haven't had a debate and vote other than
those forced by Democrats. We haven't had a hearing in the Foreign
Relations Committee. We haven't had a hearing in the Armed Services
Committee.
Now, I think we know the reason. The reason is that this
administration cannot defend and explain this war. But if they cannot
and if they are not willing to come to Congress and defend this war, it
speaks to the indictment of the preparation and the strategy.
I am going to read to you an excerpt from a Washington Post article.
Now, the Washington Post has been very careful about their criticism of
the President recently:

A surge of additional U.S. forces to the Middle East and
President Donald Trump's threat to ``obliterate'' Iran's
energy infrastructure have set the stage for what U.S. and
Israeli security officials increasingly see as the war's . .
. endgame: a battle for control of the Strait of Hormuz and
key energy installations.
Reopening the strait . . . has emerged as perhaps the
paramount objective of [the] war . . . officials now believe
is unlikely to achieve goals that briefly seemed possible at
the outset of the [war] . . . including overthrowing Iran's
theocratic regime and putting a nuclear weapon permanently
out of Tehran's reach.

Let me restate that for you. The Trump administration now says that
the goal of the war is not to dislodge an anti-American regime in
Tehran; it is not to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon; it is not
even to permanently end Iran's ability to have missiles that can reach
their neighbors or drone capacity that can provoke in the region. The
primary goal now is to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Here is the problem: The strait was open before the war began. We are
now seeking to solve a problem that we created. This is insanity. Two
billion dollars is a lot of money. That is the minimum amount of money
that is being spent every single day on this war.
There are over a dozen families who are burying their loved ones in
the United States, and there may be dozens more if this war continues.
Prices are skyrocketing--not just in America but all across the world.
Notices just went out from DuPont to their customers that the price of
plastic is doubling. The price at the pump in many States is at $4, $5,
and going higher. Fertilizer: soon to be unaffordable for American
farmers. The consequences of this war are stunning in their scope:
higher prices for American businesses and American families, a
potential global recession, the wasting of billions of dollars of hard-
earned taxpayer dollars, and new conflicts in the region that didn't
exist before the war began.
In the last day, there have been 12 missile attacks inside Israel.
Just during this last vote, news broke of another missile attack on a
community, Bnei Brak, with nine people injured, six children injured.
Just in the last week, there have been multiple missile and drone
attacks on cities throughout Israel; six ballistic missiles from two
separate attacks hit the Kurdish region in Iraq, killing six Kurdish
fighters; and an Iranian missile attack on the Iranian-United States
base in Diego Garcia. That is 2,500 miles away from Tehran.
UAE has basically stopped giving out information about these drone
and missile attacks because they happen so frequently, but on Monday,
they did publicize they engaged with 16 drones and 7 ballistic
missiles. That was just on Monday.
Israel has invaded Lebanon. Those two countries are on the verge of
full-scale war. One-sixth of the population of Lebanon has already been
displaced. Syria is at risk of falling apart again.
We have created a catastrophe in the Middle East. We are lighting
taxpayer dollars on fire. We are causing prices to go up for everyone.
And what is our new war aim? Reopening the strait that was open
before we started the war.
This is basic incompetence. This is what you get when you put talk
show hosts and real estate developers in charge of American national
security: a war that makes absolutely no sense.
Even though our war aims have been reduced to simply undoing the
damage

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that we created, it is not even clear we can accomplish that goal. Word
is that Iran has now figured out that they can open the strait for
limited purposes if you pay them, and that may now be the permanent
state of affairs in the strait, that Iran will decide who gets to go
through and who doesn't.
That is not what happened before the war. We have created a new
reality in which Iran has more power over the global economy than they
have ever had before. We have not been able to stop their ability to
project power. They are still, today, 4 weeks into the war, firing
missiles and drones at their neighbors.
The regime that is in charge now is, according to analysts, worse
than the regime that it replaced. Yes, we killed a whole bunch of
people, including the Supreme Leader, but from everything we
understand, the group now in charge is more adversarial to U.S.
interests and is going to be more provocative in the region.
So this war makes absolutely no sense. And the only way to save
American consumers, the only way to try to put the pieces back together
in the region is for the war to end.
So I am glad to be joined here on the floor today by several of my
colleagues. Many of them have introduced similar resolutions. This will
be the third time that we have brought a War Powers Resolution before
the floor--Senator Kaine and then Senator Booker. This will likely not
be the last resolution that we will bring before the floor because we
have a sacred obligation handed to us by our Founding Fathers for this
body and the House of Representatives to decide war. It was a very
deliberate decision not to give the power to make war to one
individual--to the President of the United States--but to give it to
the people. And the people make their voice heard through their elected
Members of Congress.
And so if our Republican colleagues will not do their duty, if they
are going to engage in an effort to hide the consequences of the war,
if they are going to refuse to ask questions of our incompetent
national security leaders at the White House who have waged this war
without planning for the foreseeable consequences, then we will force a
debate and a vote on this floor.

