Eliot Engel

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, this final measure we will consider would stop the transfer of fuses for precision-guided munitions--critical components that allow these weapons to be armed and detonated. Like the bombs, these components have already been manufactured, and we need to act quickly to stop their shipment. As we wrap up this debate, Mr. Speaker, I want to make an appeal to my friends on the other side of the aisle: You can be for or against these weapons sales and still understand that these resolutions are the right thing to do, if for nothing else than the integrity of this body. I spoke earlier about the rule of law. This phony emergency declaration is a message to the Congress and to the American people that when the law gets in the way, this administration is just going to find a way around it. They will twist the law into pretzels or just throw it out the window entirely if it allows them to sidestep Congress. We cannot stand for that. This administration should have played by the rules, and we could have done that and probably still gotten these sales through. They could have sent up a notification and allowed Congress to have a debate. But instead, they want to shut us out of this process. With these resolutions, we are taking some of that power back. We are saying that we won't allow the laws written in this body to be ignored. If nothing else, this is an opportunity to stand up and say: We took an oath to uphold the Constitution, and that means Congress remains a coequal branch of government. Let me say that again: that means Congress is a coequal branch of government. We will not be a rubberstamp for any administration, not only this administration, but any administration. Congress has its duties. We will not be a rubberstamp. I have felt for a long time that administrations of both parties, quite frankly, have ignored Congress when it comes to foreign policy and national security. We shouldn't stand for it any longer. No more do we give a blank check to any President of any party who wants to cut Congress out of the decisionmaking and subvert the Constitution. So, Mr. Speaker, we shouldn't agree to it, we shouldn't stand for it, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time for the purpose of closing.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time to close debate on this measure. I am glad we had a spirited debate on the issues. As always, I am grateful to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. McCaul), my friend, the ranking member, for his collegiality. We are generally bipartisan on the Foreign Affairs Committee, and when we do disagree, we do so on the issues and not on the politics and the personalities. I have enormous respect for Mr. Mast, which he knows about, but I would say that this, today, is not a referendum on Iran. I agree with everything that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have said about Iran: its bad intention, its bad behavior. I agree. But, again, I say, as I said before, it doesn't mean we give another country, being an ally or not, a blank check to do whatever it pleases. And in this particular case, the conduct of the war in Yemen is something that we cannot just turn our heads away and say: ``Oh, well, this is the war and the Iranians are bad, so, therefore, we are going to look the other way.'' I think if we are talking about American weapons, we can demand better. So I think that these measures are a chance for the Congress to take back some of the power granted by the Constitution, to say that we won't stand by when any administration--this administration, administrations to come in both parties--we won't stand by when any administration ignores Congress, plays fast and loose with the law, and fails to demand accountability for human rights abuses around the world. I encourage all my colleagues to support this measure and the two others that we have just considered. I thank Mr. Mast and my friends on other side of the aisle for a spirited debate, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include in the Record extraneous materials on the measure under consideration.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, the second resolution we are debating is very similar to the first. But in this case, it would nullify the administration's phony emergency being used to transfer 60,000 precision-guided bombs to the United Arab Emirates. That is on top of the 40,000 we estimate the Emiratis already have on hand. I won't rehash the same argument, but I would like to make a point why, when we see what is going on in Yemen, it is so important for the United States to take a stand. Mr. Speaker, one of the things the Foreign Affairs Committee has focused on this year is trying to put American values back at the center of our foreign policy: Democracy, human rights, the rule of law. Frankly, this administration has acted like it cannot be burdened with these fundamental things that make America America. It just boggles the mind that any great country can throw weight around, but we are not China. We are not Russia. Our foreign policy should show the world the character of our country, our compassion, our belief that people everywhere should be able to live prosperously, productively, and have healthy lives. These ideas go hand in hand with promoting our security. We want more stable, secure countries and communities. Democratic countries are stronger partners for the United States on the world's stage. And if we are serious about those values, it means speaking out when we see them trampled, whether they are trampled by an adversary or by a friend. When we turn our back on these ideals; when we strip the word ``democracy'' out of the State Department's mission statement; when we look the other way when friendly regimes carry out horrific human rights abuses; when we slash investments in the diplomacy and development efforts that help us build bridges of friendship and understanding; when we walk away from all of that, what signal does it send to the world? What does it say about the sort of behavior that we are willing to tolerate? I have supported our partners and our partnerships in the Gulf region. I think they are an important counterbalance to the threat Iran poses, and I recognize that our partners face real threats from Iranian-backed Houthis who are themselves guilty of serious human rights abuses. But that doesn't mean we should just look the other way in the face of violence and slaughter of civilians perpetrated by our partners. It doesn't mean we look the other way and let the President ride roughshod over Congress so there is no separation of powers and whatever the President wants, he gets, and Congress just rubberstamps it. It can't be that way. So even if this administration will not stand up for values, the Congress should, and the Congress will. These measures, along with much of the Foreign Affairs Committee's work this year, sends a strong message that our values must guide our foreign policy. So, again, it is important for us to help Saudi Arabia. It is important to realize Iran is making trouble. It is important to note the Houthis are not good people. But it doesn't mean that we give Saudi Arabia or any other country a blank check to do whatever they want, dropping bombs indiscriminately on school children, on buses. We can't just sit idly by and let that happen and continue to send weapons that are perpetrating these crimes. So, this is a strong message, I think, that our values must guide our foreign policy, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Again, Mr. Speaker, let me say that I certainly respect my colleagues on the other side of the aisle for the points they have raised. We have similar concerns, but I think the way we handle it or the way we have proposed to handle it is a little bit different. That is why I am saying if we don't pass this measure, then these bombs will be on their way to the Emirates very soon. If we do pass this resolution, then it will go to the President's desk and it will put him on the spot to answer whether he agrees that our values need to be central to America's work around the world. Again, I am very concerned and aware of the malign role that the Iranians play in the region. I am very concerned about the Houthis who also play a bad role in the region. But that doesn't mean that we should just give blank checks or give them arms. I think it would just be a mistake to let them think that they don't have to have any conduct in trying to conduct this war into diminishing civilian casualties. The other point I want to raise, again, is the fact that, Mr. Speaker, do you remember when you were a kid in school and you learned how a bill became a law? Well, there is something called separation of powers, checks and balances. It is not right for the President to declare an emergency when there really is no emergency in order to get around Congress' disapproval of something. So I feel it is important to fight for the institution as well. So, again, if we do pass this resolution, it will go to the President's desk, and it will let him answer whether he agrees that our values need to be central to our work around the world. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, may I ask how much time I have remaining?

