Protecting Volunteer Firefighters and Emergency Responders Act

Floor Speech

Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, I have said time and again that a nuclear-
armed Iran is the greatest threat this country faces. I have said time
and again that the Senate needs to have votes on the merits of this
agreement.

The President has taken us down a very dangerous path. The President
has backtracked on his own words. He said that Iran needed to live up
to all of its obligations under international law. Yet Iran still has
not disclosed the past military dimensions of its nuclear program.

The President said, after this negotiating process began in December
of 2013, that Iran has no need for a fortified underground military
bunker in Fordow. Yet our negotiators have conceded the existence, with
centrifuge cascades, of that underground military bunker.

The President has said we have to have fully verifiable, anywhere,
anytime access to all sites in Iran to ensure they are not cheating on
any agreement--to include their military sites. Yet the leaders of Iran
continue to say that we won't be able to access their military sites.
There will be no intrusive inspections.

I and the Senator from Florida, as well as many other Senators, have
submitted multiple amendments to ask for votes on these points. We have
been consistently blocked from bringing up these amendments for a vote.

It is fine if you want to vote no. If you think Iran should keep an
underground fortified military bunker with centrifuge cascades. It is
fine if you don't think they should have to disclose the past military
dimensions of their nuclear program, but we need to vote. We need to
vote now.

It is even fine if you agree with those points and that you think
this is a delicate agreement that has to be prevented from being
amended in any way. But we need to vote.

If you don't want to vote, you shouldn't have come to the Senate. If
you are in the Senate and you don't want to vote, you should leave. As
the Senator from Florida said yesterday, be a talk show host, be a
columnist. It is time we have a vote at a simple majority threshold on
all of these critical points.

We are talking about a nuclear Iran, the most dangerous threat to our
national security.

So the amendment I am offering first would simply take the language
of the bill that came out of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and
add those three points. First, that Iran shouldn't keep its nuclear
facility before it gets sanctions relief; that Iran can't get sanctions
relief until they disclose the past military dimensions of their
nuclear program. They can't get sanctions relief until they accept a
fully verifiable inspections regime.

We deserve a vote on this.

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Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, again, these amendments would do two very
simple things: First, they would require a vote on whether Iran should
get sanctions relief before it discloses past military dimensions of
its nuclear program, before it closes its underground fortified bunker
at Fordow, and before it submits to a fully verifiable, anytime,
anywhere, no-notice inspections regime. Second, they would require Iran
to acknowledge Israel's right to exist as a Jewish democratic state
before they get nuclear weapons because they continue to say that
Israel would be wiped off the map, and if they get nuclear weapons,
they will have the means to do so.

It is my intent to insist upon a recorded vote on these amendments at
a simple-majority threshold. The Senate needs to vote. If you disagree
with these policies, vote no. If you agree with these policies and you
think this will upset a delicate compromise, then vote no and explain
that. But we need to vote, and we should start voting.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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Mr. COTTON. Mr. President, let's talk about poison pill amendments. I
would say these aren't poison pills; these are vitamin pills. They are
designed to strengthen this legislation and to strengthen the U.S.
negotiating position.

Who could object that Israel has a right to exist as a Jewish state
and that Iran should not be allowed a nuclear weapon if they won't
recognize that right? The President himself said they should close
their underground fortified military bunker before they get sanctions
relief. We are simply asking for a vote on what the President himself
has said.

If the Senator from Maryland wants to talk about procedural tactics,
let's be perfectly clear what has happened here. The very first
amendment brought to the floor on this bill was designed to stop any
other amendments from being offered.

For those of you watching, you should know that the only thing that
amendment says is that any final agreement must be submitted in Farsi
as well as English. That is a noncontroversial proposal which I am sure
we could adopt by voice vote and move on in an orderly fashion to any
other amendments. Yet, they continue to object to unanimous consent to
bring up any other amendments, designed to stop the Senate from having
to cast these votes.

The amendments we have offered are no more of a procedural tactic
than what the Senator from Maryland himself is doing--an amendment that
could have been offered in committee, an amendment that could have been
voted on easily on Tuesday when it was offered but is being used to
block consideration of any other amendment.

These are not tough votes. These should be easy votes. Again, if you
want to vote no, vote no. If you want to vote no and say it is designed
to protect a compromise, do that. But we should be voting.

I yield the floor.

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