This war is not going to make more sense the longer it goes. It is
not going to become more popular. Right now, by a 26-point margin,
Americans do not support this war. It will be harder as time goes on--
not easier--for my Republican colleagues to continue to vote for this
war as a vote against this resolution will be. But it is our
responsibility under the Constitution to have this debate, and I am
glad to have my colleagues on the floor to make this case to the Senate
as well.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
Ms. DUCKWORTH. Mr. President, I thank Senator Murphy.
Every day since he started this embarrassment of a war, Donald Trump
has saluted our troops with one hand and given them the middle finger
with the other--because despite the lies he tells on Truth Social, he
is actively making the choice to use our heroes as cannon fodder.
From the moment this conflict began, Trump has tried to shroud his
incompetence behind their valor. When asked to justify his actions, he
has tried to hide his ignorance and cowardice behind their courage. He
has tried to act as if questioning why we are at war is the same as
questioning the skill and bravery of our troops themselves. It isn't--
not at all.
I know that our military will always do the best job possible. When
given a mission, our servicemembers don't say: Why me? They don't ask:
But will I be safe? And they sure as hell don't run to their podiatrist
crying ``bone spurs.'' No.
Instead, they pack their rucksacks; they lace up their boots; they
show up. And they do what is asked of them--time after time and tour
after tour. They will always--always--execute their orders to the
maximum capability of their professionalism, and they are proud to do
it.
The problem is the man who is giving those orders. The problem is
that the Commander in Chief not only has no idea what the end state
looks like in this war of choice but probably doesn't even know what
the term ``end state'' means at all.
Look, I ran for Congress so that when the drums of war started
beating I would be in a position to make sure that our elected
officials fully considered the true cost of war, not just in dollars
and cents but in human lives of our heroes as well. So as those drums
sound louder than they have in years, I am here today because, despite
what he thinks, Trump does not have the authority to unilaterally force
our Nation into war. He may have never read the Constitution, but I
have.
So for the third time since this war began, let me direct his
attention to article I, which makes clear that the President does not
have the power to declare war--only Congress does. We are the ones
tasked with deciding when and how Americans are sent into combat. We
are the ones charged with that most solemn duty. Yet Trump is acting as
if article I simply doesn't exist, as if obeying the Constitution is
something that is optional, as if our founding document is just a
yellowing, crumbling piece of paper he can crumple at will.
Refusing to allow him to get away with this should not--must not--be
a partisan issue. No matter if you are struggling to pay rent or your
name is plastered in fake gold on a building on Fifth Avenue, no one
can ignore the Constitution. No matter if you are a Mar-a-Lago worker
pulling double shifts or the President of the United States, no one is
above the law. And no matter if you are a Democrat or a Republican, you
should know that our military men and women will always do their jobs.
So it is beholden on us as legislators to do our jobs before more of
our warriors lose their lives in service of theirs. Right now, our duty
is to demand accountability. It is to get answers. It is to make sure
that their mission is justified and feasible and worthy of the
sacrifices we are asking our military to make.
That is why I am here today: to make sure that we never again get
ourselves into an ego-driven forever war, just like we experienced the
last time a President rashly sent our sons and daughters into an
unjustified war in Iraq.
I am here now to stop a man who was never brave enough to serve in
uniform himself from using our heroes as cannon fodder.
Look, I am no dove. I know there are certain solemn, urgent times
when our military must make the call and be called up to defend our
Nation. There are certain moments when the threat in question is
significant and imminent, when military force is the most effective
tool at hand, when using it is necessary to protect Americans, and when
using military force would not create more threats than it eliminates.
Trump has shown no evidence that this was one of those times. Yet he
has had almost a month to do so. But if the administration actually
does believe that this war is justified, then they need to come to
Congress and tell us why. We are not hard to find. The Capitol is the
building with a big dome on top. It is about a 20-minute walk from the
White House. They just need to walk through our doors and actually do
their jobs.
They need to explain their case, respecting the American people
enough to tell them why they are being forced to take on the cost of
this conflict. They need to prove that they have thought this through,
that they can tell us what their plan is to stop this war. They need to
show us that they have even a concept of a plan of how to get to an end
state in Iran that would make us safer, not more threatened. Then, when
their case has been made, when Congress' debate is done, we in these
Chambers must vote. It is our job. It is our responsibility. It is our
burden.
Look, centuries ago, our Nation's Founders feared that one day,
America would be burdened with a Chief Executive who would be too fond
of conflict and chaos and that that leader's affinity for bloodshed
would have unthinkable consequences for the Nation at large. That--
that--is why they placed the power to declare war in the hands of
Congress, not a single person.
Trump won't bear the cost of this war that he started. His children
won't serve in harm's way. Even though they could volunteer, none of
them have. He has been lining his pockets with corrupt billions since
the moment he took

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office, so he won't worry about how far the cost of gas has been driven
up by his actions. No. It is the American people. They are the ones who
suffer in wars of choice, so it is the American people, through their
elected representatives, who should decide when war is worth that cost.
As those elected representatives, it is our obligation to consider
the interests of our constituents over those of one man and to stop our
Nation from teetering further into this nightmare. That is what we are
doing here this evening as we vote on Senator Murphy's War Powers
Resolution.
Americans deserve better than unanswered questions, unjustified
conflict, and unnecessary tragedy. Our men and women in uniform sure as
hell do as well. So until we get some answers, I will keep coming to
this floor; I will keep voting to withdraw our sons and daughters from
hostilities with Iran.
I am going to keep working to prevent the boots on the ground that
the President so casually, so callously threatens when he talks to the
press. I am going to keep demanding that the administration end this
deadly vanity project if they cannot justify the cost we have already
been forced to bear, both in dollars and cents and daughters and sons.
It is the least we can do for those willing to sacrifice the most for
our Nation.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
Mr. SCHIFF. Mr. President, last Friday, public reports indicated that
more than 2,500 marines stationed at Camp Pendleton in San Diego County
were now on their way to the Trump war in the Middle East, the Trump-
Iran war.
This is the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit aboard the USS Portland,
the USS Comstock, and the USS Boxer. Their voyage joins the amphibious
assault force aboard the USS Tripoli, which also called San Diego home
until last year.
With great uncertainty, Californians are now being called upon to be
the potential tip of the next spear in this war. The Marines'
recruiting slogan, going back to their founding in 1775, is ``First to
Fight,'' and they continue to live up to that slogan and that ethos.
They have been boots on the beaches of islands in the Pacific, the
trenches of Europe, in the mountains of Afghanistan, in the sands of
Iraq, in Syria, Africa, and theaters of American war everywhere, and
for centuries. And that is just it--they are boots on the ground in
times of war.
So as thousands of men and women have been called up to mobilize
around the world, what solace can we offer their families about what
awaits them? What can we tell them about this so-called excursion, as
the President refers to it, or, as he called it today--reluctant to use
the word ``war'' all of a sudden, he called it a military operation.
Well, this weekend marks 1 month that our Nation has been at war with
Iran, and already we have lost one American servicemember nearly every
2 days of the conflict.
On the second day of the war, that servicemember was CW3 Robert
Marzan from Sacramento, CA. He was killed in Kuwait by an Iranian
strike. His memory has burned brightly in the hearts of those who knew
him, and since his death, we have seen tributes pour in.
One said:

