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Floor Speech

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Mr. RISCH. Senator Sanders has brought us a resolution which very simply states that Russia must immediately and completely and unconditionally withdraw from the territory of Ukraine. This isn't even a law. It isn't even a bill. It is only a resolution.

Now, there isn't anybody that disagrees with this. I certainly agree with the substance of this, but this is going to have absolutely zero effect of any kind. If my good friend Senator Sanders believes that Vladimir Putin is watching this show on TV and says, ``Huh, they passed a resolution saying I should get out of Ukraine; so I guess I will pack up and go,'' you are delusional if you think it is going to have any effect of any kind on Vladimir Putin.

However, having said that, I don't think it is a secret to anyone that there are very delicate negotiations going on. There are four entities involved. Obviously, Ukraine is involved, the United States is involved, Russia is involved, and our European allies are involved. There is constant conversation going on.

I think a lot of people were upset when they saw the exchange this weekend, understandably. But, look, what you are looking at is the tip of the iceberg. Everybody wants the same outcome and that is to have peace in Ukraine.

There is one man on this planet--one man--that can make that happen, and that is Donald J. Trump. He promised he would do that in the election. He is making very significant strides in that regard.

And to my good friend Senator Sanders, this is not helpful to the activities that are going on to try to get this resolved. You may think you know what is going on, but I can guarantee with absolute certainty, you do not know what is going on as far as the negotiations are concerned to get this over with. What you are looking at is the tip of the iceberg, and this is not going to be helpful to getting to the point that you want to get to, that I want to get to, that everyone wants to get to, and that is to get peace in Ukraine.

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Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, I respect my friend, but I vehemently disagree that this resolution is going to cause Vladimir Putin to end this war.

My good friend says that Vladimir Putin could end this war. He does not have the ability to end this war. This war is going to end when there is an agreement by the four entities involved: Ukraine, Russia, the United States, and our European allies. When those four reach an agreement, there will be an end to this war. That can be done by Donald J. Trump.

I guarantee you, Vladimir Putin does not have the ability to bring those four entities together to end this war.

Again, this is not helpful.

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Mr. RISCH. Again, to my good friend Senator Sanders I would say that Putin does not have that ability. He simply does not have the ability. You talked about how he started this and how he could end it. He could have ended it shortly after he started it. He is in so deep in this, he cannot end it. It is going to take an agreement between the four entities to end it. That is how it is going to end.

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Mr. RISCH. I don't--the answer to that is yes, but I don't want to do a quiz here.

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Mr. RISCH. You correctly stated what the resolution states, but, again, I think you, along with myself and every Member of this body, want to see the fighting stop in Ukraine. That is a necessity. It has to happen.

The things that are happening are going on right now. There are discussions going on right now. As I said to my good friend Senator Sanders, you may think you know what is going on on this because you watched what happened this weekend. I can tell you with absolute certainty that you do not know the discussions and what is happening as the train moves forward to try to resolve this.

This isn't a resolution that is going to happen with a whole bunch of people getting involved and trying to lay out different things that they want to get to resolution. It is going to be complicated. It is going to be complex.

Again, I come back to the fact that there is one person who is in the center of this that can make this happen, and that is Donald J. Trump.

Our passing resolutions here is not helpful to the efforts that are trying to be done to resolve this. So as a result of that, I am going to object to it, and as a result of that, I do object.

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Mr. RISCH. Mr. President, I agree with my good friend from Illinois that this is amongst many, many facts that are going to be taken into consideration as the parties negotiate in what is going to be a very complex negotiation to get to the end point. There are going to be a lot of things that do need to be considered.

The difficulty is that when this institution, the U.S. Senate, puts something out like this, it does have an effect on the parties that are sitting at the table. And you don't really get to a resolution by prodding on these kinds of things. You talk about what it takes to stop the fighting, not what it took to get into it, not the actions that were taken during the fighting. But if you want to stop the fighting, you have to talk about where we are and where we need to get to.

This simply, I can assure you, Senator, is not helpful to those negotiations that are going on.

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