National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. CRUZ. Mr. President, I rise in support of the Gillibrand amendment. I am proud to support Senator Gillibrand's concerted effort to deal with the problem of sexual assault in our military.

I want to begin by commending her persistent leadership in forging a bipartisan coalition to tackle this serious problem. I supported the Gillibrand amendment in committee, and I am proud to be a cosponsor of the amendment here on the floor of the Senate. I rise today to share my reasons for supporting it and to encourage my colleagues to continue to come together in support of this amendment.

Everyone in this body wants to support the men and women of our military. In the course of the Senate Armed Services Committee hearings on sexual assault, we heard testimony after testimony after testimony about the persistent problem of sexual assault in the military. I found myself persuaded by the arguments that Senator Gillibrand raised in defense of her amendments.

Indeed, when I said at the hearing that I had been persuaded by the arguments, I have to tell you, afterwards a reporter from a newspaper came up to me astonished, and asked, in wonderment: Were you really persuaded by arguments at a hearing? I thought everyone came in with their views already set in stone, and nothing that was said here made a difference.

I chuckled and said: Well, the arguments Senator Gillibrand put forth I found powerful in terms of how do we deal with a serious problem.

There were two arguments in particular that I found persuasive. The first is that sexual assault has proven to be a persistent problem in the military. According to the Defense Department, 3,374 cases of unwanted sexual contact were reported last year.

More than 23,000 additional cases of unwanted sexual contact went unreported. This has been a problem that has been present in the military for decades. Our commanders, our generals, our admirals, have worked in good faith, have worked diligently to correct this problem. It has proven a persistent problem. Yet, unfortunately, their efforts to correct the problem have not proven successful.

In the civilian side, one of the great challenges when it comes to sexual assault is the relatively low rate of reporting. Sadly, on the military side, that problem is even greater. The most significant barrier we see to deterring and preventing sexual assault is that many of the victims are unwilling, are not comfortable coming forward and reporting the assaults they are experiencing. Despite the repeated good-faith efforts of our military commanders, we have been unable to fix that problem.

The second argument Senator Gillibrand raised that I find quite persuasive is that a number of our allies, including Great Britain, including Israel, including Canada, including Germany, have implemented reforms quite similar to the reforms she is proposing, which is namely that the decision whether to bring a prosecution for a crime like sexual assault should be made by an impartial military prosecutor and not by the commanding officer who may well be the commanding officer both of the victim of the crime and the perpetrator of the crime. Those reforms have been implemented by our allies. Our allies have not seen good order and discipline undermined. Indeed, the data suggests they have seen an increase in reporting rates. Those are the arguments that persuaded me that we need to solve this problem, we need to stop this problem.

Let me point out that the coalition supporting the Gillibrand amendment is a bipartisan coalition. This cuts across party lines.

In my view, there are two strong conservative principles, both of which the Gillibrand amendment furthers. No. 1, all of us want to strengthen our military, ensure that good order and discipline are protected; that our commanders are effective; that we maintain the strongest fighting force on the face of the planet. But, No. 2, all of us want to prevent and deter violent crime and to ensure that anyone who commits violent crime, and in particular a crime of a sexual nature, meets swift and sure punishment.

Prior to being elected in the Senate I spent many years in law enforcement working to ensure that those guilty of violent crimes, and in particular crimes of sexual violence against children, against women, received the swiftest and surest punishment.

In my view, the Gillibrand amendment furthers both of these conservative objectives. I have tried to think about this issue not just from the perspective of a Senator but also from the perspective of a father. My wife and I have two little girls, Caroline and Catherine, who are 5 and 3. I have tried to think if some years hence Caroline or Catherine made a decision to step forward and volunteer to serve in our Armed Forces, what are the rules I would want to be in place to ensure that my daughters were protected against any risk of sexual assault.

Given the two-decade-plus history that we have seen in the military of not being able to effectively prevent these crimes and not having victims willing to come forward and report, in my view, shifting not to a civilian authority but to an impartial military prosecutor is going to significantly increase the reporting rates, which, in turn, is going to deter these crimes from being committed.

All of us owe a duty to our soldiers, our sailors, airmen, and marines, the young men and women who voluntarily step forward to risk everything to defend our Nation. For one of those young soldiers to find himself or herself the victim of sexual assault is an absolute violation of that trust.

The Supreme Court has referred to rape as ``short of murder, the ultimate violation of self.'' All of us have an obligation to make sure we are protecting our soldiers. An environment where young men and women in the military fear the risk of sexual assault or are not able to come forward and report those crimes is not an environment that furthers good order and discipline. So I would encourage all of my friends in this body, both Democrats and Republicans, to come together in support of this commonsense proposal to strengthen our military, and at the same time to deter and punish the unacceptable, unspeakable crimes of sexual assault so we can together honor the commitment we owe to all men and women in the military.

I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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