Rob was probably one of the best humans I've ever met. I
know that if I called him today, if he was still here, he
would drop what he was doing and help me.

Another said that Chief Warrant Officer Marzan and his family
``served as the surrogate family for a lot of soldiers'' for their unit
based in Des Moines.
In the true American spirit, these stories have been shared widely as
communities have come together to raise money to help fly those who
knew him home to California for his funeral later this month. That is a
solidarity that Americans know in time of war.
But the people who led us into this war did so without the consent of
the American people and without the authorization of this Congress. The
Commander in Chief, who called it war in his first public comments
about the strikes in Iran, now engages in semantics while thousands
more servicemembers ship out, halfway around the world.
We were also told that this war would end soon, but now the
President's extended deadline puts us on track for at least a month of
conflict, with more fighting in the future if Iran refuses to yield.
There is no deadline that anyone at this point can rely upon.
At least one Republican Senator is overtly calling for boots on the
ground, saying:

We did Iwo Jima, we can do this.

I just remind Members that the cost of Iwo Jima was high--6,821 dead,
19,217 wounded.
We have seen the timelines, the rationales, and even the baseline
facts of this conflict change by the day or even multiple times during
the same press conference. The goalposts have moved from regime change
and imminent threat to long-term freedom for the Iranian people and
then back to preventing them from building out a nuclear program that
was supposedly obliterated in a military operation only 9 months
earlier.
We can be fairly sure that before this war is over--perhaps even
before this week is over--the goalposts will move again. That is why
last week we stood here and forced the Senate to again go on record. We
cannot become ``Lucy with the football,'' constantly convinced that the
latest market-calming post by the President in the morning will mean we
will not have sent new marines off to the conflict zone that evening.
Last week, I stood here and reminded my colleagues of the words of
President Eisenhower, the architect of one of our Nation's greatest
military victories over a murderous regime.
He said:

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every
rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from
those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are
not clothed.

It is a reminder to all of us that Americans pay not just in the loss
of our servicemembers and the pain that overwhelms their families but
in the hardships and poverty that we will no longer be able to address
here at home, the illness that will go untreated, the school that will
go unopened, the road that will go unpaved, the senior that will go
unfed--as we drop the cost equivalent of 10 new hospitals a day on
Iran.

The Pentagon is proposing a $200 billion supplemental to fund this
war. Do you know what that means for your family? That means that the
cost for your family is $1,400. That is just the starting cost for this
supplemental funding bill--$1,400 for your family. That is not
including all the more you are paying at the pump and for everything
else; that is just the cost that is being proposed for your family.
Well, tonight, I stand here to remind my colleagues not just of
Eisenhower but of another Republican President, Herbert Hoover.
Hoover said:

Older men declare war. But it is the youth that must fight
and die.

The youth who are put at risk like the 2,500 marines sailing from San
Diego as we speak; the youth like the thousands of others already
sleeping in bunks aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln and the Gerald Ford.
In this case, older men have not even given them the decency of a
declaration of war. Instead, we have quietly walked up to the redline
that I know so many hold in their hearts when it comes to American
military power being used abroad.
We are on the cusp of American boots on the ground. And as the
goalposts have continued to shift and as we in this Congress have
continued to abdicate our responsibility, I ask my colleagues: Will
that still be your redline or will the President be allowed to put
American Special Forces in harm's way for a war that Congress has not
authorized, that has not been debated, that has not even held a single
open hearing to discuss; a war whose true purpose has been kept hidden
from most Americans; a war that by Saturday will have gone on for an
entire month without the support of the majority of the American people
and without the approval of the only part of government to whom the
Framers gave the power to approve military force: the Congress?
One month of war. And for what? A new Supreme Leader? A new hardliner
with a new appetite for revenge? A new windfall for Russia made
possible by American sanctions relief? A new skyrocketing price of gas?
A new rising

