Ron DeSantis

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Speaker, about 5 weeks ago, Members of this body stood on the House floor and we all raised our hands and we all swore an oath of office to support and defend the Constitution. It is the same oath that Members in the other body, in the Senate, take. I think it is an oath that means something. It is not just window dressing. We have a responsibility to conform the actions of this body and to counteract actions of other branches of government if those actions are not consistent with the Constitution. And so here we have an instance in which the President is on record 22 different times saying he does not have the authority to grant work permits unilaterally, 5 million of them, to people in the country illegally. He can't give Social Security numbers or benefits without an act of Congress. And yet, after losing the election, he did it. When he did it, a number of Members in his own party in the Senate said they were concerned about what he did, and they didn't think that it could be done by executive fiat and that changes to immigration law had to happen through Congress. And so we are in a curious situation now because the House has passed a bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security but to constrain the President from acting illegally, because the government has to follow the law just like any other citizen. And you have a situation in the Senate in which the Democrats, including those seven Senators who said that this is problematic, they are blocking even having a debate on the bill. Forget about being opposed to the bill in its final form or if you don't get an amendment, they will not even let it come to the floor so it can be debated. To me, this is the most important type of debate, when it goes to the central purpose of our oath: to support and defend the Constitution. I think they need to go on record about why they think this is constitutional. What limits are there for the President in terms of exercising this executive power? Can he legislate lower tax rates? Can he legislate in the field of environmental law or workplace safety law that the Congress doesn't support? I think what you are seeing is a dereliction of duty by those Senators who are unwilling to have a discussion and they are unwilling to debate. They are putting protecting the political interests of a President in their own party over their duty to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. If you were right on the issues and you knew that what he did was constitutional, then you should have no problem going to the floor and making that case to the American people. The fact that they are unwilling to do that, I believe, is proof positive that they know that case cannot be made, and, in fact, they would not be able to make it. So I appreciate my friend from Georgia reserving this time. I think this is something that absolutely needs to have a thorough debate; and the American people overwhelmingly are opposed to what the President did, so let's debate it. If you don't like what we did, offer your suggestion, but the idea that you can go run and hide is something that is not consistent with our duties or with our oath of office.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues have demonstrated ably the substantive problems with this law: higher costs, canceled coverage, lost doctors. I would just like to say that ObamaCare has done harm to republican government properly understood. When you go around the country telling people over and over again that they can keep their plans, that they can keep their doctors, and that they will see thousands of dollars in savings on health insurance premiums, all the while you know--or should have known--that those promises were false, I think that damages our political system because, ultimately, representative government requires honest dialogue between elected officials and the citizenry. It is almost as if this is the Jonathan Gruber law where we want to tell people lies in order to get bills that we would not have passed otherwise. I think that is unacceptable. These promises made to the American people were false, the American people were deceived, and I think our representative government and political system have been damaged as a result.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Madam Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Alabama (Mrs. Roby).

