S.J. Res. 54--Motion to Discharge

Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, this week we are discussing, among other topics, the sad fact of sex trafficking online. The reason is because yesterday we voted to advance a piece of legislation called SESTA, or the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act. The purpose of this legislation is crystal clear. We want to put an end to this abominable practice, and we want to stop shielding or protecting those web platforms that promote it.

I am proud to be a cosponsor of this legislation. Over the past year, like many of my colleagues, I met with law enforcement and victims' rights groups across the country who talk about this as a continuing problem. I met with technology providers who want to end the practice but want to make sure they maintain their independence from Federal regulation writ large. I have been in regular contact with my colleagues over at the House to make sure this bill is considered and passed in a timely fashion. I think it is fair to characterize the negotiations as delicate.

A small group of Senators, including our colleague John McCain, the senior Senator from Arizona, wanted to make sure that everyone understood what this bill does and what it does not do. What it does do is to protect our children. It provides justice to victims, and it makes sure that Federal laws don't protect those who profit from sex trafficking online. What it does not do is somehow to stymie free speech. It does not restrict web platforms from publishing objectionable content.

For example, under the Communications Decency Act, now websites have to screen for child pornography. That is one of the explicit exceptions to the Communications Decency Act, which basically provides immunity to these web platforms from liability. What we are doing is adding to that human trafficking, and it is appropriate that we do so.

This does not discourage websites that are already taking steps to proactively remove improper conduct and police their own networks. I would say to those who do: Keep up the good work.

Today the internet and other forms of technology have made certain forms of predatory behavior easier to engage in. This bill addresses this development head-on. It would allow sex trafficking victims to have their day in court by eliminating Federal liability protections for technology providers who knowingly facilitate online sex trafficking. It would allow State and local law enforcement to investigate and prosecute providers that violate Federal sex trafficking laws.

This bill was introduced last summer after a 2-year inquiry by the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which produced a report. That report found that not only had sex trafficking run rampant in certain online spaces but also that some websites had tried to cover it up.

Well, no longer. Last fall, the Senate Commerce Committee unanimously approved SESTA, the bill on the floor that the House passed last month. Now it is our turn.

Senator Portman, the junior Senator from Ohio, has been this bill's greatest champion since its inception. I believe he was one of the members of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which produced the report I mentioned. He has been involved in this issue for a long time. He has been informing us time and again of the ways in which sex trafficking has morphed from the street corner to the smartphone.

In the committee's investigation, one website in particular came up time and again, and the name is no stranger to the Senate or the Congress. It is backpage, a notorious publication now online that is responsible for three-quarters of all child trafficking reports.

It eventually became clear that even though that site was actually helping to sell young women for sex, and even the victims and their families were suing backpage, none of the lawsuits were successful because of what some people are coming to believe is an outdated immunity protection for technology providers under the Communications Decency Act, which I mentioned a moment ago.

The original law was intended to protect free speech online, which is important. I am a firm believer in the First Amendment, as I know we all are, but free speech is no license to engage in criminal activity.

At last count, 67 Senators have joined our effort as cosponsors. We are joined in support of SESTA by anti-human-trafficking advocates, law enforcement, State attorneys general, the civil rights community, faith-based groups, and tech companies like Facebook and Oracle.

Our colleague from Oregon has introduced two amendments, which I strongly urge my colleagues to oppose. The first would appropriate new money for the Attorney General to investigate and prosecute website operators that criminally facilitate sex trafficking. The problem is that this would violate the blue slip rule and subject the bill to a point of order. In other words, there are constitutional issues raised about where that sort of legislation would originate. It has to originate in the House. It would almost certainly guarantee the demise of this legislation. In other words, it is a poison pill. It is not that we will not support funding to prosecute traffickers. In fact, we will provide ample funding through the Department of Justice later this week. It is that those funds should be appropriated through the usual process and then handed over to State and local officials who can use them effectively.

The second amendment that will be offered is the ``Bad Samaritan'' amendment. This would prevent websites from being held accountable for any efforts to moderate content, even when those efforts are taken in bad faith or obviously intended to miss their mark and instead protect sex traffickers. In some States courts have found that websites like backpage might be held liable when they selectively edit sex trafficking ads to make them more difficult to be identified by law enforcement.

The ``Bad Samaritan'' amendment could protect platforms like backpage.com from liability for bad-faith editing practices, leaving victims with even less of a recourse than they have today. Simply put, it could eviscerate the steps we are taking in SESTA. I am confident that our colleague does not intend this result, but that would be the consequence of adopting either one of those amendments.

So I hope my colleagues will join me in voting in favor of SESTA this week and opposing these two amendments. That is the best way we can ensure that these websites and online platforms can be held accountable for facilitating sex trafficking.

Mr. President, later today the Senate will be voting on a privileged resolution that I spoke on yesterday, offered by three of our colleagues. Simply put, it would direct the President to cut off all U.S. support for the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen.

Now, some people may be looking at a world map to figure out where Yemen is and what the import of this conflict may be, but suffice it to say that this is another proxy war being conducted against the United States and its allies by Iran, now in Yemen, just to the south of Saudi Arabia, our ally.

So as to the motion to table, I was interested to hear my friends from Connecticut and Vermont suggesting that the motion to table would stop debate. Well, that is not exactly true. What it will do is to facilitate full debate and full consideration of the merits of the underlying resolution, starting with the Foreign Relations Committee. It is very unusual for resolutions like this to come immediately to the floor, where 100 Senators vote on it, because, frankly, not all of us are as up to speed on the details of this or what the unintended impact might be as the Foreign Relations Committee that is set up for the purpose of examining legislation with regard to our international relationships in matters like this.