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Cicilline).

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include in the Record extraneous material on the measure under consideration.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, the three measures the House will now consider are extraordinary, extraordinary but necessary, because they respond to what I view as an extraordinary abuse of power by the Trump administration, using a phony emergency to override the authority of Congress and push through $8 billion in arms sales. Each of these resolutions would prohibit a specific license for the export of precision-guided munitions, or smart bombs, and related components. We are focusing on these three licenses because the weapons would be the first ones shipped. Mr. Speaker, it is no secret that Congress has serious concerns about the Saudi-led coalition's war in Yemen. The Saudis and their partners and, for that matter, the United States do have legitimate security concerns about the efforts of Iran and its proxies to destabilize the Gulf region. But as this war has dragged on, it has become clear that the coalition has carried out its campaign with little regard for innocent life: schoolbuses full of children destroyed in a fiery flash, weddings and funerals incinerated with no warning, civilian buildings and communities targeted. Reckless doesn't begin to describe it. It is gruesome. It has contributed to the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. To make matters worse, many of the weapons used in this carnage were built in America, sold by American companies to the Saudis and their partners. Starting in the last Congress, when the administration told us they were planning to go ahead with another massive sale of offensive weapons to the Saudis and Emiratis, Senator Menendez and I used the tools at our disposal to place informal holds on these transfers. We hoped that the administration would work with us and dial up pressure on these nations to start acting responsibly. Now, the administration has complained that we stopped these sales from going through for months and months. But, as I said, this was an informal mechanism. The law--and I emphasize it is the law--says that, at any point, if an administration wants to go ahead with a weapons sale, it has to send a formal notification to Congress. That starts a 30-day clock. During that time, Congress can vote to stop a weapons sale. Did the administration stop us to try to find a way forward? No. Did they send a formal notification, starting the process laid out in the law under which Congress can legislatively block the sale? No. What did they do? They dug up an obscure provision of the arms export law and declared an emergency to justify moving ahead with these sales. What does that mean? It means, they went around Congress. It means, they went around the law. Now, the emergency provision exists in law for a good reason. And if there were a real emergency--if the United States or our citizens or our allies were in immediate danger--we wouldn't be standing here today. There would be no objection. But here is the thing, Mr. Speaker. There is no emergency. Do you know how I know? I know because nearly 2 months down the line, not a single weapon has been shipped. Most of the weapons haven't even been built. In fact, one of the phony emergency declarations lets the Saudis build new facilities to manufacture weapons in their country, which I only presume would mean the Americans currently building these weapons in the United States would be out of a job. That is right. Donald Trump declared an emergency to move jobs out of the United States--good manufacturing jobs, the kind Americans fight for. He abused the law to send them abroad. What kind of emergency requires weapons that will be built months and months down the road? Or requires building a new factory on foreign soil? Especially when the law only gives Congress a 30-day review period. The answer is clear, Mr. Speaker: a phony emergency. An emergency designed to make yet another end run around Congress, to undermine the separation of powers, to trample on this body's constitutional duties. I am sick and tired of it, Mr. Speaker. The State Department sent an assistant secretary up to the Hill to testify about this fiasco. He told us in the Foreign Affairs Committee that the administration took this brazen action out of respect for Congress' oversight role. Mr. Speaker, that is really, really hard to believe. The other body passed 22 bipartisan resolutions stopping all these sales from going forward. The three measures we are considering today deal with weapons that are already manufactured, sitting in a warehouse, and, if we don't act, will be loaded onto a ship and sent to Saudi Arabia and the UAE within the next 2 months. This resolution would prohibit the use of an emergency declaration to move ahead with the transfer of 64,000 Paveway precision-guided munitions, or, as we call them, smart bombs. Sixty-four thousand, Mr. Speaker, which would be added to the stockpile of 58,000 the Saudis previously purchased starting in 2015. What will all these weapons be used for? No one knows. If the administration wants to sell these weapons, they should follow the law, not misuse it, and they should come to Congress for its approval. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Virginia (Ms. Spanberger).