Mr. DeSANTIS. Madam Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte), the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Madam Chair, I yield myself the balance of my time. The President likes to say that he wants to focus all of our resources on the criminals, and yet, over the last 2 years, by DHS' own figures, this administration has released 66,000 individuals who have been criminally convicted in our country and who are illegally in our country. The number of crimes and the quality of crimes is stunning: some are homicides; some are rapes; some are drug trafficking. I think you have seen a record developed over the last several years that has put the public safety at risk, so I am perplexed why someone would oppose this amendment. If somebody is convicted of molesting a child, maybe it doesn't qualify under the highest priority. The administration wants to dismiss it as a significant misdemeanor. Why would we have any tolerance for child molestation? If you are not in our country legally and you get convicted of an offense like that, you should be gone. We shouldn't even be discussing this. And the fact of the matter is, as a prosecutor, you have to make some tough decisions. You may not be able to put a young child victim on the stand. You may have problems with evidence, and you may have to do a plea to a lesser charge because of the family's concerns and because of what that could do to a victim. That perpetrator is no less dangerous to our community and to our society. So I think the people that are going to vote ``no'' on this are basically saying we don't want a zero-tolerance policy against child molesters and sexual offenders. I don't care what offense it is, if you touch a child, you are here illegally, you are gone. I urge people to vote in favor of this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to recognize my colleague from Florida because she is just not only on the House floor fighting for freedom for the Cuban people, with whom she obviously has ancestral relations, she fights for freedom for everybody. Whether it is in Venezuela or Iran, she is there; you can set your clock to it. When I first heard about these concessions, I was really scratching my head. I texted some of my colleagues, and I was like: ``We are not really getting anything for this.'' Sure enough, Raul Castro goes out, talks to the people, and says: ``We are not changing. We are not changing anything.'' They are staying exactly with the values that they have been with from the beginning, which are antagonistic to freedom, antagonistic to everything we hold dear in the United States. You know, when you look at countries like Cuba, a lot of times you don't even need to get into the nitty-gritty. There are just certain signs where you know the nature of the regime. For example, when you look at communism in Eastern Europe, you don't have to look at the daily life or any of that. You just look at the fact that there was a Berlin Wall that kept people in like caged animals. If you look at the differences between North and South Korea, all you have to do is look at that satellite photo at night, where South Korea is lit up like a Christmas tree and North Korea is a land of darkness and despair. For me, when I think of what is the nature of the Cuban regime, I think all you need to know is that you have tens of thousands of people living in Cuba. It is a nice island, it has great weather, and they are suffocated so much that they are willing to swim across 90 miles of shark-infested waters--the Florida Straits--knowing that they are probably going to die. That is all you need to know. This is a Stalinist regime. And as my colleague from Alabama mentioned, the Cuban missile crisis wasn't even just that there were nuclear weapons in Cuba pointed at the United States. Fidel Castro was telling Khrushchev to fire them into the United States. We actually were fortunate that Nikita Khrushchev was actually the cooler head in that. So if Castro had his way, there would have been nuclear weapons sent here. And so this is the nature of the regime. So what are you doing with this policy? To me, I look at it very simply. I think this fact is true. Every single dollar spent in Cuba benefits the Castro regime. Every single dollar. Europe doesn't have restrictions. Most of the other world doesn't have restrictions. Have the Cuban people benefited from that? Has their standard of living gone up? No. This all goes to benefit the government. To me, this is the worst possible time to throw the Castro regime a lifeline. If you look at what is happening in Caracas, if you look at what is happening in Moscow, these regimes are buckling because of the decline in the price of oil. So this is a moment of profound weakness for the Castro regime. And giving them these concessions is exactly what the Castro regime wants. I am scratching my head trying to figure out: What do we get in return for this? The Americans who had property seized when Castro took power, are any of them getting their property back? No. What about the Cuban Americans who had to flee? They had their businesses taken, property taken. Are any of them going to get any type of recompense? Of course, not. What about freedom of speech, political rights, the ability to participate in political life and criticize those in power? Is that being extended to the Cuban people? Not on your life. Nothing. I will say, it is interesting--and my colleague from Florida mentioned this--the dismal credit rating that Cuba has. They don't pay back any loans. Are we then