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toll on servicemembers and their families?
It is time to put a stop to this war before its costs rise further
still. It is time for the Congress of the United States to do its job.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, there is something awful going on here in
the U.S. Senate, and people should focus on it right now. The Senate is
not doing their job. And we see a President unilaterally going off to
fight a war--to declare war without any authority from the U.S. Senate
or the U.S. Congress.
What does it mean when the body that is supposed to provide checks
and balances checks out? What does it mean when the body that is
supposed to provide oversight covers its eyes and refuses to see what
is happening? What does it mean when the body that should be having
hearings on this war will not hear, will not look, will not ask
questions?
We are in a constitutional crisis, and Americans are paying the
cost--the worst of all costs: the deaths of our men and women, with 13
dead and over 200 injured. And Congress is doing nothing--no checks, no
balances, no oversight, no hearings.
What does it mean when Americans all over this country are paying the
cost with the worst energy shock crisis in the history of our country?
According to the International Energy Agency, as of yesterday, the
crisis we are experiencing is larger than the two major oil shocks of
the 1970s combined. And what does Congress do? Nothing. No oversight.
No hearings. No checks. No balances.
Americans are feeling the pain already of this administration cutting
healthcare for millions. They are feeling the pain already, seeing
their energy prices go up. They are seeing the pain already from
billions being cut from our Veterans' Administration and millions more
being cut from student lunch programs and the services we provide for
special needs. And Congress does nothing.
We are supposed to be the body that declares war. Well, we are at
war. But we also have the power of the purse. And what is happening
with the purse right now? We have just spent $25 billion in Donald
Trump's war--that kind of expenditure with no oversight, no hearings,
no checks and balances.
Twenty-five billion dollars is enough to provide health insurance for
over 3 million Americans. Twenty-five billion dollars means 30 million
children could have free school lunches. Twenty-five billion dollars
could provide millions of Americans with affordable housing or housing
assistance.
There are things going on right now that nobody on either side of the
aisle thinks the President should be able to do without any kind of
oversight, without any kind of hearings, like give Russia billions of
dollars, relieving them of sanctions, the very adversary that continues
to prosecute their war in Ukraine and undermine our democracy at home--
no hearings, no checks and balances, no oversight. This is not just a
constitutional crisis. This is a shame upon this body.
I am grateful for the War Powers Resolution that Chris Murphy has
brought forward. I am grateful for Tammy Duckworth, Tammy Baldwin, Tim
Kaine for joining together to force these War Powers Resolutions so
that the Congress is not silent, that at least people have to take a
vote.
But think about what is happening right now. We see a President
moving to move more American troops. It was reported that the Pentagon
is considering deploying 3,000 soldiers from Fort Bragg's 82nd Airborne
Division. That is 3,000 of our American courageous sons and daughters--
no oversight, no hearing, no checks and balances.
The biggest military engagement since the war in Afghanistan--tens of
billions of dollars, American lives, the worst oil shock ever, prices
going up--and what does this Senate do? Nothing. It is a shame upon
this body. It is a surrendering of our duties. It is the submission
before Donald Trump and his authoritarian-like inclinations to declare
war and not come to Congress as the Constitution dictates.
We swore an oath in this body to defend the Constitution. Our fealty
should be to the Constitution and not what this President is doing.
So we bring War Powers Resolutions, and we will bring more. My fear
is that this body, amidst this shame, will be dismissed for a recess.
How many soldiers will die during that recess? How many billions of
dollars will be spent during that recess? How far will they go with
this war?
I call this what it is: one of the more shameful stretches of this
body--no hearings, no oversight, no checks and balances.
It is time that we stand up for the Constitution and stand up to
Donald Trump's unconstitutional war.
I know my colleagues and I, we have been calling these War Powers
Resolutions. We will continue to do so until this body does its job and
lifts the shame off of this body and checks a President, who is clearly
running us into a war with no off-ramp in sight, putting more of our
men and women in danger as Americans suffer from skyrocketing costs.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.

Department of Homeland Security

Mr. SCHMITT. Mr. President, the horrific murder in Chicago last week
has reminded this Nation that the battle to defend the American people,
strengthen our Republic, and yield constitutional authority for the
common good is not confined to the southern border. It is being fought
and lost right here in our own cities, in the heartland, in the streets
where our sons and daughters walk to class or watch the Northern
Lights.
Sanctuary cities are not a polite exercise of State sovereignty or
some virtue of federalism. Sanctuary cities are a declaration that
illegal aliens' lives matter but American citizens' lives do not.
Sheridan Gorman was an 18-year-old college student at Loyola
University in Chicago. Her family described her as a daughter, a
sister, and the heart of their family. She was full of life, full of
kindness, and full of love that she gave freely to everyone around her.
She made people feel seen. She made people feel valued. She was the
kind of kid, the kind of daughter American families hope to raise;
raised polite, hard-working, and the first in her family to go away to
college, carrying the hopes of parents who still believe in the
American dream.
Sheridan Gorman was not some statistic. She was somebody's
everything. Whether it was her friends, her family, or someone she had
just met, Sheridan had a way of leaving people better than she found
them.
She was only 18 years old and just beginning her journey as a college
freshman, embracing new experiences, building friendships, and living
the life every parent hopes their child will get to live.
But last week she was murdered in cold blood by an illegal alien from
Venezuela. She was killed, her life taken from her and a daughter
stolen from her family by a criminal illegal alien who would not have
been in this country but for the Democrats' open border and sanctuary
city policies.
Border Patrol caught him in May of 2023. The Biden administration's
open border policies let him go. That was the Democrats' first chance
to prevent Sheridan's murder.
Democrat-run Chicago then had another chance to prevent Sheridan's
murder. It arrested the same illegal alien Jose Medina-Medina for
shoplifting. But Illinois and Chicago's sanctuary policies ordered the
police to say nothing to ICE.
So instead of handing him over to Federal custody, they turned this
monster loose on the streets of Chicago, the safety of American
citizens be damned. And then last week, the same illegal alien shot
Sheridan in the back as she went on a walk with her friends.
Pause for a moment and really sit with the facts of Sheridan Gorman's
murder. That illegal alien was previously in law enforcement's custody
twice, and both times radical Democrat policies released him back onto
the streets to prey on the American citizenry.