This is an important and timely matter, as high-level Saudi officials are in Washington this week. The Crown Prince is scheduled to meet with President Trump today. I met with him this morning, along with other members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Saudi Arabia is an important partner in our counterterrorism operations and as a counterpoint to Iran. In Yemen, we see both terrorist operations--that is, ISIS and al-Qaida--and Iran actively deploying missiles and using Yemen as a launching pad to shoot missiles into Saudi Arabia.

I mentioned that this support for our Saudi coalition is narrowly circumscribed. It takes the form of intelligence sharing, military advice, and logistical support, including air-to-air refueling. This is part of a plan that started under the Obama administration and now has continued under the Trump administration not to put American troops on the ground--boots on the ground, as we frequently refer to it--but rather to facilitate for our allies by working by, with, and through those allies to address the threat not only to them but ultimately to the United States and to peace in the region.

The role we play in Yemen is clearly a noncombat support role, and it is meant to minimize civilian casualties by improving the processes and procedures and increasing compliance with the international law of armed conflict. In other words, we are trying to help them target the terrorists and the Iranian-backed rebels and not innocent civilians, something they are not able to do as well without our assistance.

Contrary to the resolution's sponsors' claims, the United States is not engaged in hostilities in Yemen, as it has been traditionally understood, since it is not in direct conflict with the Houthi rebels. We are not fighting the Houthi rebels. U.S. soldiers are not fighting the Houthi rebels directly. We are providing support.

Proponents of this legislation rightly point out that there is a humanitarian crisis in Yemen. Unfortunately, what they sometimes leave out is that the humanitarian crisis only started when the Iranian- backed rebels overthrew the existing government. Our military assistance is helping the Saudis with their targeting to help prevent civilian casualties, to restore law and order, and to create conditions necessary to provide aid.

Let's remember, too, that it was President Obama who first implemented the refueling and logistical support policy. This is not a political matter. There is no real difference in the way that the Obama administration and the Trump administration provide this support by, with, and through our allies the Saudis and the Emiratis.

It is clear why this has been the policy of the last two administrations. Yemen is a place of great geopolitical concern. When I visited Bahrain recently with our colleagues--the U.S. Fifth Fleet is housed in Bahrain--we heard concerns about a chokepoint near an area called the Bab el Mandeb. I probably butchered that pronunciation, but we have all heard more frequently about the Straits of Hormuz, through which a lot of the world's commerce and oil flow.

Bab el Mandeb is off to the west of Yemen, only 18 miles at its narrowest point, connecting the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean. That is one of the reasons why it is so important geopolitically--because 3.8 million barrels of oil pass through it each day, many of them in route to the Suez Canal and beyond. Bab el Mandeb shows the geopolitical importance of Yemen in the surrounding region. When rebels attempt to shut down shipping in this passage, the impact is global, including on the United States, and our Nation has every right to be concerned.

I fear the resolution I mention deals with our shared concerns in the wrong way. We all want to avoid civilian casualties. Most everyone is aware that Yemen has been suffering from a severe humanitarian crisis for years, including a terrible cholera outbreak. But if we were to remove U.S. involvement and logistical support for the Saudi coalition, the humanitarian crisis would likely get even worse.

The Department of Defense has critiqued the resolution on which we will be voting on the grounds that it would undermine our ability to foster long-term relationships with allies in the Gulf region. We also benefit from increased interoperability, burden-sharing, and strong security architectures throughout the world. In other words, the alliances we have in the Middle East fight the common enemy of ISIS and al-Qaida and try to contain Iran, which has been at war with the United States since 1979 in the Iranian Revolution in one form or another. All of these are on the table and all of these should be matters of our concern, but they are best considered, at least initially, in the context of the Foreign Relations Committee. They can then make a recommendation to us, and we can have the sort of fulsome debate that people have come to expect in the Senate, I hope, on matters of global importance. So all of the reasons I have mentioned here suggest that the need for our auxiliary and limited role in Yemen remains important.

Secretary Mattis, the Secretary of Defense, has said that a withdrawal of our noncombatant support could embolden Iranian-backed rebels in the area, enable further missile strikes on Saudi Arabia, our ally, and threaten the shipping lanes in the Red Sea, like the one at Bab el Mandeb. All this combined could stoke the embers of an even greater regional conflict in the Middle East.

So I hope our colleagues will vote for a tabling of this resolution, which does not cut off debate but just moves that debate, at least initially, to the Foreign Relations Committee, where, under the able leadership of Chairman Corker and Ranking Member Menendez, I have every confidence that they will explore every nook and cranny of this issue and come out with a reasoned and reasonable recommendation to the Senate and the Congress on how the U.S. Government should conduct itself.

I believe in a strong congressional role when it comes to wars and military conflict. This has been a fight, though, that has been going on for a long time between the executive branch and the legislative branch. We have the ultimate tool. We can cut off money, but that is a rather blunt instrument. I think this administration, like previous administrations, needs to recognize that the Congress is a partner in making these decisions, not an adversary. It is important that we each play our respective role, and I am confident that we will play that role responsibly, which is really what this is all about.

If the Senate takes this vote and passes this resolution, we lose the chance for that kind of careful, deliberate, informed consideration that starts in our standing committees. We lose the chance to have the Senate Foreign Relations Committee issue a thoroughly researched recommendation.

So I hope our colleagues will vote to table the resolution and not to close off debate but to insist that this debate take place, at least initially, where it belongs, in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and that this debate then continue among all 100 Members of the Senate. We will be better informed, we will be better prepared, and we will be better able to prevent unintended consequences from taking a rash action like voting for the resolution today.

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