going to extend Export-Import Bank loans that are backed by the taxpayer to do business in Cuba? The American taxpayer is going to have to end up paying for that. That is not a good source of business for our taxpayers. The tragedy of this is we have given away leverage that could have come in handy. These Castro brothers are on their last legs. When they finally leave the scene, we want to use the leverage we have to leverage a democratic transition. Instead, we are essentially normalizing status quo. So if the Stalinist dictatorship survives beyond the Castros due to U.S. support, you are going to have 11 million Cubans who are consigned to another generation of tyranny. I will just say one more thing. When I read the media coverage--and I think I can say this because I am not from south Florida--the coverage is so negative about Cuban Americans who fled Castro. They say: Oh, they're living in the past. This is anachronistic, all this stuff. For me, the people that I want to talk to to know the true nature of the regime are the people who suffered under the regime, the people who were forced to flee and who had family members killed, had family members in prison. That, to me, is the number one source of information that I would look to. And so the media frames it as if somehow the American policy is anachronistic. I think it is the Castro regime, based on Stalinist principles, that is anachronistic, and yet it continues to lumber on. And the tragedy of this is that we are giving them a critical lifeline so that they can continue having their country governed like a political prison. So I appreciate you organizing this, my colleague in Florida. We are giving speeches here tonight, but we need to act in this body, and we need to show that this policy does not represent the will of the American people and does not represent what is best for people in Cuba that are struggling for freedom.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Speaker, Iran is a totalitarian Islamic state, a state that has been at war with our country since the Iranian revolution in 1979. They chant ``death to America'' and consider the United States to be the Great Satan. And they have acted on their anti- American beliefs throughout the years. The revolution was founded, and Iran proceeded to hold more than 50 American Embassy personnel hostage for over 400 days, and they commandeered our embassy, which is itself an act of war. Iran sponsored the massacre of 241 U.S. Marines at the Marine Corps barracks in Beirut in 1983 through their proxy Hezbollah. Iran supported the bombing of the Khobar Towers in 1996 which killed 19 United States Air Force personnel and wounded 372 more. During combat operations in Iraq, from particularly 2006 through 2008, Iranian-backed terror groups killed hundreds of U.S. servicemembers, often via deadly EFP attacks. Iran is the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism, and they have been so for an awful long time. And yet, and this is very troubling to myself and certainly to many of my colleagues, the President of the United States recently saw fit to write a secret letter to the Ayatollah Khamenei to stress U.S.-Iran ``shared interest'' in battling the Islamic State. The idea that defeating a terrorist group requires enlisting the support of the leading state sponsor of terrorism is a complete nonstarter. It is naive, and it is also dangerous. Now, in exchange for Iran's support supposedly against fighting ISIS fighters, will the President in exchange make concessions regarding Iran's nuclear program? Will he green-light a right for Iran to enrich uranium for ``peaceful purposes''? I fear we are heading toward a potentially catastrophic outcome if we pursue this course of action. One, we know that Iran cannot be trusted to have any capabilities that could lead to nuclear weapons. They will not honor their agreements. We cannot even verify all of the facilities that they have, and consistently we have never been able to do that. So I think Iran will likely only strike a deal in which they can cheat and in which they will develop a nuclear weapon. And, of course, that would be a disaster not only for the region but for the world. The other possibility alongside that, if you are looking to Iran to help fight terrorism, which is incredible, even if you are successful at defeating ISIS by helping Iran, Iran is going to fill that vacuum. You are going to see a Shia Crescent from the Iran-Afghanistan border to the Mediterranean Sea. Iraq will be an Iranian puppet state. I know they had a lot of influence even before ISIS arrived on the scene, but this will dramatically increase their influence. And, of course, they have reliable proxies in Lebanon, Hezbollah, and they are one of the leading supporters of Hamas in the Gaza Strip. So we need to fight the Islamic State, don't get me wrong, but our policies should seek to weaken the Sunni extremism that is represented by the Islamic State and ISIS fighters, and we also want to weaken Iran and make Iran less powerful throughout the region. I think the Congress here, we can't allow the President to give away the store in a deal that he says he is not even willing to submit to the Congress for approval. Now we know that Harry Reid will not allow a vote on increased sanctions against Iran. That means one of the first orders of business of the new Congress in January, a Congress in which Reid will be demoted to minority leader, will be to consider and vote on enacting tough new sanctions against the Iranian regime. I think the flaw in this