Executive Session

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, Secretary of State Pompeo will meet with Vladimir Putin tomorrow, and there is something important he must do.

The Mueller report, for all its revelations about the President's conduct, also reminded us of things we know to be true and must resist at all costs. The Mueller report documented the ``sweeping and systematic'' disinformation campaign directed by President Putin to undermine our 2016 elections. Whatever you may think of the President's behavior, foreign interference in our elections cannot be ignored.

It was an attack on democracy itself, and in my view, America's response has not been adequate. What happened in the past has happened, as bad as it was, but the point of looking at this is to prevent it from ever happening again in the future. We don't know what country will try to change our elections and who it might support--Russia, China, Iran, North Korea. So we have to bolster ourselves, and until we get a full, full description of what happened and a plan to stop it from happening in 2020, America should not rest because it is an attack on democracy itself.

America's response, thus far, has not been adequate. Congress passed sanctions, but then President Trump failed to implement some and watered others down. Only a few months ago, the Treasury Department cut a sweetheart deal on sanctions relief for Russian oligarch and Putin crony Oleg Deripaska.

Even rhetorically, the President and members of his administration have shown an unbelievable willingness to look past President Putin's actions of 2016. A little over a week ago, just after the Mueller report came out, President Trump held a phone call with President Putin in which he reportedly brought up the Russian hoax, and he did not warn Putin not to meddle in our elections. Of course, the press conference in Helsinki last year was the epitome of President Trump's inability to confront President Putin about his interference in our elections.

This matters a great deal because any softness on the administration's part will be read by Putin and other foreign powers as an invitation to try and interfere with our elections again. We know, thanks to the testimony from FBI Director Wray and our national intelligence chiefs, that foreign adversaries are gearing up right now to try again and interfere with our elections in 2020. Yet it may not be just Russia next time; it might be China, North Korea, or Iran. Who knows?

So it is long past time for the Trump administration to make it crystal clear that another interference campaign by Putin will not be tolerated. The Secretary of State, Michael Pompeo, has an obligation to warn President Putin that any action to interfere in our elections will be met with an immediate and robust response. Secretary of State Pompeo must make clear that the cost of trying to interfere with American elections will be dear. Secretary of State Pompeo must deliver a shot across the bow to Putin and any other foreign adversary who would dare think about trying to influence our elections. Anything else from Secretary Pompeo will be a failure of diplomacy.

Here in Congress, our response must also be strong. In the wake of multiple warnings about future election interference, we must do everything we can to harden our election infrastructure before 2020. There are multiple bills--bipartisan, sponsored by Democrats and Republicans--that are in committee right now that would do just that, but Leader McConnell will not commit to bringing them to the floor, which is another example of his legislative graveyard. Instead, he just schedules nomination after nomination. This is now the third week in a row that the Senate will spend processing only nominations. Leader McConnell is, slowly but surely, changing the Chamber into a legislative graveyard, where even the most urgently needed, bipartisan bills on election security and Russia sanctions get buried.

Healthcare

Madam President, on healthcare, it is not just election security, of course, that finds itself in the McConnell graveyard. Bipartisan bills, like background checks, paycheck fairness, and the Violence Against Women Act, have all passed the House with Republican support but have languished in the Senate. I wouldn't be surprised if healthcare legislation will soon be added to the list of tombstones in Leader McConnell's graveyard.

At the end of last week, the House passed a crucial piece of legislation that would reverse the Trump administration's attempts to weaken protections for Americans with preexisting conditions--a policy supported by the vast majority of Americans and publicly supported by several State Senate Republicans who are up for reelection. This week, the House is poised to pass another great package of healthcare legislation to further protect preexisting conditions and help people sign up for quality healthcare coverage.

Compare that to the Trump administration's policies, which have only increased costs and lowered the number of Americans who have health insurance. The uninsured rate had been on a steady decline until President Trump took office. Now, for the first time since 2013, the number of Americans without insurance has been on the rise.

As the leader of the majority in the Senate, Senator McConnell has a responsibility to use our time here to help the American people. As insurance rates fall, protections for preexisting conditions are under attack, and prices go up for middle-class Americans. I believe the Senate must act to improve the Nation's healthcare system, and we have multiple House-passed bills awaiting action. Leader McConnell need only call them up for debate. Instead, the legislative graveyard--where good legislation doesn't even get debated or amended, let alone passed--is upon us.

Puerto Rico

Madam President, finally, on disaster relief, last week, our colleagues in the House passed yet another bill that would provide crucial aid for disaster-stricken communities, including for our fellow citizens in Puerto Rico who are still suffering. Importantly, the bill passed with 34 Republicans voting in favor.

Negotiations on a disaster package continue, but I believe the House vote is a sign that the Republicans in both Chambers are beginning to realize the people of Puerto Rico cannot be left behind--and rightly so. There will not be any bill if it doesn't treat all of America fairly.

Don't complain just about your State. Go to those in the Republican leadership, if you are a Republican Senator, and tell them we must pass a bill that protects everybody.

The President's animus for the people of Puerto Rico is antithetical to our values as Americans. Americans help each other in times of need. We wouldn't shortchange the farmers in Iowa or the people of Texas or California or Florida. So why should we ask 3 million fellow citizens-- the people of Puerto Rico, I remind my colleagues, who are U.S. citizens--to keep waiting for help to rebuild from a storm that made landfall over a year and a half ago? The bottom line is very simple: We have to help everybody.

Our Republican colleagues are beginning to realize their constituents are complaining and asking, what is the holdup? We all know the story. It wasn't the original idea of the Republicans in the Senate to treat Puerto Rico unfairly. President Trump came to a lunch and demanded that aid for Puerto Rico be eliminated or greatly diminished, and our Republican friends went along. They thought we would just bow down as they did, and we have not neither in the House nor in the Senate.

Now let's get moving. It is encouraging that the Republicans are beginning to realize that Puerto Rico needs help or that it at least has to be a part of the aid package. I hope these green shoots soon bear fruit, and we can send something to the President's desk and give relief to all of those who need it in California, Texas, Iowa, Nebraska, Alabama, Florida, and Puerto Rico.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source