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Floor Speech
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Mr. HAWLEY. I understand that multiple of my colleagues have objections to all of the nominees that the Senator from New Jersey is going to offer this evening. So I will be here to object on their behalf and also on my own behalf with regard to a few of them.
Mr. President, I want to address one of those nominees, Julianne Smith, the President's nominee to be United States Ambassador to NATO.
Before I do that, however, I just have to make one comment on the Senate majority leader's remarks about his own inability to get these nominees confirmed.
Now, I agree that many of these nominees are important, and that is, in fact, one of the reasons we should have a vote on them. The Ambassador to NATO, for instance, as I am about to argue, is a very important position. And the positions that she takes, the arguments that she makes are very important, which is why we ought to go on the record and actually have a vote.
But the Senate majority leader's comments--as if he has no control over the calendar. He is the majority leader of the United States Senate. He decides when we vote. He decides what we vote on.
What are we doing now?
The floor is empty. We could be voting.
What are we doing later this week?
He is gavelling us out of session so that Members across the aisle can go on a field trip to Glasgow, Scotland.
We could be voting.
It is getting a little rich to hear the Senate majority leader, who is doing almost nothing--have we brought up the defense bill?
No action. Multiple major issues--no action from the Senate majority leader.
If these nominees are so critical, he ought to be putting them on the floor for votes. He doesn't want to do that because, apparently, he can't control the floor or he just doesn't want to work for very long or he doesn't want to work very hard. I mean, I leave that to him. But it is quite ridiculous for the majority leader to blame Republicans, who cannot prevent votes.
Can I just be clear? Republicans do not have the ability to prevent votes on any of these nominees. The filibuster for these nominees doesn't exist.
We can vote whenever the majority leader wants. It is his decision when to bring them to the floor.
Now I want to comment on one just briefly.
I think the Senator from New Jersey and I can agree that this is a very important position. I am sure the Senator believes that, and I agree with him 100 percent. And I just want to take a minute and say why I think it is important and why we need to vote--actually vote--on her nomination.
A decade ago almost, 2014, after the Russian invasion--incursion into Ukraine, NATO allies finally recognized that they were not spending enough--our NATO allies--on their own defense and on our common defense. So they pledged as a group to commit at least 2 percent of their respective GDPs to their own defense and to meet that target by 2024. So far, large numbers of them are not on track to do so.
In fact, Ms. Smith said, in response to my own questions about this, that it is clear that a group of allies will fail to deliver on this pledge by 2024; and, currently, another group are not close to meeting it, although they say they hope to make up the difference.
Here is my point: The security situation has not improved since 2014. It has deteriorated. Russia, as we speak, is still menacing Ukraine. And now China is menacing Taiwan.
The United States is already facing hard choices, and we are going to face harder choices yet about how we allocate our defense resources, which are scarce; how we allocate our force posture, how we structure our force posture in a world that is growing more dangerous. And the China threat, in particular, is one that is going to make us make difficult choices in what we prioritize in the Asia-Pacific versus what we prioritize in Europe.
The bottom line is we need our allies to meet not only their 2- percent commitment, but we need them to do more in Europe for their own defense because we must focus on the deteriorating security situation in the Indo-Pacific and in the Asia-Pacific with regard to China and its imperial ambitions in Taiwan.
I asked Ms. Smith for her commitment that she will press our NATO allies not only to meet their 2-percent commitment, but to revise that commitment so that we can have a truly common defense in this era of multiplying challenges and deteriorating security. She has refused, unfortunately, to give me that commitment.
I can't block her nomination, but I can ask that we take a vote on it. And so for that reason, in a moment here, when Senator Menendez brings her nomination to the floor, I will object and ask for a vote on her, in particular; and I will, as I said, object to others on behalf of my colleagues.
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Mr. HAWLEY. Mr. President, on behalf of my colleagues and myself, I object.
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Mr. HAWLEY. Mr. President, on behalf of my colleagues and myself, I object.
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Mr. HAWLEY. Mr. President, on behalf of my colleagues and myself, I object.
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