National Security
Keeping America safe is Congress’ most important duty. Democrats are focused on strengthening U.S. national security, defending democracy, and restoring America’s leadership in the world.
Democrats are committed to enhancing our national security and advancing key American interests, while supporting human rights and democratic values at home and abroad.
In the 117th Congress, Democrats passed a bipartisan defense authorization bill that strengthened our national security, ensured our military personnel have the resources they need to defend our country, and bolstered our allies and international interests. In the 118th Congress, Democrats will build on these gains by continuing to help President Biden keep Americans safe.
We will continue to work with the Administration to provide our diplomats and our troops with the tools needed to carry out their missions abroad safely and effectively. This will include continuing to work with our allies to ensure Russia’s illegal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine ends in defeat for Putin, that America maintains its competitiveness against China’s authoritarian challenges, and that the world is free from threats posed by Iran.
National Security Related
The news today of an encounter between U.S. and Russian forces in Syria underscore the dangers of this Administration’s lack of a strategy to protect our troops, support our allies, and promote an end to the conflict there that secures our interests. I remain deeply concerned that Vladimir Putin intends to use pressure on our military - as we saw with the reports several weeks ago of Russian bounties paid to the Taliban in Afghanistan for U.S. service members killed there - and influence our election and the direction of America’s global national security strategy.
In deploying federal law enforcement to patrol American cities like Portland and Chicago and silence those exercising their First Amendment rights, Donald Trump is drawing from the playbook of the worst dictators of the past century.
Madam Speaker, I want to thank Chairman Adam Smith of the Armed Services Committee for ensuring a fair and bipartisan process as the House worked to craft a defense authorization bill that strengthens our national security and reflects our nation’s highest principles, and I want to thank the Ranking Member Mac Thornberry as well for working closely with Chairman Smith throughout this process and offering constructive input.
“Good morning. Thank you for being here. Sunday evening I received a telephone call from my former colleague, Mark Meadows, now the Chief of Staff at the White House, who asked me to put together a group of eight to 10 members for the purposes of having a briefing in the SCIF at the White House. I indicated to him I would consider that. I talked to the Speaker about it. Our view has been and always been if the White House asked you to come down for a meeting and to be briefed, you respond to that request.
John Bolton should have testified before the House during its impeachment proceedings against President Trump. Instead, he withheld his damning evidence of the President’s abuse of power, preferring to enrich himself off a book deal instead of performing his patriotic duty to testify before the American people. Shame on him.
President Truman used to have a plaque on his desk that said ‘The buck stops here.’ President Trump’s approach seems to be, dangerously, as he has said before, ‘I don’t take responsibility at all.’ Over the weekend, we learned of allegations that our intelligence services assessed in March that Russia has been offering a monetary reward for killing American troops in Afghanistan.
For my entire career in public service, I have supported efforts to make America both strong and safe and a force for peace and reconciliation. In the course of those years, I have striven to draw an acceptable balance between our national security and the protection of our personal liberty and the right to privacy central to our unique and extraordinary democracy: a government of laws, not of men.
"At the request of the Speaker of the House, I am withdrawing consideration of the FISA Act. The two-thirds of the Republican party that voted for this bill in March have indicated they are going to vote against it now.
I doubt that there is a person on this Floor who disagrees with the premises that [Ranking Member Michael] McCaul just stated. Soleimani was a bad person. I said during the course of debate on the Slotkin [resolution], which referenced exactly that premise, that no one lamented the loss of Mr. Soleimani. No one. That's not what this bill is about, nor is that what this amendment is about. This bill, which is called a partisan bill by Mr. McCaul, had 15 percent of the Republicans in the United States Senate vote for it.
The agreement with the Taliban ought to be received with caution, and while I support bringing our troops home, we must do everything possible to ensure that their sacrifices over the past eighteen years have not been in vain.