It is uncomfortable for Democrats to confront the reality that their
policies and radical ideology are causing preventable murders of
American sons and daughters at the hands of illegal aliens. So they try
to deflect.
A Democrat Chicago alderwoman had the audacity to say that Sheridan
was

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in the wrong place at the wrong time. What a disgusting lie.
Sheridan Gorman was in exactly the right place at the right time. She
was exactly where an American college freshman should be: near the
campus, with her friends, chasing the Northern Lights on a beautiful
spring night.
No, the only person who was in the wrong place at the wrong time was
the illegal alien murderer whose very presence in the country was the
direct result of Democrat open border policies and sanctuary
jurisdiction policies. He should have never been there. And if those
policies had not existed, he would have been back in Venezuela years
ago.
Rather than admit this sanctuary city policy caused the preventable
murder, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker released a statement saying that
``Republicans need to stop politicizing heinous tragedies.'' What an
ugly, revealing statement.
We are not politicizing the tragedy. We are exposing the truth.
Sanctuary policies are getting American citizens killed. I know it; the
American people know it; and deep down the Democrats know it too.
The truth is, sanctuary cities force us to confront a test, the most
fundamental test of any government: Does it still understand its first
and only real obligation is to protect its own citizens?
The duty is older than the Republic, older than modern politics
itself. It is the reason government exists. Yet through these policies,
Democrats made a deliberate choice: They sided with Jose Medina-Medina,
a criminal illegal alien, over Sheridan Gorman, an American citizen and
a college freshman.
They have chosen an open border's ideology over the American Nation.
At root, the scourge of sanctuary cities forces us to answer the same
question as the SAVE America Act: Who or what comes first?
Is it the American people, American sons and daughters, or is it
illegal aliens and this radical open borders ideology? Or, dare I say,
a theology? Not in theory, not in slogans, but in practice--when the
handcuffs go on, when the phone call to federal law enforcement is made
or not made, when lives hang in the balance.
If the answer is not the American citizen, if the answer is not
Sheridan Gorman or Laken Riley or Stephanie Minter or Katie Abraham,
then we are no longer arguing about immigration policy. We are
confronting something far more fundamental: whether our government
still understands the basic purpose for which it exists. The American
people know the answer.
Democrats' conduct--their conduct betrays their answer. Democrats
value illegal aliens more than Americans. This is a sick ideology.
I actually can't believe--in a State where I come from, Harry Truman
would be rolling in his grave. John F. Kennedy would be rolling in his
grave.
This idea, this toxic empathy, this suicidal empathy to placate the
left is driving this debate we are having right now where they don't
want to fund Federal law enforcement. They would rather a sanctuary
jurisdiction not tell ICE that a murderer or a rapist is being released
from prison to be deported. They don't want to do that. They hold onto
this altar of this crazy ideology.
So all this discussion we are having about this negotiation, I have
been skeptical from the beginning. I litigated with Democrats on title
42 and ``Remain in Mexico.'' Deep down in the DNA now is something that
has been lost. I don't understand it. Democrats admitted as much last
night in an interview.
By failing to give illegal aliens a pathway to citizenship, this
Democrat noted that ``we failed to deliver for the people we care about
the most, undocumented migrants.''
The people Democrats care about most are not you or your family.
Instead, it is Jose Medina-Medina and the 15 million other illegal
immigrants that the Biden administration let into this country.
Once you understand this reality--that this is the driving, operating
principle of the modern Democrat Party, this is not an outlier--the
other actions are predictable, including this negotiation, this
supposed negotiation that is happening, that is supposedly taking
place.
Once you see this hierarchy of needs and wants and preferences,
everything makes sense. Democrats right now value illegal aliens more
than traveling Americans. That is why they have defunded DHS and TSA.
They value illegal aliens more than the American families hit by a
disaster. That is why they are defunding DHS and FEMA.
They value illegal aliens more than Sheridan Gorman, Laken Riley,
Stephanie Minter, or Katie Abraham. That is why they have built
sanctuary cities in Chicago, in New Orleans, in Los Angeles, in
Minneapolis.
As a Senator from Missouri, where we still believe the first job of
government is to keep Missouri families safe, I say this plainly:
Prioritizing illegal aliens to American citizens is unacceptable, and
it is downright un-American.
The alternative, putting Americans first, which used to be something
maybe we could agree on, is not complicated and is consistent with both
the Constitution and common sense. Enforce Federal immigration laws.
These laws were passed by Republicans and Democrats alike, enforced by
Republican and Democrat Presidents alike until recently.
So enforce the laws. Deport the illegal aliens. Prioritize the safety
of American citizens over ideology and illegal aliens because at the
end of the day, this is not about ideology or politics. It is about
whether or not we remain a country in which the government fulfills its
most basic and fundamental obligation, a country where the law is
enforced, a country where the responsibilities of governing for the
common good is taken seriously, a country where the safety of its
people is not treated as negotiable.
If we cannot agree to affirm all those principles, then we are
drifting, slowly but unmistakably, away from the principles that
sustain a free and ordered society. And that is a drift we cannot
afford to ignore any longer.
I want to close by reading part of a statement from the Gorman
family:

We will not allow this to be dismissed as wrong place,
wrong time. This was not random misfortune. This was a
violent and preventable act. We are gravely disappointed by
the policy and failures that allowed this individual to
remain in a position to commit this crime. When systems fail,
whether through release decisions, lack of coordination, or
unwillingness to act, the consequences are not abstract. They
are real. And in our case, they are permanent.

