Motion to Discharge

Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. But this is one where we clearly see things differently.

Mr. Olsen, for most of his career--and it has been a distinguished career--has operated as a nonpartisan public servant. But as Senator Grassley, ranking member on the Judiciary Committee, said at the time he had his hearing there, once the previous administration took office, it was like a switch got flipped and he turned into a partisan warrior.

Over the last few years, Mr. Olsen has made a series of serious ultrapartisan statements. Prior to the 2016 election, he said that ISIS supported Donald Trump for President. Following the election, he claimed that the electoral college should be abolished because it is a national security threat. He signed on to a number of letters hysterically criticizing then-Attorney General Barr and the Justice Department, and he failed to disclose these writings and other critical information to the Judiciary Committee during the hearing on his nomination.

I believe now, more than ever, it is absolutely critical that the Justice Department and our intelligence community operate free from political influence and bias. But I have no confidence that, if confirmed, Mr. Olsen's partisan switch will get flipped back off. I fear he will continue to pursue his political objectives from within the Department, using the powerful tools of the Department of Justice to pave the way for his partisan political agenda.

And lest anybody think these concerns are unprecedented or groundless, let me just point out that we now have a former lawyer with the FBI that has pled guilty for falsifying an application to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in the process of investigating an American citizen. He has now pled guilty and is now serving probation, a lawyer with the FBI who erroneously communicated information to the court with which they relied upon to issue a warrant to surveil an American citizen, using the powers of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

And then, just this last week, another lawyer has been indicted by Mr. Durham, the special counsel--somebody who has a distinguished career as a former Federal prosecutor and has worked at a prominent firm that typically represents the Democratic Party.

He now has been indicted for lying to the FBI, and it rises out of a conversation he had with a general counsel at the FBI, suggesting that there was some link between the Trump administration--or Trump organization and a criminal-linked Russian lender called Alfa Bank.

The indictment says that Michael Sussmann lied about the capacity in which he was providing this information to the FBI. But, in fact, what he did is prepare white papers using confidential information obtained from a technology client and fed that to the FBI while he claimed to be just a good citizen wanting to pass this information along when he was actually on the payroll of the Clinton campaign.

And, obviously, then talking to the press, leaking this narrative to the press, this has, I think, contributed to this false narrative of somehow that the Russians colluded with then-Candidate Trump in order to win the election. There has been no evidence at all, whether if you look at the inspector general report--Inspector General Horowitz--about the now debunked Steele dossier, which supposedly was the basis upon which the FBI opened their investigation.

So what we are talking about is people in positions of trust and confidence in the U.S. Government abusing their power, lying to the FBI, and lying to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in order to pursue a partisan political objective.

Now, I have no idea what Mr. Olsen would do, but I don't think we can take any risks, given the fact he has now turned into a partisan warrior. We have got ample examples of people who, perhaps against their better judgment, have thrown into this resistance attitude and simply forgotten their professional responsibilities. And when it comes to the intelligence community and national security, we don't need any more partisan warriors in these positions of trust. These should be nonpartisan professionals.

So I don't think Mr. Olsen has certainly satisfied me or many of my other colleagues that he can flip that partisan warrior switch off.

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President.

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, what I was referring to earlier are examples of abuse of power by people in the U.S. Government who are in a position to do things to average citizens that, frankly, if they can do them to powerful individuals like candidates for President or our sitting officeholders, what is the little guy supposed to do?

If people are so blinded by their partisanship or their desire to get somebody that they violate their oath, they violate the law, and abuse power, what is the average man and woman supposed to do?

You know, it reminds me a little bit of the hearing that we had just a couple of days ago in the Judiciary Committee, where this monster named Larry Nassar, an Olympic physician for 18 years, systematically and routinely sexually assaulted and abused young female Olympic athletes.

And for years, these Olympic athletes tried to get the FBI to investigate their allegations against Dr. Nassar. And it took an extended period of time--I think it was a year and a half--before the FBI actually undertook the investigation. But it took a couple of our colleagues--people like Senator Blumenthal from Connecticut, Senator Jerry Moran from Kansas--in order to stay on this issue until, finally, this monster, Dr. Nassar, was charged with crimes and convicted and now is going to serve in prison the rest of his life.

But it haunts me to think, if these elite Olympic athletes whose names are known all around the world could not get the government to respond to their assault and to do them justice, what chance do the rest of us have? I am not worried about Members of Congress; I am worried about my 29 million constituents.

And so the examples I gave of Mr. Clinesmith, who lied to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in order to get a warrant to illegally surveil an American citizen--that is an abuse of power that causes me very grave concern.

And when I read the indictment of Michael Sussman lying to the FBI about his connection to the Clinton campaign, while he compiled information that was confidential, gave it to the FBI, claimed to just be a good citizen and not representing any client, when in fact he was on the payroll of the Clinton campaign, and he was systematically leaking this information to the press to feed this narrative about Russian collusion--which has obsessed Congress and the country for years.

And now we know there is no factual basis for the allegations against then-Candidate Trump or then later President Trump. The Russian collusion narrative was not true, but it was fed by partisans who abused their power in order to gain politically.

So I don't know Mr. Olsen that well. Like I said, I know he has had a distinguished career. But something clearly snapped when he became a partisan lawyer. And I simply do not have confidence that he will not abuse his power in pursuit of his partisan aims.

There are better people that the President could nominate to serve in this sensitive position, and I will not, in good conscience, agree to simply allow somebody with this sort of track record to be confirmed.