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to section 3 of House Resolution 491, I call up the joint resolution (S.J. Res. 36) providing for congressional disapproval of the proposed transfer to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the Kingdom of Spain, and the Italian Republic of certain defense articles and services, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Madam Chair, I rise to support the amendment offered by Mr. Khanna, which I was proud to cosponsor. If the President wants to go to war, he needs to come to Congress first. The Constitution gives Congress--not the President--the power to declare war. This is about checks and balances. It does not prevent the President from defending America, it simply enforces current law exactly as it is written in the war powers resolution. There's no special category for Iran that allows the President to skip the critical step of coming to Congress. Iran is dangerous. I am not blind to the threat it poses to our allies and our interests, but addressing those threats need not lead us into another war. We need to de-escalate heightened tensions in the region, so we don't stumble into a conflict with Iran. Now is the time for Congress to step up and assert our constitutional authority. I urge all of my colleagues to support this amendment.

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Madam Chair, I rise to support the amendment offered by Ms. Lee, which I was proud to cosponsor. I thank the gentlewoman for her leadership. There is no member of this body more principled and more passionate on this issue than the gentlewoman from California--no one who has spoken more forcefully on Congress's responsibility when it comes to war powers. Authorizing the Iraq War was a mistake--the worst vote I ever took as a member of the House of Representatives. We can't correct the error. But we must take back the authority granted to the Bush Administration in 2002 to go to war against Saddam Hussein's regime. This authorization simply isn't needed for any current military operations. It's just bad policy to keep it on the books. We've seen administration after administration misuse the other existing war authorization--the post-9/11 authorization. It's been stretched beyond anything Congress ever intended. We don't want to see this administration or any administration try to use the Iraq War authorization in the same manner--for some purpose Congress never intended. So, let's repeal it. Let's relegate it to the history books. That's what this amendment would do, and I'm glad to support it.

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I am glad we will be moving ahead with this legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 2744) to authorize the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development to prescribe the manner in which programs of the agency are identified overseas, and for other purposes.

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 441) a resolution condemning the attack on the AMIA Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in July 1994 and expressing the concern of the United States regarding the continuing, 25-year-long delay in the resolution of this case and encouraging accountability for the attack.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H. Res. 441.