whole process has been as the sanctions started to bite, the administration relaxed the sanctions, gave the Iranian regime a lifeline, and we have been kind of playing this song and dance ever since then. I think me and many of my colleagues here believe that would have been the time to increase sanctions, make them tougher because ultimately Iran is going to respond to strength and to firmness. So this is no time to stand idly by. We in Congress cannot allow a bad deal to take root that clears the way for Iran to develop nuclear weapons. And let's just be clear: we do not share any interests with Iran's terror state. They are an enemy of our country, and they should be treated as such. I would say to my friend from Colorado that I appreciate you organizing this tonight. I know that we voted long ago to hold Iran accountable here in the House, and it hasn't gone anywhere in the Senate. It almost seems as if it has kind of fallen off the radar screen a little bit here in the Congress. It is important to get this back on the front burner. I think that under no circumstances can we just sit here and allow the President to strike a deal which gives Iran too many concessions, and then have him just go around Congress and Congress not have any say in it at all.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Well, I think that not only would it pass the Senate-- and we already know in the House it is a clear veto-proof majority here--I believe we would see a veto-proof majority. And not just the bare 67 for that, I think you would see over 70 Senators vote for that. And that is why it is important for us to make our voice heard because look, the President is the President. He has certain foreign policy prerogatives, but he is way out of step with the American people and with the Congress on this issue. And I think this has gone on long enough. I think we need to make our voice heard.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Well, part of the problem I see is they have delayed these deadlines. I think on November 20, they may delay it further. To me, that may just be a ruse for Iran to be buying time because ultimately time will be on their side. If they are getting relief from the sanctions, they can then pursue their objectives as they see them. I think it is important that we not allow this to just keep going on. If there is no deal to be had, then let's act and let's hold Iran accountable immediately.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Yes, absolutely. I think a lot of people know there were a lot of tough years in Iraq, particularly after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. You had a massive insurgency. That initial insurgency in 2004 in places like Fallujah that reared again in 2005, 2006, and 2007 and was finally defeated by the surge was primarily a Sunni insurgency, and so that is what a lot of Americans think about when they think about what is going on in Iraq. And no doubt, that was huge fighting. We lost very good men and women in that. Eventually we were able to defeat AQI, I might add, in 2007-2008. In the Baghdad area and some of the parts of southern Iraq where it is overwhelmingly Shia, the groups that would rise up against the United States would be the Shiite militia groups, which are backed and funded by the Iranian regime. In fact, Iran's Quds force of the Revolutionary Guard Corps, that is a designated terrorist organization. Quds force was involved in Iraq. They were known for doing--and we know about the IED attacks, roadside bombs, those were very serious. They did EFP attacks, which are explosively formed penetrators, and kind of the scuttle you would hear in Iraq was that no one wants to get hit by an IED, obviously, but a lot of people could survive that. If you got hit by an EFP, it would blow everything to smithereens. So these were deadly attacks, and you are talking about hundreds and hundreds of U.S. servicemembers, and it was Iran who was funding that, orchestrating that. And even now today in Iraq, you have Quds forces in Baghdad. Some of these Shiite militias that are fighting ISIS are backed by Iran. I remember Prime Minister Netanyahu made this point several months ago, and he knows the region obviously as well as anybody because he has got to. When you see these Iranian-backed terror groups, and then you see Sunni terror groups like those represented by ISIS, you don't want to pick a side there; you want both of them to eventually fail. So that strategy in order to make that succeed is going to be different than the President writing a letter to the Ayatollah asking to ally against ISIS. We have no interest with Iran. The idea that we are going to align with them, align with them for what? You fight one terrorist group to reward a state sponsor of terror? That just doesn't make sense, and I think it is dangerous when coupled with what is going on with the nuclear negotiations. There is really potential to have some serious policy miscalculations here that will be detrimental to our national security and to our allies' national security.