[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 6]
[House]
[Pages 8198-8202]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




               WHAT DO WE HAVE TO LOSE: NATIONAL SECURITY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2017, the gentlewoman from the Virgin Islands (Ms. Plaskett) 
is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.


                             General Leave

  Ms. PLASKETT. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and 
include extraneous material on the subject of my Special Order.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentlewoman from the Virgin Islands?
  There was no objection.
  Ms. PLASKETT. Madam Speaker, it is with great honor that I rise today 
to anchor this CBC Special Order. For the next 60 minutes, we have a 
chance to speak directly to the American people on issues of great 
importance to the Congressional Black Caucus, Congress, the 
constituents we represent, and all Americans.
  Tonight, we will highlight the President's action to undermine our 
national security, including, but not limited to, abruptly firing FBI 
Director Comey in order to ease pressure on the Russian investigation 
just 1 day before sharing classified information with a Russian 
official.
  Madam Speaker, many in this country believe Congress continues to 
have trouble accomplishing the basic requirements of its job. Up until 
a few weeks ago, we were still scrambling yet again to complete 
spending legislation to prevent a government shutdown.
  If the only measure of national security success during the 
President's first 100 days were avoiding catastrophe,

[[Page 8199]]

okay, President Trump has succeeded: no attacks on the U.S., no new 
wars, no nuclear Armageddon.
  These are good things, and in the moment we can breathe a sigh of 
relief. However, these outcomes, arguably, owe more to the national 
security machine built by the President's predecessors than any 
decision of the 45th President.
  President Trump's first major budget proposal will be released 
tomorrow. It is reported to include massive cuts to Medicaid and will 
call for drastically and unprecedented changes to antipoverty programs.
  As for Medicaid, the State Federal programs that provide healthcare 
to low-income Americans, Trump's draconian budget plan would follow 
through on a bill passed by House Republicans to cut more than $800 
billion over 10 years.
  The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that this would cut off 
Medicaid benefits for 10 million people over the next decade. That is 
unacceptable.
  The dysfunctional relationship between Congress and the Trump 
administration has helped to bog down and complicate the fiscal 2017 
budget process and has stymied the work of this Congress when it comes 
to passing legislation that will help our constituents.
  A recent survey found that 48 percent of Americans now prefer 
increased government spending in areas like healthcare, veterans care, 
education, and infrastructure--things that the people of my district, 
the Virgin Islands, desperately need, with a 15 percent unemployment 
rate and 33 percent of our children living in poverty.