This case must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of both State and
Federal law. There can be no gaps, no shortcuts, and no second chances
that put others at risk. Accountability must be complete.
To the Gorman family: I am so sorry for your loss. As a dad who has
my first daughter headed off to college next fall, I cannot imagine the
grief and the pain that you feel when you send your little girl off to
college and she is murdered in cold blood by somebody who should have
never been here and there were two opportunities to get him the hell
out of here.
I pray for you. I pray for Sheridan and all those who loved her.
I pray for every parent who now lives with the fear that the next
knock on the door will be one that destroys their world.
We will not let this be memory-holed as ``wrong place, wrong time.''
This was a violent, preventable act, enabled by radical policies that
put illegal aliens ahead of American citizens.
This case must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of State and
Federal laws. Accountability must be complete, and it will be. It is
time--long past time--for this Senate to answer the question the
American people have already answered: Whose country is this?
Enforce the laws. Deport the illegal aliens. End sanctuary cities
once and for all. We must reclaim the foundational promise of this
Republic that a nation of the people and by the people must be for the
people. The American Government is for the American people.
The American people have made their choice clear. American citizens
come first. That is the fight I came to Washington to wage, and with
the help of the American people, that is the fight we are going to win.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Schmitt). The Senator from Wisconsin.

[[Page S1575]]

War Powers Resolution

Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. President, I rise today in opposition to Donald
Trump's war of choice in Iran.
Donald Trump came into office promising that he would lower costs and
end foreign wars, but with this war, he has broken both promises at
once. Wisconsin families are already seeing higher costs at the pump
and on airfare. Wisconsin farmers are staring down higher fertilizer
and fuel costs as spring planting gets underway. Meanwhile, the
uncertainty and chaos caused by this President is keeping interest
rates high and shaking the global stock market.
Donald Trump is raising costs on Americans at the same moment he is
spending billions of dollars on a war that Wisconsin families did not
choose. In just 6 days, Trump's war in Iran has cost American taxpayers
almost $12 billion. We are now nearly a month into this war, and it is
estimated that we have spent around $30 billion of taxpayer money.
What Donald Trump spent in 3 weeks is what it would have cost to
extend the Affordable Care Act's tax credits for a full year.
Republicans said that extending these healthcare tax credits for
working families was too expensive, but they have not said a word about
Trump spending $30 billion for another war. That money could have
stopped 22 million Americans from seeing their healthcare costs
increase by double, triple, or worse. It could have stopped 1 million
people from canceling their coverage because the costs were simply too
high to manage without those tax breaks. That $30 billion could have
paid for more than 30 million children's school lunches. That $30
billion could have put a safe roof over the heads of more than 3.1
million Americans. That $30 billion could have covered a year of
childcare for nearly 2 million children.
Using that money for an illegal war that no one wants is a choice,
and now President Trump is reportedly planning to ask Congress for $200
billion more for his war with Iran.
Here is my question: For what?
That is not a rhetorical question. I genuinely don't know, and the
American people don't know either what the goals of this war are and
why American families are being asked to shell out billions of dollars
for it. The Trump administration has, so far, been unable or unwilling
to give the American people a straight answer.
Just as Donald Trump tells the American people that we are close to
ending this war, strikes continue, and all signs point to this conflict
continuing to grow. We are hearing reports that the Pentagon is making
detailed preparations for deploying United States ground forces in Iran
as 5,000 marines and new warships are being deployed to the Middle
East. Just today, it was reported that, roughly, 3,000 soldiers who are
trained to parachute into enemy territory are being deployed to the
region.
I have been demanding hearings for weeks so that Secretary Hegseth
and Secretary Rubio can answer our questions under oath and in public
before the American people. They need to answer why they are using
taxpayer dollars on this illegal war instead of bringing down the costs
of healthcare, housing, gas, groceries, and childcare for the families
I represent.
Donald Trump ran and won on lowering costs for Americans, but his
agenda has done just the opposite. He has started expensive wars; has
pursued tariffs that have jacked up costs on consumers; and has slashed
programs that have helped Americans afford their healthcare and put
food on the table.
Enough is enough. It is time for the Trump administration to make
their case to the American people. I personally don't think that they
have one, but at the bare minimum, they need to tell Congress and the
public why we are in this war, putting more servicemembers' lives at
risk and not focusing on the kitchen table issues.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Curtis). The Senator from Virginia.
Mr. KAINE. Mr. President, I rise in support of Senator Murphy's War
Powers Resolution, which I am proud to cosponsor.
I came to this body in 2013, and as I have described on multiple
occasions on the floor under both Democratic and Republican Presidents,
I came with one obsession, and that obsession was that the Nation
should not be at war without a vote of Congress.
That obsession was born out of twin experiences--having had a child
in the military and then having been Governor of Virginia and watching
my Virginia guard members deploy repeatedly into Iraq and Afghanistan
over the course of the years that I served in office. I had gone to too
many deployments, too many homecomings. I had gone to too many wakes
and to too many funerals to simply allow war to be waged on autopilot
or at the say-so of any President--Democrat or Republican--no matter
what their previous experience in military matters or lack of
experience was.
The Founders of the Constitution were wise to decide that committing
our kids' lives to war was not a decision that should be made by one
person. There are exceptions recognized in the Constitution. A
President can take action without Congress. If there is an ongoing
attack on the United States, in self-defense, no permission is needed.
A President can initiate military action if Congress has previously
voted on an authorization that covers it; but other than that, there no
shortcut, and there is no E-ZPass lane, and there shouldn't be.
So this is now the third resolution--and I thank my colleague Senator
Murphy for bringing it--to basically ask the question of this body:
Have we seen enough? Have we seen enough that we should at least have
public hearings about this war? Have we seen enough that we should have
a debate about whether this war should be authorized by Congress or
not?
We plan on coming back every week and asking the question: Have we
seen enough?--until the Senate does what the Senate is supposed to do
according to the Founders, to the Framers, of our Constitution.
Since we were here last week, a number of things have happened. The
number of casualties has continued to grow. The cost has continued to
grow. There was significant reporting yesterday that other nations are
encouraging the United States to continue this war. The reporting
yesterday was that Saudi Arabia is encouraging the United States to
continue this war. The reporting last week was that Israel is
encouraging the United States to continue this war. Israel and Saudi
Arabia are sovereign nations that have the right to make their own
decisions for their own people, but they don't have the right to
suggest what is the right course for the United States. We have very
different interests--we have very, very different interests than those
nations--and we should make the right decision for ourselves after
consideration.
The price of oil has continued to significantly increase from last
week. When I took the floor last week on Senator Booker's resolution,
the price of oil had gone up $0.60 a gallon since before the war began
on February 28. Now it has gone up $1.02. Just to convert that into the
cost at the pump for Virginians, Virginians buy 8 million gallons of
fuel at the pump every day. So, at $1 a gallon, that is $8 million that
Virginians are spending for fuel every day that they weren't spending
before the war. All indications by those who are experts in this area--
and I do not proclaim expertise in energy--is that the energy shock is
likely to continue to drive up costs at the pump for Virginians and
Americans for a very long time.
Why did the Framers set it up so that war should be debated before it
is initiated?
So that you could ask questions.
What is the rationale for the war?
The President has suggested it was to obliterate a nuclear program
that he claimed had been obliterated; to stop a ballistic missile
program when the missiles' progress in Iran would have been years
before they could have developed a missile that would have reached the
United States; to change a regime; to back up Iranian protesters; maybe
to control Iranian oil. We would have been able to ask questions about
the rationale and get an answer rather than a shifting collection of
answers that has been given.
We would have been able to ask questions about: What are your plans
to minimize harm to civilians? We have already seen tragedies with
respect to harm to civilians.

