Designating the Outstation of the Department of Veterans Affairs in North Ogden, Utah, As the Major Brent Taylor Vet Center Outstation

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

This BDS provision is a really important provision, and I understand what he is attempting to do with the exemptions. I understand he is putting them in for the small businesses, but having said that, we really believe this should apply across the board. Once we start the exempting process, it is going to be very difficult to stop.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. RISCH. Madam President, I rise to complete, I hope, the lengthy work we have done on S. 1--the first bill we introduced this year.

It is from the Foreign Relations Committee, and it is a bipartisan piece of legislation which many people have had input into. It is a conglomerate of several pieces of legislation that we have worked on for a considerable period of time, and all of those I know are supported in a bipartisan way.

I would like to walk through the five parts of this very briefly. The first one, of course, is the United States-Israel Security Authorization Assistance Act of 2019. That is one we spent a considerable period of time on.

Without a doubt, Israel is one of the best friends we have in the world. Certainly, in the neighborhood they live in, which is a very dangerous neighborhood, they need our help. We work with them very closely in many respects--in many national security respects, with people who aren't out in the public realm and who will probably never be out in the public realm, but they are important for the security of Israel.

The second is the Jordan Defense Authorization Act. I think all of us are aware, again, that Jordan is a great friend to have in the Middle East. Like Israel, it lives in a very dangerous neighborhood. Jordan has stood by us through thick and thin and through many challenges we have had. Jordan also has, in its great humanitarian view, taken in a number of refugees there.

As we work with Jordan, it is a cooperative effort to help them as they sustain these populations of displaced people who hopefully will be able to return at some point in time.

Thirdly, the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act of 2019 is also included in this piece of legislation. This is a piece of legislation that I think my friend from Michigan described quite aptly. It is named after an individual who is very brave and who brought out a lot of evidence of acts that people knew and suspected were happening. He brought them out into the public.

This is a bill that will use America's power to sanction, and it will refresh some of the sanctions we have already put in place. It is just an excellent way to attempt to persuade Bashar al-Assad that he is going in a very wrong direction, hurting his people as he is.

The Combating BDS Act of 2019 is an act that has some controversy to it. Again, the goals have already been discussed on the floor for many days and at considerable length. Without going into all of the details, it is designed to see that the BDS activity is tamped down and that it is not appropriate to use against our friend Israel.

Lastly, the most recent addition, of course, was the McConnell amendment that has been added. This amendment has been badly mischaracterized by the national media for a number of days now.

I keep reading where the national media writes that the U.S. Senate rebuked--they used the word ``rebuked''--President Trump. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In fact, when President Trump was running for office, he said his bottom line was to attempt to get us out of some of these entanglements that we have had.

One, of course, is Afghanistan, which has been on our mind for 17 years. The other was Syria. He rolled out the idea that we shouldn't be considering that. This system worked exactly the way the Founding Fathers intended for it to work. When it comes to foreign relations, when it comes to these kind of matters, it is a joint operation between the first and the second branches of government--between the legislative and the executive branches of government.

After the President put this on the table as the leader of the Nation, people began to talk. It was greatly debated both in this body--in the U.S. Senate--in the House of Representatives, and within the administration itself. What has happened with this piece of legislation is, first of all, it commends the President for all of the things he has been able to do in Syria and getting ISIS contained to a very small area that remains. It also lays out the challenges we face and commits to joining the President as we go forward and as we continue the work that is ahead of us in the Middle East.

This is a great piece of legislation. I commend it to my fellow Senators.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source