                              {time}  1930

  It is time for Congress to get back to work for the people that have 
put us here.
  I want to highlight three pieces of legislation that I have 
introduced that will help my constituents in the Virgin Islands in 
various ways.
  With a special counsel now having been appointed to look into the 
distractions the White House has created, it is time that Congress 
focus on our job and proceed to hold hearings on these bills followed 
by a vote on the House floor, and, hopefully, these commonsense bills 
will be signed into law by the President.
  Healthcare: President Trump and the Republican Congress are planning 
to cut more than $800 billion out of Medicaid funding over 10 years 
while converting the program to a cap block grant to the States and 
territories and eliminating ACA's Medicaid expansion. These provisions 
are in the American Health Care Act, the House GOP's ObamaCare repeal 
bill.
  As a Member representing the Virgin Islands, I believe we need to get 
back to doing the work of the people, and that is working to pass laws 
that better the lives of our constituents.
  I introduced improving the treatment of the U.S. territories under 
the Federal healthcare program, which would eliminate existing 
inequities the territories face under Medicaid and Medicare. There are 
numerous bills that my other colleagues have introduced to assist their 
constituents and all Americans in areas of healthcare. We need to bring 
those bills to the floor and vote them up or vote them down.
  Veterans: There are few places in the United States with higher per 
capita rates of military service than the United States Virgin Islands. 
As a Member, I am committed to ensuring Virgin Islands veterans have 
full and equal access to health, housing, education, and employment 
benefits they have rightfully earned. Our constituents have deployed to 
Afghanistan and Iraq more than 30,000 times since September 11, and 
about 120,000 military veterans live in the territories, yet none are 
allowed to cast a ballot to choose their Commander in Chief.
  We need to remember that nearly 4 million Americans call Puerto Rico, 
Guam, the Virgin Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, and American 
Samoa home, a combined population greater than 22 States. We represent 
those Americans in the U.S. House who cannot vote for their interests 
on the House floor. Our constituents are denied representation in the 
U.S. Senate and are barred from the general election for President and 
Vice President. When the Presidential vote was tabulated in 2016, it 
was as if 4 million Americans we represent do not exist. There is a 
time, however, when our people are counted--when the country goes to 
war.
  I have introduced H. Res. 91, which proposes an amendment to the 
Constitution of the United States regarding Presidential elections, 
voting rights for residents of all United States territories and 
commonwealths.
  Education: We have to fix the education system. We have to give our 
young people better choices. We need to allow our children to be able 
to be educated in a place that is hospitable to learning. That does not 
occur right now in many places in the United States. The President's 
budget cut would remove support to schools for infrastructure, for 
afterschool programs, and for summer reading programs.
  We cannot continue with this if we want to have national security. 
National security is the security of our young people to be educated 
and to grow safely. That is not happening in the Virgin Islands or 
anyplace in the United States at this time.
  I recently introduced the United States Virgin Islands College Access 
Act of 2017, which will allow college students who are residents of the 
Virgin Islands to receive more reasonable tuition rates at 
participating 4-year institutions of higher education.
  It is time for Congress to stop doing business as usual. With budget 
decisions impacting everything from national security to infrastructure 
investment, Congress needs to focus on doing its job and doing it with 
more than the next few months or current fiscal year in mind. Moving 
forward, we as Members of Congress need to make sure that we deal with 
our legislative and budgetary responsibilities with more thoughtfulness 
and foresight.
  Congressman Dwight Evans represents the wonderful city of 
Philadelphia and the people of Pennsylvania. He is a legislator of many 
years. Although he comes here as a freshman, none of us consider him as 
a freshman having served in the legislature in Pennsylvania for more 
than 20 years. I would ask him to speak on the topic that the 
Congressional Black Caucus' Special Order hour has introduced: What Do 
We Have to Lose: National Security.
  Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. 
Evans).
  Mr. EVANS. Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from the 
great Virgin Islands, and I really appreciate her leadership.
  I would like to thank my colleagues for bringing forward such an 
important topic for tonight's Special Order hour. National security is 
an issue of utmost importance to all of us.
  The bottom line is this: If the President thinks it is okay to share 
classified information with our adversaries, we have a big problem. I 
will be reemphasizing that point: If the President of the United States 
of America shared classified information with our enemies, then the 
lives of the American people are at risk.
  Regardless of political party, if, in fact, President Trump did 
willingly share classified information with Russia, then this further 
proves that the President does not understand the consequences of his 
actions. It proves that he doesn't understand how much we stand to lose 
as a result of these actions.
  The bigger question now that people are asking is: Do you think the 
President is in so much trouble?
  It is clear from the news that the Russian investigation is the gift 
that keeps giving. But I want to be really, really clear with you. I 
did not vote for President Trump. I did not support him when he was 
running, and I fought hard to stop President Trump from becoming 
elected.
  If you want to know, I think the President is in trouble. I will tell 
you this. President Trump and his administration are not ready for 
prime time. The campaign is over. The President needs to focus on 
governing, and we

[[Page 8200]]