[[Page S1576]]

What are your plans to protect allies who, if Iran is attacked, are
likely to face retaliatory attacks from Iran?
Many of our allies were not prepared to face what Iran did because
the United States did not consult with them.
Just to use one item in this that would clearly have been a
discussion if the administration had done what the Constitution
requires and come to Congress: What about the Strait of Hormuz where
massive percentages of the world's energy and critical minerals--
fertilizer and other byproducts--come through the Strait? What is the
plan for that?
What is the plan to make sure that the Strait is not choked off in a
way that hurts everyday American families and the entire global
economy?
I mean, this is not an unforeseen problem. The British closed off the
Strait of Hormuz in the early 1950s to punish Iran. The Shah of Iran
threatened that many times during the war between Iraq and Iran in the
1980s. As those two nations were fighting, tankers were hit in ways
that often shut down the Strait of Hormuz. So the Strait of Hormuz
being shut down and then having a massive effect on the global economy
was an absolutely known and completely foreseeable consequence of a war
in the region.
And yet in the last week, the reporting of this is that either--
either--the White House didn't consider it or the White House was
warned by military officials that this could happen and it would hurt
the United States and others--a warning that they ignored.
Now, either of those options is bad. If they didn't consider the
possibility that history demonstrated was a likelihood, that shows
incredibly slipshod planning, and if they considered that possibility
because it happened before and dismissed it, that also demonstrates a
shocking degree of naivete.
And so we see, just in that one instance, how Virginians are being
punished by paying more at the pump because of the closure of those
straits. This is an entirely predictable consequence of war that didn't
get an airing before the public or before the Senate, who could have
asked challenging questions.
Some believe subjecting a war plan to being asked challenging
questions is a burden or is a hassle or, you know, it is going to be
something that we don't want to do.
No, that is exactly what should happen. Any proposal of this
magnitude that is going to risk the lives of our troops should be
subjected to the most searing examination that we would do of anything
in this body.
And I want to conclude, because there are others who want to speak,
but I will just take it back to Virginia. Hundreds, if not thousands,
of Virginians are currently deployed on the USS Ford Carrier Strike
Group. That was a strike group based in Norfolk that deployed in June.
When it deployed, the normal deployment for a carrier strike group is
7 months. So the expectation of all who deployed was that they would be
home by the holidays; they would be home with the family by the
holidays. Instead, at the end of last year, the President ordered that
the deployment be extended so that the Ford that was positioned in the
Middle East could come into the Caribbean or the Pacific to assist in
the effort to ultimately invade Venezuela. And so they extended the
deployment another 2 months.
And then the Ford was told that it needed to deploy back across the
water to provide support for the invasion and the attack of Iran, and
so the deployment has been extended further.
The Ford is about to set the record for the longest deployment ever,
but this has a cost. The Virginians and others who are deployed with
the strike group thought they were going to be home at Christmas, and
now it is being extended more and more and more.
And the Ford carrier is suffering significant maintenance challenges
that threaten the actual lives of those on board. First, it was
threatening quality of life with problems with the toilet systems and
other onboard systems on the carrier, which are not hard to predict
when you run a carrier at a much greater length than was planned for
the original deployment, and these affected basic quality of life and
morale.
But it got more serious. Last week, we learned that a fire started at
the laundry facilities on the Ford that took 30 hours to put out, and
200 sailors on the Ford suffered smoke inhalation injuries because of
that fire.
Now, recently, the Ford has been pulled out of frontline combat
support activities and taken back to Crete for repairs. But, again,
these sailors aren't coming home anytime soon, and that ship that was
supposed to be out there for 7 months is now into the 11 months--well,
I guess it would be now coming on 9 months, with more to come.
This is the kind of human cost that happens when you go into a war
without a rationale or without a plan. And so what we need is a plan, I
believe, to bring this to a close.
We were at war in the Middle East for 25 years, and I have yet to
hear a single colleague of mine come and make a speech on the floor to
suggest that those 14,000-plus American lives killed or the 65,000-plus
Americans injured or the $8 trillion spent--I have yet to hear a single
person come here and say that was a chapter in American life that we
should be proud of.
We should have learned something from it. The first thing we should
have learned is that another war in the Middle East probably makes no
sense. But we certainly should have learned that, before we go into
one, we have to examine it in significant detail to make sure that we
are not sending our sons and daughters into harm's way for no valid
reason.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, I am not going to speak for a long time. I
have given this speech over and over again. Some people say the
definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and
expecting to get the same results.
The Democrats here have been doing the same things over and over and
over again, and they are going to get the same result again tonight.
Look, the conflict that we are in with Iran right now was not started
by the United States. It was started by Iran when the Iranian regime
took prisoner our staff at the Embassy in Tehran, 47 years ago, and
held them for 444 days.
And then, over the next 47 years, they have continued to kill
Americans by the thousands--not by the hundreds, but by the thousands--
and they do it in the most insidious ways, with roadside bombs and that
sort of thing, simply because they are Americans and they are present
in the Middle East.
The President of the United States said we have had enough. He had
very good reason to pull the trigger at the time that he did, and, of
course, those, as time goes on, will come out more and more.
The fact of the matter is, we are in conflict. We have our brave
young men and women on the ground. We have our brave young men and
women fighting for the United States of America. So we need to back
those people. We need to back the President of the United States.
We all know this isn't going to go on very long, but it needs to be
done. And our friends around us say: You need to get this done. Now
that you are there, complete the job.
The President is going to complete the job.
I am going to end this with a couple of messages--the same message I
have been giving for a long time.
The first one is to the Iranians: This is over. You people have lost.
You have no navy. You have no air force. You are running out of
missiles and other materiel to fight this. This is going to be over
very soon.
And the other message I would have to the Iranians is: No one has
come to help you. And--breaking news--no one is coming to help you--
with one exception, and I will talk about that in a minute.
First of all, let me tell you who is not coming to help. The Chinese
are not coming to help. The Russians are not coming to help. The North
Koreans are not coming to help. The Cubans are not coming to help. The
Venezuelans are not coming to help. The worst actors on the planet, who
are friends of the Iranians, are not coming to help. This is all on
you, Iran.
No one is coming to help you--except there are 47 people over here
who want to help you. They cannot help you.