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Speaker, we will be debating an amendment which would not guard our Nation from terrorist infiltration nor even authorize our Armed Forces to eliminate ISIS personnel, equipment, and bases. Instead, the amendment authorizes President Obama to train and equip, with U.S. weaponry, members of the Syrian mujahideen, the so- called moderate rebels. The amendment states that training and equipment can only be provided to ``vetted'' rebels, but who are those rebels? It says they can't be affiliated with ISIS, al-Nusra, and al Qaeda, which is good, but it would allow President Obama to arm other Islamist fighters who do not meet the threshold of being terrorists, including Harakat al Hazm fighters from the Muslim Brotherhood, the Syria Revolutionaries Front, and the Army of the Mujahideen. Now, Mujahideen fighters in Syria are not moderates nor are they pro- American. They will take our arms and use them as they see fit, most likely to fight Assad in pursuit of installing a Sunni shari'a state in Syria. They cannot be counted on to vindicate our interests, which is why it is a mistake to subcontract out American national security to Islamist fighters. Half measures like this, will not suffice. There are no shortcuts when it comes to our national defense. So I constantly hear people say that Americans are war weary, and I disagree with that. I think Americans are willing to do what it takes to defend our people and our Nation. I think they are weary of missions launched without a coherent strategy and are sick of seeing engagements that produce inconclusive results rather than clear-cut victory. I think they are weary of a President that consistently proves himself unwilling to do what is necessary to win. I have heard some colleagues say that arming the Syrian Mujahideen demonstrates strength and resolve. I think it is evidence of a lack of resolve. The President's strategy rests on wishful thinking. It is not sufficient to defeat the Islamic State.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Speaker, it seems to me you have two issues here: one, Congress, which we have an enumerated power to make rules for detainees captured on land and water; then you also have, as the GAO report pointed out, a funding prohibition that withheld funds contingent on the President providing that notification. As Madison said in the Federalist Papers, the power of the purse is the most effectual weapon that we have in terms of vindicating the interests of our constituents. So whatever the President's article II power is, clearly, if we remove the funding, then he is not able to do that through the executive branch. So the question is: Knowing that, why go ahead and do it? Why not comply with both the statute and the funding restriction? I think the reason is because they knew this would not be popular with the American people. One of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle said, ``Well, this statute really shouldn't apply in this situation because hard-liners in the enemy camp can nix the deal.'' I have got news for you, Mr. Speaker, the hard-liners were the subject of the deal. I served in Guantanamo for a time. The Bush administration released detainees who they thought may not have been a danger anymore. Nobody would have even suggested that this Taliban Five did not represent a danger to our national security. So here we have an instance where Congress clearly exercised its authority in order to check the President on an issue with, in terms of the terrorist detainees, that his views are, quite frankly, not representative of the American people as a whole. We did that legitimately, and this President decided to flagrantly violate the lawful actions that we took. I urge support for this resolution.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Speaker, I rise in defense of Israel and their defensive war against Hamas. Hamas is a terrorist organization. It is an arm of the Muslim Brotherhood. Its reason for existence is to destroy Israel. And Hamas desires a second Holocaust, although they won't acknowledge that the first happened. Hamas uses human shields to protect their weapons of terror. They are not protesting occupation. Israel pulled completely out of the Gaza Strip, including uprooting more than 10,000 of their own citizens from their homes nearly 10 years ago. Hamas has used the last decade to build a complex terrorist infrastructure, including tunnels designed solely to kill as many Israelis as possible. The U.S. should not be pressuring Israel to give Hamas breathing room. The complete defeat of Hamas and the dismantling of their terrorist infrastructure will be good for Israel's security and will be a decisive blow against international terrorism and the global jihad, which is good for our national security. We need to stand with Israel at this critical juncture.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Madam Speaker, the Internal Revenue Service has a major credibility problem. Last month, Internal Revenue Service Commissioner John Koskinen told Congress under oath that the agency had confirmed that backup tapes storing Lois Lerner's emails were destroyed. Now we learn from IRS officials that such tapes may, in fact, exist. Last week, the IRS filed a declaration in Federal Court stating that Lois Lerner's hard drive was destroyed and the data contained on the hard drive was unrecoverable, yet testimony provided to the House Ways and Means Committee by IRS IT professionals suggests that the hard drive was merely scratched and the data was, in fact, recoverable. Of course, the IRS has identified roughly 80 individuals of interest in the investigation, and yet now they tell us that as many as 19 of them may have suffered Lois Lerner-style hard drive crashes. Madam Speaker, the troubling part about this is the American citizen would never be able to get away with these types of explanations. It is intolerable to have one set of rules for the IRS and one set of rules for the rest of us.