have not seen him do that yet. He needs to learn how to govern.
  We know that the Comey firing has sent a potential signal of the 
President's collusion with Russia. For this reason, I called for the 
special prosecutor and the independent commission so that the American 
people truly can know the Trump-Russia connection.
  I am glad to see former FBI Director Bob Mueller named as special 
counsel to oversee the investigation, but we still need to make sure 
that Congress is able to conduct an independent investigation into the 
Trump administration's ties to Russia and interference in the 2016 
election. The American people deserve to know the facts. The American 
people deserve to know the facts.
  I was in my district over the weekend in Lower Merion, and all anyone 
asked to talk about was Comey and Russia. They want answers, and they 
want to get to the bottom line of this.
  I want to, but what I want to do is to raise the dialogue on the 
issues that really matter here, the issues that we really have a lot to 
lose on. For example, last week, I hosted a briefing on middle 
neighborhoods. Middle neighborhoods are neighborhoods caught between 
bust and boom. They are communities doing just well enough that our 
cities aren't focusing our resources or attention on them.
  Of course, we need to get to the bottom line of collusion between 
Russia and the President. I want to, and we will get to the bottom line 
of this as the American people deserve the facts. At the same time, I 
want to make sure we are fighting for dialogue on the ways we can make 
a difference and make an impact on our communities in need.
  We need to find ways to tackle food insecurity, help our public 
schools, and expand access to capital and credit on every corner to 
build stronger neighborhoods block by block. This will not be easy. We 
need to work together. It is in our collective interest to ensure 
national security is not a partisan issue. It should be a bipartisan 
issue.
  So I stand here in the well of this House, Madam Speaker, to indicate 
that I want to ensure that national security is important. I hope, 
Madam Speaker, that the President also understands that it is 
important.
  Ms. PLASKETT. Madam Speaker, I thank the Congressman so much for his 
comments.
  I think it was very interesting that the gentleman was saying that 
the American people and people that he spoke with over the weekend want 
the truth. I think that is what we all here in Congress want. We want 
the facts. We want to hear specifically what has happened so that the 
people of the United States can make a decision about what happens 
next.
  I am not here to ask for impeachment or ask for any rash decision, 
but I am asking that the American people be able to see a transparent 
Congress and a transparent process that allows them to then speak to us 
as Members of Congress as to what they would like.
  Several months ago, almost 2 months now, several colleagues of mine 
and I wrote a letter to the Department of Justice, to the Acting 
Attorney General, requesting that he institute a special counsel, a 
special prosecutor, in this matter. We are grateful that that has 
happened. But a special counsel cannot replace an independent, outside 
commission and vigorous congressional investigation.
  The appointment of a special counsel speaks to the urgency of 
investigating the Trump connection to Russia's interference in our 
election and the gravity of the President's abuse of power in trying to 
shut down the FBI Director; but the American people need to understand 
that, while a special counsel could bring charges against those 
individuals who were, in fact, if the facts prove to be so, in 
collusion with the Russians, it cannot do anything to the President 
except bring a report to this Congress for this Congress to act on.
  This Congress needs to remember that we are a separate branch of 
government than the White House. This Congress seems to be acting as if 
it is part of the White House, an extension of 1600 Pennsylvania 
Avenue, when, in fact, this Congress stands alone.
  We have a separate set of rules, a separate power, and a separate 
responsibility than the President of the United States. As such, Madam 
Speaker, it is important that we demonstrate to the American people 
that we are acting that way. A special counsel within the Trump-
controlled Justice Department cannot replace a truly independent, 
outside commission, because it is the commission which would then be 
able to make a decision about our President.
  I say it is our President because we all respect the Office of the 
President, and we want the world to know that we respect and hold in 
reverence the individual who holds that and hold him accountable for 
that position that he holds. An independent, outside commission, as 
special counsel, Director Muller's actions will still be subject to 
review and approval by the President Trump-appointed leadership of the 
Justice Department.
  Congress must act to create an independent, outside commission that 
is completely free of the Trump administration's meddling. A special 
counsel cannot be used as a pretext for Republicans to shut down 
investigations by Congress or hide the facts of the President's 
wrongdoing from the American people.
  Now, I have heard the Justice Department and others talk about this 
being a criminal investigation, that the special counsel is using it as 
a special criminal investigation. As a lawyer, as someone who has been 
a prosecutor, I understand that the burden of proof for criminal 
charges are much different than this Congress would hold for a 
President if it were to ask for impeachment.
  So this Congress must not abdicate its responsibility because the 
work needs to be done. Jobs need to be created and infrastructure needs 
to be put in place so that commerce can be done in this country. 
Healthcare needs to be put in place for Americans. We cannot lose more 
Americans' healthcare. We need to gain more Americans having 
healthcare. We need to settle the issues of immigration.
  Madam Speaker, never mind criminal justice reform. It seems that this 
Congress has completely forgotten that, in the last Congress, we 
agreed, both Republicans and Democrats, to reform criminal justice. We 
are seeing our young people die not from the Justice Department and not 
just from what is happening on the streets, and never mind what is 
happening in our criminal justice system. I understand that a bill is 
going to be coming on the floor asking for minimum mandatory sentencing 
for a slew of charges which will again increase the school-to-prison, 
cradle-to-death pipeline of prisons in this country.
  So these are the things that we as Congress need to be concerned 
with. The national security issues that our President has are things 
that we need to continue to look at.
  There is an old Washington cliche: personnel is policy. The same 
reflects the wisdom that any President's agenda depends on his 
political appointees to refine and implement that vision. Trump's White 
House has failed first and most spectacularly in this requirement. That 
failure may not even be the President's failure at this time but the 
people he has put in place by both building a dysfunctional White House 
and National Security Council and by failing to staff his national 
security agencies with the appointees necessary to oversee and direct 
foreign policy.
  For now, the failures of Trump's political favorites with his new 
establishment professionals likely mean incoherence on the national 
security front for some time, with the White House lurching from one 
crisis to the next, its actions and words disconnected from any broader 
doctrine.
  Bad personnel decisions have also dogged the Trump administration 
during its first 100 days. Michael Flynn and K.T. McFarland hardly did 
well in leading the NSC during their brief sojourns there. Low-level 
hires have also continued poor performance.