[[Page S1577]]

They have tried and tried and tried. They cannot help you.
What is going to happen here on the floor today is, on our side of
the aisle, we are going to stand behind the Commander in Chief. Most
importantly, we are going to stand behind our fighting men and women on
the ground because they are involved in a kinetic battle.
When this happens--whatever happens--we, every American, should be
standing behind our fighting men and women. They need to continue on.
They need to complete the job. The President of the United States is
going to do this.
So to my friends on the other side of the aisle, stop this. Don't try
to help the Iranians. You are the only entity on this planet trying to
help the Iranians. Stop it. Vote with us.
This is going to fail tonight. It would be nice if you joined us in
standing behind our fighting men and women as we try to end the regime
of the last bad actor in the region.
I yield the floor.
Mr. MURPHY. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. SCHUMER. Now, I thank Senator Murphy for his great leadership on
this issue, for speaking so clearly and fiercely about the need for
this resolution.
This war has dragged on for long enough. It is long past time for it
to come to an end. And, today, with this resolution, the Senate must
assert its power on matters of war and peace.
This is the third time--the third time--that Republicans have been
given a chance to do the right thing and end this war. It is the third
time, though, they stick their heads in the sand and pretend this war
does not exist. But the war is expanding. The Senate has an obligation
to step in.
I say to my Republican colleagues: If there was ever a time to stand
up for the authority of the Senate, stand up for the powers given to us
through the Constitution, the time is now.
Thirteen American servicemembers have been killed and thousands more
injured. Energy prices are above $100 a barrel. And now the Wall Street
Journal reports the Pentagon will deploy another 3,000 soldiers from
the 82nd Airborne.
Enough.
The War Powers Act allows questions to be asked, allows the public to
be drawn into the discussion. That is the way to end endless wars, not
to tell no one what is going on, not to keep it secret, not to give
anyone else any authority. That is a loser, and it will be a loser for
the American people.
The American people are tired of sending our sons and daughters to
fight endless wars. Americans are exasperated every time they go to the
gas station and pay $4 a gallon. They are tired of Donald Trump making
outrageous and deluded statements like saying he does both have a plan
and does not have a plan. This is who is leading the war effort--
someone who changes his mind every day, who can't answer the question
of what is the goal here? what is the endgame? how much does it cost?
So enough is enough.
Donald Trump does not have the authority to wage this war without the
explicit authority from Congress.
I thank Senator Murphy for pushing this resolution. I am proud to
support it. I urge some of my Republican colleagues to vote yes.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
Mr. MURPHY. Mr. President, whatever you think about this war, it
should be unacceptable to all of us that we have not had a single
public hearing, a single opportunity for the American people to hear
directly through their representatives the justification and the
endgame for this war.
I thank my colleagues for joining me here today.

____________________