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Providing opportunities for the most vulnerable individuals from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras is common sense, and working to address the root causes of child and family migration is a long-term solution that we should all be able to agree on. It is the right thing to do, but it is also in our own interest. And while U.S. foreign assistance is crucial, it is not a gift. It must come with strong conditions. Our legislation puts in place such conditions for our assistance to the Northern Triangle and includes tough, smart, targeted sanctions to combat corruption. By passing this bill today, Congress can send, and will send, a loud and clear message that we stand with the people of the Northern Triangle countries to make their countries safer and more prosperous so they aren't forced to make the dangerous trek here. We can also send a message to China and Russia that the U.S. will not abandon our friends and partners in Central America. Let me conclude by thanking Mr. McCaul for his partnership on this measure. We truly worked on this together. We were together in Central America when we got the word of the potential cutoff of funding, and we worked closely together in a bipartisan way to make sure that that wouldn't be the case. So I urge my colleagues to support this legislation. I thank Mr. McCaul again, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, let me thank Mr. McCaul, and it is a pleasure to work with him on matters like this. I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Correa).

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H. Res. 129.

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I thank Representatives Frankel and Wagner for their leadership in bringing this measure forward. The treatment of women's rights activists in Saudi Arabia, their unjust imprisonment, is a serious problem. Since May 2018, the Government of Saudi Arabia has arrested prominent women's rights activists and imposed travel bans on numerous others. Many of them are longtime supporters of ending the ban on a woman driving and abolishing the male guardianship system. At least 10 women's rights activists have been subjected to psychological and physical abuse, including sexual violence, beatings, electric shocks, and sleep deprivation. The State Department reported, in 2018: ``Women continued to face significant discrimination under law and custom, and many remain uninformed about their rights,'' and ``women also face discrimination in courts where, in the most cases, the testimony of one man equals that of two women.'' Earlier this year, Saudi Arabia temporarily released four women activists. This is a step in the right direction, but not nearly enough. Mr. Speaker, American foreign policy is at its best when we put our values at the center of everything we do, and when a partner country like Saudi Arabia tramples on human rights, it is incumbent on us to speak out just as we would do with respect to a nation hostile to the United States. With this resolution, we are sending a clear message. It condemns the Government of Saudi Arabia's continued detention of these activists. It also urges an end to the male guardianship system and calls on the United States Government to designate the perpetrators of serious human rights violations under the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act. We must continue to call on the Saudi Government to release these women immediately. Mr. Speaker, I strongly support this resolution, and I urge my colleagues to do the same. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ENGEL

Mr. ENGEL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, let me first thank Representatives Kildee, Bilirakis, and McGovern, our Speaker pro tempore, for their hard work on this measure. I was glad to join as an original cosponsor, as well. Sudan is at a critical moment, Mr. Speaker. Three months ago, when the Transitional Military Council, the TMC, seized power, one of my top concerns was when the reins will be turned over to civilian authorities. Despite the possibility of a breakthrough between the TMC and the Forces of Freedom and Change, the FFC, I remain concerned that Sudanese security forces intend to tighten their grip on power once again and even more. The sad fact is, for the overwhelming majority of its history since independence, Sudan has been ruled by military dictatorships. This group, the TMC, has shown the world who they really are, and it is not a pretty picture. On June 3, they turned on the peaceful prodemocracy movement, committing a brutal massacre at the movement's sit-in site. Following that atrocity, the TMC shut the internet down in a blatant attempt to slow the momentum of antigovernment protestors and kill the prodemocracy movement in its infancy. Now that internet access has slowly been restored, the world is getting its first glimpses of deeply disturbing images: Sudan's citizens being murdered, tortured, or raped in Khartoum and across the country last month. These troubling developments start to make sense when we look at the cast of characters involved. The deputy of the TMC, General Mohamed Hamdan ``Hemeti,'' leads the Rapid Support Forces. We know them as the Janjaweed, and we know that they have on their hands the blood of the Darfur genocide. Now, they are turning their violent tactics against the broader Sudanese population. These are the same thugs responsible for the repression and economic mismanagement that characterized Omar al-Bashir's three blood-soaked decades in power. He is gone, but they continue to drive the country into the ground. Thankfully, the Sudanese people are resilient. They continue to fight for their country's future, even in the face of violence and repression. Their civil society and diaspora networks have helped to shine a light on what the people in Sudan are enduring. They have had enough, and the United States and partners around the world need to have their backs. This resolution underscores Congress' desire to see a civilian-led transition in Sudan, a transition free from violence and bloodshed. It is a good resolution. I am glad the House is considering it. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.