                              {time}  1945

  The most obvious foreign policy failures are that there is no policy, 
no doctrine, no strategy that knits together

[[Page 8201]]

Trump's desired ends with the government's ways and means. That should 
be of concern to my Republican colleagues who want this Republican 
President to succeed. If you want him to succeed, you need to help him. 
The help needs to come in terms of the personnel that he has put in 
place, in terms of the transparency, and as they said, cleaning the 
swamp, getting rid of the swamp, so that there can be those 
professionals and those above reproach in the White House carrying out 
the mission of this President.
  At the agency level, the Trump's White House political appointments 
machine has been incredibly dysfunctional, reportedly because of fights 
between the White House factions over personnel picks.
  This has starved the Pentagon, State Department, Justice Department, 
and other agencies of under secretaries, assistant secretaries, deputy 
assistant secretaries, special assistants who actually are carrying out 
the President's agenda.
  In the absence of an entire team, the uniformed military leadership 
and career civil servants of these agencies have carried on, but with 
significant friction given the personal disdain for these people during 
the campaign and afterwards.
  The personnel failures have worsened the second category of the 
failures, those of process. If there was personnel, we also have 
process failures going on right now.
  The NSC was codified in 1947, along with the modern Defense 
Department, CIA, and Joint Chiefs of Staff to correct perceived process 
failures during World War II. The big idea behind the National Security 
Act was to create a process that could withstand poor personnel by 
ensuring the institution of the presidency was well served by its 
national security agencies and could, therefore, make better informed 
decisions.
  Despite its aspirations to run the White House like a fine-tuned 
machine, the administration has uniformly failed to implement processes 
to serve its agenda. Indeed, at times--an example being the 63-hour 
rush to strike Syria with cruise missiles or its announcement of a tax 
plan before the details were ironed out--the White House seems at war 
with the very idea of process, as if budgets, planning, and 
coordination were toxic features of the Washington swamp, to be 
rejected at all costs.
  The biggest process failures have been those that affected the entire 
government. Trump's failure to develop detailed budgets, let alone to 
agree with Congress on the funding levels and priorities, nearly led 
the country to the brink of a government shutdown. All indications 
point to the impasse being settled, but the outcome will likely be a 
continuing resolution once again that punts all the major budget 
decisions and keeps agencies in limbo on major programs, including, if 
we are talking about national security, major weapons systems, 
acquisitions, spending on important training and exercises, and outlays 
for servicemembers and military families. This is something that is 
going to cause all Americans to suffer, spectacularly in some cases.
  One of the President's biggest campaign promises, the pledge to build 
a wall on America's border with Mexico, has stalled for lack of 
funding, and proposals will likely remain stuck in the government 
contracts process for months, if not years.
  His immigration orders have been held unconstitutional because of 
errors that his Justice Department or Department of Homeland Security 
lawyers would have caught and corrected had they been there or had a 
chance.
  In some cases, the process failures have had deadlier consequences. 
President Trump ordered a risky special operations raid on Yemen over a 
dinner meeting with his senior staff with scant process or 
coordination. The raid went badly, as military operations sometimes do. 
Instead of taking responsibility, the White House blamed the military, 
both for the substantive failure on the ground and the faulty decision 
process that put the SEALS there. Disconnects between the White House, 
Department of Defense, and the U.S. Pacific Command resulted in a 
confusing saga regarding the movements of a U.S. aircraft carrier, 
resulting in the dilution of any deterrent value that President Trump's 
words might hold in Moscow or Beijing.
  The personnel and process failures contribute to policy failures 
across the national security chessboard. The most obvious Trump foreign 
policy failure is that there is no policy, no doctrine at this time. We 
deserve better in the Middle East, in Afghanistan, in China, in North 
Korea, but most importantly, here on the home front. We as Americans 
deserve a coherent, comprehensive process oriented as well as personnel 