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Chairman, it was really troubling to be reviewing emails that the IRS finally produced to us after we asked for these emails for over a year. Of course, they gave them to us on the afternoon of July 3, so as to minimize the press damage. Basically, the emails showed Lois Lerner sending an email to a technician saying, you know, Congress will ask for our emails, and I have told people in the IRS they need to be careful about what they say; question, if we do an instant message in the system that is called OCS, will those be immune to congressional oversight? The technician basically said, well, that is the default setting, you can make it so that it would be archivable and searchable. That was very troubling because it was almost like Lerner, as a matter of course, is conducting herself in a way to obstruct the proper oversight, and that is very troubling with an agency that is this powerful. So I think what this amendment will do will be to simply prevent that. This is saying exactly what Lois Lerner was asking about, the settings. If you are going to use funds, the settings have got to be turned on, and if you don't, then you can't use funds to operate it. So I think it is a commonsense amendment, and I urge my colleagues to adopt it. Mr. Chairman, given that the point of order has been lodged, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw amendment No. 52.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Chair, as an alternative to the prior amendment, I offer amendment No. 54.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Chairman, I think this amendment accomplishes the similar objective that I articulated just a moment ago, and I would just add that it is very troubling, if you were called into court to defend yourself against the IRS and they asked you to produce certain documents in discovery and your defense was, well, the documents have been destroyed, you would be presumed essentially guilty. They would have an adverse inference lodged against you. I think that is what this amendment is getting to. The IRS has to practice what they preach. They should be held to the exact same standards as the American people are held to with their taxes, and they should follow the record retention requirements under Federal law. So I think it is a commonsense amendment, and I urge that my colleagues adopt the amendment. Mr. Chairman, I yield my remaining time to my colleague from Florida (Mr. Crenshaw).

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. DeSANTIS. I have an amendment at the desk, Mr. Chair.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Chair, last year, the House Oversight Committee conducted a hearing to review an IG report documenting a lavish conference that was put on by the IRS--over $4 million for one conference. Expenses included $135,000 on outside speakers, including $17,000 for a speaker who created paintings on stage to make his point that one must free ``the thought process to find creative solutions to challenges.'' The troubling thing about the report was that the bulk of that money, $3.2 million, came from unused funds that were allocated for hiring. Now, this is at the exact same time that the IRS began to single out conservative groups that sought tax-exempt status, in part, they said, because the agency simply did not have the manpower to handle the number of applications pouring in. Now, we have debunked that idea that somehow there was a torrent of applications, but golly gee, if that is really true, why are you spending $3.2 million on these conferences? So I think the IRS has abused the trust of the American taxpayer with respect to conferences, and I think it should be held accountable. Now, some say in response to this amendment that taxpayers need to be forced to fund these conferences because it helps with IRS employee morale. I have just got to tell you, I am more concerned with the morale of the American people. When taxpayers see an arrogant agency flout the law, refuse to produce evidence, and waste tax dollars, they become demoralized, and rightfully so. So at a time when military officers are receiving pink slips, there is no way we should allow the IRS to persist with these conferences. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. DeSANTIS

Mr. DeSANTIS. Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the terrorist group Hamas launched three long-range rockets targeting an Israeli nuclear reactor. Hamas, an arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, has received support from the totalitarian government in Iran. Hamas is firmly dedicated to the destruction of Israel. Rather than back our ally, the Obama administration has exhibited a false moral equivalency that has bordered on outright hostility to Israel. Current law requires U.S. aid to the Palestinian Authority be suspended if the PA is Hamas-influenced. Yet the Obama administration has continued to fund the Hamas-Fatah unity government with U.S. taxpayer dollars. Just this week, as the administration is underwriting the Hamas-Fatah government, the White House sends a special assistant to Israel to condemn the Jewish state for failing to broker a peace agreement with the Palestinian Authority that includes the Islamist terrorists in Hamas. This criticism was launched in the midst of receiving rocket fire. Rather than criticize Israel during this trying time, the United States should be standing firmly in favor of Israel's right to defend itself against an enemy that seeks the destruction of the Jewish state.