And as my colleagues know, the majority leader has all the tools he needs at his disposal to have a vote on the Senate floor on this nomination. But it shouldn't be done by unanimous consent. It shouldn't be done outside of the public attention because there are so many things competing for people's attention. I think this is a debate and a conversation we need to have about powerful public officials abusing their power for partisan political gain.

What chance does the average American have if they will abuse that power to go after powerful public figures like a candidate for President or an incumbent President of the United States?

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I would ask unanimous consent to complete my remarks before the vote.

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, our friends across the aisle are moving full steam ahead with what I think is fairly described as a reckless tax-and-spending spree, which is chock-full of unnecessary, unwarranted, and flatout unaffordable policies.

Remember that we had to spend a lot of money--borrowed money--during the COVID crisis, which we did on a bipartisan basis because it was a national--indeed, an international and global emergency.

But as we continue to get people vaccinated and put the pandemic in the rearview mirror, our colleagues simply want to continue spending money that we don't have to pursue their ideological and political agenda, to grow the government, to intrude more in people's lives, and to take more of what they earn rather than let them spend it as they see fit.

Our colleagues want to impose crippling tax hikes on job creators at a time when many of them are still digging out of the recession that was part of the pandemic. They want to dole out permanent welfare without requiring able-bodied men and women to work. They want to discourage medical innovation through price fixing and implement a range of items from their far-left wish list.

After charging nearly $2 trillion on the taxpayers' credit card earlier this year, our Democratic colleagues are back at it for round 2. And this time, they are going all out. That is especially true when it comes to the energy sector.

Over the past few years, we have seen no shortage of unrealistic and downright harmful policies to reduce carbon emissions. Now, there is a smart way to do it, and there is a self-defeating way to reduce emissions. One is to reduce the use of coal and increase the use of things like natural gas, which has much lower carbon content than coal. And we are doing that, and we have reduced emissions as a result.

But our colleagues have proposed everything from the socialist paradise that is the Green New Deal to more targeted but no more realistic net zero emission bills.

This reckless tax-and-spending spree compiles the most outlandish proposals into one of the greatest hits albums. The hallmark of this legislation is a full range of tax increases on the fossil fuel industry, which ultimately are passed along to consumers and contribute to inflation and the increased costs that they have to pay in order to fill up at the pump.

Whether we are talking about energy, agriculture, or any other industry, higher taxes always mean higher prices for consumers. It is inevitable.

Businesses can't just take the increases as a hit to their bottom line. They might raise taxes, lay off employees, postpone expansion plans, or implement all of the above, but that is exactly what this proposal would spur when it comes to the energy sector.

It increases taxes already paid by energy companies on income earned in the global marketplace and subjects energy employers to double taxation of their foreign income. It also adds a brand new tax, the Superfund excise tax, which was eliminated 25 years ago--all in pursuit of more revenue to grow the size of the government.

Our friends across the aisle want to resurrect this tax and force energy companies to pay more on every barrel of crude oil that is sold. Once again, the ultimate burden won't be on those companies. It will fall to consumers who are already struggling to keep up with inflation.

Gasoline prices are up 42 percent over last year. Natural gas is up 21 percent. Families in Texas are paying more on everything from electricity to groceries, to vehicles. This smorgasbord of higher taxes will only drive up costs for working families and hurt the very job creators we have been trying to help, over the last year and a half, dig out from under COVID-19.

You have to wonder, if these policies are going to hurt working Americans and the economy, who benefits? Well, for starters, our geopolitical adversaries will benefit. The higher cost on domestic crude would, once again, make the U.S. reliant on imports of oil and gas from overseas, from countries like Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Venezuela perhaps.

President Biden unintentionally demonstrated the hypocrisy of this approach when he pushed, earlier this year, to beg OPEC, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, to increase production overseas to bring down oil prices here in the United States. In other words, he doesn't want American oil and gas producers to produce oil and gas. He wants the Russians and the Saudis to do it to help us bring down prices here in America.

It is just crazy. It makes no sense. If the President is worried about affordable energy, he needs to quit pushing policies that will drive up the cost for consumers at the pump.

Other big winners include wealthy electric vehicle drivers. The sort of subsidies that are contained in this proposed package includes a tax credit for electric vehicle purchases, even if these cars are made--you guessed it--in China. And it is subsidizing--it is taking middle-income taxpayers' money and giving it to people who are buying expensive cars because they are incentivized by the tax credit. Meanwhile, we have 280 million cars on the road in America that still depend on oil and gas in order to function because they have, yes, an internal combustion engine.

On top of that, a bigger tax credit is given to electric cars built in union shops. Now, why would you favor a political supporter like organized labor? Well, I think the answer may be pretty obvious. Maybe union-built electric vehicles are more green than other electric vehicles or maybe it is a favor doled out to a special interest group by my friends on the other side, to a political constituency.

As a reminder, unlike gas-powered vehicle drivers, EV drivers don't even pay anything for the highways that they drive their car on. They don't pay into the highway trust fund, which comes out of the cost of a gallon of gas, to help maintain our roads and bridges.

So our friends across the aisle just keep on coming with tax breaks for the well-off and the well-to-do in a way that will burden hard- working Texans and Americans.

I support efforts to reduce carbon emissions to preserve our air, land, and water for future generations, but these efforts shouldn't pick winners and losers, especially when wealthy Americans are reaping the benefits at the cost of blue-collar workers.

Like the rest of the reckless tax-and-spending spree proposal, the cost of this energy proposal far exceeds any benefit. It will drive up costs for American families, hurt our global competitiveness, ultimately hurt our allies that depend on exported LNG to provide energy diversity, and it will empower our adversaries.

So there is no reason to stick taxpayers with the bill for these unnecessary policies when there are better ways to keep costs for consumers low while protecting our environment.

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