driven with career intelligence individuals at the helm and within the 
ranks of each one of these agencies because we have a lot to lose.
  We have our young people to lose if we go into wars that have not 
been thought out and have not been process driven. Our young people 
deserve better. Our world deserves better because the world is looking 
to America to still be the ones--although we seem to be abdicating our 
responsibility, whether it be in war or in the other forms of diplomacy 
that we engage in--to keep this a safe place. Famines that are going on 
in Sudan, in Yemen, and in other places, it is the American might, the 
might of our aid and our support to them, that keeps democracy alive, 
not just on the ground and in fact, but in the hearts and minds of 
those who yearn for it in other places.
  That is the national security that this America needs to be engaged 
in, and it is that kind of national security that this Congress needs 
to be concerned with. We need to get back. We have a week of bills that 
are dysfunctional in themselves that do not serve the best interests of 
the American people. This Congress needs to stop scuttling legislation, 
scuttling bills that their colleagues are trying to put forward. Vote 
them up or vote them down. Let the American people know where you stand 
on every issue. We need to stop the voice votes that are going on in 
committees that allow Members to hide behind what their positions are 
with their constituents. I know it is not easy, but that is why we are 
all adults here. We want to put on our big girl pants and be the kind 
of people who can stand for what we believe.
  So let's bring those bills forward. Let's support the infrastructure 
jobs activity, as well as national security and support for the world 
abroad. That is what we have to lose if we do not hold this President, 
this White House, and all of his agencies and his Cabinet accountable 
for the work that they are doing.
  Madam Speaker, it appears that I do not have additional Members who 
would like to speak in this Special Order hour.
  Madam Speaker, how much time do I have remaining?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman has 35 minutes remaining.
  Ms. PLASKETT. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to refrain from 
engaging in personalities toward the President.
  Ms. EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, protecting our 
national security should be among one of the top concerns of any 
administration--Republican or Democrat. Yet, President Trump has 
demonstrated an alarming disregard for the national security interests 
of the United States.
  There have been a number of incidents that I believe warrant 
additional scrutiny by Congress and the American people. Just last 
week, it was reported that President Trump revealed highly classified 
information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador during a 
White House meeting. In direct contravention of standing diplomatic 
agreements with our closest allies, President Trump also reportedly 
divulged the source of that highly classified information. Not only did 
this blatant disregard for protocol damage our credibility among the 
international community, but President Trump may have very well also 
exposed extremely sensitive information about U.S. and allied 
intelligence operations abroad.
  Earlier this month, President Trump also took a bold step in firing 
former FBI Director James Comey in the midst of an investigation into 
his administration and alleged ties to Russian officials. Shortly after 
Director Comey was

[[Page 8202]]

fired, an unnamed White House source revealed that President Trump told 
Russian officials during the same meeting that he did so in order to 
ease some of the pressure from the Russia investigation. This is deeply 
alarming, if not simply just ironic.
  During the Presidential election, House Speaker Paul Ryan criticized 
Hillary Clinton over her mishandling of classified emails on a private 
email server. He stated, ``individuals who are `extremely careless' 
with classified information should be denied further access to such 
info.'' Today, I have yet to hear Speaker Ryan--or other key House 
Republicans--speak out against this blatant mishandling of classified 
information. It is hypocrisy in its purest form.
  Mr. Speaker, we cannot afford the unauthorized divulging of 
classified information and national security secrets, especially to 
hostile nations such as Russia. I find it deeply troubling that a 
sitting president would display such a blatant disregard for the 
safeguarding of U.S. national security interests. I continue to join my 
colleagues in calling for an independent commission to investigate any 
possible collusion between the Trump Campaign and the Kremlin.

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